Iran’s President Declares ‘We Are at War with Israel, America, and Europe’

[Order Michael Finch’s new book, A Time to Stand: HERE. Prof. Jason Hill calls it “an aesthetic and political tour de force.”]

Just a few days before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with President Trump and secured from him declarations that the Islamic Republic would not be allowed to resume its aggressive and bellicose activities, Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian delivered a warning to the world that confirmed the Islamic Republic’s enmity toward the entire West, and should harden the determination of the Americans to make sure Iran cannot strike at its forces anywhere. The unintended beneficiary of his warning is Israel. More on Pezeshkian’s folly can be found here.

The Islamic Republic is in “a full-fledged war with America, Israel, and Europe,” Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said in an interview published on the country’s Supreme Leader’s official website on Saturday.

“They do not want our country to stand on its feet. This war is worse than Iraq’s war against us,” he continued, referencing the eight-year conflict which spanned the 1980s. “If one understands it well, this war is far more complex and difficult than that war.

It is strange that Pezeshkian announced to the world that Iran is “in a full-fledged war” with Europe, which has not been true — there have been Iran-appeasers inside the European Union, and not a single European state has attacked Iran — but now his announcement makes it so. He ought better to have said “America and Israel have been making war on us, and are preparing to launch a strike like the one they launched last June. Fortunately, Europe is not joining this effort by the warmakers in Tel Aviv and Washington. We have no quarrel with Europe.”

Pezeshkian also said: “In the war with Iraq, the situation was clear, they fired missiles, and we knew where to hit. Here, they are besieging us from every aspect, they are creating problems for us in terms of livelihood, culturally, politically, and security-wise.”

The American sanctions have harmed Iran economically (its “livelihood”) by forcing it to sell its oil at below-market prices to such customers as China, Russia, and India. The Americans have managed to isolate Iran diplomatically (at, for example, the United Nations), and cut off Iran culturally by denying its participation in international museum exhibitions, music and film festivals, and literary competitions.

The Americans have also managed to impose an embargo on Western weapons for Iran, and have naturally withheld spare parts for American planes that the Iranians bought while the Shah was still in power, leaving them with aging fleets of both military and civilian planes, that are now dangerous to fly.

Pezeshkian also claimed that “Despite all the problems we face, we are now, in terms of both equipment and personnel, far stronger than we were during their previous attacks.” Yet the Iranians are not “far stronger” than they were last June. Their nuclear program was largely destroyed, and its progress has been set back, according to both the Israelis and Americans, by several years.

Iran’s ballistic missile program is a different matter. That program has been quickly revived, and the Iranians believe they will be able to build about 3,000 missiles every year. But should Israel choose to strike the ballistic missile arsenal, and the plants where such missiles are built, there is no indication that the Iranians will be any more successful in preventing the IDF from striking those targets than they were last June, when not a single Israeli plane was damaged or shot down.

Pezeshkian added: “Therefore, if they choose to strike, they will then naturally face a more decisive response.” This is so much rodomontade, by a braggart warrior. It’s designed to impress Iranians, who are suffering from the horrific state of their economy, but most Iranians don’t believe their government anymore.

What is the effect of Pezeshkian’s claim that Iran “is at war with Israel, America, and Europe”? It makes the Americans more likely to engage in military operations like those it launched last June. Pezeshkian ought instead to have said something like this: “We are at war with the Zionist state. But we have no desire for a war with the United States. We understand that the Zionist lobby in Washington is very strong, and has convinced too many people in the American government that Iran is an enemy. It is not. Our quarrel is only with the Zionists who have stolen Palestinian land.”

And then Pezeshkian ought to have reassured the Europeans in the same way. Instead of declaring, as he did, that Iran is at war with “Israel, America, and Europe,” he should have said “we have no quarrel with Europe. Our ballistic missiles are now able to reach Europe, but I can assure the peoples of Europe they will never be used against them, unless the Zionists manage to convince them to make war on Iran.”

In declaring that “Iran is at war with Israel, America, and Europe,” Pezeshkian has now raised the level of alarm in Europe, and heightened the determination of American war planners to collaborate with Israel on another attack on Iran, this one directed at destroying, for a second time, its ballistic missiles and the rebuilt plants where they are manufactured.

Masoud Pezeshkian, who from time to time has played soccer with the national team, has just made Iran’s own goal.