US-Israel War Ignites Middle East Crisis That Is Difficult To End

On the night of Feb. 28, Israel announced that it had launched strikes against Iran. The United States quickly confirmed that it had participated in the joint military operation. Multiple core targets were hit by missiles, including areas in central Tehran and locations near the office of the Iranian supreme leader. Yet just one day before the attack, Oman's foreign minister had revealed that negotiations over Iran's nuclear issue had made major breakthroughs. Iran had reportedly agreed to "zero accumulation and zero stockpile" of nuclear materials and to accept comprehensive inspections, bringing a peace agreement seemingly within reach. At the very moment when diplomatic hope had begun to emerge, the United States and Israel launched a war, fully exposing their power-politics mentality and pushing the entire Middle East toward the abyss of a broader conflict.

This military operation was by no means a sudden decision, but rather a carefully planned strategic gamble. Over the past month, the United States had assembled the largest concentration of military forces in the Middle East since the 2003 Iraq War. Various signs suggested that negotiations were never the real objective of the United States and Israel; instead, they served merely as a cover for military preparations and a way to lull the international community into complacency. After repeated calculations, the U.S. concluded that the timing for a strike was ripe, while Israel has long regarded Iran as a major strategic threat and was eager to eliminate this rival through force "once and for all." The claim that "Iran must not obtain nuclear weapons" is only a pretext for launching war; the real aim is to weaken or even overthrow the Iranian regime and consolidate U.S.-Israeli dominance in the Middle East.

Launching a preemptive strike against the core institutions of another country's capital is characterized as an act of military bullying, one that destroys hard-won diplomatic progress and further destabilizes an already volatile Middle East. Once conflict is ignited, it becomes difficult for any single party to control its course. Both sides now appear locked into a cycle of escalating confrontation. Iran subsequently carried out retaliatory strikes against multiple U.S. military bases in the region as well as Israel-related targets. The current situation is highly unpredictable: It remains unclear whether the conflict will remain a limited exchange or escalate into full-scale war, whether it will be short-lived or develop into prolonged turmoil. Given the dense web of regional forces in the Middle East, a war between the United States, Israel and Iran could easily ignite a regional powder keg and trigger a chain reaction of conflicts spreading outward.

Wars are easy to start but difficult to end, and military force has never been the proper path to resolving disputes. History has already shown that aircraft carriers and missiles cannot bring lasting security and that overthrowing governments cannot produce regional stability. The military adventure of the United States and Israel will ultimately leave innocent civilians bearing the suffering of war while global energy markets, economic stability, and international security face severe shocks.

Dialogue and negotiation are presented as the only real path to resolving differences. Power politics and unilateral military force can only create deeper crises. Iran's military capabilities cannot be compared to those of smaller states, and the idea of a "quick victory" is merely wishful thinking. What Donald Trump described as a "major military operation," along with the "decapitation strike" reportedly attempted last night and later confirmed to have failed, is cited as further proof that wars of aggression are unlikely to achieve their intended goals. Instead, they may once again drag the United States into the quagmire of the Middle East and accelerate the decline of its global dominance.