On June 13, Israel launched an unprovoked, illegal war of aggression against Iran, backed by the fascist Trump regime. Nine days later, on June 22, the U.S. joined in Israel’s criminal assault on Iran. In an unprovoked, illegal act of war, the U.S. sent seven B-2 stealth planes that dropped 14, 30,000-pound bunker-buster bombs on Iran’s nuclear facilities, as well as 30 submarine-launched Tomahawk cruise missiles. 

On June 24, Trump declared a ceasefire between Israel and Iran, temporarily halting the fighting. But the situation remains very fluid and very ominous. Both Trump and Israel warned that they could launch further attacks if Iran didn’t submit to their imperialist bullying and demands. Iran’s leadership, for its part, warned it would not cave into U.S.-Israeli threats. 

Here are five basic takeaways from this latest—and most dangerous—round of U.S.-Israeli aggression against Iran:

1. Illegal, Unjust Fascist and Imperialist Aggression. These attacks by the Trump/MAGA regime as well as Israel—with full U.S. backing—are acts of unprovoked imperialist gangsterism and war crimes. Iran was not at war with and did not pose an immediate threat to either country. In fact, it was in the midst of negotiating an agreement on its nuclear program with the U.S. when Israel and then the U.S. attacked. 

Yale Law Professor Oona Hathaway writes that Trump 

did not seek advance approval from Congress or the U.N. Security Council, as required by law. The unlawful strikes have thus laid bare the dangerous absence of any effective legal constraints—whether domestic or international—on the decision of the American president to use deadly force anywhere in the world. … This prohibition on the unilateral resort to force is the foundational principle of the postwar legal order. Only if the Security Council votes to authorize a war—or where a state is the subject of an “armed attack”—may a state that has ratified the U.N. Charter resort to force against another state.¹

This attack by Trump (and his support for Israel’s) illustrates the dead-on accuracy of revolutionary leader Bob Avakian’s analysis of Trump’s fascist regime:

Trump fascism is a regime that openly and aggressively strips away basic rights and blatantly declares that there is no rule of law and due process of law other than what it dictates, and that raw destructive power is what must rule in the international arena, without even the pretense of adherence to international law or concern about the sovereignty, or even the right to exist, of less powerful peoples and countries.²

2. Death and Destruction. An eight-year-old aspiring gymnast, grandparents in their 80s, a young poet, a 28-year-old equestrian champion, a graphic designer for National Geographic. All civilians. All killed by Israel’s U.S.-backed airstrikes. These bombing raids killed more than 63, perhaps as many as 950, people. Over 3,400 more were injured. The toll from U.S. bombing is not yet known. People across Iran were terrorized, with the nearly 10 million people of Tehran—Iran’s largest city—being ordered by Trump and Israel to evacuate or face possible death. And bombing Iran’s nuclear enrichment sites also threatened to release radioactivity which could have hurt or killed many, many more.³

3. A Mountain of Lies—About Iran’s Nuclear Program and U.S.-Israeli Motives. The U.S. and Israel claimed Iran posed a grave danger because it had a nuclear weapons program and had threatened Israel with it. These are lies. Iran does not have nuclear weapons and never has. It has a nuclear enrichment program to which it has a legal right under international law (the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty), including to generate nuclear power. It has repeatedly declared it does not have a nuclear weapons program and shown its willingness to sign agreements ensuring that, such as its 2015 agreement with the Obama administration and other world powers.

The countries that do have nuclear weapons and have repeatedly threatened and carried out or backed attacks against Iran are the U.S. and Israel.⁴ The countries that have either refused to endorse or torn up agreements limiting Iran’s nuclear program are the U.S. under Trump and Israel. In March, Trump initiated negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program and then used them to conceal Israel’s preparations for its surprise June 13 attack on Iran.⁵

So what are the real motives of the U.S. and Israel?

First, Israel and the U.S. are not really worried that Iran could develop a nuclear weapon or two and then attack them. The U.S. and Israel are concerned that if Iran did have a nuclear weapon, or was seen as close to having one, it would limit the military dominance and freedom of action of the U.S.-Israel alliance—including to attack Iran. In other words, it’s not really about preventing Iran from attacking Israel, it’s about enabling Israel and the U.S. to attack Iran if they felt they needed to.

Second, the U.S. and Israel know they could sign agreements with Iran to limit its nuclear enrichment program in exchange for the lifting of U.S. sanctions and guarantees against U.S. or Israeli attacks. So why aren’t they interested in that? Because their main objective is not a non-nuclear Iran; no, their main objective is crushing Iran as a formidable rival to Israel in the Middle East, and making Israel and the U.S. the unrivaled rulers of the region.⁶

And Trump has kept open the possibility of going in to knock out the regime altogether. On June 22, he wrote on his social media, “It’s not politically correct to use the term, ‘Regime Change,’ but if the current Iranian Regime is unable to MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN, why wouldn’t there be a Regime change??? MIGA!!!”

4. Trump Uses War to Accelerate Fascism. Trump is using his attack on Iran to accelerate the consolidation of fascism in the U.S. One form this takes is using the attack on Iran as supposed proof of the “greatness of America” now being “restored to new heights” by Trump. But there have also been significant threats of repression against those who don’t toe the line.

The night of the attacks, Trump claimed that U.S. bombs had “obliterated” Iran’s nuclear program. But a preliminary report from the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) that was leaked to the press estimated that the attack had only set back Iran’s nuclear program by a few months.

When questioned about this, Trump and his regime went ballistic. They threatened to withhold classified briefings from Congress—illegally denying Congress the final say about issues of war and peace, and concentrating that power in the hands of Trump alone. 

The regime then threatened to sue the New York Times and CNN, which had reported on the DIA assessment, claiming in a letter to the Times that their coverage was “false,” “defamatory” and “unpatriotic” and had “undermined the credibility and integrity of President Trump in the eyes of the public and the professional community.” The letter demanded the Times “retract and apologize for” the piece. On his social media, Trump demanded the journalists involved be fired, and claimed that the articles were supposedly meant to “demean the military personnel who participated in the attacks.”

Axios reported that “Trump wages all-out fight for control of Iran strike narrative,” and that his regime was threatening to prosecute Democrats for supposedly leaking the DIA report. Meanwhile, Senate Republicans refused to invoke the War Powers Act or restrict Trump’s freedom to wage war in any way.

The overall message: Trump has total authority to wage war as he sees fit, with or without Congress, and it’s Trump and Trump alone who defines what’s true—not intelligence agencies or the facts. 

(Trump’s Iran attack and other moves have sharpened the divisions within the Democratic Party, with many party leaders shamefully but not surprisingly supporting the aggression, while others condemned it.)

5. Grave Danger of Further War—Nightmare of Unchecked U.S.-Israeli Aggression

Trump has announced that the U.S. would meet with Iran for further negotiations the week of June 30, but it’s unclear if this will actually take place. Trump also said he “doesn’t care if I have an agreement [with Iran] or not.” And in any case his negotiating position has been that Iran abandon all nuclear enrichment—really a demand for Iran’s surrender that the country’s leadership has so far rejected. 

Both the U.S. and Israel have made clear that they’re ready to attack Iran again whenever they choose.  Time Magazine reported that at a press conference “Trump was asked by a reporter if the U.S. would consider bombing Iran again, if intelligence reports were to conclude that Iran could enrich uranium to a level that concerns him. ‘Sure, without question, absolutely,’ he replied.”

And Israel’s defense minister said Israel would follow a “policy of enforcement” against Iran—ceasefire or no ceasefire—“preserving aerial superiority, preventing the advancement of nuclear projects and preventing the advancement of threatening long-range missiles.”

In other words, the U.S. and Israel are fighting—and killing—for a nightmare world in which they have unchecked military dominance and can attack any adversary at will (as Israel has done in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria and elsewhere).

Stop U.S.-Israel Aggression Against Iran—The Trump Fascist Regime Must Go Now!

As we wrote last week, 

Trump’s bombing attack is the largest military strike the U.S., under Democrats or Republicans, has ever carried out against Iran. The whole situation is now even more fraught, dangerous and unpredictable. It underscores why it is so urgent that THE TRUMP FASCIST REGIME MUST GO NOW!

It also underscores why the people of the world have a responsibility to stand with the people of Iran against both the U.S.-Israeli aggression and the crimes of the oppressive Iranian regime. As the Communist Party of Iran (MLM) wrote last week: “Let us march forward in building a broad and growing unity—within Iran and internationally—against the U.S.-Israeli war of aggression and together fight to create an Iran free from both imperialism and the Islamic Republic.”

Finally, this vicious Trump fascist/U.S. imperialist attack brings urgently to life the truth of what Bob Avakian has emphasized:

We, the people of the world, can no longer afford to allow these imperialists to continue to dominate the world and determine the destiny of humanity. They need to be overthrown as quickly as possible. And it is a scientific fact that humanity does not have to live this way—a whole different way to organize society, a whole better world, is possible.

STOP THE U.S.-ISRAELI UNPROVOKED, ILLEGAL WAR OF AGGRESSION AGAINST IRAN!!!

THE TRUMP FASCIST REGIME MUST GO NOW!