The Israeli assault on Iran – launched as the genocide against the Palestinian people grinds on – follows a grimly familiar script. As with its previous campaigns in Lebanon and Gaza, Israel is pursuing a ‘decapitation’ strategy, aimed at eliminating key figures in the country’s political and security establishment while terrorizing its civilian population. Though framed in the deceptive language of ‘pre-emption’ or ‘non-proliferation’, the Israeli escalation signals a far more expansive and ambitious project: not just halting Iran’s nuclear programme, but dismantling Iran as a sovereign regional actor capable of resisting US-Israeli domination. This regime-change agenda should not come as a surprise to anyone who knows the recent history of the region. It has left a trail of destruction across Iraq, Libya, Syria, Palestine and Lebanon. […]
The attacks followed renewed nuclear negotiations between Tehran and Washington which started in mid-April. It has been almost exactly a decade since Iran’s Rouhani administration signed the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), agreeing to limit uranium enrichment in return for sanctions relief: a deal which held until 2018, when Trump unilaterally withdrew and pivoted to the so-called ‘maximum pressure’ strategy, imposing sanctions designed to immiserate the Iranian population and stoke domestic unrest. Throughout this period, Iran continued to hold out hope for a diplomatic offramp which would allow it to preserve its right to civilian enrichment under the international monitoring regime. It faced substantial pressure – both from elites and the wider population – to restore some form of negotiated settlement. So when Trump returned to the White House this year and signalled that a new deal might be within reach, the incumbent Pezeshkian government agreed, perhaps credulously, to engage in further talks. It is now abundantly clear that this diplomacy was never serious. For the US, the goal was not to reach agreement, but to force surrender. Läs artikel