It is possible to have an outer div with pointer-events: none; and another div inside it with pointer-events: auto;. The outer div will be transparent to click events (ie it won't react to click events but underlying html controls will) and the inner one will.
However, I now have a scenario where I need to do the same thing with an iframe, but it is not working. I set pointer-events: none; on the iframe, but then the inner divs that should be clickable are not even if they have pointer-events: auto; set.
There is another similar question here, but is has been closed for being off-topic. I don't understand why. It is a very valid html/css question.