The US and Israel launched strikes on Iran in “Operation Epic Fury” this week, killing Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei.
About a quarter of Americans supported the move, according to a Reuter/Ipsos poll. A poll from YouGov puts overall support closer to 37% and of those who identified as MAGA supporters 85% supported the strike, though some conservative figures such as Tucker Carlson and Nick Fuentes have dissented.
Across the political spectrum there has been some common ground in wanting freedom for Iran, but differences about whether the strikes will bring said freedom. Some see the attacks as unlawful and irresponsible while others think Khamenei’s killing gives Iranians a chance at a different future.
A National Review (Right bias) writer argued, “There are three reasons why these strikes have created big problems for China. First, the Iranian counterweight is gone. In 2021, Xi told senior party officials that ‘the East is rising and the West is declining,’ that America was ‘the biggest source of chaos in the present-day world,’ and that China was entering a period of strategic opportunity. Iran was central to that thesis…Second, Xi’s own story is collapsing from the inside. The story he told 1.4 billion people — that America is a declining power incapable of decisive force projection — does not match what happened in mere hours over Tehran…Third, the energy math is turning against Beijing. China bought 1.38 million barrels per day of Iranian oil last year and takes over 80 percent of everything Iran ships.”
An American Prospect (Left) opinion read, “If public opinion had a strong bearing on U.S. foreign policy, then this would be a blinking-red indicator that the new war is neither sustainable nor desirable—an all-around destructive campaign. That the president has failed to make a coherent argument in favor of the Iran strikes, to seek congressional approval, or to make any outreach to the public may well end up backfiring.”
“Combined with the reckless attack on the Venezuelan government, new threats against Cuba, and the negatives caused by tariffs—Trump’s war could bring the rarified world of foreign policy–making into the realm of electoral politics.”
A piece in the American Conservative (Right) said, “Evidently, Trump still feels he’s got the Midas touch, that he’s a geopolitical savant who can eliminate the dastardly Islamic Republic and bring “freedom” to Iranians—his professed top priority in launching the war, according to the Washington Post. But the results of the combat operations thus far don’t inspire confidence that a golden age is dawning in the Middle East. Indeed, after the joint U.S.–Israeli attack began early Saturday, Tehran started blowing up the Middle East, hitting U.S. bases as well as civilian and commercial targets. In airports and city centers and energy markets, mayhem ensued.”
Adding, “Other not-really-surprising ramifications of the war have reached the American homeland. In Austin, Texas, a Senegalese-American gunman in clothes bearing an Iranian flag design and the words ‘Property of Allah’ killed three and wounded over a dozen early Sunday…Perhaps Trump and Levin could learn something from the Mideast Muslims they feel no apparent compunction about bombing into bloody smithereens: God’s will cannot be taken for granted.”
A New York Times Opinion (Left) guest essay said, “On Saturday, when I first saw the words ‘Ali Khamenei has been killed’ flash on a television screen, I felt choked. The distance between that possibility and all the years of being gripped by fear of him could not be crossed. There was no relief in that first moment, just a flood of grief for all the suffering and the bleak inheritance he had left us.”
“Released from the grip of life under Ayatollah Khamenei, tens of millions of Iranians — inside the country and out — will grasp at whole new ways to contemplate the future. The possibilities are precarious and depend, in part, on how the days ahead unfold. But for the first time in 47 years, there will be possibilities: for Iranians to consider how they want to be governed, as opposed to just thinking about what they don’t want; about how to articulate a new Iranian identity; and about how to relate to one another outside the logic of repression…There is a dignity in this pause and the chance to envision the path to a different kind of rule — whether it might wind through a transitional return to constitutional monarchy, a steppingstone to whatever system comes next, all prefaced by the need for gozaar, or moving beyond, from the failed Islamic model.”
