Israel

Thursday

Peter Frankopan

Israel’s attack on Iran has been planned for years

From our UK edition

It was clear at the time that what happened on 7 October 2023 would change the Middle East. What was perhaps less obvious was the impact it would have on the rest of the world. In addition to the suffering in Gaza, the weeks and months that followed Hamas’s horrific attacks have seen the reconfiguration of Syria, the effective dismantling of Hezbollah, the decapitation of the leadership of Hamas and now, with Iran, a time when the decision-making in Tehran, Jerusalem and Washington will have a profound effect on the shape of the emerging global order. Historians like to think about turning points and moments in the past where the wheels of history turned. In one sense that is, of course, true about 7 October.

Rod Liddle

Come friendly bombs and fall on Iran

From our UK edition

It is heartening to see the lefties out marching in defence of mullahs and their enlightened rule of Iran. The Stop the War Coalition has been organising protests the length and breadth of the country, demanding ‘Hands off Iran’. It is harder for the marchers to identify specifically with their cause than it is when they’re marching about Palestine: Iranians don’t wear keffiyehs. Perhaps they should take on their marches an intricately woven carpet or some uranium-235. Or maybe design some sort of badge that can be cheaply manufactured and somehow symbolises the country – I would suggest the image of a crane with a homosexual dangling at the end of it.

Wednesday

Neal Pollack

Call him Daddy

Sitting next to Donald Trump at the end of a short NATO summit, Mark Rutte, head of the organization, looked quite amused as he listened to the President describe the Israel-Iran conflict.  "They've had a big fight, like two kids in a schoolyard," Trump said. "You know, they fight like hell, you can't stop them. Let them fight for about two to three minutes, then it's easy to stop them." Raising a fist, Rutte added: "And then Daddy has to sometimes use strong language to get (them to) stop." Soon after, flanked by two of his Apprentices, Pete Hegseth and Marco Rubio, Daddy Trump gave his own press conference. He talked for 15 minutes before he took a single question. The Netherlands, he said, “has the most beautiful trees. I want to bring some back with me.

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Tuesday

Cockburn

Can Zohran Mamdani stop the Cuomo machine?

You don’t mess with the Zohran Here in the capital, the President has been doing his utmost to wrangle Israel and the Islamic Republic of Iran into a ceasefire neither government seems to want. It’s... not going great. As he departed for the NATO summit at the Hague, Trump said of the conflict: “We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don’t know what the fuck they’re doing.” Meanwhile on the Hill, senators are poring over the Big, Beautiful Bill to see if they can whip up a version of it they’re willing to pass by July 4. But Cockburn finds himself looking north to the Big Apple – and wondering whether the mayoral primary could offer signs of life for the Democratic party.

Neal Pollack

Memories of the 12 DAY WAR

President Trump didn’t start the war. But if we’re to believe the greatest social-media post of all time, he sure finished it, and quickly. Either way, he definitely branded it, and in geopolitics, as in business, branding is everything. If you break the terms of the brand, Israel and Iran have found out, the President is going to whup you, at least verbally. “Upon the 24th Hour,” Trump posted yesterday about a peace of his own making on Truth Social, a website of his own making, “an Official END to THE 12 DAY WAR will be saluted by the World. . . . On the assumption that everything works as it should, which it will, I would like to congratulate both Countries, Israel and Iran, on having the Stamina, Courage, and Intelligence to end, what should be called, ‘The 12 DAY WAR.

Monday

Tim Shipman

Does the government support Trump’s Iran strikes?

From our UK edition

13 min listen

The weekend saw the US launch airstrikes on three Iranian nuclear sites, with Tehran warning of ‘everlasting consequences’. Despite an emergency Cobra meeting and Luke Pollard’s morning media round, we are still waiting for an answer on whether the government supports Trump’s action. Keir Starmer’s assured and confident position on the world stage now looks to be in peril, as he is pulled between Trump, his attorney general and the court of public opinion. Can he de-escalate? Also on the podcast, Nigel Farage delivered a speech this morning in which he announced changes to non-doms and unveiled a new ‘Britannia card’ – although most of the questions afterwards centred on the situation in the Middle East.

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Roger Kimball

On Iran, trust Trump’s instincts

What now? After the daring and what everyone is describing as a “flawlessly executed” attack by the United States on Iran’s hardened nuclear facilities Saturday night, Macbeth’s words must be on the minds of many: “If it were done when ’tis done, then ’twere well / It were done quickly.” Things did not work out so well for the Thane of Cawdor, as Macbeth then was. But even though his attack was not “the be-all and the end-all” he wanted, everyone who wishes for peace must second his opening argument.

Friday

Charles Lipson

Fordow in a fortnight?

The decision whether to use American planes and bombs to demolish Iran’s Fordow nuclear facility is the most consequential of Donald Trump’s presidency. Iran’s hardened facility is buried deep inside a mountain, well beyond the striking power of Israeli fighter jets. The question is whether the US will use its B2 bombers to destroy Fordow with the mammoth, deep-penetrating bombs that only US planes are big enough to deliver. Whether to drop those bombs is the decision that now awaits President Trump. Reports are that he has already approved the strike plans but has not authorized their implementation. That’s the final decision that he has said he will make within two weeks. Two weeks, however, is the outside limit.

Thursday

Cockburn

The Tucker Carlson and Ted Cruz roast

Tucker Carlson teased an upcoming podcast with Senator Ted Cruz Tuesday night by posting a short, fiery clip from the two-hour interview. The clip spotlights Cruz's alleged ignorance of basic information about Iran. But, after Cockburn watched the much anticipated episode, he is sad to say that the grown men's yelling competition featured in the teaser turned out to be a faithful representation of the podcast as a whole. Here are Cruz and Carlson's zestiest and best delivered zingers: When discussing the Iran-backed assassination attempt of the former secretary of state Brian Hook, Cruz said, "Killing terrorists is a good thing.

Tucker Carlson screenshot
Lara Prendergast

Starmer at sea, Iran on the brink & the importance of shame

From our UK edition

46 min listen

Starmer’s war zone: the Prime Minister’s perilous position This week, our new political editor Tim Shipman takes the helm and, in his cover piece, examines how Keir Starmer can no longer find political refuge in foreign affairs. After a period of globe-trotting in which the Prime Minister was dubbed ‘never-here Keir’, Starmer’s handling of international matters had largely been seen as a strength. But as tensions escalate in the Iran–Israel conflict, global events are beginning to create serious challenges. They threaten not only to derail the government’s economic plans but also to deepen divisions within the Labour party, particularly between the leadership and much of the parliamentary party. Tim joined the podcast alongside The Spectator US editor Freddy Gray.

Charlie Gammell

Striking Fordow will not solve the Iran problem

From our UK edition

The world is watching Donald Trump to see if he will give his military the green light to use one of America’s most deadly weapons, the Massive Ordnance Penetrator (Mop), to destroy Iran’s underground nuclear facilities at Fordow. As a man with a seemingly inexhaustible need for attention, this is a gratifying position for him to be in. But a potentially dangerous one for the rest of us. ‘Trump doesn’t have a taste for war,’ someone said to me recently. ‘War’s bad for business.’ This appears to be true so far; we have certainly seen Trump try his hand at peace-making in Gaza, Ukraine and Iran with consistently poor results. But history is full of examples of far more principled men than Trump acquiring a taste for war through a thirst for power and money.

Douglas Murray

What else could Israel do?

From our UK edition

Over the past few days British readers have been able to enjoy a number of hot takes on the situation in the Middle East. First, there have been all the politicians, such as the Scottish First Minister John Swinney, who have called for our government to step in and ‘de-escalate’ the conflict between Israel and Iran. But even leaving aside whether the mullahs in Tehran can be swayed by Britain or Scotland, ‘de-escalation’ is the only surefire way to ensure that they continue to pursue a nuclear capability. Elsewhere, the BBC has been playing a blinder. When the conflict began, it decided that its audience would be well served by having the celebrity chef Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall give his thoughts on the matter.

Freddy Gray

Who’s pushing Trump to be an Iran hawk?

From our UK edition

‘This never would have happened if I had been president,’ says Donald Trump, whenever the international news goes from bad to worse. It’s a line he uses a lot in relation to the wars in Ukraine and Gaza, both of which began in the interregnum between his first administration and his second. Yet the latest war, between Israel and Iran, is a different matter. Trump of course blames his predecessor, Joe Biden, who ‘made Iran rich’ with $300 billion for the evil regime’s dreaded nuclear weapons programme. It was Trump, though, who in 2018 tore up Barack Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran and in 2020 killed Qasem Soleimani, the head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard’s Quds Force.

Wednesday

James Heale

Westminster waits for Donald’s decision

From our UK edition

14 min listen

Westminster waits with bated breath to discover whether Donald Trump will ally with Israel in striking Iranian nuclear sites. The President called for ‘UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER!’ from Tehran overnight. The day to day of domestic politics appears diminished by comparison with the ever-looming threat of an escalated conflict… But the show must go on: today’s PMQs saw Chris Philp (why not Robert Jenrick?) and Angela Rayner deputising for their absent leaders; Liz Kendall introduced legislation to enact cuts to personal independence payments for disabled people; the Commons voted to decriminalise abortion at any point until birth; and the Office for National Statistics (ONS) is up to its old tricks, announcing that inflation has fallen when the reality is much more complicated.

Tuesday

Cockburn

Posting your way through World War Three

A few months ago Team Trump tried to organize its war-gaming plans on the messaging app Signal. It didn’t work. It appears the team has taken to an even more secure platform, as the Iran-Israel war escalates, communicating instead on X. US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee shares with the President, Cockburn and everyone else: Mr. President, God spared you in Butler, PA to be the most consequential President in a century – maybe ever. The decisions on your shoulders I would not want to be made by anyone else. You have so many voices speaking to you Sir, but there is only ONE voice that matters. HIS voice. I am your appointed servant in this land and am available for you but I do not try to get in your presence often because I trust your instincts.

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Roger Kimball

Trump is putting ‘America First’ by ignoring the MAGA punditocracy

Political imbrioglios often take on the character of theological controversy. Back in the 6th century, the wise men of the Western Church, pondering the Trinity, decided to make an addition to the Nicene Creed. The Holy Spirit, they determined, proceeded not simply “ex Patre” (“from the Father”) but also “filioque,” “and from the son.” No big deal, right? Wrong. For reasons I shall refrain from dilating on now, the Eastern Church repudiated the addition. Controversy raged for centuries. Indeed, what became known as the “filioque controversy” culminated, in AD 1054, in the Great Schism between the Eastern Church and the West. For most of us mortals, the controversy now seems arcane, not to say bootless. But at the time it was a matter of life and death.

Regime change
Daniel McCarthy

Trump won’t be dragged into a regime-change war

The handsome pages of The Spectator World’s July issue readers will find an essay of mine arguing that the United States doesn’t win wars anymore because we don’t even understand what a modern war is. From the French Revolution to the Cold War, and in the long, warm afterglow—thankfully, non-nuclear—of Cold War success, Western elites have tended to think about wars in terms of regimes and ideologies. Winning a war is all about changing the opponent’s regime so that it endorses one’s own ideology: turning a “dictatorship” into a “liberal democracy” through the magic of bombs and bullets.

Monday

Freddy Gray

Operation Rising: will Trump get dragged into the Israel-Iran conflict?

From our UK edition

20 min listen

Relations between Iran and Israel are deteriorating rapidly, with comparisons being drawn to Israel’s 1981 strike on Iraq’s Osirak nuclear reactor. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appears to be advocating for regime change in Tehran, reportedly encouraging the United States to take military action. Donald Trump, who previously came close to authorising a strike, is now said to be more cautious – mindful of the risks of exposing American forces abroad and being drawn into another protracted conflict, contrary to the non-interventionist platform on which he was elected. The Iranian regime, built on a foundation of resistance, is responding to Israel’s attacks while also expanding its network of regional proxies, which now extends as far as South America and east Africa.

Charles Lipson

Why Democrats back the wrong side of 80-20 issues

“80-20” issues have become a catchphrase recently. Most voters on those issues favor one policy by overwhelming margins and oppose the other. The “winning side” may poll anywhere between 60 and 90 percent, depending on the issue, but they are all conveniently grouped under the same label of “80-20.” These lopsided issues have three striking features. First, there seem to be more and more of them, especially on contentious social issues and law enforcement. Second, the same constituency that supports the 20 percent side of one issue frequently supports the 20 percent side of other issues, even those that are substantively quite different. Once an issue is depicted as “progressive,” for example, it generates that support.

Friday

Cockburn

Inside the April Ryan-John Fredericks Briefing Room brouhaha

Radio Ga Ga That’s it, yes, it’s war! Forget Israel and Iran’s back and forth, ignore the tanks on Constitution Avenue: the real conflict of the week was the heated Briefing Room scrap between two titans of radio, John Fredericks and April Ryan. It all kicked off on Wednesday afternoon ahead of the press briefing, when Trump-supporting call-in host Fredericks sidled in and started airing his grievances about how the briefings used to work under the previous Trump administration. He was moaning about how he never got to ask questions due to the focus-pulling antics of CNN’s Jim Acosta and April Ryan, who, sources tell Cockburn, he referred to as the “woman from urban radio.” Fredericks said this... while directly next to Ryan.

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