Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu launched their war against Iran believing that overwhelming military power could achieve what decades of sanctions, diplomatic isolation and covert operations had failed to accomplish: cripple the Islamic Republic, break its political will and establish unchallenged American-Israeli dominance over the West Asia.

Eight months later, the irony could hardly be more devastating. The Iranian regime they sought to reduce to a lame duck has survived, while both men have suffered humiliating electoral setbacks. Netanyahu has lost his parliamentary majority, and Trump has watched the Democrats capture both the House and the Senate. The two leaders who wanted to dictate Iran’s political future now face profound uncertainty about their own.

The joint American-Israeli offensive, launched on 28 February 2026, was presented as a decisive blow against Iran’s nuclear ambitions and regional influence. Trump promised overwhelming success, while Netanyahu portrayed the confrontation as the culmination of his lifelong mission to neutralise Iran. Both assumed that military superiority would translate into strategic victory. What they failed to understand was that destroying military installations is not the same as destroying political authority. Bombs can devastate infrastructure, but they cannot manufacture legitimacy, produce a compliant government or guarantee that a battered adversary will surrender.

Iran has paid a heavy price in destruction, economic hardship and human suffering. Yet the Islamic Republic remains in power, its negotiating position has improved, and its leadership can claim to have resisted two of the world’s most formidable military powers. The war has also allowed Tehran to frame its rule in the language of national resistance. A government previously challenged by domestic discontent has found an opportunity to portray opposition to its rule as a foreign-funded threat to national survival. Trump and Netanyahu have inadvertently handed Iran’s rulers precisely the political narrative they needed.

The strategic failure becomes even more striking when measured against the domestic consequences........

© National Herald