Iran

If Donald Trump secures an encore in 2020 and if the clerical regime in Tehran doesn’t fall of its own volition – action could be taken to tackle Iran. That’s the state of play, I can say, based on countless discussions with dozens of current and former administration officials over the last two years of this presidency. A former senior administration told me last year that war with Iran remained  ‘very’ possible. Today the State Department formally designated the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corp (IRGC), including its vaunted Quds Force, a terrorist organization.

I’ve written repeatedly for The Spectator about how the Western media has a track record of misreporting on the plight of homosexuals in the Middle East. However, an outrageous article by Benjamin Wenthal for the Jerusalem Post on the hanging of a child kidnapper and rapist in Iran, which was picked up by dozens of major news outlets, has introduced new depths of inaccuracy and sensationalism to the coverage. Published under the headline ‘Iran Publicly Hangs Man on Homosexuality Charges’, the article quotes Iranian student media as saying a 33-year-old man was executed in the southwestern city of Kazeroon ‘based on his criminal violations of “lavat-e be onf” – sexual intercourse between two men.

Will the Trump administration embrace the Bolton doctrine? John Bolton, whom Donald Trump appointed in April to replace the stolid H.R. McMaster, has been trying to tailor administration foreign policy to match his hawkish views. Among his initiatives, the Wall Street Journal reported, is to make a move to do what he has long wanted done, which is to wage war against the mullahs in Tehran. The result is a schism in the administration.With the resignation of Defense Secretary James N. Mattis, Pentagon officials are now starting to fight back publicly against the National Security Council, especially as Bolton tries to install his former deputy Mira Ricardel, who was fired from the National Security Council, after Melania Trump denounced her, at the Pentagon.

Warmongers on the Left and Right are united in their fury at President Donald Trump’s extraordinarily bold and brave decision immediately to begin withdrawing all US troops from Syria. For those of us who prefer peace, it is a sure sign that Trump deserves our unconditional support and gratitude, no matter how we view the rest of his presidency. After all, the only other time Trump united the neocons and liberal hawks was when he launched a futile cruise missile barrage last year at an empty Syrian airfield in response to an alleged chemical weapons attack against civilians.