The US bombing of Iran is about more than its nuclear ambitions

For the American empire and her most important ally in the Middle East, Israel, the Muslim world must remain in a miserable state in perpetuity. Only two kinds of countries are acceptable to this enterprise; the first resembles something of a failed state, like Libya, Sudan and Iraq – who, through military action directed or inspired by America – remain fragmented and inconsequential—chastened by internal civil strife and warlordism. These states are unable to provide for their people equitably, let alone pose any counterweight to the expansionist and genocidal ideology that inspires Israeli state policy.

The second kind is that of the UAE, Jordan, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia – each wretched in its own way. Their governments are seats of Arab Zionism, clamouring to defend this colonial outpost. They not only stay clear of any solidarity with Palestine but also curry favour with the United States by offering tithes and jizya in exchange for protection. Picture the recent hideous sight of these Gulf rulers providing trillions of dollars in US trade whilst the US oversees a genocide in Gaza.

These states, in their current form, not only waste the resources and energies of the Muslim ummah but also drain the iman of its people – who either queue up to find better lives elsewhere or accept the inevitable numbness that comes with an inconsequential life of malls, beaches and concerts – the kind of false consciousness that trades ummah and justice for empty materialism. Their people are either forced into a life of poverty like in Egypt or put in a permanent comatose state like in the UAE and Saudi Arabia.

The US attack on Iran must be viewed in this context. For sure, there have been divisions on tactics between the Israelis and Americans, but the aim of a Middle East where no single hegemonic order free from US control or a balancer to Israel arrives remains constant, whichever party occupies the Whitehouse. Iran was made to pay for its quest to maintain its independence. For sure, this independence came with its own excesses, including its grotesque actions in Syria and beyond. However, Iran represents a form of autonomy that Netanyahu found dangerous and inexcusable.

It was clear that despite its uranium enrichment programme, there was little sign it earnestly sought to create a nuclear weapon. Not because it couldn’t but because the Iranian government knew the negative consequences this would have for it internationally. And that is why it signed the JCPOA in 2015, committing to strict regulations on its nuclear aspirations. This is why, even after Trump left office in 2019, it remained wedded to its principles – using enrichment as leverage for the lifting of sanctions. The Iranian government was content to create strategic depth in the Middle East by promoting its proxies like Hezbollah and keeping Asad in office; these surrogates were its first line of defence against Israel. For many years, this strategy was successful, with the US under Obama turning a blind eye to its militias as they sought to wrestle power from popular uprisings.

Iran, however, did represent a potential counterbalance to Israel, and this is why the language of preemption was evoked in the latest weeks of bombing and the reason the US used to conduct its recent intervention. Preemption is a construct that has zero grounding in international law but was used by President George W Bush as a pretext to invade Iraq. Trump had previously chastised his predecessors for foreign policy adventurism. Netanyahu had been imploring the US for decades to act before Iran became too powerful, and it found an audience after recent events severely weakened Iran. Iran’s miscalculations post-October 2023 and the consequent erosion of its proxies opened the door for Israel to confront it in its weakest state. The Israelis had decimated its defences in recent weeks, killed its key leaders, military, political and scientific, in what looks like a colossal failure of intelligence and left an opportunity for America that it could not resist.

Far from playing a game of 4d chess, as administration loyalists have been queuing up to suggest. The truth of American foreign policy decision-making comes down to the whim of one man, the commander-in-chief. He had called for a two-week space for diplomacy two days before US intervention, only to go back on his word. Trump had come to office promising his MAGA base that he would eschew Middle Eastern entanglements. Make America Great Again is a way of thinking that promotes domestic national interests over neoconservative and neoliberal delusions of ordering the world. It is the most significant departure from American foreign policy since the country's rise to globalism in 1945. However, the pull of foreign policy orthodoxy, the military-industrial complex, and Zionist ambitions were too irresistible for the president.

Trump’s base is unhappy. Steve Bannon, Marjorie Taylor Greene and Tucker Carlson have all pointed out the feeling of betrayal. Their form of nativism was meant to be a break from the last 25 years of never-ending US wars. In Trump, they found a fellow ideologue, yet his actions in Iran illustrate the power of what they call the ‘’deep state’. Tucker Carlson, in his car crash interview with Senator Ted Cruz, went further than most when he acknowledged that the blank check the US offers Israel serves to undermine efforts to fix America’s problems at home. Already, administration officials like Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth and Vice President JD Vance have tried to justify action in Iran on MAGA terms, but the reasoning remains thin.

The bombing of Iran should be a wake-up call for the Muslim ummah. This joint enterprise of America and Israel will never accept any form of independence in the region. The Arab Spring's 'democratic moment' paved the way for Islamic parties precisely because Muslim people know that independence can only come through Islamic justice. The West will never entertain such aspirations again, with countries like the UAE acting as a counter-revolutionary force in the region. It should send a signal to the regimes that litter the Muslim world that you will never be safe in a region that has served Israel’s colonial ambitions.