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Welcome to The Geopolity’s What We’re Watching (3W), our daily look at the interconnected worlds of Geopolitics, Economics and Energy. Curated from the world’s leading sources of information, our analysis and commentary is designed to help you make sense of the events driving the major developments in the world.
On Monday, at 3W we wrote that Israel is very deliberately sabotaging all US efforts to get to a formal ceasefire deal with Iran. Among the tools applied by the Israeli’s is its War on Lebanon, for which Hezbollah is the excuse.
Later on Monday, Israeli prime minister Netanyahu issued a joint statement with Defense Minister Katz threatening to bomb Hezbollah targets in the Dahieh district of Beirut “following repeated violations of the ceasefire” by the Iran-backed militia, writes Axios. In response, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi issued his own warning on X that Israel’s actions in Lebanon were a violation of the US – Iran ceasefire, and the US and Israel would bear “the consequences of any violation.” Iranian officials told the semi-official Tasnim News Agency that no talks with the US would take place until Israel stopped its attacks in Lebanon, and threatened retaliation in the Strait of Hormuz and possibly “other fronts.”
According to Axios, US president Trump then called Israeli prime minister Netanyahu and scolded him for this. Summarizing Trump’s remarks to Netanyahu, a US official said: “You’re fuc!*$! crazy. You’d be in prison if it weren’t for me. I’m saving your ass. Everybody hates you now. Everybody hates Israel because of this.” A second source briefed on the call said Trump was “pissed” and at one point yelled at Netanyahu: “What the fu*! are you doing?” Trump’s anger appeared to be driven by the fact that Netanyahu’s decision to escalate in Lebanon was threatening to implode his negotiations with Iran. After the call, Trump posted on Truth Social that the Iran talks were “continuing, at a rapid pace.”
Separately, Trump also claimed he’d had a “very good call” with “highly placed Representatives” of Hezbollah who agreed “that all shooting will stop — That Israel will not attack them, and they will not attack Israel”, writes Axios. The Lebanese embassy in Washington on Tuesday then said that Hezbollah had confirmed a “mutual halt of attacks” after a call between Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and US secretary of state Marco Rubio, writes The National.
But Netanyahu quickly denied the existence of any agreement. Late Monday night he said that Israeli operations in southern Lebanon would continue “as planned,” writes The New York Times.
Israeli defense minister Israel Katz on Tuesday then also denied any sort of deal between the US, Israel and/or Hezbollah in Lebanon. He said that Netanyahu had informed Trump in the phone call that Israel will attack Beirut’s southern suburbs if Hezbollah continues targeting northern Israel, writes The Los Angeles Times. At the same time, Israel continued expanding its attacks on southern Lebanon. Through a wide variety of strikes across the region it killed 11 people, including a Christian dentist and his daughter, two Syrians working in a plant nursery, and six people a single family – Hassan Abdullah, his wife Hanan, as well as their children, Ali, Ibrahim, Leen and Julia. One son survived the Israeli attack. The Israeli military also issued a new evacuation order on Tuesday for Nabatieh, one of southern Lebanon’s largest cities, writes The New York Times.
Israeli defense minister Israel Katz on Tuesday then also denied any sort of deal between the US, Israel and/or Hezbollah in Lebanon
According to Bloomberg, the whole affairs highlights the fact that the US and Israeli have different objectives in the Middle East, and that the US has only limited control over Israel. This, 3W notes, is indeed a possible explanation of events. But, we note, if true, this would be the result of US policy choices. The power imbalance between the US and Israel is such that the US could have total control over Tel Aviv, if it wanted to. If the US does not have this total control, it chose not to establish this. And this would be evidence of a powerful pro-Zionist lobby in the US.
At 3W we therefore prefer another explanation of the events of recent days, which is that Israel effectively leads US thinking on Middle East policy. In support of this thesis we have highlighted before that the US launched the current War on Iran based on Israeli arguments and plans, and despite pushback from US intelligence agencies – just refer to the Joe Kent affair. And as we explained on Monday, whenever there are indications the US is starting to deviate from the plans concocted in Tel Aviv, Israel shoots into action: creating problems on the ground for whatever part of the plan Israel does not agree with, and urging on its agents inside elite US circles, in order to realign the US with what Israel wants. What can be observed in particular since October 7 is that whenever Israel does this, the US eventually does indeed turn around and re-aligns itself with Iran. Trump’s sudden return to a “hardline position” on Iran’s nuclear program, after become more lenient on it just a week earlier in order to create an opening for negotiations. Is just the latest example of this.
Israel effectively leads US thinking on Middle East policy
For these reasons we suspect that much of the Axios reporting on the “tensions” between Trump and Netanyahu is just typical Axios propaganda, crafted in coordination with the US – Israel Alliance. It is designed to maintain Trump’s room to maneuver with Iran, giving him “plausible deniability,” while Israel just presses on with the real plan regarding Lebanon.
Support for the thesis that the US – Israel Alliance is just seeking “plausible deniability” comes from the fact that the US continues to undertake “low intensity strikes” on Iran. Last week, the US said it launched strikes on southern Iran, targeting what it said were Iranian missile sites and boats attempting to place mines, wrote the BBC. In response, Iran then targeted the US military base in Kuwait, the BBC wrote separately. Over the weekend the US military said it had conducted “self-defence strikes on Iranian radar and command and control sites for drones” in the city of Goruk, near Iran’s southern coast, and Qeshm, an island in the Strait of Hormuz, writes the BBC. On Tuesday the US military then fired a Hellfire missile at a tanker heading toward Iran, writes Reuters. The US military’s Central Command posted a video showing the missile strike the tanker and said it targeted the Botswana-flagged M/T Lexie’s engine room, disabling it. Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman said the strikes had been a violation of the ceasefire, and it struck back, attacking US military targets in Kuwait and Bahrain, as well as a vessel in Iraq’s Umm Qasr port, writes Reuters.
These US military actions against Iran make clear, in the 3W view, that the US is not (anymore) talking seriously with Iran. But also, and this is more important, that Iran is realizing what is going on. For as we at 3W wrote last week, the efforts to achieve a “negotiated settlement” are in reality nothing but a US – Israel Alliance trap, which the Alliance hopes Iran will walk into.
in the 3W view, that the US is not (anymore) talking seriously with Iran
But, as 3W also mentioned before, this situation leaves the global economy facing a major physical shortage of fuel, petrochemicals, sulfur, fertilizers, helium and aluminium. In the absence of supplies from the Arabian Gulf region, prices for these products will have to increase significantly, in order to rebalance the market through forcing a reduction in demand – something which will significantly reduce economic growth, and comes with the risk of financial crises being triggered.
Considering that, according to Reuters, US secretary of state Marco Rubio on Tuesday told a US Senate hearing that the US has not offered Iran sanctions relief in exchange for reopening the Strait of Hormuz, and will continue to insist that any sanctions relief is tied to Tehran giving up the entirety of its nuclear program first, there is no solution in sight. And this means the worst case scenario for the global economy is now the base case.