As we speak, Iranian-American tensions are at an all-time high. In the wake of the assassination of Quds Force chief Qassem Suleimani, US President Donald Trump claimed that he was not seeking regime change in Tehran and the Iranians themselves also are looking for a "proportional" response.
Will war emerge from the retaliation?
One scenario could see the two sides engaged in a war of attrition, where after the Iranian strike the US selectively attacks certain targets and Iran retaliates again. Or the US could start to reach out to anti-Iran opposition groups, who will serve as proxies and fight against Iran on America's behalf.
At this point, it is hard to know what will happen. Trump is predictably unpredictable. It is hard to know in advance what direction Trump will take.
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Nevertheless, many prominent figures in Israel are already welcoming a possible American heavy-handedness to the Iranian regime.
In fact, it is plausible that pro-Iranian elements that staged the provocations in Iraq prior to assassination did so merely to distract the Iraqi people from their struggle against the Iranian regime.
As Iranian journalist, Neda Amin explained: "The Iraqi people realized that they cannot trust the Iranian regime and that this regime does not benefit them. For this reason, they are protesting against the Iranian regime, attacking the Iranian Embassy in their country, burning the Iranian regime's flag, etc. However, the Iranian regime is not silent about this and it is trying to hold the Iraqis hostage."
For this reason, Mendi Safadi, who heads the Safadi Center for International Diplomacy, Research, Public Relations and Human Rights, believes that if the US wants to avoid a war over the long term, the US must act now against the Iranian regime and to support the Iraqi pro-democracy protesters: "Anyone who disregards the Iranian expansion in the Middle East is likely to cause a world war that will take place in the region. Hezbollah's takeover of Lebanon politically and militarily, the Iranian militias in Iraq, Syria and Yemen, etc. have transformed the Iranian regime into a reign of terror that controls the resources of countries, thus expanding their axis of evil. Former President Barack Obama turned a blind eye to the Iranian militias."
