Much of the unease about the US-Israeli campaign against Iran — especially among its backers — centers on the aims of the operation.
Some are concerned about the scope of the goals, especially as pertaining to regime change. “Trump talks regime change in Iran after strikes, but history shows that could be very hard,” read an Associated Press headline on Sunday.
Others argue that US President Donald Trump has “shifting Iran strategies.”
The unease, and the ambiguity, shouldn’t come as a surprise. Americans on both sides of the political spectrum are now averse to anything even faintly resembling the costly nation-building wars in Iraq and Afghanistan after the 9/11 attacks, and they are less than enthused to see US forces back once again in the Middle East fighting in a major conflict.
There is reason for concern about war aims on the Israeli side as well. Israel fought a series of undecisive campaigns whose goals were not at all clear in the decades before the October 7, 2023, Hamas attacks that set off the ongoing conflicts between Israel and the Iranian axis.
Read the rest of this article at the Times of Israel.
