What a disaster the war against Iran has been for Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu. The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the United States and Iran signed on June 17 has formally brought a halt to the devastating war. Yet, as the ink dries on the 14-point preliminary framework, the reality of the document stands in stark contrast to the grandiose, megalomaniac rhetoric that defined the start of the conflict.

Only a handful of analysts and scholars that I know of foresaw what is now unfolding, stressing the realities of Iran’s resilience in the face of international pressure for decades. I was one of them: back in 2012, I warned that there could be no military solution to curbing Iran’s nuclear programme and noted that the US not only knew this, but had warned Israel that this would be the case.

When Trump and Netanyahu launched the initial military campaign on February 28, the objective was explicitly stated: the complete destruction of Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programme, an end to Tehran’s support for regional proxies such as Hezbollah, the Houthis and Hamas – and regime change. But the text of the MoU reveals a profound pivot from those aims, at least as far as the White House is concerned.

Ultimately, the agreement marks the final collapse of Pax Americana in the Persian Gulf region and highlights the resilience of Iranian state sovereignty against external pressure. At the onset of the war, both Washington and Tel Aviv projected absolute confidence in their military capabilities.

Following initial........

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