How Iran aims to win the war

 Published in the Jerusalem Post, 24 March 2026

   ​         The success or failure of the US-Israeli military operation in Iran hangs in the balance​.   It is very largely dependent upon how ​"success​" is finally adjudged.

Since February 28 the Iranian regime has sustained a massive armed offensive, and as a result its resources and its infrastructure have been substantially depleted.  US President Donald Trump has on several occasions detailed the vast losses Iran has ​incurred, and hinted that he is on the verge of declaring victory.  At other times he has indicated that he has considerably more in reserve by way of military power,​ including the possible use of American troops, to be used in loosening Iran’s grip on international shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, and ensuring the unconditional surrender of the regime. 

Trump has been criticized for the apparent inconsistency of his various statements, which to some seem ill considered.  They are, however, just as likely to be a deliberate strategy aimed at keeping the enemy, and perhaps the world at large, guessing as to his calculated and detailed plans for the end-game.

Meanwhile Iran, far from seeking as early an end to the war as possible – on the face of it the obvious course to follow – is continuing to attack states that host Western military bases and to disrupt international shipping and thus the global oil market. On March 15 foreign minister Abbas Araghchi said Iran had “never asked for a ceasefire”.

In fact the regime seems to be conducting what Eric Mandel, writing in the Jerusalem Post on March 16, calls “a war of attrition”.  The loss of its current leadership through targeted assassination is unlikely to affect this survival strategy.

The March issue of Foreign Affairs carries an article by Robert Pape, Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago, entitled: “Why Escalation Favors Iran”. 

In it Pape explains why Iran, despite its weaker conventional military power, paradoxically benefits from broadening and extending the current conflict. The core of his argument is that Iran is pursuing a strategy he calls “horizontal escalation” — namely, expanding the scope, geography, and duration of the conflict, in order to shift it from direct military contest toward political endurance and strategic costs.

Pape contends that Iran knows it cannot defeat a US-Israel alliance in a direct military confrontation. Instead, it is changing the nature of the conflict.  By using regional proxies, attacking economic targets and disrupting international commerce, Iran can vastly increase the political and economic costs borne by its stronger adversaries and their allies.

The strategy draws on historic precedents. One example is the Vietnam war.  The North Vietnamese and Vietcong forces out-maneuvered the US by escalating the war “horizontally” into the towns and cities in the south.  The US won every battle over 11 bloody years, but lost the war. 

Another is the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, and America’s in 2001.  Both operations ended as classic “wars of attrition”, where the insurgent side wore down the occupier over time until domestic political support and strategic patience eroded.

The Soviets entered Afghanistan expecting a short stabilization mission, but were drawn into a decade-long counter-insurgency that Gorbachev later called a “bleeding wound,” with mounting casualties, economic strain, and political embarrassment.  The mujahideen, backed by Pakistan, the US, and others, used sanctuary, terrain, and time to ensure the conflict was prolonged and costly, rather than decisive.

The later US campaign similarly morphed into an open-ended effort against an adaptive insurgency – in this case the Taliban and its allies – that aimed to outlast Western domestic will and unity, rather than to defeat US forces tactically in set-piece battles. 

Finally both the Soviets and the US acknowledged defeat and withdrew their forces.

According to Pape, Iran’s current actions – rapid retaliatory strikes, disruption of regional infrastructure, and resilience even after leadership losses – are meant to demonstrate to their opponents and to the world in general that the regime can sustain a long conflict.

This strategy transforms the confrontation into a test of political will rather than battlefield superiority, a test the Iranian regime may believe it is capable of winning.  The longer it drags on, the more it works in Iran’s favor.  It disrupts energy markets, strains host-country tolerance for US bases, and erodes domestic and allied political support for an open-ended campaign. Unless Washington adjusts its strategy to account for these dynamics, Pape warns, the US and Israel may have “bitten off more than they can chew” and risk losing control of the war they initiated.

What is the slowly accumulating danger for the US-Israel alliance?  By broadening and prolonging the conflict, Iran could impose mounting costs and heavy political pressure on the alliance, and gradually wrest control of the war’s trajectory from its stronger opponents.  In short, continued escalation risks putting the US and Israel into a strategic trap. 

For example, the longer the conflict continues, the harder it becomes for rulers in the Gulf – and particularly Abraham Accord partners – to sustain their relationship with Israel without sacrificing legitimacy at home.

          A protracted war would also reshape American politics. Sizable elements of Trump’s political coalition have been wary of Middle Eastern entanglements, and have accused the administration of simply following Israel’s lead.  The longer US military operations continue, the greater the danger of fractures widening within Trump’s political supportive base – as exemplified by the resignation on May 17 of Joe Kent, Director of the National Counterterrorism Center.

Transatlantic strains could also follow. The US could be in difficulties if, faced with the dangers of a prolonged and economically disastrous war, European states decided to limit their support or constrain the use of their territory.  US strategists would also obviously be factoring into their calculations the danger of the conflict escalating beyond the confines of the Middle East.

          Out of this complex military, political and economic maelstrom, there is a real danger that the US-Israel alliance could end by plucking defeat from the jaws of victory.  It would be a hollow victory indeed if, in the final analysis, the revolutionary regime remained in power in Iran.  It has to be swept away.


Published in the Jerusalem Post, and the Jerusalem Post online titled: "Political, economic pressures mount as US-Israel war with Iran continues", 24 March 2026:
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-890897

Revolutionary Iran must be toppled

Published in the Jerusalem Post, 17 March 2026

On March 8 Mojtaba Khamenei, the son of Ali Khamenei who was killed in a targeted strike on February 28, was announced as Iran’s new Supreme Leader.  He has not been seen in public from that day to this, and the speculation is he may have been badly wounded in that strike. His first address to the people was read for him by a TV news anchor.

If US President Donald Trump had been hoping that Iran’s new leader would be open to negotiate a better future for its people, he has been sadly disappointed.  Mojtaba Khamenei is very much his father’s son.  He is generally viewed as hardline and anti-West politically, and strongly aligned with the IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps). 

In short the regime’s elite has done its best to reconstitute itself and proceed on its quest to achieve the basic purposes of the Islamic revolution that, half a century ago, swept away Iran’s Pahlavi dynasty.  Ever since, most world leaders have been unable, or perhaps unwilling, to acknowledge the underlying motivation of its instigator, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.  They have also refused to accept that the same objectives have driven the regime ever since.

In his writings before the revolution, and in his speeches after, Khomeini affirmed repeatedly that the foundation stone of his philosophy was to impose Shiite Islam on the whole world by destroying Western-style democracy and its way of life.  To achieve this aim, he identified Israel and the United States (and also, at one time, Soviet Russia) as his prime targets.

“We wish to cause the corrupt roots of Zionism, Capitalism and Communism to wither throughout the world,” said Khomeini.  “We wish, as does God almighty, to destroy the systems which are based on these three foundations, and to promote the Islamic order of the Prophet.”

By this he meant his strict Shiite interpretation of Islam, for elsewhere he had declared that the holy city of Mecca, situated in the heart of Sunni Saudi Arabia, was in the hands of “a band of heretics”.

   Ever since 1979 the world could have recognized, if it had had a mind to, that the Iranian regime has been engaged in a focused pursuit of these related objectives – the destruction of democracy and the global imposition of Shiite Islam – quite impervious to any other considerations.  Instead, wishful thinking has governed the approach to Iran of many of the world’s leaders.

The administration of then US President Joe Biden maintained the tradition, inherited from his years as vice-president to Barack Obama, of seeking an accommodation with the regime. 

A clear-eyed look at the facts would have shown that the Iranian regime did not intend to become one of the comity of civilized nations.  To do so would have negated the revolution’s fundamental purposes, to which the ayatollahs remained unshakably committed. 

In the words of Khomeini, its founder: “We shall export our revolution to the whole world.  Until the cry 'There is no God but Allah' resounds over the whole world, there will be struggle.”

His successor, the recently deceased Khamenei, was a devout disciple.  Like Khomeini, he considered the revolutionary objectives so supremely desirable – even, perhaps, divinely approved – that any means were justified in furthering them, regardless of the human or political consequences.  Accordingly both leaders authorized a continuous succession of terrorist operations, most carried out by proxies to maintain the fiction of Iranian deniability.

Immediately following the revolution Iranian militants seized the US embassy in Tehran and held more than 50 people hostage for 444 days.  This was followed in 1983 by the bombing of the US embassy in Beirut, resulting in 63 deaths.  Later that same year Hezbollah bombed the US Marine Barracks in Beirut resulting in the deaths of 241 US and 58 French troops.

Bombing campaigns and hostage taking continued in the Middle East and Europe during the 1980s, and in the early 1990s Iran-inspired terror operations expanded to South America.  In 1992 Hezbollah bombed the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires causing 29 deaths, following this two years later by bombing the city’s AMIA Jewish Community Center, which killed some 85 people.  Meanwhile Iran continued to supply funding, weapons, training, and operational guidance to sustain continuous Hezbollah, Hamas, Houthi and militia attacks against Israel, Iraq, Syria, and Gulf states. 

As Hamas’s primary sponsor, the Iranian regime was undoubtedly complicit in its bloodthirsty attack into Israel on October 7, 2023. 

What explains the palpable failure by most of the world’s leaders to perceive what was plainly discernible?  The mistake was the same as the world made in the case of Adolf Hitler.  Few who read his Mein Kampf, first published in 1925, thought he meant what he said.

But the philosophy underlying Hitler’s political beliefs was there, in black and white, for years before he was in a position to implement it.  If politicians, or opinion formers, had taken it seriously, his rise to supreme power could have been thwarted.  He could have been prevented from maneuvering his way into becoming Germany’s Chancellor in 1933.

In the same way not enough scholars and political leaders bothered to look into the philosophy underlying Iran’s 1979 revolutionary leader, Khomeini, or to take seriously the burning religious conviction that motivated him, and subsequently the policies of the Islamic Republic.  The regime’s unceasing effort to acquire a nuclear arsenal was integral to its underlying purpose.  Whatever other strategic or political advantages nuclear arms might confer, it was only as a nuclear power that Iran could achieve its basic aim of eliminating Israel and confronting the Great Satan, America.

   If the Iranian regime is permitted to remodel itself under a new Supreme Leader, no amount of negotiation will dislodge it from its fundamental revolutionary purpose, as first propounded by Ayatollah Khomeini.  Nothing will induce it to reject the deluded vision of an Israel-free Middle East and an entire world subject to Shiite Sharia law.  That is why the future peace of the Middle East depends on Iran’s governing structure crumbling in the coming weeks under the sustained US-Israel aerial bombardment. Trump has demanded “unconditional surrender”.  He cannot declare total victory while Iran remains a theocratic dictatorship under the ayatollahs, led by a Khamenei.

Published in the Jerusalem Post, and the Jerusalem Post online titled: "Mojtaba Khamenei’s rise means Iran’s revolution is far from over," 17 March 2026:
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-890086

Iran’s tactical blunder

 Published in the Jerusalem Post, 10 March 2026

            Justifiable though the February 28 US-Israeli pre-emptive strike on Iran may have been on moral, humanitarian, strategic and political grounds, it was arguably not so strong in terms of international law. France has criticized it as illegal, while Spain has explicitly declared it a breach of that law.

          Which international law is the action presumed to violate?

          The UN Charter, binding on all member states, is generally regarded as the central component of international law. Article 2(4) bars a state from using force “against the territorial integrity or political independence” of another state, but elsewhere the Charter specifies two accepted routes to its legal application: Security Council authorization, and self-defense.

          The US-Israel strike did not receive Security Council authorization, and self-defense under Article 51 is permitted only “if an armed attack occurs.”

          When the US and Israel struck, therefore, Iranian strategists could have reasoned that their two great enemies had breached international law and laid themselves open to universal condemnation in the UN and in the court of world opinion.

          But blinded by their long‑standing doctrine of regarding US forward bases and regional hosts as part of the hostile “system,” they ignored the political potential of the situation. They sanctioned the launching of missiles and drones at Israel and at US bases in Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, UAE, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. Inevitably some hit civilian areas.

          Iranian officials framed this onslaught as a “legitimate right and duty” of self‑defense and revenge. They explicitly declared “all US resources in the vicinity” to be lawful targets, warning that the operation would continue until the US and Israel were “definitively defeated.”

          The decision to strike US bases regardless of their location was a tactical error of major proportions. It could also, in the long run, prove existential for the regime. By attacking states that were not direct participants in planning or carrying out the February 28 strike, Iran has pushed them toward tighter alignment with the US and Israel, solidifying a broad anti‑Iran coalition. 

          Joint statements by Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain, UAE, Jordan, Kuwait and the US have explicitly denounced Iran’s strikes. They “reaffirm our right to self‑defense,” signaling a willingness to treat Iran as a common threat and to act accordingly. The Gulf monarchies in particular host critical US infrastructure and missile defense networks. Having framed Iran’s attacks as aggression against their own territory and civilians, they can justify far‑reaching cooperation in a prolonged campaign against Iran’s military and economic base.

           By striking a range of Middle East states, Iran has turned Charter Article 51 – the “self-defense” justification for military action – against itself. Host states whose territory or US bases were attacked now clearly have their own self‑defense claims against Iran. Many of those governments publicly condemned Iran’s strikes as “blatant aggression” and “flagrant violations” of sovereignty. The UAE has severed diplomatic relations with Iran, closed its embassy in Tehran and withdrawn its ambassador and staff.

          For Western states with facilities and military personnel in those countries, Iran’s attacks strengthen the argument for continued, or even expanded, defensive action against Iranian launches. Even experts who were highly critical of the original US–Israeli raid affirm that once Iran widened the battlefield to third‑state territory not directly involved in the February 28 attack, its own self‑defense claim was weakened, and those of third states became correspondingly stronger.

          Iran’s broad regional retaliation has done a good deal of Washington’s coalition‑building work for it.

Tehran has realized the magnitude of its tactical mistake too late. Speaking on Iranian state TV on March 7, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian apologized “on my own behalf and on behalf of Iran to the neighboring countries that were attacked by Iran… no more attacks will be made on neighboring countries, and no missiles will be fired, unless an attack on Iran originates from those countries."

          The eminent British lawyer Geoffrey Robertson conducted the inquiry into “arguably the worst crime since the Second World War” – the mass murder by the Iranian regime in 1988 of many thousands of political prisoners. Writing on March 5, he has suggested how the UN could act to provide some justification for the US-Israeli strike.

He points out that just two weeks before the invasion the state of Iran “murdered at least 15,000, and possibly upward of 35,000, of its own peacefully protesting citizens.”

          Many more, he reports, were crippled by a new form of torture carried out by Islamic revolutionary guards, namely shooting them in the face. This barbarism, he claims, was ordered by Ali Larijani, Supreme Head of Iran’s National Security Council, and came after government newspapers had urged a return to the “spirit of 1988”.

          Robertson suggests that the UN, without condoning or condemning a war that has divided its members, could act under Chapter VII of its charter. This gives it power – used before for wars in the Balkans, Rwanda, and Sierra Leone – to set up a war crimes court to investigate and indict those responsible for crimes against humanity prior to the war in question.

          “The work,” he writes, “could begin immediately in The Hague and the indictments made available to a new government when it emerges.”

          Agreeing with President Donald Trump that UK prime minister, Keir Starmer, “is not Winston Churchill”, Robertson says that Starmer at least respects international law. He suggests that Starmer could urge the UN to establish an international criminal court for Iran, to prepare indictments against those officials and military officers who over the past 47 years have committed international crimes against political prisoners and peaceful protestors.

          What of the immediate future? While Trump has clarified his war aim as “unconditional surrender”, the Iranian regime is struggling to reconstitute itself after the death of its Supreme Leader. Effective governance in Iran could be bombed out of existence. Russia could act to prevent regime collapse - media reports indicate that Russia is currently providing Iran with targeting intelligence on US forces and assets. Meanwhile a coalition of those states attacked by Iran is possible, but not assured.

          As for Iran’s tactical blunder, whether it actually becomes existential for the regime only time will tell.

Published in the Jerusalem Post, and the Jerusalem Post online titled: "Iran's tactical blunder:  Strikes on third-party states give the US, Israel more allies", 10 March 2026:

https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-889311

If Iran falls, what follows?

Published in the Jerusalem Post, 5 March 2026:

                Speaking to reporters at Fort Bragg military base in North Carolina on February 13, US President Donald Trump said, unambiguously for the first time perhaps, that regime change in Iran is "the best thing that could happen". 

   Ever since late January the US administration has been building up a massive naval and military presence in the region, nominally to pressure Iran over its nuclear program, ballistic missiles, regional proxies, and internal repression. Trump has consistently tied the US military build-up to his insistence that Iran must never acquire nuclear weapons. 

            In his remarks at Fort Bragg Trump declined to specify whom he wanted to take over in Iran, but noted "there are people" who could.  One such, of course, is the late Shah’s son and heir, Reza Pahlavi, who has acquired significant support both within the country and among the Iranian diaspora as a potential future leader. 

US special envoy Steve Witkoff is reported to have met with Pahlavi at least once, but probably more often, in the past few weeks.

At the inaugural meeting of Gaza’s Board of Peace on February 19, Trump said that if the regime did not accept stricter limits “within days,” unspecified but “very bad” consequences might follow.  The latest round of US-Iranian negotiations in Geneva ended on February 26.  Unsatisfied with Iran’s delaying tactics, Trump ordered a military strike on the morning of February 28.

Speaking via his Truth Social medium, Trump was crystal clear about one major objective of the joint US-Israeli attack.  Addressing the Iranian people direct, he said:

“For many years, you have asked for America’s help. But you never got it. No president was willing to do what I am willing to do tonight. Now you have a president who is giving you what you want. So let’s see how you respond. America is backing you with overwhelming strength and devastating force. Now is the time to seize control of your destiny and to unleash the prosperous and glorious future that is close within your reach. This is the moment for action. Do not let it pass.”

 Trump has no plan for large‑scale US ground involvement or occupation.  He anticipates an internal uprising that would topple the government.  It is not an impossible scenario.  With the Iranian economy on life support, and the regime struggling to contain prolonged and persistent anti-government demonstrations, targeted military action by the US could cause the Islamic theocratic dictatorship to implode.

On February 25 AOL, the American web portal formerly known as “America Online,” published an article which stated “…the US has reportedly drawn up a target list of key regime stalwarts, such as the Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and his son, to be eliminated as part of a decapitation strategy aimed at achieving regime change in Tehran.”  This objective was achieved in the first strike on February 28.

The Iranian people, having endured nearly five decades of despotic rule, have made it abundantly plain over the past month or more that the sooner they see the back of the ayatollahs, the better.  However, the fall of the Iranian regime would have repercussions well beyond Iran – many of them highly desirable. 

For example, the widespread network of terrorist groups created and sustained by the Islamic Republic would suddenly find themselves without the financial and logistical support that has sustained their jihadist activities for decades. 

Shiite Hezbollah, a creature of the Iranian regime, would be critically weakened by its demise.  The Houthis’ ability to act at sea and against distant targets is very largely dependent on Iranian military supplies.  Sunni Hamas could look to Qatar and perhaps Turkey for some degree of support, but without Iran at its back could it withstand Trump’s demand that it disarms and dismantles its terrorist infrastructure?

Wider afield, Russia and China, which have forged trade and military partnerships with Iran in recent years, would see their global standing seriously diminished.

Iran has been supporting Vladimir Putin’s war effort in Ukraine by providing constant supplies of drones and ballistic missiles.  The sudden loss of this flow of vital ordnance would undoubtedly weaken Putin’s military capabilities in Ukraine and could hasten some sort of ceasefire.

China would also feel the pinch, since 90% of Iran’s discounted oil exports go to Beijing. A sudden loss of  cheap Iranian oil would have a significant effect on China’s economy.  Moreover, bearing in mind the 2021 Iran-China partnership pact, any leadership change in Tehran could have a negative impact on China’s strategically ambitious world-wide Belt and Road initiative, already signed by some 150 countries.

The first and only serious attempt to overthrow the Iranian regime occurred just eighteen months after the February 1979 Islamic revolution.  In September 1980 the Iraqi dictator, Saddam Hussein, fearing that Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini’s revolutionary Shia Islamism would destabilize Iraq’s Sunni‑dominated Ba’athist regime, invaded. 

He hoped that a quick attack into Iran’s oil‑rich province of Khuzestan would trigger internal unrest and possibly a collapse of the new Islamic Republic.

A range of Western and Arab states, including the US, the UK, France, and Gulf monarchies, provided him with significant military, economic, and diplomatic support.  Iran’s revolutionary regime was seen by them as a greater threat to stability and Western oil interests than Saddam’s Iraq.  History had a different story to tell.

By mid‑1982 Iran had reversed Iraq’s initial gains, and for the next five years Iraq was largely on the defensive.  A series of successful Iraqi offensives in 1988, however, diminished Iran's hope for victory and induced a change of heart. In August 1988 both sides accepted a UN-brokered ceasefire and truce.

This time has Iran’s revolutionary regime reached the end of the road?   On February 28 Pahlavi issued his own video message to the Iranian people: 

“In these sensitive hours and days, more than ever we must remain focused on our ultimate goal: reclaiming Iran…Stay alert and ready to return to the streets for the final action at the appropriate time, which I shall communicate to you. Follow my messages through social media… We are very close to final victory. I hope to be with you as soon as possible, so that together we may reclaim Iran and rebuild it.”

          Will the dream eventually become reality?

Published in the Jerusalem Post, and the Jerusalem Post online titled: "What follows the fall of Iran?  A look at the widespread repercussions", 4 March 2026:
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-888758

Published in Eurasia Review, 11 March 2026:
https://www.eurasiareview.com/06032026-if-iran-falls-what-follows-oped/

Will Maliki return?

Published in the Jerusalem Post, 25 February 2026

          On January 27 US President Donald Trump declared on his Truth Social media platform that Iraq would be making a “disastrous mistake” if Nouri al‑Maliki was re-installed as prime minister.  He argued that “last time Maliki was in power, the country descended into poverty and total chaos” and that this “should not be allowed to happen again.”

Trump, typically riding roughshod over accepted practice, was openly seeking to influence the election of Iraq’s future prime minister.  To whom was he offering his advice?

Iraq’s constitution specifies that following parliamentary elections, the parliament – known as the Council of Representatives – elects the president of the republic.  Within 15 days of his election, the president appoints as prime minister‑designate the candidate nominated by the parliamentary bloc with the largest number of seats.  The prime minister‑designate then has 30 days to propose a cabinet and present it to parliament.  He becomes prime minister only if parliament grants him and his government a vote of confidence.

Trump was therefore speaking directly to the 329 parliamentarians elected to the Council of Representatives in the poll held on November 11, and especially to the Shia parties which took nearly 200 seats in those elections and form the majority bloc that will nominate the prime minister-designate.

Since the elections were held in November and the prime minister is not yet in post, the constitutional timetable has clearly slipped.  But the blockage is further up the line.  Parliament has not yet been able to elect a president.  The Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) have repeatedly failed to agree on a consensus Kurdish candidate for the presidency (a post traditionally held by a Kurd), and they have formally asked for more time.

​Assuming the logjam is eventually cleared, Trump has warned Iraq’s parliamentarians that if Maliki were to be elected prime minister the US will no longer help the nation, “and without our support Iraq has zero chance of success, prosperity, or freedom.”  US officials believe Maliki is too closely aligned with the Iranian regime, and regard his possible return as an attempt to bolster Iran’s Shiite Crescent in the Middle East. 

Maliki and his allies have, of course, condemned Trump’s comments as unwarranted American interference in Iraq’s internal political process.  Nouri al-Maliki was indeed proposed in January as candidate for prime minister by the Shia Coordination Framework and allied lists.  His election is not a foregone conclusion, though.  Some Shia figures (for example, leading Iraqi cleric and politician Ammar al‑Hakim) have not endorsed the nomination,

while parts of the Sunni and Kurdish camps are openly opposed to Maliki.  These negative factors, allied to Trump’s warning, might be sufficient to swing majority opinion against him, so at the moment it is uncertain whether his nomination will survive the government‑formation bargaining.

A return to power by Maliki would not, on the evidence, augur well for Iraq.

From 2006 till 2014 he served two four-year terms as Iraq’s prime minister. His performance over that period is generally considered to have deeply damaged Iraq’s stability, institutions, and social cohesion.  His second tenure of office, from 2010-2014, was especially  marked by internal instability and increasing authoritarianism.  He began accumulating power in his own hands.  By personally holding a number of key security and economic portfolios, he was able to evade scrutiny.  He was also widely criticized for using the security forces and state institutions to support his political allies, marginalizing and antagonizing many Sunni and some Kurdish groups. 

His fall from power resulted from his inability to combat the forces of ISIS and its allied militias as they overran Iraqi army units and, as government forces withdrew in disarray, seize control first of Fallujah and then of Nineveh and surrounding areas.

On June 10, 2014 Mosul, Iraq’s second city, fell after large numbers of Iraqi troops abandoned their positions – around 1,500 ISIS fighters routed an estimated 60,000 government soldiers and police, leaving vast stocks of weapons and equipment in ISIS hands.

The same offensive saw ISIS and allied insurgents seize Tikrit and other towns along the Tigris corridor, while Iraq simultaneously lost control of border crossings with Syria and Jordan.

These catastrophic defeats at the hands of ISIS were unsustainable politically, and on August 14, 2014 Maliki was pressured to resign.

According to Iraqi and international reports, his years in power saw politically sanctioned corruption flourish.  Human rights groups and policy institutes link his period in office to dishonest practices such as ghost soldiers on payrolls and fictitious contracts.

In a speech to the Iraqi parliament reported on October 28, 2015 Iraq’s Commission of Integrity spokesman Adil Nouri claimed that roughly half of reconstruction funds and a similar share of oil revenues – some hundreds of billions of dollars – had, in effect, been stolen.  He said explicitly that the money went missing “during the 8‑year period of office of former prime minister Nouri Maliki,” noting that Iraq’s oil income “between 2006 and 2014 alone was only 822 billion dollars.”​  The presumption is that it should have been double that.

While Maliki initially pledged to reconcile Sunnis and Shias, his later approach relied heavily on Shia‑dominated security forces and militias, deepening Sunni grievances.  His crackdown on Sunni protest movements in 2012–2013, and his dictatorial style, helped foster the unstable internal situation that led to the collapse of Iraqi army units in 2014, enabling ISIS’s rapid expansion.

            Publicly Maliki emphasizes Iraqi sovereignty but, especially worrying in present circumstances, he maintains a very close relationship with the Iranian regime.

          ​"Since leaving office," the trustworthy policy forum Chatham House notes​, “Maliki has kept close relations with Iran”​. ​ Iran backed his return as a prime‑ministerial candidate in 2026​, it says, because it sees him as a “trusted figure” who can impose order on Iraq’s fragmented security landscape.  Moreover, Iraq “serves as a critical security buffer closely entwined with Iran’s own domestic stability.”

Given Maliki’s record in office, his close Shiite connections, and his strong association with the Iranian regime, Trump’s opposition to his return to power makes sense.  Will Maliki succeed in out-maneuvering him?

Published in the Jerusalem Post, and in the Jerusalem Post online titled: "Trump warns Iraq of the dangers of Nouri al-Maliki returning, but will he be out-maneuvered?", 25 February 2026:
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-887737  

 

Help? What help?

 Published in the Jerusalem Post, 16 February 2026

            On January 12, when riots and violent protests had been wreaking havoc across Iran for more than two weeks, US President Donald Trump posted a message on his social media platform, Truth Social.  “Iranian patriots,” he wrote.  “Keep protesting.  Take over your institutions.  I have cancelled all meetings with Iranian officials until the senseless killing of protesters stops.  Help is on its way.”

            This was not his first message of encouragement to the hundreds of thousands who had taken to the streets of Iran’s cities and towns protesting against the regime and the hardships it was inflicting on the people.  In a Truth Social post in the early hours of Friday, January 2 he had already posted that if Iran “violently kills peaceful protesters, which is their custom, the United States of America will come to their rescue,” adding: “We are locked and loaded and ready to go.”

            The nationwide insurrection can be dated back to December 28, when a sudden currency collapse, coming on top of already severe inflation and falling purchasing power, led to bazaar strikes and street demonstrations in Tehran. 

The Iranian rial had plunged to a historic low of around 1.42 million per dollar, destroying price stability for import‑dependent traders, and making normal bazaar commerce impossible.  Rapid exchange‑rate swings and rising costs meant that shopkeepers could not set or honor prices.  Facing possible bankruptcy, they closed their shops and struck in protest at what they saw as regime mismanagement of the economy.

The uprising moved quickly from economic dissatisfaction by the trading community to an open challenge to the entire Islamic Republic by large numbers of the public.  By the first week of January, protests had expanded to cities and towns in nearly all 31 provinces.  It is still in progress and according to diplomatic and media estimates, the numbers of people participating nationwide could possibly be in the millions. 

The use of live fire by the security forces escalated sharply around 8–10 January.  Reports speak of thousands killed over a 48‑hour period and describe this phase as the deadliest repression since 1979.  So by the time of Trump’s January 13 message, the unrest had moved from an economic‑triggered protest to a nationwide, highly lethal confrontation.

          The many slogans chanted by protesters include calls for the overthrow of the Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, demands for an Iranian republic, and nostalgia for the deposed monarchy (“Reza Shah, may your soul be blessed”, which honored the founder of the Pahlavi dynasty).  “This is the final battle, Pahlavi will return” is chanted in places, explicitly calling for Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi to lead a reborn Iran. 

These monarchist slogans do, however, coexist with strong anti‑monarchical and republican currents, and the insurrection’s center of gravity is essentially anti‑Islamic Republic.

In the light of Trump’s own words, Iranians who are risking life and liberty by challenging their oppressive government might reasonably believe that the US president is preparing to intervene on their behalf and help them overthrow the regime.  But that is not likely to happen. 

From the US perspective there are, in addition to the regime’s violent crackdown on protesters, three pressing issues in the Iran file:  the nuclear program, the ballistic missile program, and Iran’s regional proxies.  These seem to have taken precedence over any practical support for the popular uprising against the regime.

To justify Trump’s visible military buildup around Iran in late January, Washington did cite Iran’s ruthless crackdown and soaring protester death toll, but also mentioned broader concerns about Tehran’s regional and nuclear behavior.  The marked increase in US air, naval, and missile‑defense deployments across the Middle East, notably the deployment of the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group and accompanying forces to the region, were explicitly framed as deterrence and preparation for possible strikes on Iran.

​​Preliminary ​US–Iran talks ​in the first week of February ​were fruitful enough for a further round to be tabled, and Prime Minister Netanyahu flew to Washington to coordinate with Trump the line to be taken.  Talks not action emerged as Trump’s priority.  Meanwhile confused commentators are asking why Iran’s nuclear program is once again a central concern.  Didn’t Trump himself say Iran’s nuclear capabilities had been “completely and fully obliterated” during the 12-day war in June?

Herb Keinon, writing in the Jerusalem Post, put the issue in a nutshell:  “The return to negotiations – reviving the nuclear file while setting aside what has taken place on Iran’s streets – gives the impression that a moment of great regime vulnerability has been squandered. All of a sudden, the two sides are talking about centrifuges and enrichment levels, when many assumed the focus had shifted decisively to the awful nature of the regime and its violent suppression of its own people.”

As regards the nuclear issue, the current US position is a demand that Iran completely halts its nuclear program and ships its stock of enriched uranium, estimated at some 450 kg, out of the country – presumably to Russia.  If serious negotiations actually start, several months of talks would probably be needed to finalize agreement on the nuclear issue, which is the only one the Iranians have so far agreed to consider.

​But there is no evading the harsh truth.  Trump explicitly urged Iranians to “keep protesting” and “take over” institutions, telling them that “help is on its way​.” ​ He then held back from intervention while the ​regime's crackdown ​on the protesters escalated, and ​now US policy ​has shifted toward nuclear talks and military deterrence, leaving Iranians facing mass killings, detentions, and collective punishment without the external backing they thought had been promised.

According to Reza Pahlavi’s media office the regime has killed at least 43,000 Iranians since the current protests began.  On February 10 the family of 20-year-old Ali Heydari, arrested by regime forces on January 8, reported that he had been executed without facing trial.  

For protesters, Trump’s combination of rhetorical encouragement and minimal practical support must be a bitter disappointment.  Anger against the regime will doubtless persist, but what has happened may well be perceived by the people of Iran as a form of betrayal by Trump and the US.

Published in the Jerusalem Post and the Jerusalem Post online titled: "Donald Trump promised to help the Iranians - when is that help coming?", 17 February 2026:
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-886674

Published in Eurasia Review, 20 February 2026:

https://www.eurasiareview.com/20022026-iran-help-what-help-oped/

Syria’s enigmatic al-Sharaa

Published in the Jerusalem Post, 10 February 2026 

Syria’s interim president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, has become something of a puzzle. His words increasingly appear at odds with his actions.

For example​, he repeatedly emphasizes that his overriding aim is to unify the nation while recognizing the basic rights of its minorities. Yet here he is in deadly conflict with both the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and the administrative body of Rojava, the Kurds’ semi-autonomous region in the north-east.

Sharaa probably regards the offensive as consistent with his unification agenda: he is seeking to bring Kurdish-controlled areas fully under state authority.  But since the campaign marginalizes Kurdish political representation, undermines local self-administration, and results in collective harm to Kurdish civilians, it breaches his commitment to protecting minority rights.

In December 2024, with a militant Sunni Islamist career behind him, Sharaa emerged at the head of a professional fighting force to overthrow the dictatorship of Shia-aligned Bashar al-Assad.  Since then he has consistently declared that his aim is to ​construct a ​Syria that unites its disparate elements into a unified​ democratic state.  He has been just as clear in insisting that the future Syria will be rooted in Sunni‑Islamic moral and legal principles. He clearly does not believe his twin aspirations are mutually incompatible​, though they may be. Where is an Islamic state that is truly democratic?  

He may be looking as a model toward Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Turkey, which retains a few democratic elements in its constitution.

​In fact it is Erdogan who is eyeing Syria as a future sphere of influence – and ​Turkey already has a foot firmly planted there.  Large areas of Syrian territory ​adjacent to the Turkish border have been under de facto Turkish military occupation and administration since 2016.

The Kurds have long been a domestic political nightmare for Erdogan with their constant demands for autonomy, and he has been engaged for years in ensuring that his Turkish Kurds get no military support from their Syrian co-ethnics lodged in their autonomous administration just across the border.

Current analysis suggests Erdogan is seeking to consolidate and, where possible, expand the partial security zones he has seized inside Syria along  the Syrian-Turkish border. Turkish officials consistently proclaim their goal to be a 30‑km wide buffer zone. 

In August 2025, Syria and Turkey signed a military cooperation agreement.  The text presents Turkish involvement as supporting, not dismembering, Syria.  By early 2026, official statements emanating from Ankara were increasingly framing Turkey’s entrenched military presence in northern Syria as part of a cooperative security and state‑building process during Syria’s transition from the Assad regime.

There has as yet been no ultimatum, demand or even request from Sharaa that Turkey evacuate the northern zones it occupies.  It is however implicit, in Sharaa’s long‑term aim of recovering full sovereignty, that once security threats are removed, foreign forces, including Turkey’s, should ultimately leave.  Erdogan may have different ideas.

Given Sharaa’s jihadist past, many of his statements as he took control of Syria surprised world opinion.  From the start he repeatedly emphasized unity, reconstruction, transitional governance and “a new era” for Syria, including democratic elections and a truly representative parliament.

In his first televised address as interim president on January 30, 2025 he said: “We will work on an inclusive transitional government that reflects Syria’s diversity.”  This government, he added, would “build institutions and run the country until it can hold free and fair elections.”

He went on to announce that he would shortly form a committee to prepare for a national dialogue conference, described as “a platform for Syrians to discuss the future political program of the nation.”  The committee was indeed set up by presidential decree early in February 2025, and has been at work ever since.  Some commentators criticize it for being dominated by Islamists close to Sharaa, and as excluding key Kurdish, Alawite and Druze figures.

Druze exclusion from the constitutional committee reflects Sharaa’s ambiguous relationship with this minority community.  As with the Kurds, while his words emphasize his intention to include them within the fabric of a unified Syria, what he does appears to negate what he says. 

For example, government forces were certainly involved in the armed attacks on the Druze community over the four months April-to-July 2025.  The immediate triggers were a combination of long‑standing grievances between Druze communities and the new Syrian authorities over perceived discrimination and security control, and local provocations by Bedouins.

In July, Sweida – a city where Druze form about 90% of the population – became the site of intense conflict. 

          Syrian government forces were deployed to suppress the violence, but multiple independent reports document government troops and allied fighters looting and burning homes and shops, humiliating Druze clerics and residents, and in some cases executing civilians hiding in their houses.  Human rights groups put the death toll at over a thousand, mostly Druze civilians.

Before the mid-July ceasefire between Syrian government representatives and Druze leaders, Sharaa declared in a televised address: “Protecting our Druze community is a top priority… We will do everything in our power to protect the lives and dignity of every Druze citizen.”

After the ceasefire, in the course of a speech on TV he said: “Sweida remains an integral part of the Syrian state, and the Druze constitute a fundamental pillar of the Syrian national fabric”, adding a vow “to protect all minorities in Syria.”

Israel, of course, intervened militarily and politically in July 2025, first striking Syrian army positions around Sweida, and then key military sites in Damascus.  Prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other ministers told both the Syrian Druze community and Israel’s own Druze citizens that the IDF was “acting to protect our Druze brothers.”

The Syrian leadership rejects any Israeli claim to a protective role over Syrian Druze, portraying it as cover for reinforcing a demilitarized belt along the Golan to Israel’s advantage.  Sharaa insists that reasserting central control is integral to his policy of unifying the nation.

Will he eventually bring his disparate minority interests, such as the Kurds and the Druze, within the overall control of a unified national government that represents a democratic, albeit Islamic, state?  That is the conundrum he currently represents.

Published in the Jerusalem Post, and the Jerusalem Post online titled: "Syria's future: "Can Ahmed al-Sharaa reconcile democracy, Islam and minority rights?", 10 February 2026:
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-886054

Published in Eurasia Review, 14 February 2026:

https://www.eurasiareview.com/13022026-syrias-enigmatic-al-sharaa-oped/

A pro-Israel bookshelf

 Published in the Jerusalem Post Weekend Magazine, 6 February 2026

I talk about the book on YouTube at: https://youtu.be/GYd0nyAnoNU

          I have been reviewing books for The Jerusalem Post and its sibling, the bi-monthly Jerusalem Report, for a good many years. One day, looking through the ever expanding “Reviews” folder on my computer, I was struck by just how many good books and eminent authors the Post and Report have allowed me to bring to the attention of their readers. A quick tot-up showed that I had well over 100 reviews stored online.

          Dedicated readers, I thought, might welcome the chance to learn about books and authors they could have overlooked, while occasional book buyers or people seeking a suitable present could surely find something to their taste in such a wide selection of titles. So, the idea was born of bringing 100 of my book reviews together in one volume.

         What would I call such a volume? My first thought was “Your Middle East Bookshelf,” but I realized almost immediately that potential readers might be misled into believing that the contents would cover the whole regional spectrum, whereas the books I have been reviewing all these years were selected to appeal specifically to a Jewish readership. Honesty is always the best policy, so I decided on Your Pro-Israel Bookshelf: 100 titles reviewed.

          With that issue settled, the next problem was how to present the material. The reviews covered a very wide range of genres. Among the hundred were biographies, political and personal memoirs, novels, thrillers; works on morals, religion and psychology; and poetry, humor, children’s books, even a cookbook and a graphic novel (that is, a book conceived as drawings accompanied by words). Should all the biographies be listed together, all the short stories, and so forth?

          That possibility was rejected for good reasons, as were several others. Finally, the best solution, from the point of view of the potential reader, seemed to be to present the hundred volumes alphabetically by title. Anyone reading through the book would never be aware of what type of volume the next review would be dealing with and would, it was hoped, be pleasantly surprised by the variety of subject matter and the range of authors – some of them very eminent – whose works are represented.

          Among them are Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, Douglas Murray, leading historian Lord Andrew Roberts, political journalist Melanie Phillips and Alan Dershowitz.  The memoirs represented include those of Danny Danon, Israel’s ambassador to the UN, and Zalman Shoval who was Israel’s ambassador to the US.

          Thrillers with an Israeli theme include A Death in Jerusalem, Jonathan Dunsky’s seventh novel featuring his Israeli hero-detective Adam Lapid, and Khaled Talib’s fast-paced thriller Smokescreen.

          I also reviewed a fair selection of short stories. Notable are those of Michael Oren and Jennifer Anne Moses.

          My hope in putting together this collection of reviews was to whet readers’ appetite, and lead them perhaps to purchase a volume or two that particularly catches their interest. To help potential book buyers, each review is preceded by the book’s publisher.

Published in the Jerusalem Post Weekend Magazine and the Jerusalem Post online, 8 February 2026:

https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/article-885615#google_vignette

The ISIS prisoner dilemma

 Published in the Jerusalem Post, 3 February 2026

The first week of 2026 witnessed a significant turnaround in US policy in the Middle East. 

A key factor was the visit of Syria’s interim president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, to US President Donald Trump in the White House on 10 November, 2025. Speaking in the Oval Office, Trump said of Sharaa: “We aspire to see Syria evolve into a prosperous nation, and I believe this leader has the potential to achieve it…”

By December 2025, the US was publicly expressing satisfaction with “steps being taken by the Syrian interim government.”

For more than a decade, the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) had maintained effective governance in Rojava, the extensive region in north and north-east Syria where Kurds form the largest community alongside other minority populations.

But on January 6, Sharaa launched an intensive campaign across the SDF‑held areas in the north-east aimed at absorbing the SDF into the Syrian army. Washington pressed the SDF to accept integration and focused on mediating ceasefires and withdrawals.

On January 18, a US‑mediated ceasefire was announced, setting out terms for SDF integration into the Syrian army. In reports of a late‑January phone call between Trump and Sharaa, Trump is quoted as supporting “the aspirations of the Syrian people to build a unified and strong state” and welcoming “the understandings related to the integration of military forces, including the SDF, into official state institutions.”

So what began as Trump’s full military and political backing for the SDF as the central anti‑ISIS instrument has evolved into a policy where the SDF is treated as a problem to be solved through subordination to Sharaa’s forces. His support has moved from arming and shielding the SDF to endorsing a unified Syrian state under al‑Sharaa and accepting, even facilitating, a Syrian military campaign that directly targets SDF forces.

The SDF ran 29 prisons and detention facilities containing some 10,000 men and about 40,000 women and children captured during the anti-ISIS campaigns. The largest prison was Hasakah; other prisons included al‑Shaddadi and al‑Aqtan. In addition, the al‑Hol family camp held around 24,000 women and children; the smaller al‑Roj camp held around 16,000.

“Two tumultuous weeks,” as ABC News put it in a report on January 21: “saw the fall from power in Syria of the Kurdish-led force that was once the main US partner there, as Washington shifts its backing to the country’s nascent government.”

Having toppled the Assad regime in December 2024, Sharaa was appointed interim president, committed to unifying the nation while recognizing the basic rights of its minorities. In pursuit of his policy to reestablish a sovereign Syria, he and SDF leader Mazloum Abdi agreed in March 2025 that the tens of thousands of SDF fighters would be integrated into Syria’s national army. The government would take over key institutions in north-east Syria, such as border crossings and oil fields, but also include the prison facilities and camps.

The deal failed to stick. US-brokered negotiations aimed at finalizing the agreement petered out. If the SDF believed that after so long an alliance, the US would support them in holding out for the autonomy they had won in Rojava, they miscalculated.

When attacked by Sharaa’s Syrian Armed Forces (SAF) on January 6, the Kurdish-led force lost most of its territory in north-east Syria, and Washington did not intervene. It focused on mediating a ceasefire.

By January 21, the ceasefire was holding, and the SDF had signed a deal that would effectively dissolve it as a separate fighting force, merging it instead into Syria’s national army. The agreement also triggered a rapid reshuffling of control over prisons and camps. Custody shifted from the SDF to a mix of Syrian state control and Iraqi-run facilities backed by US logistical and financial support.

The ceasefire allowed US forces to begin transferring up to some 7,000 ISIS detainees from SDF‑run prisons in Syria to facilities in Iraq, a process that US Central Command (CENTCOM) and Iraqi officials say will continue in phases.

A few ISIS and ISIS‑linked detainees, formerly held by the SDF, escaped during the conflict.

According to Syria’s Interior Ministry, about 120 ISIS detainees got out of al‑Shaddadi prison, of whom 81 were recaptured in subsequent sweep operations. Some 39 are still believed to be at large.

Under the 14‑point ceasefire deal with the SDF, the Syrian government formally assumed full responsibility for the “ISIS file,” including running ISIS prisons and camps. On 23 January, Syrian authorities took control of al‑Aqtan prison in Raqqa, and Syrian forces have also moved into the so-called “family camp” at al‑Hol, replacing the former SDF guards. Syria now formally runs al-Hol with its thousands of women and children, and faces major humanitarian and security challenges.

The prisoner issue, with which the SDF grappled and which now falls into the lap of Syria and the US, is a hot potato. Between 2012 and 2020, a fair number of foreigners traveled to Syria and Iraq to join ISIS and live under the so-called caliphate.

Following the defeat of ISIS in 2019, very large numbers of ISIS militants and supporters were captured and imprisoned. The SDF soon came to realize that it held a large, diverse foreign population without the legal authority, resources, or diplomatic recognition to resolve their status.

Roughly 8,500 of the 40,000 women and children held in al‑Hol and Roj were third‑country nationals from about 60 states. Some 38 countries took back a few nationals, but many refused to do so, thus effectively exporting the legal, humanitarian, and security burdens to north-east Syria for the indefinite future.

The UK repatriated a small number of children without their mothers, and a handful of orphans, while in the classic case of Shamima Begum, she was stripped of her British citizenship.

It is estimated that only a couple of thousand of these foreign women and children been repatriated so far. Thousands more remained confined.

The SDF/Rojava administration lacked recognized statehood and formal diplomatic relations, so it could not negotiate repatriations through normal consular channels. With the change of responsibility to Sharaa’s Syria, formal diplomacy might succeed in alleviating the problem.

Published in the Jerusalem Post, and in the Jerusalem Post online titled: "Why Washington shifts from Syria's Kurds to Sharaa", 3 February 2026:
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-885205

Published in Eurasia Review, 15 February 2026
https://www.eurasiareview.com/06022026-the-isis-prisoner-dilemma-oped/