Friday morning’s Israeli strikes on Iran and its nuclear weapons program could very well mark at least the beginning of the end of the Middle Eastern conflict, for two reasons. If Iran continues to act recklessly and retaliates, for example, against American bases or other collateral targets, then the Americans will have no choice, and in fact would be invited, to wipe the regime off the face of the map. If instead the regime acts more wisely and grabs Trump’s olive leaf and cobbles together an agreement to forever give up on its nuclear weapons ambitions, and hopefully missiles and other weapons of regional destabilization, then an even better result might be achieved.
Once the Iranians are dealt with, either through a definite destruction of their war apparatus and nuclear sites, or through a negotiated settlement that now will be done from a position of extreme (Iranian) weakness, then there will be no active foci of conflict in the Middle East. Hamas and Gaza are in ruins, Hezbollah is not even trying to help its Iranian bosses, Syria’s regime was toppled, and the Houthis will most likely stop once their Iranian patrons tell them to. That will be the time where the foundations for a new Middle East could well begin to be imagined. Let’s hope.