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Report from Tehran: Iranians View U.S. Strikes on Key Nuclear Sites as “Act of War”

JUNE 23, 2025

[https://www.democracynow.org/2025/6/23/iran_united_states]

AMY GOODMAN:  Seyed Hossein Mousavian is Visiting Research Collaborator with Princeton University’s Program on Science and Global Security. From 2003 to ’05, he served as spokesperson for Iran in its nuclear negotiations of the European Union, author of The Iranian Nuclear Crisis: A Memoir, and most recently, _Iran and the United States, An Insider’s View on the Failed Past and the Road to Peace_. His new op-ed for ­_Middle East Eye_ headlined, “After U.S. Attack, Iran Could Reconsider its Nuclear Strategy.” Thanks so much for joining us from Brussels, Ambassador Hossein Mousavian. If you can respond to what the U.S. has done. It’s interesting to have both of you on because Mohammad Marandi was involved with the Iran deal negotiations in 2015, and you, back a decade before.

SEYED HOSSEIN MOUSAVIAN: It is obvious, Amy, that the U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran is in a clear violation of international law and regulations. It is a clear violation of United Nations security, United Nations charter. It is in a clear violation of the International Atomic Energy Agency rules and regulations. And many experts now are talking that the current attacks are not only attacks on Iran, they are attacks on non-proliferation treaty. It is – it would have definitely a counterproductive result. The fact is, Amy, that Israel is the only country in the region with 100 to 400 nuclear bombs, and Iran is a member NPT. Israel is not. Iran does not have nuclear bomb. Israel does have nuclear bomb. And Iran has given the highest – the most inspections to the IAEA during the history of IAEA, and Israel has never given such access to IAEA.

And now, Iran is the most-sanctioned country, and the U.S. is supporting Israel with nuclear bombs. And they both are claiming that they are fighting proliferation in the Middle East. Practically, the U.S. is supporting a country with nuclear bomb attacking a country with no nuclear bomb, claiming that the U.S. is fighting for proliferation in the Middle East. Therefore, Iranians are now looking for key as being member of non-proliferation treaty, giving every access to the IAEA, and now they have been attacked. Before, they have been sanctioned. And countries like North Korea, Israel, India, Pakistan, which they have never accepted non-proliferation treaty, they have never been attacked. That’s why they are now thinking perhaps having nuclear bomb is much better deterrent compared to being member of NPT.

AMY GOODMAN: This is an extremely important point you’re making, Ambassador. The issue of whether this would encourage nuclear proliferation, that you have Iran, a non-nuclear nation at this point being attacked by two nuclear nations, the U.S. and Israel. So, the lesson learned is, you need to a nuclear bomb-armed nation not to be attacked. For example, the U.S. isn’t attacking North Korea. So, if you can talk about what this means and the idea that you can come up with a military solution to what’s happening in Iran. It now may be well that the nuclear material has been moved from the place that the U.S. bombed, from Fordow. And so, in the end, it’s going to take diplomacy anyway.

SEYED HOSSEIN MOUSAVIAN: First of all, from the day one, when Israelis, they attacked Iran, I publicly said, “This is not Israeli strike. Israel has coordinated this military invasion of Iran by the NATO countries, by the U.S., and it is fully supported by NATO, and Iran is confronting NATO, not only Israel. And it is now about 12 days passed, everybody understands that the NATO countries, they are fully supporting Israel, and the U.S. also attacked Iran by the demand of Israelis. This is number one.

Number two, if President Trump really wanted a nuclear deal, he could get it easily. Because in his first term, he chaired the JCPOA. You remember. JCPOA, the Iran nuclear deal was agreed between Iran, and the U.S. and the world powers, the United Nations Security Council passed the Resolution 2231, the IAEA adopted many resolutions. It was working very well. Iran gave the highest level of access inspection, transparency measures to the IAEA. Every technical issue with the IAEA was resolved. Even IAEA publicly said, “All possible military dimension issues are resolved.” The deal was working very well. Even beyond the nuclear, Iran and the U.S., they agreed that Iran would buy 100 American passenger planes, the Boeing planes. Even when 16 American sailors, they entered Iranian water territory illegally, Iran released them in less than 48 hours. Everything was going in the right direction until President Trump withdrew and imposed the most comprehensive sanctions. This is about the first term of President Trump.

In the second term, when he was elected, he actually put an option on the Iranian table, “Deal under my terms and condition, or you would be attacked.” This was not and is not the language of diplomacy. This is the language of threat and bullying. And then, we have Iranian Foreign Minister Araghchi with Steve Witkoff. They had three rounds of talks in Oman and Rome, and they agreed on the principles. They really agreed. Then, they agreed that the technical team would sit, and they would draft it to be signed. Suddenly, Prime Minister Netanyahu called President Trump, and President Trump backed down. And then, Israel attacked Iran. When Israel attacked Iran, then President Trump publicly said to Iranians, “Unconditional surrender.” And then, the U.S. attacked. And now, after the U.S. attacked, now he’s saying “regime change”! Therefore, now, everybody, I think, has a correct understanding, well understanding that unfortunately, President Trump is not really for diplomacy and a solution.

Otherwise, if really, they want a solution on the nuclear, it is easy because we have three major issues. One is about Iran cooperation with the IAEA. We have the model. The model worked for three years very well. All technical issues were resolved. The nuclear deal, they can agree that all transparency measures, verification measures can be revived based on the deal, and all technical issues can be resolved between Iran and the IAEA. The second issue is about whether Iranian enrichment would be military or civilian. If it is below 5%, definitely would be civilian. Iran is ready to go back to – like the JCPOA, to go back to enrichment below 5%, to stop 20%, to stop 60%. And the third issue is about the Iranian stockpile of enriched 400-kilogram of 60% enriched uranium. I think if there is a comprehensive, fair and balanced deal, Iran would be ready either to export or to dilute this stockpile. Therefore, every concern would be removed. It is really within the reach if President Trump is going to have diplomacy succeed.

AMY GOODMAN: We’ve just spoken with Ambassador Mohammad Marandi in Brussels, who helped to negotiate an Iran nuclear deal back in 2005.

Seyed Hossein Mousavian
Visiting Research Collaborator

Program on Science and Global Security.

Princeton University

By Craig Mokhiber

The attack on Iran is just the latest crime in the Israeli regime’s path of destruction across the Middle East. Its Western-backed impunity has become a global threat. 

18 Jun 2025 – The Israeli regime, drunk with western-backed impunity, flush with western-supplied weapons, and driven by a violent, western-born racist ideology, is rampaging across the Middle East, leaving a trail of blood and destruction in its wake.

The Israeli regime’s blatant act of aggression against Iran is just the latest crime perpetrated by the regime in its current twenty-month orgy of violence in the region.

But Israel is not a lone rogue. And it could not get away with its crimes without a powerful backer.

The U.S. provided the Israeli regime with the greenlight for its surprise attack, the distraction of (perhaps disingenuous) diplomatic talks to facilitate the attack, U.S. tax dollars to finance the operation, the intelligence for targeting, the weapons and ammunition for killing, the diplomatic cover to protect it from Security Council action, U.S. forces for the interception of Iran’s defensive response, the promise of direct U.S. military backing if Israel requires it, and the propaganda cover of complicit U.S. media corporations. Now the U.S. appears poised to enter the military assault directly.

Once again, the U.S. is a co-perpetrator in Israel’s crimes.

The resulting Israeli impunity, the principal byproduct of U.S. collaboration with the Israeli regime, not only threatens Palestinian self-determination and the sovereignty of countries across the region, but global peace and security itself.

The global threat of Israeli impunity

In recent months, the Israeli regime has perpetrated genocide and apartheid in Palestine, a transnational terrorism attack with booby trapped pagers in Lebanon, thousands of armed attacks on Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, & Iran, the unlawful occupation of Palestinian, Lebanese, and Syrian territory, several extrajudicial executions on foreign territory, the assault on and commandeering of the humanitarian flotilla ship the Madleen, countless attacks on United Nations staff and facilities, and the use of its proxies in Western countries to harass human rights defenders and to corrupt governments.

Israel has stockpiles of conventional, hi-tech, nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons, allows no international inspections of them, and refuses to ratify the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). And it is governed by a far-right, deeply racist, and fundamentally violent regime that is unconstrained by any norms of international law, international diplomacy, or common morality.

Add the ingredient of impunity, and you have a formula for global disaster. The western-guaranteed impunity that the Israeli regime has enjoyed is what has produced the regime’s serial criminality. And that criminality threatens the entire region and, potentially, the world.

Worse, to further insulate the Israeli regime, the U.S. and its allies have systematically corrupted, captured, or crushed virtually every government in the region, and battered the parts of Lebanon (Hezbollah) and of Yemen (Ansar Allah) still challenging the regime and its violent hegemonic project. Only Iran is left standing. As such, it represents an intolerable element to the Israeli regime and its U.S. sponsor: deterrence.

A war for U.S.-Israel regional hegemony 

Thus, Iran is being targeted because it is the last independent state still standing in the region, following the corruption and capture of most Arab governments by the U.S., and the systematic destruction of those that refused to submit (e.g. Iraq, Libya, Syria).

The essence of this plan was revealed more than two decades ago by U.S. General and former NATO Commander Wesley Clarke, when he described U.S. plans to “attack seven Muslim countries in five years.” On the list were Iraq, Libya, Syria, Lebanon, Somalia, Sudan and, of course, Iran.

Iran is being targeted because it is the last independent state still standing in the region. Because decades of efforts by the U.S.-Israel axis to strangle and destabilize the country have failed to force Iran to submit, the U.S. and Israel have now moved to large-scale military aggression.

Even after decades of sanctions, sabotage, aggression, destabilization efforts, and the meddling of Western intelligence agencies, Iran has defiantly refused to submit to the U.S.. Despite sustained pressure, it has refused to abandon the Palestinian people, to normalize Israeli settler-colonialism and apartheid, or to look the other way as Israel perpetrates a genocide.

Importantly, it has also refused to surrender control of its natural resources (including significant oil and gas reserves) to the U.S. empire. And, famously, it refuses to give up its right, as a sovereign state, to develop peaceful nuclear energy for the benefit of its developing economy.

Because decades of efforts by the U.S.-Israel axis to strangle and destabilize the country (while causing great civilian suffering in the country) have failed to force Iran to submit, the U.S. and Israel have now moved to large-scale military aggression, dusting off the old, fabricated “WMD” justifications that served them so well in justifying their aggression in neighboring Iraq more than twenty years ago.

But, in this case, they have extended the argument to absurd levels, basing their justification for war not on a claim that Iran has WMDs, but that they might someday acquire them. A charge made all the more ridiculous by the fact that the attackers themselves- both the U.S. and Israel- in fact possess such weapons, and that both are themselves guilty of serial acts of aggression, while Iran is not.

Jus ad bellum: The crime of aggression

The U.S.-backed Israeli regime’s unprovoked attack on Iran was a crime under international law. Indeed, it was a treacherous attack, launched in the middle of ongoing U.S. negotiations, and even targeting the Iranian official in charge of the negotiations. (And, by the way, right after Israel cut off the internet in Gaza, drawing a digital curtain around its accelerating genocide there).

Article 51 of the UN Charter recognizes the right of self-defense only in response to an “armed attack,” or when specifically authorized by the Security Council. Any other armed attack constitutes the crime of aggression in international law.

That means that the Israeli regime is using force against Iran unlawfully, in violation of Article 2(4) of the UN Charter, prohibiting the threat or use of force, and, as such, is committing the crime of aggression. In this case, as a matter of law, the right to self-defense belongs to Iran, and decidedly not to Israel (or the U.S.).

Furthermore, contrary to the claims of the Israeli regime’s proxies in the West, international law does not allow for so-called “anticipatory self-defense” or so-called “pre-emptive strikes.”

This is quintessential aggression, considered the supreme crime in international law, and perpetrated by the same regime that is currently perpetrating the other crime of crimes, genocide. In this context, any U.S. complicity in these Israeli crimes renders the U.S. equally criminal.

Some, like the Bush administration in the lead up to the Iraq aggression, have tried to argue that anticipatory self-defense is permissible. But that argument was widely rejected, since the intent of the Charter was to prohibit claims of self-defense unless and until an armed attack has occurred, or military force is authorized by the Security Council.

Even the 19th-century customary international law idea of anticipatory self-defense, argued by some before the adoption of the UN Charter, did not go as far as the Bush distortion. Before the Charter was adopted, the Caroline Test allowed for a kind of anticipatory self-defense but only if the threat was “instant, overwhelming, and leaving no choice of means, and no moment for deliberation,” clearly not the case in Israel’s attack on Iran.

Others have tried to carve out a middle ground, saying anticipatory action may be permissible whenever an attack is deemed “imminent.” This, too, is a dubious argument since there is not a hint of such an exception in international law. In any event, in the case of Iran, no such attack was imminent—and the Israeli regime did not even claim one to be imminent.

Of course, Israel, the quintessential rogue regime, wrapped in the armor of U.S.-guaranteed impunity, cares little about legality. But its representatives and proxies will often try to adopt a veneer of legality as part of the regime’s propaganda efforts in Western media.

As such, Israel proxies have tried to distort the idea of anticipatory self-defense even further by claiming the right to attack anybody who might someday in the future decide to attack Israel. They seek to claim that Iran may one day develop nuclear weapons, that it may use them on Israel if it develops them, and that therefore Israel has no choice but to attack Iran now.

Clearly, as a matter of international law, that is entirely impermissible. If that were the rule, any state could lawfully attack any other state at any time, just by claiming a potential future threat. And that would effectively annul the UN Charter.

But, for Israel, this makes perfect sense. Israel is, in essence, an annihilatory state. It was created in violence, has expanded through violence, and is sustained by way of constant violence. Its official ideology is premised on a militarized conception of security that essentially says that anyone who does not submit to us must be destroyed, lest they someday try to fight back.

Thus, the entire history of the Israeli regime has been defined by militarization, conquest, colonization, expansion, and aggression. In practical terms, this has meant genocide against the indigenous people of Palestine and constant attacks against the regime’s neighbors.

But even under the broadest possible arguments of anticipatory self-defense (which, again, is rejected by almost the entire discipline of international law), Israel’s use of force against Iran would still be illegal.

This is not a hard case. (1) Iran does not have nuclear weapons, (2) there is no evidence that it is developing nuclear weapons, (3) there is no evidence that it would use those weapons against the Israeli regime even if it obtained them, (4) there was no imminent threat, and (5) the Israeli regime has not exhausted peaceful means, as required by international law.

In sum, this is quintessential aggression, considered the supreme crime in international law, and perpetrated by the same regime that is currently perpetrating the other crime of crimes, genocide. In this context, any U.S. complicity in these Israeli crimes renders the U.S. equally criminal.

Jus in Bello: Attacking civilians and civilian infrastructure

Beyond the crime of aggression, the Israeli regime’s attacks on Iran have included a number of other grave breaches of international humanitarian law. As of the drafting of this article, the Israeli regime has already killed hundreds of Iranians, overwhelmingly civilians. It has targeted apartment buildings, media buildings, and at least one hospital. And it has murdered several Iranian scientists. Needless to say, such acts violate the principle of distinction and the prohibition of targeting protected persons and protected civilian infrastructure.

The killing of scientists is a case in point. Only if a scientist is a member of the military (that is, not a civilian working for the military), then, in some circumstances, s/he may be a legitimate target.  But most scientists, including the Iranian scientists, are civilians, even if they were working on weapons. (And the Iranian scientists are not even working on weapons, just nuclear energy.) As such, targeting them is entirely unlawful. And, needless to say, it is impermissible, as a matter of law, to target people in their homes just because they are scientists who might someday work on weapons. This, in simple terms, is the crime of murder.

To accept the Israeli regime’s outrageous arguments would be tantamount to adopting a rule whereby it would be permissible to shoot all males on sight, simply because they might someday become soldiers.

Similarly, Israel’s targeting of civilian infrastructure (e.g., apartment buildings) to kill a scientist (whether civilian or military) could not pass the international humanitarian law tests of precaution, distinction, or proportionality, and is thus unlawful. Additionally, attacks on scientists because they might someday build a bomb would be unlawful in itself. In the current conflict, these scientists cannot be seen to threaten the Israeli forces in any way and are not legitimate military objectives.

To accept the Israeli regime’s outrageous arguments would be tantamount to adopting a rule whereby it would be permissible to shoot all males on sight, simply because they might someday become soldiers. Needless to say, this is not allowed.

Israel’s attacks on Iran’s energy infrastructure are also unlawful. Such installations are generally protected under international humanitarian law, because they are essential to civilian survival. Only in very narrow circumstances can they become military targets, (for example, when soldiers are firing from them, and all humanitarian law principles are respected). Those conditions are clearly not met here. In the current conflict, these facilities have not been used to threaten Israeli forces in any way. Attacking them is impermissible as a matter of law.

Attacks on nuclear facilities

Particularly egregious, as a matter of both law and humanity, is the Israeli regime’s attacks on Iran’s nuclear facilities. In international humanitarian law, attacks on dangerous facilities, such as nuclear power plants and other facilities containing what the law calls “dangerous forces”, are generally prohibited. Indeed, the International Atomic Energy Agency has affirmed that such attacks are prohibited in international law and are a violation of the UN Charter.

These facilities are protected under international law due to the potential for severe harm to the civilian population if attacked. While theoretically, there may be circumstances where such attacks are allowed, in practice, it would be almost impossible for a warring party to meet the necessary conditions for lawfully attacking such facilities.

The only circumstances in which it may be permitted are when (1) these facilities are directly used for military purposes (like launching attacks), and (2) there is a legitimate military objective, and (3) the attack is necessary for that objective, and (4) an effective warning is given, and (5) the military action meets the legal tests of precaution, distinction, and proportionality. Such a standard is almost impossible to satisfy with regard to a nuclear facility, because of the risk of radiation leaks and dissemination and the potential for widespread civilian harm.

What is more, international humanitarian law also prohibits any means of warfare that are intended or may be expected to cause widespread, long-term, and severe damage to the natural environment. The law of neutrality requires that parties to the conflict must not cause transborder damage to a neutral state due to the use of a weapon in a belligerent state, which would be inevitable with the release of nuclear emissions.

As such, the Israeli regime’s attacks on Iran’s nuclear facilities are unlawful.

Reining in the rogues

The open lawlessness of the Israeli regime and its sponsors has wreaked havoc both on the countries and peoples of the Middle East, and on the very legitimacy of international law itself. Calling out the crimes of these states and pursuing accountability for them are essential to the cause of justice.

While the West obsesses about the risks of peaceful nuclear programmes, the true threat to global security at this moment in history rests not in reactors and centrifuges, but rather in aggression, genocide, and impunity. Containing these threats is a global imperative.

Craig Mokhiber is an international human rights lawyer and former senior United Nations Official.

23 June 2025

Source: transcend.org

By Prof. Jan Oberg

18 Jun 2025 – We’ve seen it repeatedly: You invent a pretext based on deliberate lies, fake news, exaggerations or a false flag operation which serves to construct a story that country or leader X is a threat to “us” which legitimates that we do a ‘preemptive’ strike against that – obviously invented – threat to eliminate it.

Mainstream media’s task is to propagate the ploy, not to ask questions or reveal the lie.

Take Serbia’s ‘genocide’ in Kosovo, Afghanistan’s responsibility for 9/11, Saddam’s possession of nukes in Iraq, Assad’s use of chemical weapons against the Syrians, Russia’s planning to occupy and administer not only Ukraine but also a series of European countries thereafter, Hamas’ attack on Israel – that Israel knew everything about before it happened – and now you have the blatant lie about Iran’s being just about to become a nuclear weapons power.

Basic facts about Iran that we are not hearing

Just a few facts you almost never hear but which are extremely important no matter what you think of the Iranian theocracy: It was the US/CIA and UK that made a regime-change in 1953 that deposed the democratically elected Dr. Mossadegh. The US installed the Shah – at the time the most ruthless and militarist leader in the world, and gave him nuclear technology.

Since 1979, when the Iranian revolution sent him running and occupied the US Embassy in Tehran, the US has done nothing – nothing – but harass Iran and its 90 million innocent Iranian citizens with the hardest sanctions thinkable (that have destroyed the middle class that could, if any, have changed the country’s leadership). The US and other NATO countries have systematically been building up Israel militarily – knowing full well that Netanyahu’s 30-year-old pathological dream is to eliminate Iran.

The leading actors in this drama are therefore “USrael” and not Iran.

Furthermore, Iran does not have nuclear weapons; Israel has – estimates state up to 400. Iran is a member of the NPT, the Non-Proliferation Treaty; Israel is not. Iran has been under constant inspection by the IAEA, but Israel has never accepted that. Around 2003, the present Supreme Leader, Khamenei, issued a fatwa against nuclear weapons, which is considered by some to be consistent with Islamic tradition.

More recently, in 2015, the JCPOA Agreement was concluded, which was rightly considered a major diplomatic victory for all involved parties. It led Iran to significantly decrease its uranium enrichment. Iran kept itself within the limits of that agreement, but the boastful, grumpy Donald Trump cancelled the US’ participation in 2018, and Iran has since used its enrichment as a bargaining chip while never getting near the level that would permit it to produce a nuclear weapon. In March, Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s director of national intelligence, confirmed that there was no indication that Iran was nearing the threshold. On June 17, Trump said that he did not care about what she said; he knew that Iran was ‘very close.’ More information on these matters can be found in my article from yesterday, available here.

This will do as a broader background to the prediction in the headline. The West’s stockpile of lies, misinformation and media deception seems to me to be way more fateful than any Iranian military fact or activity.

Specific reasons for the prediction and the laws of war

Now to the more specific reasons, which point in one direction, only: A larger war on Iran with aim of changing the Iranian regime.

According to media reports, Netanyahu had told Trump that Israel could kill the Supreme Leader, and Trump said he would not accept that. Israel has bombed civilian areas and the Iranian IRIB broadcasting complex in Iran, and Israeli agents have blown up cars inside Iran. None of that would be necessary to destroy nuclear research facilities. Trump left the G7 meeting early and stated that he was not working on a ceasefire between Iran and Israel but working on an “end, a real end,” and he has called for Iranian “UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER” and demanded that Tehran’s population leave the city.

He also talked about something bigger to come and that Iran better accept his demands before there would be nothing left of it. In the afternoon, US time today, he had a meeting in the White House Situation Room with his national security team. He talks about knowing exactly where the Supreme Leader is hiding, but that he has no plans to kill him – “at least not now.” (I leave aside at this point what to think about these international law-violating, fascist statements. Trump would have no qualms about killing Iranian top leaders, remember the 2020 liquidation of Qassem Soleimani).

There are, while I write this, movements of huge US and British naval vessels to the region and talk about B52’s delivering bunker busters.

There is no doubt that the Trump Regime gave the green light to the Netanyahu Regime’s unprovoked and fake-preemptive attack on Iran. Trump said that he knew “everything” about it well in advance. This, in my view, means that he has also faced the possibility that the US will be drawn in if the Iranian response over time would be too hard for Israel – already in war with several neighbouring states – to handle alone.

This time, Iran has responded more forcefully than before, and it probably sees the USraeli threat as existential. If Iran continues to respond to Israeli attacks, this would drag in the US – and sooner rather than later. Trump would simply have no choice. He also knows that NATO allies in Europe will remain supportive of both him and Netanyahu if he goes down that slippery slope: A repetition of the Iraq war.

Some may object here that Trump is just bluffing. First, bluffing whom? If Iran perceives this as a threat to its very existence, it is, of course, not going to unconditionally surrender. It will fight to the last Iranian, and the idea that the Iranians would stand along the roads when the US and Israeli forces roll into Tehran is as delusional as it was in the case of Iraq. (After one day in Baghdad in 2002, I understood that there would be no one, no matter what they thought of Saddam).

No, there is another dynamic that is both much more powerful and relevant: the escalation of conflicts and violence, up to the outbreak of wars, pretty much follows its own dynamics and laws. If you’ve said “A” you have to move on and say “B” and do tit-for-tat – “C”… to the end of the alphabet, or the world.

De-escalation is extremely difficult, but phoney/pious statemen love to advocate de-escalation because they have nothing else to suggest and because they themselves caused the escalation in the first place by pumping in weapons, supporting one side and demonise the other in a conflict and have no clue about conflict-resolution, mediation, peace-making, reconciliation and that sort of – to them totally irrelevant – professional knowledge. Simply put, they are conflict and peace illiterates.

Given what has already happened, I do not have the imagination to see how Trump and Netanyahu can now back down from their words and deeds without losing face, and that is not exactly what they are known for. They will soon be guided less by their own decisions than by the laws of militarism, escalation and eventually full warfare: warfare for regime-change in Iran.

De-nuclearise Israel and have both under NPT and IAEA

To some extent, the nuclear issue is a pretext. To some extent, it is a real issue too. The tragedy is that it is impossible for anyone to destroy nuclear technology facilities and equipment, perhaps 100 meters down in massive mountains. Secondly, if they could succeed, Iran is capable of re-establishing its capacity and will likely have become convinced by the USrael policies that it has, against its will, to acquire nuclear weapons.

Since Israel has nuclear weapons and thereby violates all the non-binding UN resolutions about the Middle East as a zone free of weapons of mass destruction, the simple, effective solution would be for the international community to deprive Israel of its nuclear weapons and place both countries in the NPT and under IAEA surveillance. The West’s stupid insistence that Israel shall have nuclear weapons while Iran shall not is simply illogical, conflict- and war-promoting as well as morally unsustainable and discriminatory.

The dissolution of the messianic West: Evil, exceptionalism, escalation and eschatology

None of these decision-makers is burdened with ethics, long-term thinking or analyses of the consequences of their actions. They are driven by emotions, groupthink, lack of basic security knowledge, hubris, hate (of an Iran they do not know as anything but ‘mullahs’), of self-aggrandisement and a belief that they are exceptionalist. After all, the US and Israel are the two exceptionalist states par excellence. They see themselves as standing above the laws, ethics, and norms that the rest of the world feels obliged to respect at least to some extent.

In their delusional omnipotence, they seem to accept a kind of modern-day eschatological paradigm supplemented with the catharsis that the use of nuclear weapons may seem to promise: The birth of a new world in which Evil – that of the ‘others’ has been eradicated. That that evil is merely a psycho-political projection of their own evil system, such as militarism, and personalities, is of course, an unthinkable thought. However, it is an end-time view that is deeply embedded in Western Christian and Jewish social cosmology, which probably steers more in situations such as this than any rational thought, analysis, or prudent statesmanship.

Macro-historically, it belongs to a civilisation, an Empire, in rapid decline, decay and dissolution. And at the micro-level, it would be foolish to underestimate Trump’s and Netanyahu’s messianic zeal in times of their systems’ decay. I fear weapons, yes. But I fear these types of people more.

Prof. Jan Oberg, Ph.D. is director of the independent Transnational Foundation for Peace & Future Research-TFF in Sweden and a member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace Development Environment.

23 June 2025

Source: transcend.org

By Jeffrey D. Sachs and Sybil Fares

We could soon see several nuclear powers pitted against each other and dragging the world closer to nuclear annihilation.

16 Jun 2025 – For nearly 30 years, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has driven the Middle East into war and destruction. The man is a powder keg of violence. Throughout all the wars that he has championed, Netanyahu has always dreamed of the big one: to defeat and overthrow the Iranian Government. His long-sought war, just launched, might just get us all killed in a nuclear Armageddon, unless Netanyahu is stopped.

Netanyahu’s fixation on war goes back to his extremist mentors, Ze’ev Jabotinsky, Yitzhak Shamir, and Menachem Begin. The older generation believed that Zionists should use whatever violence–wars, assassinations, terror–is needed to achieve their aims of eliminating any Palestinian claim to a homeland.

The founders of Netanyahu’s political movement, the Likud, called for exclusive Zionist control over all of what had been British Mandatory Palestine. At the start of the British Mandate in the early 1920s, the Muslim and Christian Arabs constituted roughly 87% of the population and owned ten times more land than the Jewish population. As of 1948, the Arabs still outnumbered the Jews roughly two to one. Nonetheless, the founding charter of Likud (1977) declared that “between the Sea and the Jordan there will only be Israeli sovereignty.” The now infamous chant, “from the River to the Sea,” which is characterized as anti-Semitic, turns out to be the anti-Palestinian rallying call of the Likud.

The challenge for Likud was how to pursue its maximalist aims despite their blatant illegality under international law and morality, both of which call for a two-state solution.

In 1996, Netanyahu and his American advisors devised a “Clean Break” strategy. They advocated that Israel would not withdraw from the Palestinian lands captured in the 1967 war in exchange for regional peace. Instead, Israel would reshape the Middle East to its liking. Crucially, the strategy envisioned the US as the main force to achieve these aims—waging wars in the region to dismantle governments opposed to Israel’s dominance over Palestine. The US was called upon to fight wars on Israel’s behalf.

The Clean Break strategy was effectively carried out by the US and Israel after 9/11. As NATO Supreme Commander General Wesley Clark revealed, soon after 9/11, the US planned to

“attack and destroy the governments in seven countries in five years—starting with Iraq, then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Iran.”

The first of the wars, in early 2003, was to topple the Iraqi government. Plans for further wars were delayed as the US became mired in Iraq. Still, the US supported Sudan’s split in 2005, Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in 2006, and Ethiopia’s incursion into Somalia that same year. In 2011, the Obama administration launched CIA operation Timber Sycamore against Syria and, with the UK and France, overthrew Libya’s government through a 2011 bombing campaign. Today, these countries lie in ruins, and many are now embroiled in civil wars.

Netanyahu was a cheerleader of these wars of choice–either in public or behind the scenes–together with his neocon allies in the U.S. Government including Paul Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith, Victoria Nuland, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, Richard Perle, Elliott Abrams, and others.

Testifying in the U.S. Congress in 2002, Netanyahu pitched for the disastrous war in Iraq, declaring,

“If you take out Saddam, Saddam’s regime, I guarantee you that it will have enormous positive reverberations on the region.” He continued, “And I think that people sitting right next door in Iran, young people, and many others, will say the time of such regimes, of such despots is gone.” He also falsely told Congress, “There is no question whatsoever that Saddam is seeking, is working, is advancing towards to the development of nuclear weapons.”

The slogan to remake a “New Middle East” provides the slogan for these wars. Initially stated in 1996 through “Clean Break,” it was popularized by Secretary Condoleezza Rice in 2006. As Israel was brutally bombarded Lebanon, Rice stated:

“What we’re seeing here, in a sense, is the growing — the birth pangs of a new Middle East and whatever we do we have to be certain that we’re pushing forward to the new Middle East not going back to the old one.”

In September 2023, Netanyahu presented at UN General Assembly a map of the “New Middle East” completely erasing a Palestinian state. In September 2024, he elaborated on this plan by showing two maps: one part of the Middle East a “blessing,” and the other–including Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Iran–a curse, as he advocated regime change in the latter countries.

Israel’s war on Iran is the final move in a decades-old strategy. We are witnessing the culmination of decades of extremist Zionist manipulation of US foreign policy.

The premise of Israel’s attack on Iran is the claim that Iran is on the verge of acquiring nuclear weapons. Such a claim is fatuous since Iran has repeatedly called for negotiations precisely to remove the nuclear option in return for an end to the decades of US sanctions.

Since 1992, Netanyahu and his supporters have claimed that Iran will become a nuclear power “in a few years.” In 1995, Israeli officials and their US backers declared a 5-year timeline. In 2003, Israel’s Director of Military Intelligence said that Iran will be a nuclear power “by the summer of 2004.” In 2005, the head of Mossad said that Iran could build the bomb in less than 3 years. In 2012, Netanyahu claimed at the United Nations that “it’s only a few months, possibly a few weeks before they get enough enriched uranium for the first bomb.” And on and on.

This 30-year-plus pattern of shifting deadlines has marked a deliberate strategy, not a failure in prophecy. The claims are propaganda; there is always an “existential threat.” More importantly, there is Netanyahu’s phony claim that negotiations with Iran are useless.

Iran has repeatedly said that it does not want a nuclear weapon and that it has long been prepared to negotiate. In October 2003, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei issued a fatwa forbidding the production and use of nuclear arms—a ruling later officially cited by Iran at an IAEA meeting in Vienna in August 2005 and referenced since as a religious and legal barrier to pursuing nuclear weapons.

Even for those skeptical of Iran’s intentions, Iran has consistently advocated for a negotiated agreement supported by independent international verification. In contrast, the Zionist lobby has opposed any such settlements, urging the US to maintain sanctions and reject deals that would allow strict IAEA monitoring in exchange for lifting sanctions.

In 2016, the Obama Administration, together with the UK, France, Germany, China, and Russia, reached the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) with Iran—a landmark agreement to strictly monitor Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief. Yet, under relentless pressure from Netanyahu and the Zionist lobby, President Trump withdrew from the deal in 2018. Predictably, when Iran responded by expanding its uranium enrichment, it was blamed for violating an agreement that the US itself had abandoned. The double-standard and propaganda is hard to miss.

On April 11, 2021, Israel’s Mossad attacked Iran’s nuclear facilities in Natanz. Following the attack, on April 16, Iran announced that it would increase its uranium enrichment further, as bargaining leverage, while repeatedly appealing for renewed negotiations on a deal like the JCPOA. The Biden Administration rejected all such negotiations.
At the start of his second term, Trump agreed to open a new negotiation with Iran. Iran pledged to renounce nuclear arms and to be subject to IAEA inspections but reserved the right to enrich uranium for civilian purposes. The Trump Administration appeared to agree to this point but then reversed itself. Since then, there have been five rounds of negotiations, with both sides reporting progress on each occasion.

The sixth round was ostensibly to take place on Sunday, June 15. Instead, Israel launched a preemptive war on Iran on June 12. Trump confirmed that the US knew of the attack in advance, even as the administration was speaking publicly of the upcoming negotiations.

Israel’s attack was made not only in the midst of negotiations that were making progress, but days before a scheduled UN Conference on Palestine that would have advanced the cause of the two-state solution. That conference has now been postponed.

Israel’s attack on Iran now threatens to escalate to a full-fledged war that draws in the US and Europe on the side of Israel and Russia and perhaps Pakistan on the side of Iran. We could soon see several nuclear powers pitted against each other and dragging the world closer to nuclear annihilation. The Doomsday Clock is at 89 seconds to midnight, the closest to nuclear Armageddon since the clock was launched in 1947.

Over the past 30 years, Netanyahu and his US backers have destroyed or destabilized a 4,000-km swath of countries stretching across North Africa, the Horn of Africa, the Eastern Mediterranean, and Western Asia. Their aim has been to block a Palestinian State by overthrowing governments supporting the Palestinian cause. The world deserves better than this extremism. More than 180 countries in the UN have called for the two-state solution and regional stability. That makes more sense than Israel bringing the world to the brink of nuclear Armageddon in pursuit of its illegal and extremist aims.

Jeffrey D. Sachs, Professor of Sustainable Development and Professor of Health Policy and Management at Columbia University, is Director of Columbia’s Center for Sustainable Development and the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network. 

Sybil Fares is a specialist and advisor in Middle East policy and sustainable development at SDSN.

23 June 2025

Source: transcend.org

By Caitlin Johnstone

“OMG nuclear weapons!” Shut up, idiot. If you’re a grown adult with internet access still swallowing this load of bull spunk in the year 2025 you’re either stupid or evil.

17 Jun 2025 – There is absolutely no excuse for buying into the war propaganda about Iran after what we all saw with Iraq.

“OMG nuclear weapons!” Shut up, idiot. If you’re a grown adult with internet access still swallowing this load of bull spunk in the year 2025 you’re either stupid or evil.

President Donald Trump is now saying he has no intention of seeking or facilitating a ceasefire with Iran, telling reporters that he’s after a “complete give-up” from Iran instead.

“I’m not too much in a mood to negotiate,” Trump said.

Asked by the press if he’s worried about US troops being targeted by Iran in the coming days, the president said “We’ll come down so hard if they do anything to our people. We’ll come down so hard. The gloves are off. I think they know not to touch our troops.”

This is a stupid, crazy lie. Iran has explicitly said it will strike US bases in the region if the US attacks Iranian territory. If you punch someone, you expect to be punched back.

If Trump orders US forces to bomb Iran, it will be because he wants to start a war and knowingly chose to do so.

[https://twitter.com/stairwayto3dom/status/1934920657261019171]

One of the dumbest narratives we’re currently being fed about Iran is the claim that Israel is precision-striking high-level targets in Iran while Iran is just bombing civilians all over the place in Israel.

A casual glance at the death tolls shows this is clearly false. As of this writing the current official death count sits at 24 Israelis killed by Iran and 224 Iranians killed by Israel — most of whom are reportedly civilians. On Friday they bombed a residential building and killed 60 people, including 20 kids.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz thumped his chest on Twitter about an IDF strike on an Iranian television station on Monday, saying “The Iranian regime’s propaganda and incitement broadcasting authority was attacked by the IDF after a widespread evacuation of residents in the area.”

I wonder how the western press who are currently deceiving the public to promote Israel’s information interests feel about this new rule that it’s okay to bomb media outlets if someone decides they’re propaganda?

People shouldn’t be so hard on Trump about all this. You’d probably start a war with Iran too if someone was threatening to leak your child molestation video.

The war on Iran isn’t really about nuclear weapons — if it was they would’ve kept the nuclear deal in place, which was working as intended. The Gaza holocaust isn’t really about Hamas or hostages — if it was they would’ve just targeted Hamas or negotiated a hostage deal.

It’s all lies. The war on Iran is about regional hegemony and the genocide in Gaza is about Israel’s longstanding desire to remove all Palestinians from a Palestinian territory. It’s not about self-defense, it’s about land and power, and it always has been.

This is one of the reasons antiwar people have been focusing so hard on Gaza, by the way. It wasn’t just because it’s a horrific genocide happening right in front of us, it was because it always risked blowing up into a regional war involving Israel’s western allies. We’ve been watching it expand into the West Bank, Lebanon, Yemen, Syria, and into Iran for a bit last year, and now it’s blown up into all-out war between Israel and Iran with the US poised to join in.

For 20 months I’ve been getting people asking me why I’ve been so laser-focused on Gaza while paying less attention to this or that conflict or foreign policy issue. This is why. It’s a waking nightmare in and of itself, but it’s also always been a powderkeg that could explode into something much, much worse.

Caitlin Johnstone is a rogue journalist, poet, and utopia prepper. Contact: admin@caitlinjohnstone.com

23 June 2025

Source: transcend.org

By Chris Hedges

Israel and its neoconservative allies in the United States have long attempted to start a war with Iran, a war that neither Israel nor the U.S. can win and will engender ferocious blowback.

13 Jun 2025 – The neoconservatives who orchestrated the disastrous wars with Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and Libya — and who were never held accountable for the profligate waste of $8 trillion taxpayer dollars, as well as $69 billion squandered in Ukraine — look set to lure us into yet another military fiasco with Iran.

Iran is not Iraq. Iran is not Afghanistan. Iran is not Lebanon. Iran is not Libya. Iran is not Syria. Iran is not Yemen. Iran is the seventeenth largest country in the world, with a land mass equivalent to the size of Western Europe. It has a population of almost 90 million — 10 times greater than Israel — and its military resources, as well as alliances with China and Russia, make it a formidable opponent.

Iran launched retaliatory attacks today on Israel following waves of Israeli strikes that hit nuclear facilities and killed several top Iranian military commanders and six nuclear scientists. There have been dozens of expolsions over the skyline in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. There is video footage of at least one large explosion on the ground in Tel Aviv from an apparent missile strike and reports of other explosions in some half dozen sites in and around Tel Aviv.

“Our revenge has just started, they will pay a high price for killing our commanders, scientists and people,” a senior Iranian officials told Reuters. The official added that “nowhere in Israel will be safe” and that “our revenge will be painful.”

“They think it’ll be an easy war,” said Alastair Crooke, a former British diplomat and member of British intelligence (MI6) who spent decades in the Middle East, told me of the neocons when I interviewed him. “They want to reassert American power and leadership. They feel that every so often throwing a small country against the wall and smashing it up is good for this.”

These neocons, bonded with the Israeli leadership of Benjamin Netanyahu, he went on, “will not tolerate any rival power, any challenge to American leadership and American greatness.” They will create facts on the ground – a war between Israel and Iran – that will “pull Trump into a war with Iran.”

You can see my interview with Crooke here.

While Iran’s air force is weak, with many of its fighter planes decades old, it is well supplied with Russian air defense batteries and Chinese anti-ship missiles, as well as mines and coastal artillery. It can shut down the Strait of Hormuz, the world’s most important oil chokepoint that facilitates the passage of 20 percent of the world’s oil supply. This would double or triple the price of oil and devastate the global economy. Iran has a large arsenal of ballistic missiles it can unleash on Israel, as well as on American military installations in the region. While initial waves can be intercepted, repeated attacks would swiftly deplete the Israeli and U.S. air defense stockpiles.

Israel is not equipped to endure a war of attrition, such as the eight year conflict between Iran and Iraq that ended — despite U.S. support for Saddam Hussein’s regime — in a stalemate, or as in Israel’s 18 year occupation of southern Lebanon that eventually forced it to withdraw in May, 2000, after repeated losses suffered from Hezbollah.

When Iran, in its Operation True Promise, launched over 300 ballistic and cruise missiles at Israel’s military and intelligence sites on April 13 and 14, 2023, in retaliation for an Israeli strike on the Iranian embassy in Damascus, the U.S. intercepted the vast majority.

“Israel cannot fight off an Iranian missile attack,” John Mearsheimer, a West Point graduate and a professor in the Political Science Department at the University of Chicago, told me. “You have this very interesting situation where not only can Israel not win these wars, but they’ve turned [them] into protracted wars” in which “Israel is heavily dependent on the United States.”

“We have lots of assets in the Middle East and the eastern Mediterranean, as well as in Israel itself and in the Red Sea,” he said. “These [are] designed to help Israel in its various wars. This includes not just Iran. It also includes the Houthis. It includes Hezbollah. So we are deeply involved in helping them fight. That was not the case in 1973 or any time before this war.”

Israel and its neocon allies believe they can eradicate Iran’s nuclear enrichment program by force and decapitate the Iranian government to install a client regime. That this non-reality-based belief system failed in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and Libya, eludes them.

Israel, at the same time, wants to divert world attention from its genocide and mass starvation in Gaza and the accelerated ethnic cleansing in the West Bank. Internet connection has been completely shut down in Gaza. The West Bank has been placed under a total blockade.

“The Israelis understand that if you have a general conflagration, people will not be paying much attention to the Palestinians,” Mearsheimer said. “People will be willing to give Israel more of a pass than they would in peaceful times. So let’s really ramp things up. Let’s have a general conflagration, and the end result will be that we can cleanse, on a massive scale, in Gaza and hopefully in the West Bank as well.”

You can see my interview with Mearsheimer here.

Iranian attacks would eventually leave hundreds, then thousands dead. Iran will appeal to Shi’ite Muslims through the region in what the Iranian leadership will describe as a war against Shi’ism, the second largest branch of Islam. Saudi Arabia — which condemned the attacks on Iran — has two million Shi’ites who live in the oil-rich Eastern province. There are significant Shi’ite communities in Pakistan, Bahrain and Turkey. Shi’ites form the majority in Iraq.

The Shi’ite-dominated government in Baghdad will side with Iran. Yemen will continue to disrupt maritime traffic in the Red Sea and hit Israel with drone attacks. Hezbollah, however crippled, will renew attacks on northern Israel. Expect terrorist attacks on U.S. bases in the region and perhaps even U.S. soil, as well as widespread sabotage of oil production in the Persian Gulf.

Iran will soon have enough fissile material to produce a nuclear weapon. A war will be a powerful incentive to build a bomb, especially with Israel possessing hundreds of nuclear weapons. If Iran acquires a nuclear weapon Saudi Arabia will be next, with Turkey, Iraq and Egypt not far behind. The efforts to blunt nuclear proliferation in the Middle East will evaporate.

A war, as Mearsheimer points out, will also solidify the alliance between Iran, Russia and China.

“The United States has pushed China, Russia, North Korea and Iran very close together,” he noted. “They form a tight knit bloc. Largely as a result of the Ukraine war, the Russians and the Chinese have been driven together, and given what’s happening in the Middle East, the Iranians and the Russians have been drawn together. The United States may be helping Israel, but it’s important to understand that the Russians are helping Iran. It’s not to America’s advantage to have China and Russia aligned closely against Washington. It’s not in America’s interest to have Russia and Iran working together against Israel and the United States.”

“There’s always the possibility that if a war heats up involving Iran on one side and the United States and Israel on the other side, that at some point down the road that the Russians will get dragged into that war, because the Russians now have a vested interest in supporting Iran,” he added.

A war could last months, if not years. It will be an aerial duel, one largely between Israeli warplanes and missiles and Iranian missiles. But to subdue Iran it will require perhaps a million U.S. troops being deployed to invade and occupy the country. An occupation of Iran will end with the same humiliating defeat the U.S. experienced in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The fantasy of Israel and the neocons is that they can break Iran with aerial assaults, an updated version of Shock and Awe, the bombing campaign in Iraq in 2004. But the amount of ordinance required, especially to pulverize Iran’s underground nuclear facilities, will be massive. Israel, in its decapitation of the leadership of Hezbollah in Beirut, including Hezbollah’s General Secretary Hassan Nasrallah, had to employ Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) 2,000-pound bunker-buster bombs.

“If you’re going to fly F-35’s with JDAM missiles, each of those is about 14 tons,” Crooke said. “It’s not just the weight, but the fuel they use. So you have to refuel maybe once, refuel twice, then you’ll have to fight your aircraft to suppress their defenses. You’re talking about a huge performance. Is America going to be able to do this? The Iranians have multiple air defense systems and good radars, over the horizon radars as well.”

So why go to war with Iran? Why walk away from a nuclear agreement that Iran did not violate? Why demonize a government that is the mortal enemy of the Taliban, along with other Takfiri groups, including al-Qaeda and Islamic State in the Levant (ISIL)? Why further destabilize a region already dangerously volatile?

The generals, politicians, intelligence services, neocons, weapons manufacturers, so-called experts, celebrity pundits and Israeli lobbyists are not about to take the blame for two decades of military fiascos. They need a scapegoat. It is Iran. The humiliating defeats in Afghanistan and Iraq, the failed states of Syria and Libya, the proliferation of extremist groups and militias, many of which we initially trained and armed, along with the continued worldwide terrorist attacks, have to be someone else’s fault.

The chaos and instability we unleashed, especially in Iraq and Afghanistan, left Iran as the dominant country in the region. Washington empowered its nemesis. It has no idea how to reverse this other than to attack it.

International law, along with the rights of almost 90 million people in Iran, is ignored just as the rights of the people of Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Yemen and Syria were ignored. The Iranians, whatever they feel about their leadership, do not see the United States as allies or liberators. They do not want to be attacked or occupied. They will resist. And we, and Israel, will pay.

Chris Hedges is a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist who was a foreign correspondent for fifteen years for The New York Times, where he served as the Middle East Bureau Chief and Balkan Bureau Chief. 

23 June 2025

Source: transcend.org

By Vijay Prashad

Israel’s attacks on Iran, backed by the US and EU, violate international law and aim to maintain regional dominance by undermining Iran’s sovereignty, despite Iran’s compliance with nuclear agreements. Since the 2020 U.S. assassination of General Soleimani, Washington and Tel Aviv had been working to weaken Tehran. Now Israel smells an opportunity to overthrow the Iranian government by force.

13 Jun 2025 – Israel’s consistent attacks on Iran since 2023 have all been illegal, violations of the United Nations Charter (1945). Iran is a member state of the United Nations and is therefore a sovereign state in the international order. If Israel had a problem with Iran, there are many mechanisms mandated by international law that permit Israel to bring complaints against Iran.

Thus far, Israel has avoided these international forums because it is clear that it has no case against Iran. Allegations that Iran is building a nuclear weapon, which are constantly raised by the United States, the European Union, and Israel, have been fully investigated by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and found to be unfounded. It is certainly true that Iran has a nuclear energy programme that is within the rules in place through the IAEA, and it is also true that Iran’s clerical establishment has a fatwa (religious edict) in place against the production of nuclear weapons. Despite the IAEA findings and the existence of this fatwa, the West – egged on by Israel – has accepted this irrational idea that Iran is building a nuclear weapon and that Iran is therefore a threat to the international order. Indeed, by its punctual and illegal attacks on Iran, it is Israel that is a threat to the international order.

Over the past decades, Iran has called for the establishment of a Middle East Nuclear Free Zone, a strange idea coming from a country accused of wanting to build a nuclear weapon. But this idea of the nuclear free zone has been rejected by the West, largely to protect Israel, which has an illegal nuclear weapons programme. Israel is the only country in the Middle East with a nuclear weapon, although it has never tested it openly nor acknowledged its existence. If Israel was so keen on eliminating any nuclear threat, it should have taken the offer for the creation of a nuclear-free zone heartily.

Neither the Europeans, who so often posture as defenders of international law, nor the United Nations leadership have publicly pushed Israel to adopt this idea because both recognize that this would require Israel, not Iran, to denuclearize. That this is an improbable situation has meant that there has been no movement from the West or from the international institutions to take this idea forward and build an international consensus to develop a nuclear-free zone in the Middle East.

Israel does not want to build a nuclear-free zone in the region. What Israel wants is to be the sole nuclear power in the region, and therefore to be exactly what it is – namely, the largest United States military base in the world that happens to be the home to a large civilian population. Iran has no ambition to be a nuclear power. But it has an ambition to be a sovereign state that remains committed to justice for the Palestinians. Israel has no problem with the idea of sovereignty per se, but has a problem with any state in the region that commits itself to Palestinian emancipation. If Iran normalized relations with Israel and ceased its opposition to US dominion in the region, then it is likely that Israel would end its opposition to Iran.

Israel and the United States prepared the way

In January 2020, the United States conducted an illegal assassination at Iraq’s Baghdad Airport to kill General Qassem Soleimani, the leader of the Quds Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC). Soleimani, through the Quds Force, had produced for Iran an insurance policy against further Israeli attacks on the country. The Quds Force is responsible for Iranian military operations outside the boundaries of the country, including building what is called the “Axis of Resistance” that includes the various pro-Iranian governments and non-governmental military forces. These included: Hezbollah in Lebanon, various IRGC groups in Syria that worked with Syrian militia groups, the government of Bashar al-Assad in Syria, several Palestinian factions in Occupied Palestine, and the Ansar Allah government in Yemen. Without its own nuclear deterrent, Iran required some way to balance the military superiority of Israel and the United States. This deterrence was created by the “Axis of Resistance”, an insurance policy that allowed Iran to let Israel know that if Israel fired at Iran, these groups would rain missiles on Tel Aviv in retaliation.

The assassination of Soleimani began a determined new political and military campaign by the United States, Israel, and their European allies to weaken Iran. Israel and the United States began to punctually strike Iranian logistical bases in Syria and Iraq to weaken Iran’s forward posture and to demoralize the Syrian and Iraqi militia groups that operated against Israeli interests. Israel began to assassinate IRGC military officers in Syria, Iran, and Iraq, a campaign of murder that began to have an impact on the IRGC and the Quds Force.

Taking advantage of its genocidal war against the Palestinians in Gaza, Israel, with full support from the United States and Europe, began to damage the “Axis of Resistance”, Iran’s insurance policy. Israel took its war into Lebanon, with a ruthless bombing campaign that included the assassination of the Hezbollah leader Sayyid Hassan Nasrallah on September 27, 2024. This campaign, while it has not totally demolished Hezbollah, has certainly weakened it. Meanwhile, Israel began a regular bombing campaign against the Syrian military positions around Damascus and along the road to Idlib in the north. This bombing campaign, coordinated with the US military and with the US intelligence services, was designed to open the roadway for the entry of the former al-Qaeda fighters into Damascus and to overthrow the government of al-Assad on December 8, 2024. The fall of the al-Assad government dented Iran’s strength across the Levant region (from the Turkish border to the Occupied Palestinian Territory) as well as along the plains from southern Syria to the Iranian border. The consistent campaign by the United States to bomb Yemeni positions further resulted in the loss of Ansar Allah’s heavy equipment (including long-range missiles) that fundamentally threatened Israel.

What this meant was that by early 2025, the Iranian insurance policy against Israel had collapsed. Israel began its march to war, suggesting an attack on Iran was imminent. Such an attack, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu knows, would help him in a domestic political fight with the ultra-orthodox parties over the question of a military exemption for their communities; this will prevent his government from falling. Cynical Netanyahu is using genocide and the possibility of a horrendous war with Iran for narrow political ends. But that is not what is motivating this attack. What is motivating this attack is that Israel smells an opportunity to try to overthrow the Iranian government by force.

Iran returned to the negotiations brokered by the IAEA to prevent such an attack. Its leadership knew full well that nothing would stop a scofflaw such as Israel from bombing Iran. And nothing did. Not even the fact that Iran is still at the negotiation table. Israel has taken advantage of Iran’s momentary weakness to strike. And that strike might escalate further.

Vijay Prashad is an Indian historian, editor and journalist. He is a writing fellow and chief correspondent at Globetrotter. 

23 June 2025

Source: transcend.org

By Defend Democracy Press

21 Jun 2025 – The UN Secretary-General António Guterres described the United States’ bombing of three nuclear sites in Iran as a “dangerous escalation” today following eight days of deadly strikes and counter strikes between Tehran and Tel Aviv.

“I am gravely alarmed by the use of force by the United States against Iran today,” said the UN chief, reiterating that there is no military solution.

[https://twitter.com/antonioguterres/status/1936603735330898368]

“This is a dangerous escalation in a region already on the edge – and a direct threat to international peace and security.”

President Donald Trump delivered a televised address to the nation from the White House at 10pm local time and said that Iran’s nuclear facilities at Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan had been “totally obliterated” describing the long-range bombing raid as a “spectacular military success.”

President Trump called on Iran’s leadership to now “make peace” and return to negotiations over its nuclear programme or suffer a far greater wave of attacks.

Iranian authorities have yet to confirm the extent of the damage to the three sites in central Iran. Earlier in the day, Iran’s foreign minister reportedly warned the US against any involvement in the Iran-Israel conflict which erupted on 13 June.

Deadly strikes

At least 430 Iranians are believed to have been killed during waves of strikes since then with around 3,500 injured, according to figures from the Iranian health ministry.

In Israel, 24 civilians have died in the retaliatory attacks according to local authorities with more than 400 missiles reportedly fired towards the country.

B-2 bombers were involved in the US strikes, President Trump confirmed, dropping so-called “bunker buster” bombs on the uranium enrichment site at Fordow which is buried deep inside a mountain south of the capital Tehran.

‘Avoid a spiral of chaos’

In his statement, the Secretary-General reiterated his concerns voiced in the Security Council during Friday’s emergency meeting on the crisis that the conflict “could rapidly get out of control – with catastrophic consequences for civilians, the region, and the world.”

He called on all Member States to de-escalate the situation which threatens the stability of the Middle East and beyond, calling for everyone to uphold their obligations under the UN Charter and international law.

“At this perilous hour, it is critical to avoid a spiral of chaos,” he added calling for an immediate return to negotiations between the warring parties.

“There is no military solution. The only path forward is diplomacy. The only hope is peace.”

23 June 2025

Source: transcend.org

By UN News

As the pall of starvation hangs over Gaza, UN agencies have sounded the alarm over deadly violence at food distribution points, where over 400 Palestinians have reportedly been killed in recent weeks while trying to access desperately needed humanitarian aid.

18 Jun 2025 – The UN human rights office (OHCHR) in the Occupied Palestinian Territory on Wednesday called on the Israeli military to cease the use of lethal force near aid convoys and food distribution sites.

It cited “repeated incidents” of Palestinians being shot or shelled while seeking food, warning that such attacks could constitute war crimes under international law.

“We are horrified at the repeated incidents, continuously reported in recent days across Gaza, and we call for an immediate end to these senseless killings,” the office said in a statement.

Hundreds killed

Since 27 May, when the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), an initiative backed by Israel and the United States began food distribution in southern Gaza – bypassing the established UN-led system – hundreds have been killed and many more wounded near four distribution points or while waiting to pick up aid.

In one of the deadliest recent incidents, Israeli military reportedly shelled a crowd waiting for UN food trucks in southern Gaza on 17 June, killing at least 51 people and injuring some 200 others, according to Gazan health authorities.

A day earlier, three Palestinians were reportedly killed and several injured in a similar incident in western Beit Lahiya.

“There is no information to suggest that the people killed or injured were involved in hostilities or posed any threat to the Israeli military or to staff of GHF distribution points,” OHCHR said.

Protect civilians, aid workers

The UN World Food Programme (WFP), which has managed to dispatch only 9,000 metric tons of food within Gaza over the past month – a fraction of what is required for the 2.1 million people in need – echoed calls for immediate protection of civilians and aid workers.

“Far too many people have died while trying to access the trickle of food aid coming in,” the agency said in a separate statement.

“Any violence resulting in starving people being killed or injured while seeking life-saving assistance is completely unacceptable.”

Massive scale-up needed

The UN emergency food relief agency said the fear of starvation and desperate need for food is causing large crowds to gather along well-known transport routes, hoping to intercept and access humanitarian supplies while in transit.

“Only a massive scale-up in food distributions can stabilize the situation, calm anxieties and rebuild the trust within communities that more food is coming,” it said, calling urgently for safer convoy routes, faster permissions, restored communication channels and additional border openings.

“The time to act is now. Delays cost lives. We must be allowed to safely do our jobs,” the agency said.

23 June 2025

Source: transcend.org

Statement Issued by the Palestinian Alternative Revolutionary Path Movement (Masar Badil)
U.S. Military Bases Out of Our Arab Homeland Immediately! No to U.S. Military Occupation in Our Region!

In light of the ongoing U.S. aggression against our peoples—most recently, the treacherous bombing of the Islamic Republic of Iran—the Masar Badil, the Palestinian Alternative Revolutionary Path Movement reaffirms its firm position: all American and Western military bases must be expelled from our Arab region. Their presence constitutes a form of direct colonialism and remains a constant source of aggression, plunder, and terrorism.

U.S. bases in the Arab Gulf, Iraq, Syria, Jordan, and across the Arab world have been transformed into launching pads for bombings and direct support to the Zionist enemy. They function as command centers for the aggression against the resistance in Palestine, Lebanon, and Yemen, as well as hubs for espionage and domination serving only the interests of Washington and Tel Aviv, at the expense of the sovereignty and dignity of our peoples.

The occupying U.S. forces in our Arab land benefit from extensive privileges, including the use of airspace, ports, airports, and military camps, along with fuel services, maintenance, and weapons storage across most countries in the region. This grants them unrestricted mobility by land, air, and sea.

The presence of U.S. military bases in our region constitutes a direct occupation of the land, through which the Arab people are stripped of their will and sovereignty. These bases serve only the Zionist entity and the regimes of subservience and normalization. Accordingly, they are legitimate targets for all armed revolutionary forces in the region.

We call upon the masses of our Arab people everywhere, upon the forces of liberation and revolutionary change in the Arab homeland, and upon international liberation movements, to launch a broad popular campaign against the American military presence in West Asia. The expulsion of U.S. military bases must be seen as an urgent national and revolutionary objective, no less vital than the struggle against the Zionist project in occupied Palestine.

Palestinian Alternative Revolutionary Path Movement (Masar Badil)
June 22, 2025

Source: masarbadil.org