On Feb. 28, the U.S. and Israel escalated their decades-long regime change campaign in Iran by launching an illegal war against the nation, targeting missile infrastructure, leadership and civilian sites. The joint assault confirms what people around the world have echoed in the streets since the start of Israel’s genocide in Gaza: the United States and Israel pose an existential threat to West Asia (a.k.a the Middle East). Our very humanity is at stake if Western imperialism and Zionism — intertwined expansionist ideologies rooted in ethnonationalism — continue to go unchecked.
In the first 19 days of the war, the U.S. and Israel killed at least 1,444 civilians in Iran and 912 civilians in Lebanon. In Iran, over 19,000 civilian sites have been targeted, including schools, hospitals, water desalination plants, energy infrastructure and world-heritage buildings.
It is evident that Israel’s genocide in Gaza, sponsored by the U.S., is a prototype for a new type of warfare — one that relies on AI and air power, targeting critical infrastructure, and using drones and unmanned vehicles — that is now being unleashed on Iran. It is the brazen opening of a new front in a seemingly endless war to convert all the countries of the region into loyal U.S. subjects that are open for business, while paving the way for Israel to pursue its territorial expansion.
We cannot feign surprise at the U.S. onslaught, one that is symptomatic of a dying empire lashing out to hold onto waning power. The result is a war that is not only bloodthirsty, immoral and illegal, but also unstrategic and illogical. The assassination of former supreme leader Ali Khamenei, followed by America’s feeble attempt to declare a quick victory, has backfired catastrophically, strengthening the Islamic Republic’s resolve to defend against U.S.-Israeli aggression.
As expected, middle powers like Canada have reaffirmed their support for the U.S. and Israel. In his initial statement, Prime Minister Mark Carney parroted ready-made phrases like “Israel has the right to defend itself” and a few days later performed logical acrobatics to also call the American-Israeli war illegal, all while condemning Iran as the one to blame for the crisis.
It is absurd to think of Iran as the “primary source of instability and terror in the Middle East”— as Carney claimed — when Israel is the one carrying out a genocide in Gaza next door. In the last two and a half years, Israel has slaughtered tens of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza, annexed territory in the West Bank, and bombed seven of its neighboring countries. Israel is now using the war against Iran as pretext to quietly continue the genocide in Gaza and its annexation of the West Bank, and to justify the invasion of southern Lebanon.
Iran, on the other hand, has shown considerable restraint in recent years despite the many attacks on its sovereignty, refusing to be baited into conflict. It is now retaliating by targeting Israel’s defence capabilities and U.S. and U.S.-affiliated military infrastructure in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states in hopes of pressuring the U.S. to retreat.
Iran’s key piece of leverage is the Strait of Hormuz, the waterway through which oil produced in the GCC states is exported across the world, and which Iran closed in early March. As with all American interventions in the region, oil is at the centre of the war. It is no coincidence that the country being carpet bombed right now is also the one that controls much of the global flow of oil. Trump has openly admitted wanting to take over the Strait of Hormuz as a way to cement American dominance over West Asia’s plundered resources.
Mainstream media has played a central role in providing military cover for the U.S. and Israel’s actions. Media outlets in Canada and the U.S. have been cherry-picking their quotes, underrepresenting anti-war coverage and voices coming from inside Iran. Meanwhile, these outlets have provided an outsized platform to a faction of the Iranian diaspora that cheers on the U.S. and Israel as they indiscriminately bomb their own people, believing the myth that war can bring about liberation.
History tells us that “freedom” is only invoked by the U.S. when it serves American interests. Regardless, why are a couple million Iranians in the diaspora being considered over the 93 million people living inside the country — people who can provide direct testimony of life under the Islamic Republic and foreign war?
True liberation for the Iranian people can only come about once the warplanes are silent and economic sanctions are lifted by countries including Canada. Grassroots movements like “Women, Life, Freedom” and the strikes by bazaar workers must be allowed to emerge organically without Western interference or appropriation. As Iranians mourn the lives of thousands of anti-government protesters who were massacred by the government in January, people of conscience must ensure their grief is not instrumentalized in support of war. A free Iran means liberation from U.S. and Israeli bombs, from false monarchist saviours and from government oppression.
This latest chapter in Iran will eventually end, but war will continue in some form or another if Zionism and Western imperialism continue to go unchecked. A peaceful West Asia is not in the interest of the ruling class in the U.S., Israel or Canada. Pushing for lasting peace means uniting globally against Western imperialism and Zionism in order to stop the massacre of the people of Iran, Lebanon and Palestine, and providing Iranians with the relief they need to enact their own self-determination.
Kalliopé Anvar McCall and Sheida Lasheni are members of the Canadian group Iranian United for Palestine.