In risking a war with Israel and its backers, the clerical regime in Tehran is at risk of causing its own demise.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy must be feeling a tad let down. He walked away from a Russian peace offer in April 2022. Had he agreed to that, Ukraine would have been a different country now from the shattered state it has become after enduring Russian assaults since then that have only further reduced the areas under Kiev’s control. Russophobes such as Victoria Nuland must be as devastated as the President of Ukraine, as neither Putin nor the country he runs have been demolished. Among those policymakers in the US who remain fixated in the 1970s when the US was in an existential conflict of systems with the USSR, Nuland is among several throughout both sides of the North Atlantic whose mission in life is to ensure that the Russian Federation follows the USSR into oblivion. Zelenskyy believed her when she swore, together with then Secretary-General of NATO Jens Stoltenberg that Kiev would be given “whatever it takes” in order to recover the territories which separated themselves from Ukraine in 2014. This was after the Maidan Revolution resulted in the coming to high office in Kiev eof Russophobes who were as committed to the disintegration of Russia as the Nulands of the Atlantic Alliance.
Throughout their tenures as high officials, Russophobes within NATO have been generous and deferential to China, which since the close of the 20th century has emerged as a far more potent systemic challenger to western and other democracies than the USSR ever was. Zelenskyy, after promising peace to his electorate, became the face of the Russophiles. Since he walked out of the April 2022 peace talks, Zelenskyy has sought to persuade NATO to join him in his crusade, and has sought the direct intervention of that military alliance in the conflict. Such involvement is something that NATO commanders, who have not fought a war in Europe except with Serbia in 1999, have wisely avoided so far.
Such an option may not be available to them in the war between Israel and those who seek its destruction that broke out on 7 October 2023 with a mass terror attack by Hamas on Israeli music lovers. The very next day, Hezbollah joined Hamas in attacking Israel, and so did the Houthis, all of whom were encouraged to do so by the clerics who control policy in Iran since the Khomeinist takeover of the country in 1979. Ayatollah Khomeini believed that the key to Arab hearts was to back the elements in Palestine who believe violence mixed with terror is the most effective path towards the elimination of Israel. Since the IDF counterattack following the 7 October terror attack, they have been discovering that such a path is indeed leading to destruction. Only, it is not the destruction of Israel but the destruction of themselves. Step by step, Iran and Israel are moving towards war with each other, in which predictably the US and some of its allies are on the side of Israel. Russia in its own interests should avoid the 1979 example of Leonid Brezhnev in Afghanistan by directly entering the battle on the side of Iran. The intent of the Kremlin appears to be to assist Iran in the way NATO is helping Ukraine. Which is by supplying that country weapons to fight what from the start is a lost war. In entering a war with Israel and its backers, the clerical regime in Tehran is at risk of causing its own demise. Major losses on the battlefield and on the home front as a consequence of Israeli and allied bombardment are likely to cause a revolt by the population of that country against a clerical regime that prioritises war at the expense of reconciliation with the West. In contrast to the clerics, President Masoud Pezeshkian wishes for an understanding with the West, and implicitly also with Israel. The Jewish state is far more consequential for Atlanticist security than Ukraine. Hence, it is no surprise that the US and some of its allies have become kinetically involved in the conflict between Israel and Iran, a degree of involvement that they have been avoiding in the Russia-Ukraine war. There is a fear that the conflict with Iran may result in oil prices shooting up. Any rise in prices is likely to be a short-term event. The fact is that the situation is presently very different from what prevailed during the Nixon “Oil Shock” of the 1970s. More and more consumers are moving away from fossil to green fuel, and producers such as Saudi Arabia would be well advised to sell as much of their oil reserves as they can while demand for fossil fuel continues. Such self-defeating steps as Germany acquiescing in the destruction of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline by Ukrainian and other commandos are why Chancellor Scholz is likely to lose the next poll to parties that do not prioritise the interests of faraway countries above their own. The sooner Nord Stream 2 gets back online, the better not just for Russia but for Germany. Small wonder that the AfD, which is opposed to the war with Russia, is doing much better than the SPD in recent polls. The link between economic hard times and the way Scholz has sacrificed the interests of Germany in Ukraine is making him and his coalition unpopular.
Their defeat in World War II ensured that Japan and Germany emerged as democracies. In the same way, the war now going on in the Middle East may ensure that Lebanon and Iran get freed from the tentacles of unelected leaders who are ready to sacrifice the interests of their country in order to attempt the futile task of destroying Israel. Given the setback that terror groups are getting as a consequence of the war that began with the Hamas terror attack, it ought to be possible for a viable Palestinian state to live at peace with Israel rather than be a breeding ground for terror. Palestinians deserve a peaceful, prosperous state of their own, something possible only when terrorists are removed from there.