It is time to hold Iran to account
How the US and its Middle Eastern allies can contain the Iranian threat.
The Islamic Republic of Iran is an octopus of evil that has sowed chaos across the Middle East. It is time for the US and its allies to tie up some of its tentacles and put it back in its tank.
The clerical regime wants to become the dominant Middle Eastern power, assert its Shia version of Islam over Sunni Arab states, destroy Israel, and push the US out of the region. Using its proxy militia, Iran has wrecked Syria and Yemen, turned Iraq into a client state, engulfed Israel in war, and disrupted global shipping in the Red Sea. It is also winning a game of chicken with the international community over its nuclear arms ambitions.
The US must take a tougher line. Israel, which does not suffer the Western affliction of dithering, is taking the fight closer to Tehran. It has killed a senior Iranian Revolutionary Guard general in a strike on the Iranian embassy compound in Damascus. Iran has promised to retaliate and has the region on tenterhooks. Neither side wants an all-out war. US President Joe Biden has said that US support for Israel is “ironclad”. The world is watching to see if that is true, given recent tensions between Washington and Jerusalem.
Iran’s leaders are fanatics, but they can reason in their own interests. The 84-year-old supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s primary interest is ensuring a smooth succession. Iranians despise their government. It remains in power only due to a ruthless crackdown on dissent in 2022, during which the regime’s full psychopathy was on display. Instability and war could threaten the transition, so now is the timeto apply pressure.
REESTABLISHING DETERRENCE
The US must re-establish its deterrence credentials, which have never recovered fully from President Barack Obama doing nothing in 2012 when Syria’s odious president Bashar al-Assad crossed Obama’s “red line” and used chemical weapons on his own people.
It must make clear to Iran that it will help Israel defend itself and, if necessary, help it fight back. It should further state that it will treat attacks on its ships in the Red Sea by Yemen’s Houthis as an attack from Iran itself.
The US response to Houthi attacks on its bases and its ships has been feeble. It fired some missiles, assembled an international fleet to defend shipping lanes, and is shooting down drones, but it has not stopped the Houthis from launching them. The US is considering taking the Houthis off its terrorist list if they stop attacking ships. It is absurd that a superpower with a $842 billion annual military budget is bargaining with a zealot militia that controls barely half of Yemen.
TOUGHER SANCTIONS
Biden has allowed billions of dollars in oil revenues to flow to Iran, rewarding it for minor concessions, and setting a pattern of appeasement. Emboldened and flush, Iran has strengthened its proxies and continued enriching uranium to levels beyond any civilian use.
Tougher sanction must be imposed, although alone they will not deter the Islamic Republic. President Donald Trump’s sanctions deprived Iran of cash, but Iran responded by selling more oil to China and accelerating its nuclear program. A rationale for Trump pulling out of the West’s nuclear deal with Iran (the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action) in 2018 was that it prevented the US from sanctioning and acting against Iran’s proxies. They have not been deterred, either.
A REGIONAL ALLIANCE
The US and its allies should build an alliance comprising the six Gulf Arab states (Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates), Israel, Egypt, and Jordan (which have peace treaties with Israel). This would demonstrate US commitment, stunt Iran’s objective of pushing the US out of the region, and stifle Russian and Chinese influence.
Biden sending two aircraft carriers to the Persian Gulf after October 7 stopped any plans Hezbollah might have had to join Hamas’ attack on Israel. This shows the US still has the power to maintain regional stability. It must show it has the political will, too.
BACKING IRAN’S MINORITIES
The US should also undermine Iran from within by backing its oppressed ethnic minorities, which include Azeris, Kurds, Balochs, Lur, and Arabs. They make up about 40 percent of the population. All want more autonomy. Azerbaijani Turks alone, or with the Kurds, could threaten stability and the mullahs’ precarious grip on power.
PUSHING BACK HEZBOLLAH
Israel has destroyed Hamas’ military capabilities in Gaza, cutting off one Iranian tentacle. Israel will be fighting Hamas for years, but it is not the threat it was. Israel has said that the much-stronger Hezbollah in Lebanon must be dealt with next. The October 7 attacks have taught Israel that it cannot live with Jihadists on its borders. The Lebanese border is especially important because a nuclear-armed Iran could move a nuclear weapon into Israel through Lebanon.
Hezbollah has refrained from a full-scale attack, but its rocket fire has succeeded in evacuating Israel’s north, creating 80,000 refugees. Israel has hit back hard, and deeply, and so far gotten the better of these exchanges. Hezbollah’s troops are battle-hardened from the Syrian civil war, but that is nothing like the high-tech missile-and-drone warfare that Israel employs. Hezbollah cannot beat Israel, but with anywhere from 40,000 to 150,00 missiles, it could inflict great damage. Such a war would devastate Lebanon.
As Hezbollah threatening Israel is Iran’s chief deterrent against a direct attack, it will not want Hezbollah diminished in a war with Israel. This gives the US leverage to demand Hezbollah retreat to a distance that does not threaten the Jewish state. The US should iterate that, if necessary, it will support Israel pushing Hezbollah back militarily. This would re-enforce what Iran is already realizing, that its proxies are becoming more trouble than they are worth.
ISRAEL-PALESTINIAN PEACE
As long as the Israel-Palestinian conflict festers, Iran can claim what it sees as legitimate grievances against Israel. A political settlement- or even a path towards one - would delegitimize Iran’s hostility towards Israel and reveal Iran for the Jihadist aggressor it is.
Despite the international community pushing hard, that looks improbable. Israel rightly thinks that a Palestinian state would make Israel less secure and weaker, and be a terror state. However, defanging Iran is also in Israel’s long-term strategic interests, so doing so might be the best way to sell a political solution to Israel. The US must push for direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians, and work with Muslim states on deradicalizing the Palestinian territories.
NUCLEAR TALKS
Iran knows it is vulnerable. That is why it wants nuclear weapons. It would create mutually assured destruction with Israel and deter any US or other attacks. Iran has noted that Russia’s nuclear capabilities have deterred the West from coming to Ukraine’s defense more directly. It will also have noted that North Korea’s nuclear capability is why the rogue state never suffered Iraq’s fate. Saudi Arabia has said if Iran acquires nuclear weapons, it will too. That would make the region even more combustible.
The US and its allies must use all the pressure levers to bring Iran back to negotiations. It should be clear that it will not sit idly and allow Iran to develop nuclear weapons. Regardless of how Iran responds to Israel’s assassination of its top general, it is time for the US and its allies to get serious.
In the Moral Clarity pipeline…
The US foreign policy crisis: The US no longer runs a consistent foreign policy. Its treatment of Ukraine and Israel have revealed a huge credibility problem. The world is taking note.
Appeasement, home and abroad: The West must stop appeasing extremist forces at home and overseas. The consequences are mounting.
The betrayal of the Palestinians: The world’s decades of feeding Palestinians the lie that Israel can be removed from the map is a deadly betrayal that has lead them nowhere.
Is the diaspora losing its liberal home? Israel is not the only Jewish homeland under attack, liberal democracy is the other.
With the Obama crime syndicate in charge enriching themselves from kickbacks helping the mad mullahs, sadly the US position won’t change soon. Valerie Jarrett supports the Islamic jihdadists from her home country. Barack just hates Jews almost as much as he hates Americans.