(I had previously written a number of articles under this title between 2019 and 2024, concluding on 6 April 2024 while awaiting the next phase of the recurring Zionist assault on our region. Those who wish to consult them may find them on my blog. Today, however, I write because what is unfolding is more perilous than any development since the beginning of this century.)
In the previous instalment, published on 6 April 2024, I concluded with the following:
“I believe that Israel will not cease its attempts to drag Iran into a comprehensive military confrontation. If its most recent strike fails, it will try again, escalating in a manner that may directly target Iranian territory.”
What I anticipated indeed came to pass. Iran was drawn into a short war in which Zionist forces struck nuclear research and uranium enrichment facilities. The conflict lasted twelve days and came to an end on 24 June 2025, at Zionist request and under international pressure—at a moment when Iran lacked, perhaps, the political, and possibly the military, will to continue the fight.
Yet Iran learned several lessons from that aggression. It became convinced that truthfulness is the last virtue possessed by Zionism. It also discovered vulnerabilities in its own defences. Whether it has succeeded in remedying them remains uncertain, despite the assurances of some of its officials. Moreover, during those twelve days, Iran came to realise that Zionism holds sway over the entirety of the Arab world.
I did not write at the time, as I was awaiting the completion of a plan of aggression that was halted by Zionist forces for reasons that remain unknown. What we are witnessing today is the continuation of that plan.
On the very day following Zionist declarations that an agreement concerning the future of Iran’s nuclear programme was imminent—after Iran had offered concessions few had anticipated—Zionist forces launched a wide-ranging assault targeting Iran’s religious leader, along with a number of first-tier political and military figures. This was clearly a premeditated operation, demonstrating that the negotiations were nothing more than deception and misdirection.
This assault bore no essential difference from that of 13 June 2025. Iran succeeded in absorbing the severity of the blow that claimed the leader and his companions, proving—as I have argued in previous instalments—that it is a genuine institutional state, not one dependent on a single individual whose fall would bring about its collapse, as naïve Zionists had presumed. Their delusions of intellectual superiority blind them to the realities of history—and how could they grasp such realities when their leader is a convicted felon, and those surrounding him are of the so-called “Epstein circle”?
As I write these lines, war is ongoing. I will not speculate on its outcome, nor claim knowledge of where it may lead. Instead, I shall focus on the dimension concerning Iraq, where part of this conflict has now shifted.
Iran now finds itself confronting one of the harshest truths: the aggression inflicted upon Iraq in 2003—an event Iran applauded and to which it contributed through Iraqi proxies—has returned to confront Iran itself in a similar form, carried out by the same Zionist force that invaded Iraq. The objective, the method, and the instrument remain essentially unchanged.
- Just as Zionist forces claimed in 2003 that they sought to eliminate weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, so too have they claimed in 2026 that their assault on Iran is intended to prevent it from acquiring nuclear weapons—even as they themselves possess vast stockpiles of such arms.
- Just as they alleged in 2003 that Iraq was on the verge of attacking them, they now claim that Iran was preparing aggression in 2026.
- Just as the 2003 invasion began with an attempt to assassinate Iraqi President Saddam Hussein—through the bombing of sites in Baghdad—so too did the 2026 assault begin with the assassination of Ali Khamenei, Iran’s political and religious leader.
- Just as the invasion of Iraq aimed at regime change through the overthrow of Ba‘ath rule, so too is regime change the declared objective of the 2026 assault on Iran.
- Just as NATO participated in the 2003 invasion, so too does it play a full role in the 2026 assault, albeit in varying forms.
- Just as invading forces in 2003 launched their campaign from Arab lands, so too has the 2026 assault on Iran been launched from bases situated on Arab territory.
- And just as the invasion of Iraq reshaped the political map of the region—removing Iraq from the Arab–Zionist conflict and precipitating wider transformations, including the toppling of regimes in Libya and Syria—the assault on Iran, whatever its outcome, will inevitably reshape the region once more, perhaps even extending its effects into the broader sphere of international relations.
Yet there is a crucial difference between the invasion of Iraq and the impending invasion of Iran. Iran did not participate in the attack on Iraq in 2003; in contrast, in 2026 Iraq has participated in the assault on Iran. Iraqi airspace has been actively used in aerial bombardments, and Zionist bases within Iraq have been essential for operations and logistical support. Nor is this Iraq’s only form of participation; it mirrors, in this regard, the roles played by the Arabian Peninsula, the Gulf states, and Jordan. Indeed, Iraq represents an even greater danger to Iran due to their shared land border, which enables hostile forces—whether foreign or local proxies—to infiltrate Iranian territory.
Thus, Iran finds itself face to face with bitter realities it had long sought to avoid:
- It has discovered that its western land border is now its most dangerous frontier, owing to Zionist presence in Iraq—not only in the form of military forces and airbases, but also intelligence networks operating freely: spying, infiltrating, recruiting adversaries, training them, sheltering them, and deploying them for sabotage and unrest when required.
- It has realised that the Iraqi factions it once sheltered and cultivated are not true allies. They have proven instead to be opportunists in a marketplace of loyalties, readily serving any patron who secures their narrow interests.
- Iran has been forced into a contradictory posture toward Iraq compared to its stance toward Gulf states. While it threatens the interests of Gulf countries from which attacks are launched, it avoids treating Iraq in the same manner, despite the fact that the danger emanating from Iraq is no less—and perhaps greater.
- Iran’s past support for Kurdish autonomy in Iraq has revealed itself to be at odds with its own national security, as such support inevitably encourages similar aspirations among its own Kurdish population.
- It has confronted a painful truth it may never openly acknowledge: that its national security was, in some respects, more stable during Ba‘athist rule in Iraq than under the subsequent order. It would have been exceedingly difficult for Zionist forces to establish bases in Iraq without occupation, and equally difficult to imagine foreign intelligence operating freely along Iran’s western frontier under Ba‘athist rule.
- Claims by certain Iraqi actors that they remain neutral in the face of ongoing Zionist aggression across the region lack even the most basic political coherence. The adversary itself has repeatedly declared that neutrality does not exist—a doctrine famously articulated by George W. Bush: “If you are not with us, you are with the enemy.”
The Zionist adversary, as I have repeatedly argued, is not limited to Israel and the United States alone. Rather, it constitutes a unified political, military, and economic bloc encompassing NATO and any state—Arab or otherwise—that hosts its bases or is bound to it through security and military agreements.
When a ruler in the Gulf Cooperation Council prevents me from visiting the land of my forefathers in the Arabian Peninsula, yet open it unconditionally to someone cursed in the Qur’an, such a ruler, is no less a Zionism than Golda Meir; indeed, perhaps the time has come for him to join her.
What, then, do I believe Iran ought to do? Though I hold no influence over its decisions, I shall address this question in the next instalment.
To be continued