Iran Declares War – We Pretend Not To Notice

Ever since Joe Biden sat down in the White House, he has pursued policies contrary to the interests of the American people and beneficial to our enemies. He has projected weakness. He has practiced appeasement. We have grown weaker. Those who wish us dead have grown stronger.

The corporate media has pretended this is not true. The Democratic Party has stood behind Joe even as he has placed the entire nation in jeopardy. The feckless GOP establishment has done nothing of consequence to push back.

We will now all pay the price.

Last week Hamas launched an invasion of Israel and killed well over 1400 Israelis. Hezbollah also has now begun attacks on Israeli territory. Both groups are creatures of Iran, which is now making increasingly direct threats against not only Israel but the United States and its allies all across the world.

This crisis is not spinning down. It is escalating, and that escalation originates in Tehran, where the mad mullahs have calculated correctly it appears that they can act with impunity. Perhaps the fact that they have a great many supporters in this administration has something to do with that.

Iranian-backed Shia militia, armed, trained, and directed by Tehran have within the last 24 hours launched drone and missile attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq at least two different locations. Details are still sketchy, but it appears no casualties resulted from either attack.

This action should come as no surprise. Last week Ahmad “Abu Hussein” al-Hamidawi, the head of the Kataib Hezbollah militia, an Iranian surrogate, said, “Our missiles, drones, and special forces are ready to direct qualitative strikes at the American enemy in its bases and disrupt its interests if it intervenes in this battle.” He was warning the U.S. not to support Israel in its fight with Hamas.

Following the attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq, Iran’s proxies wasted no time in making sure the world knew who was behind the actions. “We announce the targeting by a drone of the Harir American occupation base in northern Iraq at exactly twelve o’clock in the afternoon on Wednesday,” said a Telegram statement by the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, a network of Iraqi militia groups backed by Iran and affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). 

The Islamic Resistance is not a handful of guys. It is a network of at least fifteen Iranian proxies, front groups, and other pro-Iranian actors. They are all armed, trained, and directed by the IRGC. Every one of the groups in the Resistance has a history of attacking American forces.

The attacks in Iraq did not occur in isolation. Last night the U.S. Embassy in Beirut was attacked. Crowds of Iraqis marched on the U.S. Embassies in Amman and Baghdad as well. The U.S. Embassy in Ankara, Turkey was also attacked by Hamas supporters.

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has made clear Iran’s intent. On Tuesday he issued a direct threat against the United States.

“Our numerous intelligence reports show that the US is formulating the Zionist regime’s current policy, and what is being done is governed by US policymaking,” read the post on X, formerly known as Twitter. “The US must be held responsible for this situation.”

The Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian has been equally as clear saying that “preemptive action” against Israel is coming, “the resistance front is capable of waging a long-term war,” and “all options are open.”

None of this is happening by accident. None of it was unforeseeable. We have enriched Iran and emboldened the ayatollahs and the whole Middle East is now in danger of going up in flames.

We do not need more appeasement. We also do not need knee-jerk war-hawk reactions, like air strikes and deployments of troops with no strategic purpose or clear vision of an end game. What we need is what we have lacked since at least 9/11, a strategy.

In this case, that would likely include the enforcement and tightening of sanctions against Tehran, the dismantling of its network of surrogates across the Middle East, support for the democratic resistance in Iran, and a renewed dedication to the Abraham Accords and the achievement of a lasting rapprochement between the Arab states and Israel. Part of parcel of this effort to contain and strangle revolutionary Iran would be a concerted effort to dismantle its nuclear weapons program and prevent Tehran from ever getting the bomb.

We will, of course, get none of these things.

An administration that has given Iran by some estimates $50 billion dollars over the last three years and appointed a Hamas supporter its envoy to Tehran would not dream of such actions. Instead, we will stumble blindly ahead. Iran has declared war, and we will now pretend not to notice.