The Iran crisis
Shahab Zolfaghari | Unsplash
On February 28th 2026, the US and Israel launched a combined attack on Iran, striking several parts of the country, destroying military infrastructure and killing several key leaders including Ayatollah Ali Khamenei himself. Also killing hundreds of innocent civilians in the process, including dozens of students at a girls’ school in the South of the country. This comes less than two months after the US triggered a somewhat similar operation in Venezuela, in that case capturing incumbent leader Nicolas Maduro.
The Venezuela precedent
The January precedent warrants renewed analysis in the wake of this latest operation. The Trump administration’s stated reason for overthrowing Maduro was that his country stood as a key hub for drug trafficking that has been severely impacting the US. In actuality, much of said traffic comes from Colombia and Bolivia via Mexico. The actual reason behind the operation was, quite blatantly, to seize control over the largest oil reserves in the world. And they did.
That Maduro was a dictator who did not respect the will of his own people in fraud-filled elections is a widely recognized fact. That Venezuela was extremely badly run by his corrupt regime which largely profited a small elite controlling key infrastructures is not being debated. What happened in January still raises two key issues:
Taking over by such force reserves detained by a particular country set a dramatic precedent, in which Trump’s America cannot be trusted to respect any form of international law. Thus upending the post-World War II order the West largely profited from, starting with the US.
What came since in Venezuela was short of an anarchic state of affairs. While political opponents did get freed and some international trade resumed, inflation rose to even greater heights while the economy was projected to shrink. All of it overshadowed by the looming threat of subsequent discretionary US intervention.
The Iran crisis
Iran stands as the next target in Trump’s list: a bigger, stronger one, hence the fact that he didn’t get to it first. Why? Because Iran is a much larger country, with decades of ongoing tensions between the two nations — and beyond. Also, with the ever impending threat of an Iranian nuclear program, which would obviously make the country that much greater of an enemy.
Still, what unfolded in the last couple of days shows that Trump is perfectly willing to take that chance: taking down the heads of the country while claiming to annihilate the very military infrastructures his administration stated had already been wiped out in last year’s airstrikes. What a difference a year makes.
Once again, the Ayatollah and his brutal theocracy have long been known as one of the world’s most repressive regimes. Recent demonstrations amounted to what many independent observers believe to be thousands of deaths — at least. The prospect of a regime change is thus, in and of itself, appealing.
However, these Iran attacks raise the very same issues the Venezuela situation did: the unlawfulness of the US-Israel operation, as well as the uncertainty of what will follow once this regime is taken down — if it is: remaining Iranian leaders are vowing to continue the fight for now. Making the likelihood of a long-term positive outcome ever more elusive.