The war’s transformation into a US-Iran war is the result neither of an imposition nor of a deliberate choice. As Washington shifted from military instruments to economic pressure, Israel’s influence over the course of the war diminished with it.

A Ukrainian strike in the Caspian Sea on July 25 hit an Iranian vessel and killed a crew member. Tehran threatened retaliation in the first days, then moved within four days from a military response to a demand for compensation. That retreat did not follow from any resolution of the dispute. The matter closed because both capitals chose to preserve the ambiguity surrounding it. Yet ambiguity worked as an escalation brake only under a particular set of conditions, and those co

What the ANA was in fact carrying is not yet known. The strategic message of the strike is clearer: for the Ukraine war, the geographical distance between Iran and Russia no longer provides strategic security on its own.

In mid-July, the United States resumed strikes on Iranian territory, sustaining them night after night. Iran has answered with missile and drone attacks on the Gulf states hosting American forces. Commercial transit through the Strait of Hormuz has effectively ground to a halt, and war-risk insurance premiums have climbed to as much as 10% of a vessel's value. All of this has unfolded barely a month after a memorandum of understanding (MoU) was signed in Islamabad on June 17.

The targets struck on Iran’s coast point most clearly to a coercive operation aimed at seizing control over Hormuz. The same set of targets also makes a strike on hardened nuclear facilities militarily feasible.

The fate of the Islamic Republic will be determined not by military superiority alone but by the outcome of this longer and more uncertain struggle. It is precisely there that Israel has now turned all of its attention.

The first exchange of missile fire since the 8 April ceasefire is less a reignition of the war than a message. For Tehran an agreement is a necessity, not a preference; for Washington, only an agreement can reopen Hormuz.

Islamabad’s mediating role has more to do with a reflex of threat management than with foreign policy gain. Five interconnected threats, from the western border to the energy bill, are shaping Pakistan’s response to the war.

For the first time Iran has carried its claim over the Strait of Hormuz into domestic law. The measure is the most comprehensive challenge directed at the transit passage regime since 1982, and the end of the war will not make it disappear.

In 1927, at a chess tournament in New York, the Latvian-born grandmaster Aron Nimzowitsch spotted his opponent place an unlit cigar on the table. Nimzowitsch, notorious for his hatred of tobacco smoke, rushed to the tournament director to file a complaint. The director pointed out that the opponent had not actually lit the cigar. "I know," Nimzowitsch replied, "but he is threatening to smoke, and as an old player you must know that the threat is stronger than the execution."

Iran’s deep underground facilities withstood the most powerful American conventional weapons, but the capacity sheltered inside became steadily less usable. Passive defense proved more effective than expected, yet on its own it could not provide an adequate security umbrella.

The debate in Washington is no longer about whether a ground operation will take place but about its scope and timing. Yet none of the three scenarios on the table has a defined exit strategy behind it.

Is the U.S. conducting this operation in line with its own strategic priorities, or is it being drawn into Israel's tactical thinking?

The strategic reflex of a state whose energy infrastructure has been badly damaged, whose refineries have been struck and whose daily life has been severely disrupted is more often asymmetric radicalization, less costly but riskier, rather than surrender.

Israel’s silence since the beginning of 2026 looks less like withdrawal than a deliberately sustained, multi-layered strategy of ambiguity, within which Tel Aviv is pursuing a four-part agenda behind the scenes.

The protests that began on Dec. 28, 2026, have taken their place in Iranian history. However, these demonstrations were neither as massive as the Mahsa Amini era nor as widespread as the Green Movement. Most notably, while participation levels remained more limited compared to previous uprisings, this wave was among the harshest in terms of the intensity of violence. Initially, Iranian authorities approached the issue with a degree of understanding. However, following the dep

The 12-day direct conflict between Iran and Israel in June 2025 resulted in consequences that have fundamentally altered not only the regional military and strategic balance but also Iran's internal security paradigm. During this period, Israel conducted targeted assassinations, cyberattacks, and air operations against Iran’s critical military, security, and nuclear infrastructure, achieving an unprecedented level of deep infiltration. The losses sustained and the exposed sec

Israel’s air strikes revealed more than military weakness; they exposed a systemic failure in Iran’s ability to think strategically in an...

On June 13, 2025, Israel launched a wide-ranging air operation across Iran, targeting not just nuclear facilities but also internal...

The Houthis, less commonly known as the Ansarullah Movement, represent a striking case of a local uprising in northern Yemen evolving...