How to Think About What’s Happening With Iran and Israel

Opinion|How to Think About What’s Happening With Iran and Israel

The full-scale Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear infrastructure on Friday needs to be added to the list of pivotal, game-changing wars that have reshaped the Middle East since World War II and are known by just their dates — 1956, 1967, 1973, 1982, 2023 — and now 2025.

It is far too early, and the possible outcomes so multifold, to say how the Middle East game of nations will be changed by the Israel-Iran conflict of 2025. All I would say now is that the extreme upside possibility — that this puts in motion a set of falling dominoes, ending with the toppling of the Iranian regime and its replacement by a more decent, secular and consensual one — and the extreme downside possibility that it sets the whole region on fire and sucks in the United States are both on the table.

Between these extremes still lies a middle-ground possibility — a negotiated solution — but not for long. President Trump has deftly used the Israeli attack to, in effect, say to the Iranians: “I am still ready to negotiate a peaceful end to your nuclear program and you might want to go there fast — because my friend Bibi is C-R-A-Z-Y. I am waiting for your call.”

Given this wide range of possibilities, the best thing that I can offer to those watching at home are the key variables that I will be tracking to determine which of these — or some other I can’t anticipate — is the most likely outcome.

First: What makes this Iran-Israel conflict so profound is Israel’s vow to continue the fight this time until it eliminates Iran’s nuclear weapon-making capability — one way or another.

Iran invited that, vastly accelerating its enrichment of uranium to near weapons grade. It had begun aggressively disguising those efforts to such a new degree that even the International Atomic Energy Agency declared on Thursday that Iran was not complying with its nuclear nonproliferation obligations, the first time the agency has declared that in 20 years. Israel has cocked its gun and aimed at the Iranian nuclear program several times in the past 15 years, but each time either under U.S. pressure or doubts by its own military, it stood down at the last minute — which is why it is impossible to exaggerate what is happening today.