Is Pezeshkian The Peacemaker The Answer to Israeli Imperialism?

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.” - Jesus Christ

The ultimate question of this new Trump administration with regards to Israel is “What did Miriam Adelson pay $100 million to Donald Trump’s campaign for? What did the the Israel lobby pay the Trump campaign a total of $230 million for?”

Miriam Adelson is, as everyone should know, a single issue voter. That issue is Israel. She is loyal to a single country, and that country is not the United States of America. That country is Israel. She is a dual-national citizen who wields her financial influence to further Israel’s interests. So what does she want from this new Trump administration?

That question might be answered this week, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meeting with President Trump in Washington D.C today, February 4th.

This week, prior to Netanyahu’s arrival, President Trump asked Congress to approve an additional $1 billion in military aid to the Israelis, $700 million of which will be in the form of 2000 pound bombs and $300 million of which will be in the form of armored bulldozers for the Israelis to carry out demolition campaigns in Gaza and the West Bank. Trump, in the past week, has stated that he will pressure Egypt and Jordan to accept a population transfer (ethnic cleansing) of the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip as well.

Trump’s first meeting with a foreign leader is Netanyahu. Not Vladimir Putin, not Xi Jinping, not any leader who leads a country that has significant influence over the world because they should, but the leader of a tiny country that always seems to be dragging the United States into things that are not in its interest to be involved in.

There are a few possible outcomes that can arise from this week’s meetings between Netanyahu and Trump. If Netanyahu could have it his way entirely, he would have the Trump administration support the restart of his genocidal campaign in Gaza, support an effort to annex the West Bank, and have the United States go to war with the Islamic Republic of Iran on behalf of the Israelis.

That is what Netanyahu wants. That is what the Israelis, especially the Likud party, have been advocating for since the 1970s. Total regional submission of the Middle East to the Israeli state through the total sterilization of Egypt, Libya, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Iraq, and Iran. They have, as of December 2024 with the coup of Syrian president Bashar Al-Assad, achieved all of their objectives except for the sterilization of Iran.

Will Netanyahu get everything that he wants? We will find out after this week. Should Netanyahu be given anything that he wants? Absolutely not. Not in a moral world.

The dream scenario for the freedom-loving peoples of the world would be for Trump to arrest Netanyahu for the genocidal war criminal he is. This scenario has a less than 0% chance of happening.

Netanyahu’s dream scenario is also unlikely, but far more likely than the dream scenario of the people of the world who value justice, truth, and freedom. Trump ran on a campaign of keeping the United States out of new wars, and, most likely, the only way President Trump would have the United States Army go to war with Iran would be if the Israelis staged a false-flag attack on the United States that was able to successfully trick the US government and the American people into believing that Iran was responsible.

Netanyahu will be coming into his meeting with President Trump asking for everything he wants. Trump will likely allow him to restart the genocidal campaign in Gaza, meaning only one phase of the three phase ceasefire deal announced before Trump’s inauguration will have been implemented. Trump does want to keep the United States out of a military confrontation with Iran, but could provide the Israelis with the foreign aid it needs to carry out strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities. Trump could also support an Israeli effort to annex the West Bank.

This week will be a good indicator of how much leverage the Israelis have over the new Trump administration. If Netanyahu only is allowed to restart his genocidal campaign in Gaza, it would suggest that the Trump administration is taking a “hands-off” approach with the Israelis. While this is not morally justifiable or in the interest of the American people, as the Israelis have not had a “hands-off” approach with the United States government in a long time, it would be better than the Trump administration taking a “kneel and kiss the ring” approach to the Israelis whereby they are given everything that they want.

Supporters of the military effort against the Israelis have rallied around the Axis of Resistance since October 2023, which prior to December 2024 consisted of the Palestinian resistance in Gaza, Hezbollah and its allied factions in Lebanon, Iraqi militias, Syria, Yemen, and Iran. This past December, Syrian president Bashar Al-Assad was overthrown and forced to flee the country due to a coup led by Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS), an organization that up until recently was designated as a terrorist organization by the United States due to it being an offshoot of the Al-Nusra Front, an ISIS and Al-Qaeda allied terrorist group (all of which have always been backed and controlled by the United States and Israel, read more here).

Here is where Iranian president Masoud Pezeskian comes in. Since being elected as the President of the Islamic Republic of Iran in July 2024, Masoud Pezeshkian has faced an onslaught of criticism from supporters of the resistance effort against the Israelis, but this criticism is quite misplaced.

After HTS took control of Syrian government, Pezeshkian and Iran were strongly criticized for “allowing it to happen,” despite offering military support to the Syrian Arab Army. Additionally, the Israelis took control of the Golan heights and territory which positioned themselves 20 kilometers away from Damascus (less than 10 miles away). We must be honest that Bashar Al-Assad was overthrown via a coup, not by any “revolution” and not by the Syrian civil war. HTS was prepared to go to war with the Syrian Arab Army with their one to two hundred thousand fighters when they began their campaign on November 27th, and were allowed to march into Damascus and take control of the Syrian government on December 8th virtually unopposed. Iran had no reason to engage militarily on behalf of Assad and Syria when the Syrian Arab Army itself did not fight back.

The only conclusion one can draw from this unopposed overthrow of Assad is that there was an internal coup that led to his deposal. Curiously enough, even though HTS was ready to go to war against the Syrian Arab Army as well as their Iranian and Russian allies, when they did not have to and were simply allowed to take power unopposed, they claimed their army was not ready to go to war against the Israelis occupying their territory and positioning themselves within 20 kilometers of Damascus. How an army can be ready to go to war against Syria, Iran, and Russia, but not Israel, doesn’t make much sense (unless, of course, Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham has the same ties to the Israelis that their Al-Nusra Front predecessors had).

So what are Iran, Ayatollah Khamenei, and President Pezeshkian doing with their current geopolitical situation? While there are criticisms worth making with regards to Pezeshkian’s neoliberal economic policies, the Iranians have adopted a “diplomacy-first” foreign policy platform that has been quite merciful to the Israelis. This mercy should not be mistaken for weakness, and is not a betrayal of the Axis of Resistance or Palestine.

While it is true that Operation True Promise 3 has not yet taken place, and likely will not take place with Iran’s allies in Lebanon, Palestine, and Yemen weakened and their alliance in Syria gone, in the event of an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities, a retaliatory attack on the Israelis or even all-out war with them is to be expected. While Iran has adopted a “diplomacy-first” approach, they have coupled it with a “turn the other cheek” military doctrine. After the Israeli attack in Tehran which resulted in the martyrdom of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, Iran attempted to honor Haniyeh’s sacrifice by being peacemakers that would end the genocide in Gaza. President Masoud Pezeshkian travelled to New York City to negotiate a full ceasefire throughout the entire Middle East.

This was a shocking development, as the Shia Islamic culture of Iran is rooted in a deep sense of honor. The Israeli assassination of a guest of Iran’s like Haniyeh on July 31st, the day of Masoud Pezeshkian’s inauguration, was more disrespectful to Pezeshkian and Iran than probably any event in the history of the Islamic Republic. For a foreign nation to kill a guest, to the Iranians, is worse than killing a citizen or even the Ayatollah himself. It was only after the Israeli assassination of Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah on September 27th that Iran carried out Operation True Promise 2, even though they had every reason to retaliate sooner for the gross Israeli violation of Iran’s honor and sovereignty with the assassination of Haniyeh. Iran turned the other cheek, allowed the Israelis to show their true colors, and then retaliated.

The message of turning the other cheek does not mean that you turn it back if your mercy is taken advantage of, and the Iranians have demonstrated that they understand this perfectly. Oftentimes, we find ourselves thinking about military doctrine in terms of deterrence, and Masoud Pezeshkian has been blamed for costing the Axis of Resistance its deterrence, but the reality is that Pezeshkian is fulfilling exactly the role that Ayatollah Khamenei wants him to fulfill, and excellently. When history is written about this era, The Islamic Republic of Iran, Ayatollah Khamenei, and President Pezeshkian will be remembered as peacemakers. Iran is fulfilling a Christlike role in geopolitics right now. Realism, liberalism, constructivism, Marxism, no theory of international relations can explain what they are doing quite like Jesus Christ’s message of “turn the other cheek.”

We are barely halfway through Pezeshkian’s first year of his four year term in office, and many supporters of Palestine and the Axis of Resistance have already tossed Pezeshkian aside as a traitor to the cause of Palestine. But the reality is that Iran, Ayatollah Khamenei, and Masoud Pezeshkian have crafted a military doctrine that is ahead of our time.

Dr. Masoud Pezeshkian served in the Iran-Iraq of the 1980s. He has seen war firsthand, as has the Ayatollah, and they do not want to subject their country or the region to war again. In the event of an all-out military confrontation between the Iranians and the Israelis, as opposed to this hybrid warfare that the Iranians, on the surface, seem to be struggling with, there is a strong argument that Iran will come out on top thanks to Pezeshkian’s military experience as well as Iran’s extensive weapons capabilities. While he may not be the best economic planner for Iran, there could be a hidden warlord no one expects underneath his peacemaking personality, a personality that he prefers and should be admired for. His “diplomacy-first” foreign policy should not be mistaken for weakness. Iran and Pezeshkian only have so much mercy they can show the Israelis. They are turning the other cheek to the last Israeli strike on Iran as we speak because they are peacemakers, but if new strikes occur on their nuclear facilities, it could be the final straw that erupts the Middle East into a regional war that will reshape the region permanently.

Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall inherit the kingdom of heaven.