There are stark similarities between the US-led intervention against Gaddafi in 2011 and the US-Israeli campaign against the Iranian theocracy. There are stark differences, too. While the former was largely heralded by Western public opinion, the latter has been met with widespread opposition. Yet, in principle, they are identical: a struggle to depose a ruthless regime. Today, Iran represents a far greater threat to its own people and the West than Gaddafi’s Libya ever did – the same Libya that Sir Anthony Giddens, writing in The Guardian, “presciently” hailed as the future “Norway of North Africa” only a few years earlier. The discrepancy in support likely stems from the geopolitical and ideological stakes: the fight against Iran is a battle for Israel’s survival and durable peace in the Middle East, whereas the intervention against Gaddafi saw Qatar joining forces with NATO (including Turkey that time).

It is ironic that while critics lambasted Trump for bypassing Congress to strike Iran, they largely ignored that Obama did the same in his attack on Libya in 2011. Obama appeared justified by humanitarian concerns – the fear that Gaddafi, as a ruthless dictator, might perpetrate atrocities against his own people. And the Iranian regime? A regime that butchered approximately 40,000 of its own citizens in a matter of days is still treated as a trustworthy interlocutor by a vast section of Western public opinion. This dismissal is driven by Foucaultian “culture” and anti-Semitism – the twin roots of Western demise and helplessness.

Calls for a diplomatic solution to the conflict will only serve to stabilize the Iranian regime and sustain its proxies: Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Houthis. Despite the academic chatter regarding “national interest,” “geostrategy,” and “security issues,” the fall of the Iranian regime would be a monumental victory for both the West and the Middle East. It would shatter the “Axis of Evil,” weakening Russia’s regional foothold and forcing China to abandon its calculated ambiguity. Furthermore, such a shift would act as a powerful catalyst – building on the Abraham Accords – toward the widespread acceptance of Israel within the Arab world.

Yet Western public opinion remains paradoxically resistant to this outcome. It is unmoved by humanitarian concerns or the plight of millions of oppressed Iranians, including the tens of thousands slaughtered in mere days. Even the Left, which once considered it noble to dismiss economic interests, is now preoccupied with the price of oil. It remains willfully ignorant of the fact that even the Gulf monarchies have quietly aligned with Israel in the fight against evil.

Unfortunately, it turned out that few in the West care about the Iranian people, and even fewer – predictably – about Israel, and that Trump, in the end, may well have TACOed again. He had the chance to be remembered for something positive – a truly humanitarian intervention – yet he chose to let it slip into a missed opportunity. Unless he changes his mind once again.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)