The president and the Israeli prime minister launched a criminal war of aggression yesterday:
The U.S. and Israel said they launched an attack on Iran, which retaliated with strikes on Israel and targeted U.S. bases. President Trump confirmed major combat operations against the regime, and urged Iranians to “take over your government” as the strikes continued.
The U.S. has waged many stupid wars of choice, but this stands out as one of the most senseless we have ever seen. There is no cause for war. The U.S. and Israeli governments started this war because they could and because they felt like doing it. Trump has condemned the region to endure another pointless and unnecessary conflict that will leave only ruin in its wake.
Trump and Netanyahu are responsible for everything that happens next. They own this war and its consequences. Every life lost in Iran and throughout the region as a result of this war is their doing. They are war criminals, and they should be held accountable for the death and destruction they have chosen to cause. They have set the region on fire on a whim.
The president has attacked Iran for no good reason. He has told many lies to give himself a pretext for doing it, but there was no threat that warranted resorting to military action. If there was any doubt that Trump’s fake diplomacy was a smokescreen, that doubt has been laid to rest. There was no concession that the Iranian government could have offered short of unconditional surrender that would have satisfied him. As he always does, the president has sided with the ghoulish Iran hawks, and the U.S., Iran, and the entire region will suffer as a result.
The Iranian people will be the ones to pay the steepest price for this aggression. It is their country’s infrastructure that will be wrecked by the bombing campaign, and they will be living in fear as their cities are struck. The government will be even more repressive during wartime. To the extent that opposition leaders are seen as cheering on foreign aggression, it will likely backfire on them.
