Latest Analysis and Commentary
by Khaled Abu Toameh • June 18, 2026 at 5:00 am
Hamas, the Iranian-backed group responsible for the October 7, 2023 massacre in Israel, is openly calling to escalate attacks against Israel and signaling its intention to shift the center of its jihad (holy war) from the Gaza Strip to the West Bank. To Hamas and the rest of Iran's "Axis of Resistance," the prospect of a "deal" between Washington and Tehran is not being interpreted as a sign of American strength. It is being viewed as a sign of America's weakness and a victory for the Iranian regime -- which the US defeated -- and proof that the US is eager to end conflicts at virtually any price. The world had been expecting to hear the US announce that unless Iran accepted all of America's terms unconditionally, the ceasefire was over. Instead, the US has agreed in principle to Iran's terms. America has deliberately chosen to lose a war -- again. Unlike the Gaza Strip, the mountainous terrain of the West Bank is high ground. It overlooks the low broad plain along the Mediterranean coast that is home to Israel's most densely populated areas. Major Israeli cities, Ben-Gurion International Airport, and critical infrastructure are within easy range of terrorists operating from the hills: one can comfortably look down over all of central Israel. Unlike in the Gaza Strip, there are hundreds of thousands of Israelis who live in the West Bank -- easy targets for the terrorists. The reported MOU... does not address Iran's terrorist proxies: Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis in Yemen, and various Shiite militias across the Middle East. This is not a minor detail. It is fundamental -- seen by these groups as a green light to step up their terrorism ever since Trump tried to stop Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from dismantling them. The terrorists see the "daylight" that Iran's regime maneuvered Trump into creating between the US and Israel as a most welcome gift. To Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran, public friction between Washington and Jerusalem signals that at last, the US may be distancing itself from its closest ally in the Middle East. International agreements and diplomatic arrangements do not persuade terrorist organizations in the Middle East to abandon their jihadist ideology or their objective of destroying Israel. Trump promised a new reality for the Gaza Strip – a "Riviera of the Middle East." More than six months after his much-publicized "Board of Peace" initiative and ceasefire plan, however, Hamas remains in power there, more brutal than ever. It still controls large parts of the territory, continues to recruit and train terrorists, retains substantial military capabilities, and openly rejects disarmament. So long as this Iranian regime and its proxies remain intact, there will be no genuine peace or stability in the Middle East.
Hamas, the Iranian-backed group responsible for the October 7, 2023 massacre in Israel, is openly calling to escalate attacks against Israel and signaling its intention to shift the center of its jihad (holy war) from the Gaza Strip to the West Bank. Pictured: Hamas and Islamic Jihad members in the city of Jenin, on August 6, 2024. (Photo by Khadija Toufik/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images)
A first reaction to US President Donald J. Trump's "Memorandum of Understanding" (MOU) has already come from Tehran's terrorist proxy, Hamas. The Iranian-backed group responsible for the October 7, 2023 massacre in Israel is openly calling to escalate attacks against Israel and signaling its intention to shift the center of its jihad (holy war) from the Gaza Strip to the West Bank. The timing is not a coincidence. To Hamas and the rest of Iran's "Axis of Resistance," the prospect of a "deal" between Washington and Tehran is not being interpreted as a sign of American strength. It is being viewed as a sign of America's weakness and a victory for the Iranian regime -- which the US defeated -- and proof that the US is eager to end conflicts at virtually any price.
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by Uzay Bulut • June 18, 2026 at 4:00 am
On June 17, US President Donald J. Trump signed the "Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding" (MOU) with the Islamic Republic of Iran. According to its text, the US undertakes to develop a plan "with at least USD 300 billion for the reconstruction and economic development of the Islamic Republic of Iran," and appears to be a deal to talk about a deal -- one that appears potentially to provide Iran's regime with almost every concession it asked for. No matter where the funds come from, they will still be used to reconstruct Iran's terror state. Who is to enforce this fantasy agreement after Trump leaves office? The US won the war; why is Iran dictating its terms to the US? Worse, Iranian citizens, after being told that "HELP IS ON ITS WAY," will continue to face arrests, abuse, and multi-year prison sentences for "offences" such as incorrect hair covering on a woman, requesting freedom or converting to Christianity. In Iran, leaving Islam is a crime punishable by death. The legal system allows capital punishment for apostasy and blasphemy. While apostasy is not explicitly written as a capital crime in Iran's formal penal code, the judiciary is empowered to use Islamic law (sharia) in situations where statutory law is silent. Those who abandon Islam can face the death penalty or be sentenced to life imprisonment. Individuals can also face the death penalty for insulting Islam's prophet Mohammad, speaking against Islam, or promoting atheism or non-Muslim religions. Christians are among the more than 6,000 Iranians randomly arrested and, in some instances, subjected to enforced disappearances, since the start of the war, according to a recent report by Amnesty International. On January 13, Trump urged protesters in Iran to keep going and promised that "HELP IS ON ITS WAY". Trump's new agreement with this terrorist regime is a massive betrayal. It condemns Iranians indefinitely to abuse, torture and death. A deal that allows the Islamic Republic of Iran, a major source of terrorism and instability in the Middle East and beyond, to stay in power means that women, Christians, human rights lawyers and other innocents will continue to be arrested, tortured, languish in jail, and killed. By signing this MOU, Trump is not only betraying millions of Iranians who trusted the US and sacrificed their lives for freedom, but also, in "snatching defeat from the jaws of victory," damaging both America's reputation and his own.
In Iran, leaving Islam is a crime punishable by death. Individuals can also face the death penalty for insulting Islam's prophet Mohammad, speaking against Islam, or promoting atheism or non-Muslim religions. Christians especially remain highly vulnerable to arrest and persecution in the country, and are, according to Amnesty International, among the more than 6,000 Iranians randomly arrested and, in some instances, subjected to enforced disappearances, since the start of the war. Pictured: The outer walls of Gohardasht Prison in Karaj, Iran. (Image source: Ensie and Matthias/Wikimedia Commons)
On June 17, US President Donald J. Trump signed the "Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding" (MOU) with the Islamic Republic of Iran. According to its text, the US undertakes to develop a plan "with at least USD 300 billion for the reconstruction and economic development of the Islamic Republic of Iran," and appears to be a deal to talk about a deal -- one that appears potentially to provide Iran's regime with almost every concession it asked for. No matter where the funds come from, they will still be used to reconstruct Iran's terror state. Who is to enforce this fantasy agreement after Trump leaves office? The US won the war; why is Iran dictating its terms to the US? Worse, Iranian citizens, after being told that "HELP IS ON ITS WAY," will continue to face arrests, abuse, and multi-year prison sentences for "offences" such as incorrect hair covering on a woman, requesting freedom or converting to Christianity.
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by Robert Williams • June 17, 2026 at 5:00 am
World leaders like Macron play a game of pretend, according to which the situation in the Middle East is an issue between Israel and the Palestinians; if only that is resolved through the establishment of a new Palestinian (terrorist) state, "peace" will descend upon the region. Nothing could be further from the truth -- a truth of which world leaders are well aware, but choose to ignore. They appear to be hoping that Israel's neighbors will finish off Israel for them so they can enjoy "plausible deniability." Meanwhile, they continue to fund organizations dedicated to delegitimizing and undermining Israel. World leaders have not been demanding that Iran stop its proxy war, and the terms of the new Iran deal have yet to be determined. Lately, Trump has been demanding that Israel refrain from protecting itself from attacks by Hezbollah in Lebanon on the excuse that no one was killed, while, when Iran shot down a US helicopter, even though no one was killed, the US retaliated quite strongly. Israel cannot allow its hands to be tied while Hezbollah continues its attacks. It is crucial to decouple Lebanon from any agreement between the US and Iran. It is clearly a separate issue. Trump deserves infinite thanks for being the only world leader to take on Iran in the first place, but if he thinks the story is over with General Ahmad Vahidi and the rest of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps still in charge there, a rude shock is on its way. Trump promised the Iranian people that "Help is on the way." It is deeply hoped that he will keep this promise. His legacy must be that of a job well done, not of a job half-done. The north of Israel, and potentially the rest of this country, smaller than New Jersey (22,000 sq. km), is deliberately being made into a hell, ignored by the international community. This situation is being caused by an undeterred Hezbollah. Israel -- like any other country -- has to be able to do whatever it must to protect itself.
Israel cannot allow its hands to be tied while Hezbollah continues its attacks. It is crucial to decouple Lebanon from any agreement between the US and Iran. It is clearly a separate issue. Pictured: A house in Moreshet, Israel, which took a direct hit from a rocket fired by Hezbollah from Lebanon, on September 22, 2024. (Photo by Amir Levy/Getty Images)
For the past two years, a steady stream of world leaders has flocked to Israel to cajole and pressure the only democracy in the Middle East into stopping its self-defense against Iran's proxies in Gaza -- Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad -- who carried out the October 7 massacres and have launched more than 10,000 rockets into Israel, attempting to perpetrate mass slaughter. Let us hope that with US President Donald J. Trump's new "Iran deal," this abuse will stop. It is to be hoped that liberating Lebanon from Hezbollah will still be possible. In June 2024, French President Emmanuel Macron came to Jerusalem, where he told Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he must end the war in Gaza. "The ordeal of the Palestinians in Gaza must end," Macron said. As most world leaders at that point, he did not even demand that Hamas release Israeli hostages as a precondition for a ceasefire.
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by Lawrence Kadish • June 17, 2026 at 4:00 am
(Image source: OpenAI)
Perhaps not since President Franklin D. Roosevelt established the Advisory Committee on Uranium in October 1939, whose mission would eventually lead to the creation of the atomic bomb, have the actions of a president regarding energy been so crucial to America's future. In November 2025, President Donald J. Trump established a dedicated Office of Fusion within the Department of Energy. It represents a pivotal shift in America's approach to energy independence and leveraging unlimited energy to ensure global leadership. By elevating nuclear fusion energy from a research-focused effort hidden within the Office of Science to its own office, the president has publicly recognized that the most transformative energy technology of the 21st century needs to be American "born."
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by Gordon G. Chang • June 16, 2026 at 5:00 am
Of these regimes [Russia, North Korea, and China], the most dangerous is China, now engaged in the fastest nuclear buildup since the Cold War. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, SIPRI, estimates that the Chinese military "now has around 620 nuclear warheads." "There are, however, two main unknowns," he also said. "First, there is a new generation of small nuclear warheads revealed in a late 2025 book by China-educated engineer Hui Zhang. Second, the China Military Power Reports do not report the number of smaller 'theater' missile warheads in the inventory of the People's Liberation Army. That number could be large, perhaps close to 1,000." China's theater arsenal, Fisher argues, "constitutes a major threat to the Asian democracies." Dangerous regimes are fast preparing for war. China, Russia, and North Korea are "expanding and diversifying their nuclear arsenals at a breakneck pace, showing little or no interest in arms control," said Pranay Vaddi, a National Security Council official, in June 2024 at an arms-control conference. These three regimes and Iran, he said, are "increasingly cooperating and coordinating with each other—in ways that run counter to peace and stability, threaten the United States, our allies and our partners, and exacerbate regional tension."
China is now engaged in the fastest nuclear buildup since the Cold War. The combined number of China's and Russia's nukes — not to mention North Korea's — is beginning to create an imbalance that could lead to horrible consequences. Pictured: China's new DF-5C intercontinental ballistic missile, which has a range of 20,000 km and carries nuclear warheads, is displayed at a military parade that was attended by Russian President Vladimir Putin, North Korean ruler Kim Jong Un, and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, in Beijing on September 3, 2025. (Photo by Kevin Frayer/Getty Images)
"The risk of nuclear conflict is rising, with the world on the cusp of a nuclear-arms race centered on the Asia-Pacific," writes the International Institute for Strategic Studies this month. "China's expanding military capabilities and North Korea's growing arsenal are driving the assertive force postures and procurement decisions of regional states and the U.S." "Apart from small additions to the arsenals of India and Pakistan, the only nations increasing deployed nuclear weapons are Russia, North Korea, and China," Peter Huessy of the National Institute for Deterrence Studies and the Gold Institute for International Strategy told Gatestone last week. Of these regimes, the most dangerous is China, now engaged in the fastest nuclear buildup since the Cold War. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) estimates that the Chinese military "now has around 620 nuclear warheads."
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by Ahmed Charai • June 15, 2026 at 1:00 pm
The real obstacle to peace has never been the Iranian nation. It is the regime that governs Iran against the will and aspirations of its own people—a regime that behaves less like a normal state than like a revolutionary-security cartel. Iran cannot be allowed to acquire a nuclear weapon—not under this framework, not after sixty days, not in five years, not through ambiguity, delay, concealment, or the gradual normalization of violations. The nuclear file cannot be postponed into irrelevance while sanctions relief, oil access, and frozen assets are granted upfront. Any serious diplomatic process must begin with verifiable commitments, intrusive inspections, a full accounting of enriched uranium stocks, and consequences that are automatic rather than rhetorical. An agreement with Tehran is not a contract with a normal government. It is an arrangement with a divided, opaque, militarized system in which diplomats may sign while commanders sabotage; presidents may speak while the Revolutionary Guard decides; moderates may promise while hard-liners prepare the next escalation. Iran's recent posture follows a familiar pattern: negotiate under pressure, demand relief, preserve leverage, and use regional proxies to complicate the battlefield. The Revolutionary Guard is the backbone of the regime's coercive power at home and its projection of force abroad. Figures such as Ahmad Vahidi symbolize the problem. That is why the framework must not be limited to the Strait of Hormuz and the nuclear file. It must also address the machinery of regional destabilization. If Tehran is allowed to trade temporary calm in the Gulf for continued proxy pressure in Lebanon, Gaza, Syria, Iraq, or Yemen, then the agreement will not bring peace. It will simply move the war from one front to another. The third principle must be regional consultation. Israel has direct security concerns that cannot be dismissed as political inconvenience. Washington need not make regime change the declared objective of this diplomacy. But America should not grant the regime legitimacy without conditions. Human rights must remain part of the architecture: internet freedom, political prisoners, women's rights, the right to protest, and accountability for repression. This is where President Trump should consider a bold political and economic complement to the security negotiations: entrust Jared Kushner with a parallel track focused on the future of the Iranian economy, but designed for the benefit of the Iranian people—not the enrichment of the regime. Kushner's achievement with the Abraham Accords was not merely that he helped negotiate documents; it was that he understood the strategic power of economic imagination in a region exhausted by ideology. The same logic should now be applied to Iran. Any sanctions relief, investment mechanism, infrastructure plan, or economic opening must be tied to transparency, private-sector development, young entrepreneurs, women, students, technology, and civil society—not to the Revolutionary Guard, not to the clerical establishment, and not to the regime's networks of coercion. The purpose of diplomacy should not be to rescue the regime from the consequences of its own failures. It should be to ensure that the Iranian people, and not their jailers, become the ultimate beneficiaries of peace.
Iran cannot be allowed to acquire a nuclear weapon—not under this framework, not after sixty days, not in five years, not through ambiguity, delay, concealment, or the gradual normalization of violations. Pictured: Iran's President Masoud Pezeshkian looks on as a 'Qasem Soleimani' missile is displayed during a military parade in Tehran, on September 21, 2024. (Photo by Atta Kenare/AFP via Getty Images)
On his eightieth birthday, President Donald Trump announced what many in Washington, Jerusalem, Abu Dhabi, Manama, and beyond had been waiting to hear: the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran had reached a framework aimed at ending a dangerous war, reopening the Strait of Hormuz, and beginning a new round of negotiations over Iran's nuclear program. This is good news. It should be welcomed. But it should not be romanticized. No serious person in the Middle East is hungry for war. The people of the region—Israelis, Emiratis, Bahrainis, Kuwaitis, Lebanese, Yemenis, and above all the Iranian people themselves—have lived too long under the shadow of missiles, militias, intimidation, and ideological blackmail. They want security, dignity, prosperity, and a future for their children. They do not want another generation sacrificed to revolutionary fantasies or strategic miscalculations.
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by Gatestone Staff • June 15, 2026 at 12:30 pm
In regards to the article "Europe in Wonderland: Belgium Criminalizes Truth," from June 14, Gatestone is aware of Dries Van Langenhove's background and does not in any way endorse many of his views. However, his conviction marks a new and dramatic low in the ongoing destruction of free speech in Europe. Langenhove was sentenced for simply stating facts, a shocking development even for Europe. The verdict was too important a development for Gatestone to ignore, as when courts criminalize facts, everyone suffers.
by Bassam Tawil • June 15, 2026 at 5:00 am
Why would any country -- especially one smaller than Maricopa County, Arizona -- allow anywhere near it, let alone on its border, a barbaric, homicidal state, committed to its destruction? Would Luxembourg, or even France, welcome Al-Qaeda or Islamic State on its border? Such a hostile state, dedicated to Israel's destruction, would pose an existential threat to its neighbor and massively destabilize the region. Perhaps that is why the Europeans are advocating it? Is the actual wish to help the Palestinians "finish the job" Hitler started while they, the Europeans, sipping their claret, can pretend to appear as righteous and just? If the Gaza Strip, after Israel's withdrawal, became a launching pad for terrorism, why should anyone believe that a Palestinian state in the West Bank would be any different? As US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee noted last year: "If France is really so determined to see a Palestinian state, I have a suggestion for them–carve out a piece of the French Riviera." Even now, a year after Abbas promised French President Emmanuel Macron that he would hold presidential and parliamentary elections, no elections have taken place.... Macron publicly welcomed it as evidence that the Palestinian Authority was committed to reform and democratic renewal. One year later, there are no elections, no timetable, and no meaningful reforms. As Palestinians would no doubt have elected the terrorist organization Hamas, perhaps it is for the best that elections have not taken place. Abbas can plainly see that he would be have been committing himself and his Palestinian Authority to a sumptuous, permanent retirement. Palestinian leaders fear being branded traitors by their own people if they accept compromise with Israel. They have preferred to reject the Israeli proposals rather than explain to their people that peace requires difficult concessions – chiefly, giving up their dream of obliterating Israel. At the same time, Palestinian leaders have failed -- deliberately, one assumes -- to prepare Palestinians for peaceful coexistence with Israel. Instead of promoting reconciliation, many Palestinian leaders continue to pay and glorify terrorists, incite hatred and teach generations of Palestinians that Israel has no right to exist. Hamas, for its part, squarely rejects any disarmament plan or peace process. Hamas does not seek a Palestinian state living alongside Israel. Hamas seeks a Palestinian state replacing Israel. That goal appears to be what the Paris conference was really about. The conflict is not fundamentally about the absence of a Palestinian state. It is about the refusal of many Palestinians, as well as Iran and its terror proxies, to accept the existence of Israel within any borders. The Europeans, pressing for an openly warmongering Palestinian state, apparently agree. The entire goal of these supposed "friends" of Trump in "helping" him has been to make sure that Iran's regime survives to try to eliminate Israel after Trump leaves office. Sadly, the Paris conference could have made a meaningful, constructive contribution. It could have called on Palestinians to renounce terrorism, end incitement, and recognize Israel's right to exist. It could have insisted on genuine reform and elections inside the Palestinian political system. France and other Western countries are free to continue promoting the two-state solution. Before doing so, however, they should answer a few basic questions: Who will govern the Palestinian state? How will Hamas be prevented from taking over and attacking Israel "time and again until it is annihilated," as it has vowed to do? How will Iran be prevented from again turning the Gaza Strip into a forward operating base against Israel? What guarantees will be provided that October 7 will not be repeated from the West Bank hills overlooking Israel's major population centers?
As US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee noted last year: "If France is really so determined to see a Palestinian state, I have a suggestion for them–carve out a piece of the French Riviera." Pictured: Huckabee testifies during his Senate Foreign Relations Committee confirmation hearing at the Dirksen Senate Office Building on March 25, 2025 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
Nearly three years after the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 massacre in Israel, many Western governments and diplomats remain trapped in a dangerous fantasy: the belief that creating a Palestinian state will bring peace to the Middle East. The latest example is France's international conference in Paris, where foreign ministers, activists, and self-appointed peace advocates gathered this month to revive the two-state solution and promote the establishment of a Palestinian state. The conference is detached from reality. Why would any country -- especially one smaller than Maricopa County, Arizona -- allow anywhere near it, let alone on its border, a barbaric, homicidal state, committed to its destruction? Would Luxembourg, or even France, welcome Al-Qaeda or Islamic State on its border?
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by Drieu Godefridi • June 14, 2026 at 5:00 am
In a ruling that should send chills down the spine of anyone who still believes in the Enlightenment values of reason, evidence, and open debate, a Belgian court has convicted nationalist activist Dries Van Langenhove for the crime of stating uncomfortable facts. This is not merely another skirmish in Europe's war on free speech. It is something far more sinister: the explicit criminalization of observable, verifiable reality itself. Van Langenhove warned of "the great replacement," and linked mass migration to housing shortages, strained welfare systems, rising criminality, and cultural erosion. He criticized multiculturalism as incompatible with cohesive societies and mocked certain progressive dogmas on gender. None of these points was fabricated. The court itself acknowledged that many of his statements rested on scientific evidence and official statistics. This turns justice on its head. Since when does presenting verifiable facts about crime rates, IQ distributions, or fertility differentials constitute "criminal intent"? Where is the evidence of incitement to violence? There is none. The "proof" is the speech itself — and the judges' subjective interpretation of its potential emotional effect on special protected groups. In liberal democracies worthy of the name, truth has always been a defense against charges of defamation or incitement. In 21st-century Belgium, truth is now aggravating evidence. European elites have made him a repeated target precisely because he articulates what growing numbers of citizens observe daily: mass migration from culturally distant regions correlates with parallel societies, higher welfare dependency, and spikes in certain crimes. Across Europe — from hate speech laws in the UK and Germany to "disinformation" monitors in the EU — authorities are not merely restricting expression. They are punishing the acknowledgment of reality when it contradicts the multicultural narrative. Facts about integration failures, no-go zones, grooming gangs, or group differences in outcomes are treated as heretical, regardless of their empirical basis. While facts concerning Arabs, Africans, or Muslims are thus censored or forbidden, in Belgium, as soon as it concerns Jews, then absolutely everything is permitted. When courts declare that even accurate statistics can be criminal if they foster "intolerance," they do not protect minorities — they infantilize them and infantilize the public. They signal that native Europeans have no right to discuss the transformation of their own societies. Van Langenhove will appeal his conviction, as he has before. The real verdict, however, is already in: Western Europe's governing class has chosen repression over reality. They would rather punish the messenger than confront the inconvenient data on the real costs of migration.
In a ruling that should send chills down the spine of anyone who still believes in the Enlightenment values of reason, evidence, and open debate, a Belgian court has convicted nationalist activist Dries Van Langenhove for the crime of stating uncomfortable facts. Pictured: Van Langenhove speaks to the media at the Gent Court of Appeal on June 20, 2025. (Photo by James Arthur Gekiere/Belga Mag/AFP via Getty Images)
Note to our readers: Gatestone is aware of Dries Van Langenhove's background and does not in any way endorse many of his views. However, his conviction marks a new and dramatic low in the ongoing destruction of free speech in Europe. Langenhove was sentenced for simply stating facts, a shocking development even for Europe. The verdict was too important a development for Gatestone to ignore, as when courts criminalize facts, everyone suffers. In a ruling that should send chills down the spine of anyone who still believes in the Enlightenment values of reason, evidence, and open debate, a Belgian court has convicted nationalist activist Dries Van Langenhove for the crime of stating uncomfortable facts.
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by Amir Taheri • June 14, 2026 at 4:00 am
Trump was the only US president to make a serious attempt to mend relations with Iran. Tehran misinterpreted that [the June 2025 ceasefire] as American weakness and reignited the fires by resuming its campaign against Israel through proxies. [T]he fact is that so far at least Trump is the winner of this war. Tehran's illusion is that by waiting until US midterm elections, which they think Trump will lose, they could claim victory. That is a foolish dream. The longer they wait before they accept a truce, the heavier Iran's losses shall be. In my opinion, the wars involving Iran will not end without regime change in Tehran....
President Donald J. Trump was the only US president to make a serious attempt to mend relations with Iran. Pictured: Trump addresses the nation from the White House in Washington, DC on June 21, 2025, following the announcement that the US bombed nuclear sites in Iran. (Photo by Carlos Barria/Pool/AFP via Getty Images)
Who is playing with whom? This is the question posed by the behavior of President Donald Trump and whoever is still running Iran from Tehran in the current phase of a war that started more than 100 days ago. Both Trump and his Iranian co-authors of this war appear as if they are prepared for this war to last 100 years. At the same time, both pretend that an accord leading to a sine die [without a day cited] truce is one step away. According to CNN, Trump has trumpeted that elusive accord 38 times in two months. According to IRGC's news agency, Tasnim, Tehran's authorized or self-authorized spokesmen have a more modest record by announcing an imminent accord only 22 times. What is certain is that neither side wishes to return to the early phase of the conflict that saw Iran suffer the heaviest air attacks the world had witnessed since World War II.
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by Majid Rafizadeh • June 13, 2026 at 5:00 am
Iran's rulers might sign a piece of paper -- as Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Chairman Yasser Arafat did with Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin with the 1993 Oslo Accord – but, like the PLO, its fundamental goals will not change. The regime cannot abandon "Death to America" or "Death to Israel" without dissolving its own reason for being. Leaving it in place only ensures that it will dig its hooks in even deeper -- especially after President Donald J. Trump leaves office and his successor possibly turns to interests more enjoyable than "enforcement." Iran's regime will not change -- especially not for "infidels." Deals simply buy time for the regime to rebuild its power. Deals do not alter core behavior. If the regime wanted reform, it could easily have renounced those slogans and stopped sponsoring terrorism. Any negotiations or deals that leave the current system intact simply grant it "oxygen," resources, and time to rebuild capabilities aimed at annihilating its perceived enemies, foreign and domestic. The West's -- particularly the United States' -- most important decision is recognizing that the Iranian regime simply cannot be reformed. No deal will essentially alter it. It will continue its objectives, its terrorism, and its oppression. We should not be deceived by tactical "moderates" fronting for the IRGC. The regime's revolutionary identity has brought only suffering -- for Americans, for Iran's neighbors in the Gulf, for Israelis, and especially for the Iranian people. Ending this regime is the only path to peace.
Iran's regime cannot abandon "Death to America" or "Death to Israel" without dissolving its own reason for being. Leaving it in place only ensures that it will dig its hooks in even deeper -- especially after President Donald J. Trump leaves office and his successor possibly turns to interests more enjoyable than "enforcement." Pictured: Iran's then "Supreme Guide," Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, gives a speech on November 1, 2023, televised on Iran's Channel 1. (Image source: MEMRI)
We have seen in the last few weeks — and for the last 47 years — that Iran's regime is not one with which any responsible actor should seek a deal. Iran's rulers might sign a piece of paper -- as Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Chairman Yasser Arafat did with Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin with the 1993 Oslo Accord – but, like the PLO, its fundamental goals will not change.
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by Eric Levine • June 12, 2026 at 5:00 am
The Obama strategy was apparently to make any deal and call it a "good deal." In exchange for these concessions to the Ayatollah, the Obama Administration agreed to lift economic sanctions on Iran at a time when its frozen overseas assets totaled approximately $115 billion, and delivered $400 million of cash on a pallet as ransom for American hostages being illegally held by the Islamic Republic. In short, Obama gave away everything and got nothing in return. Now that is a really bad deal. Obama and his lead negotiator, Secretary of State John Kerry, must have understood that the money Iran received was to be used to fund its military, its international terror network, and to advance its hegemonic goals in the region. Obama rammed the deal down the throats of a skeptical American public and implemented it in the face of overwhelming bipartisan congressional opposition. Moreover, Israel and the Gulf Arab states -- the countries most directly impacted by the deal and that strenuously opposed it -- were not consulted. The Obama propaganda machine also understood that it could not tell the truth about the terms of the deal if they wanted any support from the American people. So they simply lied about them. The current hostilities with Iran are a direct result of Obama's failed policy. Obama did not just save the Iranian regime; he empowered it. Iran's regime will only make a deal with the US if Iran's rulers believe the survival of the regime is guaranteed. No matter what is agreed to by Trump, Iran's rulers are sure to violate the agreement. Maybe not today or tomorrow, but as soon as Trump leaves office. If Trump makes a deal, even a great one, it will last no longer than his presidency. The Gulf states will hedge their bets. Trump will be gone but the Iranian regime, perhaps with the support of a new American administration, will still be in their midst.
The current hostilities with Iran are a direct result of Obama's failed policy. Obama did not just save the Iranian regime; he empowered it. The Obama strategy was apparently to make any deal with Iran and call it a "good deal." Obama and his lead negotiator, Secretary of State John Kerry, must have understood that the money Iran received was to be used to fund its military, its international terror network, and to advance its hegemonic goals in the region. Pictured: Iran's then Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif (center) shares some laughs with his delegation during nuclear deal negotiations with Kerry in Vienna, Austria, on June 30, 2015. (Photo credit should read Carlos Barria/AFP via Getty Images)
Before agreeing to the JCPOA (the Iran "nuclear deal") in 2015, President Barack H. Obama assured the American people that he understood, in the words of his press secretary, Josh Earnest, that "no deal is better than a bad deal." Obama then proceeded to make a historically epic terrible deal. Because Obama made it clear to friend and foe alike that he would never use military force to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons, the only possible outcome was a "bad deal." As Obama told a skeptical and worried Israeli public on June 1, 2015: "I can, I think, demonstrate, not based on any hope but on facts and evidence and analysis, that the best way to prevent Iran from having a nuclear weapon is a verifiable, tough agreement.... A military solution will not fix it. Even if the United States participates, it would temporarily slow down an Iranian nuclear program but it will not eliminate it."
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by Khaled Abu Toameh • June 11, 2026 at 5:00 am
Hamas is not agreeing to disarm. It is bargaining. The Cairo meetings reportedly focused heavily on what mediators described as the "restriction of weapons" rather than outright disarmament. Some proposals reportedly envision Hamas and other armed groups "depositing" weapons with Palestinian authorities or placing them under international supervision. This brush-off alone should convince Washington that the current strategy of negotiating with Hamas, as with Iran, is failing. The notion that Hamas would voluntarily surrender the means that allow it to dominate the Gaza Strip, intimidate Palestinians, and wage jihad (holy war) against Israel is detached from reality. Hamas did not spend decades building a military infrastructure, digging tunnels, stockpiling rockets, and indoctrinating generations of Palestinians only to hand over its weapons because mediators asked politely. Any agreement that allows Hamas to survive politically while retaining influence over the Gaza Strip is only postponing the next war. That Qatar and Turkey are once again serving as mediators just adds another layer of lunacy to the process. Both countries have long been among Hamas's most important political and financial supporters. Expecting Qatar and Turkey to pressure Hamas into disarming is asking sponsors to dismantle the very organization they have spent years supporting. For months, Washington has sought calm and stability across the Middle East. America's adversaries, however, increasingly interpret this desire for stability as weakness. Hamas sees endless negotiations. Hezbollah, Iran's Lebanese proxy, sees repeated efforts to preserve ceasefires. Iran sees a US administration eager to avoid significant escalation at any cost. Instead of complying with American demands, Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran are setting conditions and leading the Trump Administration around by the nose. For the past few years, every ceasefire has allowed Hamas to regroup. Every negotiation has given it time. Every diplomatic initiative has enabled it to re-entrench itself. That is not a sign of diplomatic progress. It is evidence of diplomatic failure. At some point, the Trump Administration might confront a simple reality: terrorist organizations do not voluntarily negotiate themselves out of existence. For both Hamas and Iran, survival means remaining armed so that they can continue pursuing their ultimate goal: the elimination of Israel, and for Iran, eventually Europe and the US. Until this reality is acknowledged, the world will continue to witness the same futile spectacle: mediators begging a terrorist organization to surrender weapons it never intends to give up.
The notion that Hamas would voluntarily surrender the means that allow it to dominate the Gaza Strip, intimidate Palestinians, and wage jihad (holy war) against Israel is detached from reality. Hamas did not spend decades building a military infrastructure, digging tunnels, stockpiling rockets, and indoctrinating generations of Palestinians only to hand over its weapons because mediators asked politely. Pictured: Hamas terrorists in Gaza City on January 25, 2025. (Photo by Abood Abusalama/Middle East Images via AFP)
Nearly three years after the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led massacre in Israel, and more than six months after US President Donald Trump announced his ceasefire initiative for the Gaza Strip, one reality remains painfully clear: Hamas is still armed, still in control of large parts of the Gaza Strip, and still openly refusing to surrender its weapons. This week, mediators from Egypt, Qatar, and Turkey gathered in Cairo with Hamas leaders and representatives of several Palestinian factions in yet another attempt to persuade the Iran-backed Islamist group to comply with Trump's peace plan, which calls for the demilitarization of the Gaza Strip and the decommissioning of weapons held by Hamas and other armed groups.
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by Robert Williams • June 10, 2026 at 5:30 am
"Qatar is at the top of funding terrorism worldwide.... Even more than Iran." — Udi Levy, a former senior official of Israel's Mossad spy agency who dealt with economic warfare against terrorist organizations, YNet, April 18, 2024. It was disclosed last week that Qatar has been funding US institutions of learning for years with donations amounting to more than $400 billion. Those were just the ones for which there were receipts. Qatar also hosts the forward headquarters of US Central Command (CENTCOM) at Al Udeid Air Base in addition to a recent promise from the Trump administration to defend the emirate if it is attacked. It is hardly a secret that Qatar is no friend to Israel. Qatar has been called "A genocidal anti-Israel propaganda machine." After Trump leaves office, will Qatar be one of the new launchpads from which to try to eliminate the Jewish State? During the first Trump administration, the US warned Israel that "security cooperation with the U.S. could be reduced," due to a deal signed with China's Shanghai International Port Group to operate a new terminal at Haifa Port, where the U.S. Navy ships often dock. How come the US does not have the same concerns with Qatar?
US President Donald J. Trump is reportedly strengthening Qatar's military and giving immunity from any potential future attack by supplying it with state-of-the-art counter-drone capabilities, including Raytheon's FS-LIDS system. Qatar is also purchasing the MQ-9B SkyGuardian remotely piloted aircraft system ("the most advanced multi-mission remotely piloted aircraft in the world"). The rapid increase in Qatar's military power is a direct reflection of the strides that the terror-sponsoring and terror-propagandizing Islamist state has been able to make in its gradual buy-up of a greedy and flatterable Western world. Pictured: U.S. Air Force KC-135 Stratotankers at Qatar's Al-Udeid Air Base on Aug. 19, 2017. (Photo by U.S. Air National Guard/Andrew J. Moseley)
Wherever you look, Western leaders are engaging in policies that invite civilizational suicide by arming enemies of the West who would like to see it dead. Sadly, the last place one would expect such policies is the Trump administration. It claims it wants to "Make America Great Again." Now it has been incentivizing countries -- such as Qatar, Turkey and Pakistan -- that want to "Make States that Sponsor Terrorism Great Again." "Qatar," according to Udi Levy, a former senior official of Israel's Mossad spy agency who dealt with economic warfare against terrorist organizations, "is at the top of funding terrorism worldwide.... Even more than Iran." It was disclosed last week that Qatar has been funding US institutions of learning for years with donations amounting to more than $400 billion. Those were just the ones for which there were receipts.
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by Lawrence Kadish • June 10, 2026 at 4:00 am
Eighty years ago we learned costly lessons in the Pacific regarding just how difficult it is to supply, fight, and win in this part of the world. Lessons learned, lessons remembered, and lessons for our foes: never underestimate the United States. Pictured: The fast-attack submarine USS Springfield arrives at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, in Hawaii, on October 21, 2019. (U.S. Navy photo by Michael Zingaro)
Not so very long ago, the Pacific was the scene of some of the bloodiest battles of World War II, where no quarter was given. While the guns have long since gone quiet, that vast area of the globe remains a source of intense military brinksmanship. This time it is the giant of Communist China seeking to dominate the Pacific's democratic nations that range from Japan in the north to Australia in the south. In between those nations is the U.S. Seventh Fleet, along with an island chain with American outposts such as Okinawa and Guam.
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