Is War with Iran Inevitable? The U.S. Military's Re-Engagement in the Middle East

The Biden administration came to the Oval Office promising to end the United States’ “forever wars” only to find itself entangled in multiple all-out wars in Europe and the Middle East before its term ended. Due to the ‘unconditionality’ of US commitment to Israel, the Biden administration’s foreign policy has not only re-ignited the “forever wars”, but also has blindly pushed Israel to the abyss of its own “forever wars”. (1) Israel is now fully engaged in its invasion of Gaza and on the brink of getting entrapped as well in Lebanon if it does not abide by its ceasefire with Hezbollah and moves forward with an invasion of the country’s south. Both wars have no clear ‘day after’ plans; and the root causes of the conflict with Israel remain unaddressed.

Since the Israeli-Hezbollah ceasefire came into effect on 27 November 2024, it has been repeatedly violated by Israel, resulting in the killing of dozens of persons. (2) The truce agreement is thus on the brink of collapse as Hezbollah has retaliated with assaults from its side. (3) Brokered by the US, the truce calls for Hezbollah to withdraw about 30 kilometres from the Israeli border, north of the Litani River. Meanwhile, the Israeli military has to vacate southern Lebanon in 60 days. The renewed attacks showcase the fragility of the truce and Israel’s growing zeal to expand the war, which may not be in the interests of a second Trump administration that would try to avoid any further entanglement in the region’s conflicts.

American foreign policy during the Biden era in the Middle East has been short-sighted and precarious towards Iran and the Israeli-Palestinian question as well. It is overshadowed by crisis management mode and the excessive protection of Israel to the point of nurturing an image of a rogue foreign policy and pushing the entire region closer to an all-out war. As the confrontation between Iran and Israel escalates to an unprecedented level, the US finds itself shackled in Israel’s multi-front war, risking direct confrontation with Iran. In light of these tectonic developments, US foreign policy in the Middle East under a second Trump administration is likely to involve a deeper re-engagement in the region's security if President Donald Trump succumbs to the hawkish policies of Israel and its staunch supporters within his circle.

The Setbacks of Iran’s Allies

More than a year into the Israeli war on Gaza, Hamas has sustained heavy losses in its top political and military command structure with the assassination of its leader, Yahya Sinwar; its political chief, Ismail Haniyeh; Haniyeh’s deputy, Saleh Al-Arouri; Deputy Commander of Hamas's military wing, Marwan Issa; and a Hamas leader in Lebanon, Fatah Sharif. Israel has managed to fully invade Gaza, destroying most of its infrastructure and killing more than 45,400 Palestinians and rendering the strip almost unliveable. (4)

Even if the inaction or inability of the international community to push for a ceasefire miraculously changes, The Lancet estimates that the death toll could already exceed 186,000. (5) Based on the Gaza Strip’s 2022 statistics, this figure equates to 7.9 % of the population. This alarming estimate has not affected the United States’ complacency about Israel’s conduct of the war. To exacerbate conditions even further, Israel has besieged north Gaza since launching a renewed ground offensive about two months ago, adding to the already critical humanitarian crisis and imminent famine. Nonetheless, Hamas leaders have high morale and are determined to keep fighting unabatedly for the liberation of their land until their last breath, as did the late Sinwar. (6)

Throughout the war, it was evident that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tried his best to dodge every single round of negotiations that could lead to a ceasefire and the release of all hostages. For instance, the May 2024 ceasefire agreement proposal, which had Qatar, Egypt, the United States and the United Nations as the guarantors was accepted by Hamas. (7) Similarly, Hassan Nasrallah, the late Secretary General of Hezbollah, had also agreed to a 21-day ceasefire shortly before he was assassinated. (8) Nevertheless, Netanyahu was bent on prolonging the war, hoping for the re-election of Donald Trump and another Trump administration that would be more lenient towards or aligned with the expansionist policies of the radical right-wing government of Israel.

After all, it was the Trump administration that had recognised Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and the Israeli annexation and sovereignty over the Golan Heights in 2017 and 2019 respectively. President-elect Trump’s recent threat that there would be “HELL TO PAY” if the hostages held in Gaza are not released by the time he returns to office on 20 January 2025, and that “those responsible will be hit harder than anybody has been hit in the long and storied History of the United States of America” (9) signals the blank cheque his administration is prepared to give to Israel to continue its military actions in Gaza unrestrained.

Meanwhile, more than a year into the deadly tit-for-tat attacks between Israel and Hezbollah, the Lebanese resistance movement has suffered a substantial blow, especially with the elimination of almost all its top military commanders and Nasrallah himself. Added to that, the communication breakdown among the Hezbollah fighters caused by the detonated pagers, which Israel planted with undetectable explosives, resulting in the injury of thousands of the group’s members, (10) has impacted Hezbollah's organisational and mobilisation capabilities against the ramped-up Israeli incursion into South Lebanon. Having said that, Hezbollah is able, although racing against the clock, to recover and rebuild itself thanks to its tens of thousands of fighters and huge military arsenal.

Trump Administration 2.0 and the Israeli Zeal for War Expansion

In light of the setbacks of Iran’s allies in the region, mainly Hezbollah and Hamas, and despite the fragile Israeli-Hezbollah truce agreement, the extreme right-wing government of Israel has repeatedly indicated that it envisions widening the scope of war by going deeper into Lebanon. On 3 December 2024, Netanyahu made it crystal clear that, "We are currently in a ceasefire, I note, a ceasefire, not the end of the war". (11) If Hezbollah’s military capabilities are crippled, Iran would considerably lose one of its most powerful proxy forces and deterrence cards against Israel. In this case, Netanyahu would spare no effort in trying to convince the second Trump administration to seize this ‘golden opportunity’ to attack a bleeding Iran.

Another Trump mandate is widely expected to restore its “maximum pressure” strategy towards Iran. However, the vulnerability of Iran’s proxies in the region may propel a second Trump administration to shift its foreign policy towards Iran and consider two other possibilities: pushing Iran to negotiate a new nuclear deal, which the Iranians have expressed their willingness to do, (12) or giving Israel the green light to pre-emptively dismantle Iran’s nuclear programme. The far-right Israeli government’s zeal for reshaping the Middle East through military means, (13) coupled with the influence of staunch pro-Israelis within the new Trump team, (14) will make it challenging for Trump to miss the opportunity, if it arises, to thwart Iran’s nuclear programme, especially if Iran miscalculates its responses to Israeli provocations.

Israel is more tempted than ever to reshape the region, which would overshadow American foreign policy towards the Middle East under a second Trump mandate. The first Trump administration successfully achieved diplomatic breakthroughs in 2020 by paving the way for Israel to normalise ties with four Arab countries. This diplomatic track will likely continue to with more Arab countries set to join the train of normalisation on the horizon. Yet, given the multi-front war that has engulfed the region since 7 October 2023, Israel may push a second Trump administration, heavily influenced by avid Israeli supporters and staunch anti-Iranian hawks, to seriously consider the resort to hard power to achieve another breakthrough in the regional balance of power. This time would be by giving Israel the green light to destroy Iran’s nuclear programme once and for all, or at least setting it back, which is a possibility given the unconventional making of American foreign policy under the Trump administration.

Before the inauguration of the second Trump administration, Iran may attempt to move ahead with its pledge to retaliate against Israel for the third time, as a response to Israel’s 26 October strikes on its air defence system. However, Iran risks a disproportional counterstrike from Israel – an escalation that could potentially spiral out of control and a scenario Israel yearns for in hopes of dragging the US into direct military confrontation with Iran. Having said that, Iran would most probably reassess its strategy and recalculate its moves against Israel. It should be noted that the first Trump administration proved beyond any doubt that it was quite unpredictable, most notably with the assassination of Iranian Major General Qasem Soleimani – a move no one thought was likely at the time. Any miscalculated move may provoke the Trump administration or give a pretext to its anti-Iran hardliners to pressure Trump to endorse Israel’s attack on Iran’s nuclear sites. Israel would of course frame any pre-emptive strike against Iran and sell it to the Trump administration as self-defence. Therefore, the ball is perhaps in Iran’s court, and much depends on its next retaliatory move.

The Resilience of the ‘Axis of Resistance’

From its side, Iran has proved beyond any doubt that it has the capability and resolve to attack Israel and cause it considerable harm. Iranian ballistic missiles have managed to strike multiple parts of Israel with precision, notwithstanding the defence aid provided by the US, the UK and Jordan. The Iron Dome failed to intercept around 80 of the 200 ballistic missiles Iran launched, which resulted in great damage to the Nevatim air base. (15)

It is evident that the successive US administrations have failed to curb Iran’s activities in the region. Historically, the Clinton administration’s policy of ‘dual containment’ was designed to isolate the Islamic Republic. Yet with the invasion of Iraq and the collapse of Saddam Hussein’s regime and the Bush administration’s ‘Freedom Agenda’, Iraq descended into civil war and was handed over to Iran on a silver plate. The latter managed to grow its geopolitical influence in the Middle East by creating what is known as the ‘Axis of Resistance’ against the US and Israel, which includes Hezbollah, Hamas, the Houthis in Yemen, and various armed groups in Iraq and Syria.

Despite its attempt to escalate and expand the war with Iran, Israel must not fool itself into believing it could easily crush Iran and its proxies in the region. The agency of Iran’s allies in the region – Hamas and Hezbollah – continues to surprise both the Israelis in the battlefield and pundits alike; thus, their resilience should not be underestimated. Iran itself managed, alone, to shower Israel with hundreds of ballistic missiles, which necessitated the intervention of Israel’s allies for defence. The Israeli illusion of changing the Middle East by force should remind the US of its own miscalculated military adventures in the Iraq and Afghanistan, which not only tarnished its image but also cost it over 5 trillion dollars. (16)

A US-engineered Regime Change in Tehran?

Persuading the Trump administration to pursue a regime change in Iran remains very unlikely. (17) But, to put things into perspective, getting rid of a ‘rogue’ regime remains an ideal scenario for the US and its allies in the region. US policies towards Iran have driven it closer to Russia and China. Therefore, pursuing a regime change in Iran may ensure the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons; the safe flow of oil to US allies such as Japan, South Korea and Europe; and further set the stage for the normalisation of ties between the Arab states and Israel. On the strategic level, toppling the clerical regime could derail Iran’s potential strategic alliance with China and Russia, two major great nuclear powers in the international system, and undermine their geopolitical influence in the Middle East. It is worth noting that Iran has supplied Russia with suicide (kamikaze) drones that are used in invading Ukraine. (18)

In 2013, former President Barack Obama assured Iran that “we are not seeking regime change.” However, it would be difficult for the Iranians to trust the US when his successor unilaterally pulled out from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) and re-imposed painful sanctions, or when certain influential US policy makers call for a new regional order in the Middle East without the clerical regime of the Islamic Republic of Iran. In fact, Senator Tom Cotton (R-Ark) declared in 2017 that, “The policy of the United States should be regime change in Iran”. (19) On 8 October 2024, Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) reaffirmed his longstanding stance on the need for a regime change in Iran stating that: “There needs to be a confrontation of Iran” and that he is “1,000 per cent for regime change”. (20) Trump’s nominee for United States Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth called in 2020 for massive airstrikes against Iran’s key infrastructure, including energy, nuclear programme, ports, and even cultural sites. (21) These neoconservative ideas of regime change, which underpinned US foreign policy during the Bush era, would likely be the trend of the US foreign policy debate in a second Trump era given that the developments in the Middle East are currently shifting in favour of the US and its closest ally Israel.

The Nightmare of US Military Re-Engagement in the Middle East

Should President Trump opt for another confrontational approach with Iran, the leverage that the anti-Iran hawks and pro-Israel supporters have in US policy making would likely cloud the US strategy of restraint in the region. The US has already deployed the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system in Israel along with 100 US soldiers who will be responsible for its operation, to cover Israel’s back. (22) Stepping up US deployment in the Middle East could be limited. Bet widening the scope of war with the Israeli invasion of Southern Lebanon and escalating the Israel-Iran front suggests and necessitates a deeper US re-engagement in the security of the region.

Since the Obama era, the US has tried to shift its global position by focusing more on curbing China's rise and Russia's resurgence. With the introduction of the “Pivot to Asia” strategy, successive US administrations have worked on disengaging from the Middle East. The US has slashed its deployment of military forces in the region very considerably, going from more than 200,000 troops in 2003 (23) to around 30,000 by mid-2023. (24) Recently, however, it has amplified its military presence by raising its troops to nearly 50,000. (25) The number is expected to spike again in case the attacks between Israel and Hezbollah and Iran boil over into all-out war.

The excessive ‘unconditionality’ of Israel’s support will forever remain a destabilising factor in the Middle East. The Arab-Israeli normalisation of ties will not be a sustainable solution for peace in the region, but only a ticking bomb that could explode at any given moment. The Trump administration set in motion new dynamics in the security architecture of the region by incentivizing the normalisation of relations between the Arab states and Israel and pushing for the formation of a US-Israeli-Sunni security alliance, (26) which hopes to replace the US as the security guarantor to counter Iran’s activities in the region. This top-down approach to handling the longstanding Israeli-Palestinian conflict has managed to achieve normalisation deals between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan, at the expense of the Palestinian cause. Nonetheless, Trump’s “Deal of the Century” ultimately failed with the Palestinians unsurprisingly rejecting it altogether.

The Biden administration followed the same approach by choosing to ignore the root causes of the conflict and advocating instead for a normalisation of ties between Saudi Arabia and Israel. Indeed, just weeks before Tufan al-Aqsa was launched, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was very eager to normalise relations with Israel, declaring in an interview with Fox News on 20 September 2024, “Every day we get closer, it seems it's for the first time real one serious. We get to see how it goes.” He even described his country’s deal with Israel as “the biggest historical deal since the end of the Cold War”. (27) On 29 September 2023, Biden’s National Security Adviser, Jake Sullivan, boasted that the “The Middle East region is quieter today than it has been in two decades,” only to find out eight days later that the region was boiling with the 7 October attack.

US foreign policy in the Middle East will always be reactionary as long as the Israeli occupation continues and no fair solution to the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict is found. Some attribute Hamas’s attack on 7 October as a pre-emptive move to prevent a normalisation deal between Saudi Arabia and Israel that was in the offing. Others attribute it to the accumulation of suffering for over 17 years of brutal blockade on Gaza, the continuous annexation of lands and settlement by Israel in the West Bank, and the increasing number of Palestinians killed in the West Bank by Israeli forces.

Conclusion

The US has been grappling with the shift in the international system from unipolarity has ended ushering in a new era of multipolarity whereby China and Russia are considered major great powers. Its catastrophic withdrawal from Afghanistan prompted US foes to undertake a more assertive approach to their conflicts. Russia invaded Ukraine and Hamas attacked Israel on an unprecedented scale on 7 October. More than a year into the war between Hamas and Hezbollah on one side, and Israel on the other, the threat of a wider war that involves Iran and the US looms. Due to the unconditionality of the US support, Israel’s foreign policy, premised on expansionism and confrontation, operates with impunity that requires the US to re-adjust its regional posture by increasing its military presence and back Israel in the case of an all-out war with Iran. Without the unending US provision of military equipment and defence, under the umbrella of “preserv[ing] its qualitative military edge amid rapid and uncertain regional political transformation”, (28) Israel’s security is fragile and would be in peril given its inability to defend itself against Iran’s missile attacks. Therefore, the US will forever be embroiled in the security of the region, with its own military forces, to protect Israel and deter any aggression against it, especially in times of escalating violence.

Moreover, Israel’s warmongering efforts will continue so long as its military aid is secure, and the US is unlikely to intervene. American foreign policy under the Biden administration in the Middle East has been marked by inconsistency, strategic miscalculations and short-sightedness. Its military re-engagement in the security of the region runs counter to its global efforts to contain China and Russia. In the March 2021 Interim National Security Guidance, the Biden administration reasserted US disengagement from the Middle East by “right-siz[ing] our military presence”, while US “presence will be most robust in the Indo-Pacific and Europe”. (29) The rapid transformation and escalating violence taking place in the region have ruined an otherwise idealist US foreign policy.

On his part, Netanyahu is tempted to capitalise on the recent ‘victories’ in the fronts of Gaza and Lebanon hoping to achieve the ultimate victory: the elimination of Iran’s capabilities to develop nuclear weapons. With the great leverage the Zionists exert in the US political landscape, and the need for Iran to re-establish the balance of deterrence, they can pressure the US administration into direct confrontation with Iran to tilt the balance of power and reshape the regional order in the US’s favour. During the next four years, President-elect Trump is the only person who could prove whether the US can curb Israel’s fervour to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities the same way he  curbed the war-mongering policies of his former National Security Advisor, John Bolton, a neo-conservative hawk, who according to Trump, would have cause “World War Six”. (30)