In recent weeks, major protests have erupted in Iran, initially over economic issues including high inflation and the devaluation of Iran’s currency, the Rial. As demonstrations have spread across the country, an estimated 29 protesters have been killed and 1,200 have been arrested in clashes with police. But several Iranian officials, including President Masoud Pezeshkian and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, have publicly acknowledged that protesters have legitimate grievances and demands related to the nation’s economic crisis.
But just one day before the U.S. launched a military attack on Venezuela to kidnap that nation’s president Nicolas Maduro, Donald Trump took note of the protests in Iran and posted a note in his social media account, warning that “if Iran kills peaceful protesters, the U.S. will come to their rescue.”
Just days earlier, Trump welcomed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the White House where the two leaders reportedly discussed the possibility of launching new attacks on Iran, in order to prevent Tehran from rebuilding its capabilities after the joint U.S. Israeli air attacks in June. Between The Lines’ Scott Harris spoke with Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, who discusses the danger of a wider regional war if Netanyahu convinces Trump to join Israel in launching a new war against Iran.
TRITA PARSI: Well, that tweet as well as tweets that he issued today, comes after him spending two-and-a-half days with Netanyahu who came—the Israeli prime minister—who came to the U.S. on Dec. 29 for meetings with Trump. And the top of the agenda was the Israeli demand for yet another war with Iran. And Trump’s comment after some of those meetings was that he essentially appeared to publicly give a green light for the Israelis to attack again and that the basis of the attack no longer needed to be the nuclear program, but rather also Iran’s missile capabilities. The Israelis did not manage to achieve their objectives in the summer war that they launched in June of this past year and this is part of the reason why they want to go to war again. But they simply cannot do anything effectively without U.S. support. They absolutely need U.S. support in order to protect Israel against Iran’s retaliatory missiles. And even with U.S. support, a very large number of those missiles went through the Israeli air defense systems.
But it’s precisely because the Iranians do have the capacity of retaliating against Israel that the Israelis want to go to war again and eliminate not only that capability, but any capability the Iranians may have that enables the Iranians to challenge Israel’s growing domination in the region. And I think that’s really the core issue that this is about. Now, in that context, we see suddenly how Trump starts to speak the language of regime change, even though early on, of course, he had been very explicit that he’s against regime change wars, that he’s against all of these different—what he called neoconservative or neocon— policies that the U.S. pursued under the Bush administration, for instance.
But just today, he explicitly said that regime change is not a popular word, but why shouldn’t there be regime change in Iran? So it much indicates that the U.S. is actually getting ready to support Israel or actively participate in another strike on Iran with the aim of regime collapse at a minimum, as well as taking out much of Iran’s military capability. The Iranians clearly know they’re going to lose a war against the United States, so they’re going to do everything they can to avoid it.
But there comes a point in which they feel that they have their backs completely against the wall. And at that point, they will have no other choice but to fight back. And I think if Trump is signaling that his aim is regime change, at that point, there really isn’t any de-escalatory ladder. There is no exit ramp for the Iranians to be able to do just the performative retaliation. Wnd that may force them into a position in which they actually would use a lot of their capabilities, not just against Israel, but against the U.S. as well.
So we may very well end up getting bogged down in yet another needless war of choice in the Middle East.
For more information, visit Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.
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