In yesterday’s post (Iran, Nukes, and the Realities of Military Power: A Constitutional Perspective) I said I would follow up with a post on Israel’s grievances with Iran. After reviewing my writings on the subject, I saw that I covered a lot of this in previous posts and considered writing instead about the Supreme Court decision to allow the Trump Administration to deport illegal aliens to third countries was a leading contender. However, developments overnight bring me back to this subject.
Yesterday, Trump announced he had successfully brokered a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Iran. However, shortly after the announcement, Israeli forces reportedly carried out additional military actions against Iranian targets, defying the terms of the agreement. The move prompted a sharp rebuke from Trump, who expressed frustration over Israel’s actions, stating that their defiance undermined his diplomatic efforts and risked reigniting broader conflict. As of now, it looks like hostilities between the countries have ceased.
I understand Israel’s difficulty in adhering to the terms of a ceasefire in the face of a regime determined to obtain nuclear weapons and wipe Israel off the face of the earth. Iran has long been identified as a leading state sponsor of terrorism, using proxy groups and financial networks to project influence and destabilize regions that serve its strategic interests—Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, and various Shia militias in Iraq and Syria. These proxies allow Iran to engage in confrontational policies without direct engagement, targeting Israel, American assets, Sunni regimes, or Western allies while preserving plausible deniability. Iran’s deniability fails to withstand scrutiny. The world knows what Iran is doing.
Israel rightly views Iran as an existential threat—its sponsorship of anti-Israel terrorist groups, its ongoing ballistic missile development and nuclear program justify this view. Now there is evidence that Iran moved large quantities of enriched uranium before the bombing. A nuclear-armed Iran would fundamentally alter the strategic balance in the region and embolden Iranian aggression under a nuclear umbrella. Iran’s ideological hostility combined with growing military capabilities necessitated preemptive actions. The US degraded Iran’s nuclear capacity on Saturday. But Israel is concerned that the job isn’t finished. Unfortunately, given Iran’s size, the material could be anywhere. It would take a ground invasion to know for sure—and that is the last thing the world wants to see (excepting neoconservatives like Linsday Graham).
As I wrote in my June 22 essay US Strikes Iran’s Nuclear Facilities, Trump should listen to George Washington’s warning about foreign entanglements. While I support Trump’s efforts to broker peace in the Middle East, I also expressed in a June 14 essay (America First is Not Israel First) my understanding that Israel has to do what it believes it must to protect its population from a nuclear holocaust. But at what cost?
freedom and reason 