Roots of the Middle East conflict trace back centuries

OPINION:

In 1979, I spent several months in Iran covering what was then called the Iranian Revolution. My attempts to learn Farsi were unsuccessful, but all these years later, two phrases stick in my mind: “Marg bar Esraʾil!” and “Marg bar Amrika!”

Many of my fellow reporters insisted that “Death to Israel!” and “Death to America!” should not be taken literally or even seriously.

Also, many Iranians didn’t believe that Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the religious leader who led the revolution, intended to become a dictator and mass murderer.

They failed to understand that Mr. Khomeini’s antipathy toward the “Little Satan” and the “Great Satan” was implacable, subject to neither negotiation nor compromise.

He was committed to Islamic revival. He believed that could be achieved only through a great struggle against the West, with a particular focus on the sole Jewish-majority nation state.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who became the second supreme leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran in 1989, has unwaveringly adhered to Khomeinist theology.

In a public address two years ago, he stated plainly: “The situation between America and Iran is this: When you chant ‘Death to America!’ it is not just a slogan; it is a policy.”

Last week, Israel launched a wave of attacks against Ayatollah Khamenei’s regime to prevent him from acquiring the nuclear capability needed to implement his “policy.”

This is a major battle in what analysts at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, the think tank where I hang my hat, have been calling The Long War.

I know, I know: We all dislike “forever wars” or “endless wars” or whatever term is preferred by those who brand themselves “restrainers,” but when our enemies are patient, what are we to do?

One choice: Decisively defeat them. Don’t settle for “exit strategies.” Demand “unconditional surrender” as President Franklin D. Roosevelt did during the war against Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan.

Another choice: Retreat. Let our enemies live to fight another day. Try to appease them while “managing decline.” We can pretend that’s “responsible statecraft,” but it’s nothing of the sort.

Though the battle now raging began when Hamas invaded Israel from the Gaza Strip on Oct. 7, 2023, the roots of this conflict trace back much farther.

The Islamic Republic of Iran is committed, and I’m quoting from its constitution, to “jihad in the way of Allah.”

The jihad began in the seventh century CE when Arab Muslim armies defeated the Byzantine Empire in the Levant and conquered Iran, a sophisticated civilization under the Sasanian Empire.

Zoroastrians, then the dominant Iranian religious group, suffered persecution, including massacres, the destruction of their temples and expulsions. Only a small and oppressed minority remains in Iran today.

Ayatollah Khamenei disparages his country’s pre-Islamic past, including even the era of Cyrus the Great, founder of the first Persian Empire in the sixth century BCE, who liberated his Jewish subjects and enabled their return to Jerusalem. He calls the centuries before the Muslim conquests an “Age of Ignorance” (Jahiliyyah).

Recall that in 1979, ABC News correspondent Peter Jennings asked Ayatollah Khomeini how he felt about returning to his home country after years in exile. His answer: “Nothing. I don’t feel a thing.”

In 1980, having become the Islamic republic’s first supreme leader, the ayatollah elaborated: “We do not worship Iran. We worship Allah. For patriotism is another name for paganism. I say let this land go up in smoke, provided Islam emerges triumphant in the rest of the world.”

If you understand this, you grasp why it made no sense for President Obama, in his 2009 inaugural address, to admonish Iran’s dictator for being “on the wrong side of history” and offering to “extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.”

President Trump has taken a more strategic approach. Consistent with the Reagan doctrine, he is supporting an ally battling a common enemy.

Consistent with the diplomatic philosophy of George Shultz, he cast “the shadow of power” across the bargaining table, understanding that without it, negotiations are a “euphemism for capitulation.”

The conventional wisdom, which I confess I shared, had been that Mr. Trump would rein in the Israelis until the negotiations being conducted by his envoy, Steve Witkoff, resulted in a deal or a dead end.

With a new round of talks scheduled for the past weekend, the regime’s leaders were caught sleeping (in some cases literally) when, on Friday, the Israelis struck nuclear weapons facilities and other military targets while eliminating nuclear weapons scientists, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps officers and political leaders.

The Israelis, as is their consistent practice, have been doing their best to limit collateral damage. Many, if not most, Iranians despise Ayatollah Khamenei and his brutally oppressive regime.

If those Iranians take this opportunity to overthrow the now-weakened theocrats, they will deserve all the help that Americans and other free people can give them.

After the first Israeli strike, Mr. Trump noted on social media: “Two months ago I gave Iran a 60-day ultimatum to ‘make a deal. They should have done it! Today is day 61.”

Earlier on Day 61, the International Atomic Energy Agency censured Tehran for deceiving the world about its nuclear program for decades.

Mr. Trump had warned Ayatollah Khamenei that more attacks were coming and would be “even more brutal.” He added: “Make a deal.”

The octogenarian jihadi may now be considering that, but it’s also possible that, as a true believer, he would prefer to end his life as a martyr to the Khomeinist Revolution.

If so, Israelis will be safer, Americans will be safer, and Iranians will have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to forge a free nation.

• Clifford D. May is founder and president of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a columnist for The Washington Times and host of the “Foreign Podicy” podcast.