Words Matter. So Do Policies.

Everyone is asking when the war on Iran will end, whether ships carrying oil or gas will be able again to cross the Strait of Hormuz, and whether or not US troops will soon land on Iranian soil.  But we should also look at the language used by the president of the world’s most influential country. Here’s what Trump said on March 13:

“We have unparalleled firepower, unlimited ammunition, and plenty of time. Watch what happens to these deranged scumbags today. They’ve been killing innocent people all over the world for 47 years, and now I, as the 47th President of the United States of America, am killing them. What a great honor it is to do so!”

Two days later, after claiming that US strikes had “totally demolished” most of Iran’s Kharg Island, critical to the country’s life, Trump warned that more strikes could follow and told NBC News, “We may hit it a few more times just for fun.”

With such words, children and grandchildren everywhere in the world were encouraged, from a place of unique prestige, to utter foul terms and take pride and delight in killing fellow humans. In the name of making America great again, youngsters everywhere were prodded to swim in a gutter reddened with blood and to enjoy “the fun.” It’s indescribably sad.

Trump is not the only one. The statement at a Pentagon briefing by Pete Hegseth, the US defense secretary, that in continuing operations the enemy would receive “no quarter, no mercy” is more than a verbal assault. An article in the Hindu by Saurabh Trivedi cites experts in the laws of war who point out that a “no quarter” policy, implying that a surrendering or wounded enemy soldier could be put to death, violates accepted rules of war.

CLOSE TO VICTORY? 

Several times in recent days Trump has come close to declaring “victory,” but other statements from him seem to suggest doubt. In one post on March 15, Trump wrote that he “hoped China, France, Japan, South Korea, Britain and others would send warships to the Strait of Hormuz” in order to ensure the flow of oil and gas to the world. 

That was an appeal to a wide range of nations, not all of them accustomed to functioning as US allies. While providing this list, Trump led with China, his favorite adversary much of the time, thereby belying the mask of supreme confidence he likes to wear. 

On social media the US president posted a claim that he was forming a coalition of forces to help protect shipping through the Strait of Hormuz. “One way or the other, we will soon get the Hormuz Strait OPEN, SAFE, and FREE!” Since he made his call for partners, however, says the BBC, “a growing list of nations – including Japan, Australia and many European powers – have indicated that they are not interested in joining the effort.” 

“We will not be drawn into the wider war,” the British prime minister, Sir Keir Starmer, said on March 16, while adding that he was open to a “viable collective plan” to address the situation in the Strait. 

That leaves Trump with the unpleasant decision of whether to more fully commit the US Navy on its own for securing the narrow waterway. On March 16, he declared that the US was destroying Iran’s minelaying ships but added, “all it takes is one”.

“It’s a little unfair,” continued Trump. “You win a war, but they have no right to be doing what they’re doing.” 

Others, including many Americans, persist in asking whether Trump had the right to attack Iran (in conjunction with Israel) and kill its leader while taking part in negotiations in Geneva. 

LARIJANI KILLED 

Meanwhile Israel has succeeded in killing Ali Larijani, Iran’s top national security official who in recent days had become his nation’s recognized emblem, as also Gholamreza Soleimani, the commander of “Basij”, Iran’s internal militia. 

According to Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, Larijani, who was 67, was killed alongside several others, including his son and security personnel. A former speaker of Iran’s parliament, Larijani in the recent past was a key architect of Iran’s resistance to US and Israeli attacks; and he also seemed to possess the negotiating skills which may be needed some day. Larijani’s removal is undoubtedly a major blow to Iran, but there’s little evidence so far of Iran losing its ability to replace eliminated figures. 

According to CNN, in September last year the US and Israel had favored Larijani as a transitional “regime change” candidate. Minds evidently changed after Larijani showed stubborn loyalty to an independent Iran. It was decided to take him out. 

JOE KENT RESIGNS 

In the US, meanwhile, a voluntary crack has appeared. The New York Times tells us that on March 17 Joe Kent, director of the National Counterterrorism Center, announced his resignation, citing his opposition to the Iran war and to Israel’s influence over the Trump administration’s policies. The newspaper quotes Kent as saying in his letter of resignation, “I cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in Iran.” In a social media post, Kent has evidently said, “Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby.” 

Adds the New York Times: “Mr. Kent is the highest-ranking Trump administration official to quit over the Iran war.  His resignation bluntly exposes how the Iran war is expanding fissures in President Trump’s coalition. Mr. Kent is a close friend of Tucker Carlson, the Trump ally who has emerged as the sharpest critic of the war. 

“In a brief interview, Mr. Carlson praised Mr. Kent’s resignation. ‘Joe is the bravest man I know, and he can’t be dismissed as a nut,’ Mr. Carlson said.

A BBC report on March 15 that the American embassy in Baghdad had “warned its citizens in Iraq to leave immediately” did not accord with Trump’s frequent claims that but for some formalities the war was practically over. The embassy’s instruction was apparently issued “immediately after” an Iranian missile hit its building.

“THUNDEROUS” WORD 

To repeat, we don’t know whether Trump will succeed in organizing a multinational navy and ordering it to open up the Hormuz Strait. A BBC report of Trump’s phone conversation on the subject with Starmer, the British prime minister, was full of question marks. According to that report, a “Downing Street spokeswoman” conceded after the conversation that “Sir Keir and Trump had discussed the ongoing situation in the Middle East and the importance of reopening the Strait of Hormuz to end the disruption to global shipping, which is driving up costs worldwide.” 

The report added that “the prime minister also expressed his condolences for the American service personnel who have lost their lives during the conflict,” and concluded with the thunderous word that the two had “agreed to keep in touch.” 

The spokeswoman told the BBC of a separate phone conversation between the British prime minister and Canada’s prime minister, Mark Carney, adding that the two had “agreed on the importance of ending the blockade.” The BBC also reported: “Refusing to be drawn into operational details, [the UK’s] energy secretary, Ed Miliband, reiterated that ‘ending the conflict is the best and surest way to get the strait reopened’.”

Many in the world, including, we can be sure, the people of Iran, Israel, and the US, are hoping that conversations are taking place somewhere -- anywhere -- for “ending the conflict.” Despite the heavy bombardment it has faced, Iran retains the capacity to fire from its shores at ships in the Hormuz Strait and to lay mines in the Strait. To eliminate this capacity is said to be one of the tasks that may be given to the US ground troops. 

WHO COULD INTERVENE? 

Will BRICS intervene for ending the conflict? It is now India’s rotational turn to lead this association, of which Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa are the founding members. Although Modi visited Tel Aviv only a couple of days before the US and Israel launched its end-February attack on Iran and spoke there of India’s strong alliance with Israel, the Indian prime minister is now being asked by some in India to attempt to broker peace in the Strait and the Middle East. 

Millions of Indians work in the Gulf and send valuable remittances to India. The UAE and the other Gulf nations share with India an immense stake in ending the current war and could perhaps undertake joint initiatives. On the other hand, shouldn’t this moment in fact be the one where Europe -- understood in its earlier sense, a Europe led by Britain, France and Germany – asks, on behalf of the world as a whole, for peace and sanity in the Middle East? Isn’t it time, moreover, for someone other than Trump to hold the big microphone? 

The opposite scenario of thousands of US troops landing on Kharg Island and elsewhere on Iran’s ground and trying to force a regime change is not only what Trump railed against for years. It is also the kind of exercise about which history has given unqualified verdicts from the 1970s to the 2020s, from Vietnam to Iraq and to Afghanistan. 

LEBANON’S SUFFERING 

According to CNN, Lebanon’s public health ministry announced as of March 14 that Israeli strikes on Lebanese targets had killed at least 826 people, including 106 children. Israeli evacuation warnings had displaced hundreds of thousands of others. 

The WHO chief, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said in ​a post on X that two strikes on Lebanon’s health care facilities on just one day, March 13, had killed 14 health care workers, including nurses, paramedics, and doctors. 

Should a bomb on your roof be the reward for the service you render to wounded children, women, and men? Or the price for your religious belief, your nationality, your political preference? The fact that Hezbollah remains alive and active in parts of Lebanon and is able at times to hit targets in Israel is supposed to justify the wholesale destruction by Israel of homes and neighborhoods in Lebanon, especially in Shia-majority pockets that are deemed pro-Iran. Is obliteration the price that sympathy must pay? 

Israel’s apparent plan to invade fresh pieces of Lebanon in supposed revenge for Hezbollah’s hits appears to have troubled European governments that have thus far been strongly pro-Israel.

INSIDE IRAN 

Writing on March 16, a CNN analyst saw “no public sign” in Iran that the regime’s grip was loosening. Added Stephen Collinson: “Trump opened the war by telling Iranians he was giving them a once-in-a-lifetime chance to throw off repression. But no uprising has yet occurred in a nation where thousands of protesters were recently gunned down by the authorities.” 

Continued Collinson: “The overthrow of the government would... provide Trump with a genuine legacy achievement. Many Iran analysts, however, worry that a collapse of central authority could lead to sectarian or civil strife and an implosion of the Iranian state. Such an outcome might bog down US forces in the region for years to come — or leave allies facing massive security problems. The war between the US, Israeli and the Iranian governments might ostensibly end. But the international crisis it precipitated might get a lot worse.” 

Individuals in Tehran seem to have spoken to BBC about their desire for a regime change, but the UK channel says that “so far, there have been no signs of the mass anti-establishment protests similar to those seen in January”. The BBC cites Netanyahu in support of this assessment: “[O]n 12 March, during his first press conference since the war, Netanyahu said that he could not ‘say with certainty that the Iranian people will bring down the regime’”. 

AND PALESTINE

Attacks on Palestinians continue in occupied Palestine. Here is a CNN story, dated March 16: “Four members of the same Palestinian family, including two boys aged 5 and 7, who were out on a late-night drive after breaking the daily Ramadan fast, have been shot dead by Israeli soldiers in the West Bank, Palestinian officials reported. Israel’s military said the soldiers opened fire because they felt threatened by the movement of the family’s car. It is the latest in a rising number of fatal incidents in the occupied Palestinian territory, in which Palestinians have been killed either by Israeli soldiers or Israeli settlers.

“Ali Bani Odeh, aged 37, and his 35-year-old wife, Wa’ed Bani Odeh, had taken their four young sons out in the car and were driving back home from the city of Nablus, according to one of the two boys who survived, 11-year-old Khaled Bani Odeh, when they came under fire.

“Said Khaled, ‘Suddenly there were direct gunshots towards us... My father was saying the shahada (the Islamic declaration of faith, which Muslims cite when facing death) and raised his finger. My mother was screaming and then went silent. I tried to turn over my brother Mohammed, but I was unable. There is no one left other than me and my brother Mustafa.’”