JERUSALEM — The Biden administration is losing ground in the Middle East and Central Asia because of misguided policies toward enemies ranging from the Iranian regime to the Taliban and Hezbollah, according to experts contacted by Fox News Digital.
The Islamic Republic of Iran launched drone and missile attacks on Iraq, Syria and Pakistan within 24 hours starting Tuesday. The regime's open war follows military aid to Hamas, which preceded its massacre of 1,200 people, including more than 30 Americans, in southern Israel on October 7.
Pro-war sentiment was on display in the capital Tehran last Tuesday, when the clerical regime hung banners on buildings warning the enemy in Hebrew and Persian: “Prepare the coffin.” Pro-Iranian regime activists gathered in front of a banner to demonstrate their loyalty to the Islamic Republic.
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Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdullahian (right) speaks with Houthi spokesman Mohamed Abdulsalam in Tehran, Iran, on January 1, 2024. (Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs/Anadolu, via Getty Images)
The Islamic Republic's foreign policy has long been animated by the founder of the country's anti-Western revolution, the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Khomeini famously declared: “Islam is all about politics.”
Khomeini's successor, Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, announced: “Death will come to America. In the new order I am talking about, America will no longer have an important role.”
According to Khamenei, another pillar of Iran's foreign policy is “Death to Israel.”
The rapid spread of Khomeini-style radical Islamism across the Middle East, including support for the Lebanon-based terrorist group Hezbollah, is another sign of a flawed Biden foreign policy, experts say. It is said that it is just one window.
This image from a video shows Houthi fighters hijacking the cargo ship Galaxy Leader off the coast of Hodeidah, Yemen, on November 20, 2023. (Houthi movement, via Getty Images)
Walid Fares, a Lebanese-American academic expert on the Middle East, told Fox News Digital, “The Biden administration has fully reinstated Obama's Middle East policy, but there is more recklessness and domino effect across the world, especially in the Middle East and North Africa. The removal of the Houthis from the US list of terrorists in February 2021 suggested that the US was making concessions to Iran in its favor at the expense of the Arab coalition. The Taliban had destroyed the foundations of America's anti-jihad strategy, and it was also a message to anti-American forces that the United States was moving toward a global withdrawal.”
“Secretary Blinken and the State Department have been committed to promoting stability and regional integration in the Middle East since the beginning of the administration, and particularly since the outbreak of the Israeli-Hamas conflict,” a U.S. State Department spokesperson told Fox News Digital. He has visited the region four times since October 7, during which the United States negotiated a humanitarian moratorium in Gaza, secured the release of 110 hostages, and provided critical humanitarian aid to Gaza. We have supported the promotion. . ”
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Iranians burn the American flag during a demonstration in front of the former US Embassy headquarters in Tehran on May 9, 2018. (Ali Mohammadi/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“Our overriding and enduring interest in Afghanistan is to ensure that Afghanistan never again becomes a safe haven for those seeking to harm the United States and our allies,” the spokesperson added. Ta.
“We are closely monitoring the Taliban's treatment of the Afghan people. As we have said publicly and privately with Taliban representatives, our relationship with the international community depends solely on the Taliban's actions. “We want peace with Afghanistan, where we and our neighbors can stand on our own two feet,” a State Department spokesperson said.
Fares, who served as an advisor to President Trump, said, “The Biden administration will continue to pursue traditional U.S. initiatives, including pressure on Israel to slow down action against Iran's aggressive behavior in the region, as well as pressure on Saudi Arabia.'' “He made a dangerous choice regarding his friends and allies.” The UAE and Bahrain have criticized the containment of the Houthis in Yemen for lionizing Ansarullah and thus encouraging them to take the Red Sea maritime line hostage. ”
President Biden and Iranian Supreme Leader Khamenei (Probst/ullstein bild via Getty Images | Nicholas Kamm/AFP via Getty Images)
Ansarullah, commonly known as the Houthis, was re-registered as a terrorist organization by the United States on Wednesday. To the surprise of many counterterrorism experts, Biden removed the Houthi movement from being a terrorist organization at the beginning of his 2021 term. “Allah is great. Death to America. Death to Israel. Curse to the Jews. Victory to Islam.'' is the Houthi slogan.
One foreign policy expert offered a more complex analysis of Biden's role on the international stage. Fox News Digital spoke with Michael E. O'Hanlon, senior fellow and director of foreign policy studies at the Washington, D.C.-based Brookings Institution, about White House foreign policy strategy and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan. Asked.
Sullivan wrote an article in Foreign Affairs magazine just before Oct. 7 in which he said, “The war in Yemen is in its 19th month of ceasefire. For now, Iranian attacks on U.S. forces have ceased and Iraq… “Japan's presence in the country is stable,” he boasted. For now, I want to emphasize that everything can change and the Middle East region is quieter today than it has been for 20 years.”
“Leaving Afghanistan was a mistake, and Jake's article was a mistake, but I see no other significant evidence of a lack of vigilance or resolve,” O'Hanlon told Fox News Digital.
On August 31, 2021, Taliban fighters took control of the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. (Wali Sabaoun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
Jason Brodsky, policy director for the U.S.-based Alliance Against Nuclear Iran (UANI), told Fox News Digital that the Biden administration is committed to rekindling the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the official name of the Iran nuclear deal. He said he thought it was important. , as a flawed starting point for the White House.
One think tank estimates that Biden will inject more than $100 billion into Iran's coffers as part of the revived JCPOA deal in exchange for Tehran's promise to impose temporary limits on its nuclear weapons program. hope to do so.
“I think the Biden administration’s Iran policy has repeatedly failed, with efforts to revive the JCPOA collapsing and subsequent unofficial negotiations with Tehran to keep information about Iran off the president’s desk before the 2024 presidential election.” “The regime's strategy is premised on false and outdated assumptions about the Islamic Republic, and it does not understand the psychology of the Iranian leadership.'' “It won't work if you do something like that.”
On October 23, 2023, a rocket will be fired from the Gaza Strip towards Israel. (AP Photo/Ariel Shalit)
Brodsky added: “The Biden administration's message to the public is also very weak. Constant appeals that the US is not seeking conflict with Iran have given rise to the impression that the US government fears the Islamic Republic more than the Iranian government. We are giving it to Tehran,” he added. “The U.S. government. It only emboldens the supreme leader to escalate. President Biden is seen by the supreme leader as a predictable and non-threatening adversary. That's a dangerous perception. If the U.S. government wants to deter Iran, We can't just focus on that.'' To restore deterrence and reduce tensions, we must attack strategic targets of value to the Iranian leadership. ”
Fares agreed with Brodsky about the Iranian regime's key role in fostering instability in the region.
“The Iranian regime is the central source of terrorism and instability in the region, followed by Islamist forces that are metastasizing and taking advantage of the organized migration of extremists across the Mediterranean and the Rio Grande. Both are promoted by extremist lobbying groups and make up today's Iran, “a global threat to Western democracies, on top of the Ukraine war and Western division,'' Fares said.
Iran's rapid plan to weaponize nuclear warheads remains front and center in the minds of countries affected by Tehran's desire to eliminate Iran.
A missile fired from Israel's Iron Dome defense system attempts to intercept a rocket fired from the Gaza Strip over the city of Netivot in southern Israel on October 8, 2023. (Mahmoud Hamuz/AFP via Getty Images)
David Albright, American physicist and nuclear weapons expert Warning on January 8th “Given the short warning time and little prospect of a nuclear deal, the United States and its allies have little choice but to focus on a strategy that prevents Iran from deciding to build a nuclear weapon in the first place.”
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei has commented on the progress of his country's nuclear program. (Iran Supreme Leader's Office/WANA/Reuters)
The Albright report states, “Iran needs to be made fully aware, through concrete demonstrations, that the production of nuclear weapons will provoke prompt and drastic action from the international community, including a military attack, and the destruction of Iran's nuclear capabilities.'' We should strengthen military cooperation between the United States and Israel to ensure reliable action.” If there were any signs that Iran was moving toward building nuclear weapons, Israel could immediately and decisively attack Iran's nuclear facilities, including the possibility of a second attack if Iran resumed nuclear weapons activity. It also includes the ability to perform. ”
Asked about the Iranian threat, a State Department spokesperson referred Fox News Digital to comments made by Press Secretary Matt Miller on Nov. 14. Since the administration took office, more than 400 sanctions have been imposed on Iran. In the past few weeks, we have taken a number of steps to ensure deterrence, and…the Department of Defense conducted strikes against Iranian-backed militias. And we will continue to… hold Iran accountable for its destabilizing actions on many levels. ”
