Internationalize the Solution for Gaza and Iran

I just had a piece come out in the Boston Globe’s Ideas section, with the tiny ambition of proposing a comprehensive peace plan for the Middle East and a path from disorder to order in our mad mad mad mad world. To Read the full article on their (firewalled site) click here. To read part of it on my substack, click here.

Here is the intro:

Hed: The US and its allies — not Israel — should handle Iran and Gaza

Dek: Now is time for something better than a ceasefire in the Middle East: lasting peace.

President Trump's Iranian gamble may have paid off, at the very least he claims to have brought about a ceasefire between Iran and Israel-- and will scream at both sides till they honor it. But establishing a lasting and real peace in the region will take unity and coordination among the United States and its European and Gulf Arab allies. Only consistent American messaging and firm pressure can dissuade Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu to be content with his victory against Iran’s nuclear program and end his delusional focus on regime change.

It is not mere Trumpian bluster to claim that the US strike has reconfigured the balance of power in the Middle East. It is now possible for an American-European-Gulf-Israeli alliance to defeat the Iranian-led “Axis of Resistance,” which includes Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis.

The wars in Gaza and Iran are conceptually linked. Iran funded, trained, and inspired Hamas, thereby enabling it to carry out the terrorist attacks on Oct. 7, 2023. Permanently defanging Iran could end the cycles of conflict that have convulsed the region after those attacks. With a profoundly weakened Iran, Trump now has a chance to show whether he is an actual peacemaker or merely enjoys the plaudits of playing one on social media….