Over the weekend the United States and Israel launched a massive military assault on Iran. “Eliminating imminent threats from the Iranian regime — a vicious group of very hard, terrible people.” Within hours, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was dead, along with much of his senior command. The attack on Iran came less than two months after the United States military captured Nicolás Maduro, the president of Venezuela, in an overnight raid on his compound in Caracas. The Iranian regime was monstrous, but Trump is not insisting that it be changed, nor is his administration. What if the Iranian people rise up, as Trump has asked them to do, and are slaughtered by the Iranian military?

Source: International New York Times March 03, 2026 05:43 UTC