|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
US Signals New Military Strikes in Iran Unlikely as Economic Pressure on Regime Mounts | Avi Melamed’s insights quoted by debbie Weiss, in this article for The Algemeiner.
Top US officials suggested this week that Washington was unlikely to resume military strikes against Iran, signaling that economic pressure on the regime was having a significant impact and would be the priority.
However, some Israeli experts expressed concern that the US position was guided by uncertainty over what to do next and that a resolution without further military pressure could result in a “capitulation agreement.”
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Tuesday told reporters after meetings with G7 counterparts in Paris that the US blockade and sanctions were inflicting such severe economic damage on Iran that further major military operations were unnecessary.
“The economic pain that is being inflicted on Iran right now is extraordinary, and it compounds. It’s growing every day,” Rubio said.
“We don’t need to conduct military strikes if we’re achieving the same objective through economic means and economic pressure. That’s not stalemate,” he added.
Senior administration officials, including Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and White House chief of staff Stephen Miller, also favor maintaining economic pressure rather than resuming strikes, Reuters reported. Vice President JD Vance favors reaching a negotiated settlement, although President Donald Trump currently considers a viable agreement unlikely, a person familiar with the administration’s thinking told the news agency.
Trump said Monday that the war with Iran was “effectively over” militarily and suggested that Washington was unlikely to resume strikes against Tehran, following talks with Qatar’s prime minister aimed at ending more than eight months of conflict.
“Iran militarily is effectively over,” Trump told reporters at the White House. “We’re just keeping it the status quo.”
“At this point, taking the military action doesn’t seem to be a very necessary thing – but we’re locked and loaded, ready to go for any reason,” he added.
His remarks marked a departure from repeated threats to resume large-scale attacks following last week’s midterm elections.
In a post on Truth Social, Trump said his discussions with Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani had reinforced the preference of Gulf states, including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Kuwait, for maintaining the US naval blockade and the land-based Operation Iron Gate.
“All have agreed that Iran cannot have a Nuclear Weapon,” he wrote, calling the requirement “non-negotiable.”
“Israel, and the entire Middle East, are protected from Iranian danger and threats,” Trump wrote. “We are seeing positive momentum toward an end to this Conflict, and will ensure that America’s interests are at all times protected.”
Avi Melamed, a Middle East analyst and former Israeli intelligence official, said the uncertainty surrounding US strategy reflected several factors, including Gulf states’ opposition to renewed fighting, Iran’s changing positions, developments in Israel, and the post-election situation in Washington. But the ambiguity was not necessarily an attempt to “conceal or obscure” a clear strategic vision; rather it “reflects uncertainty and a lack of clear direction within the US administration about how to proceed with the Iranian regime,” he told The Algemeiner.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, meanwhile, defended the military campaign on Tuesday, claiming the US had achieved “a historic military victory” over Iran.
“More than 13,000 targets struck. Their navy sunk. Their air force grounded. Their defense industrial base gone,” Hegseth said at a Pentagon news conference, asserting that more than 80% of Iran’s nuclear industrial infrastructure had been destroyed.
Hegseth said Washington was capable of monitoring Iran’s nuclear facilities and warned that any attempt by Tehran to rebuild its military or nuclear capabilities could trigger further action.
“We know that they’re going to attempt to reconstitute. We know that we are in a much stronger position,” he said.
Iranian officials, meanwhile, rejected suggestions that negotiations were progressing.
Mohsen Rezaei, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, accused Washington of inventing reports of diplomatic contacts and demanded that it accept Tehran’s conditions for ending the conflict.
“The war on Iran has already wrecked the US government. But Washington flails like a desperate gambler,” Rezaei wrote on X.
“FOLD YOUR HAND. STOP manufacturing FAKE NEWS about imaginary talks,” he added. “Time to SURRENDER to the seven conditions Iran has repeatedly set out.”
Iran’s proposal calls for Washington to lift its naval blockade, ease sanctions, release frozen Iranian assets, and halt military operations in exchange for Tehran reopening the Strait of Hormuz to commercial shipping. Negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program would follow those initial measures.
Rubio rejected the proposal on Sunday, describing Tehran’s demands as “outrageous and ridiculous and really not realistic.” He said a diplomatic breakthrough was not imminent.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly been urging Trump to resume military operations. According to the Financial Times, which cited a person briefed on the discussions, Netanyahu has been calling the president daily to call for renewed strikes, while Gulf leaders have pressed the White House to avoid escalation.
Israeli defense officials, meanwhile, are preparing for the possibility of a renewed American offensive or a surprise Iranian attack on US military installations in the Middle East, including Israeli bases hosting American personnel, Israeli journalist Amir Bohbot reported on Tuesday in the Walla news outlet. IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir held a series of operational assessments, the report said.
US forces carried out limited strikes against Iranian air defenses and other military targets on Qeshm Island in recent days. On Saturday, US Central Command said its forces disabled a commercial vessel in the Gulf of Oman after its crew ignored warnings and attempted to breach the American blockade.
Eitan Shamir, director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar-Ilan University, outlined three possible scenarios: a limited military operation intended to pressure Iran into concessions at the negotiating table; a larger offensive with unpredictable consequences; or what he described to The Algemeiner as a “capitulation agreement” by Trump aimed at bringing the conflict to an end.
Iran has also continued attacks on shipping in the Gulf and Strait of Hormuz, with maritime security agencies recording a sharp increase in incidents during October.
Trump has acknowledged that the conflict, launched by the US and Israel on Feb. 28, contributed to Republican losses in the midterms, while Vance was more explicit, telling reporters last week that “the reason we lost is the war.”
Hegseth also acknowledged on Tuesday that the campaign was “not necessarily popular” with American voters but defended it as a necessary undertaking to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons.
US Signals New Military Strikes in Iran Unlikely as Economic Pressure on Regime Mounts | Avi Melamed’s insights quoted by debbie Weiss, in this article for The Algemeiner.
If you want to have a better understanding of the news and what really drives the unfolding events… Read the latest book of Avi Melamed,
INSIDE THE MIDDLE EAST | ENTERING A NEW ERA, available now >>>
Follow me on Twitter @AviMelamed; Facebook @InsideTheMiddleEast; for more Videos on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/c/AviMelamed
I can always be reached at Av*@********ed.com
