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The United States has joined Israel in an all-out war on the Islamic Republic of Iran. On February 28, 2026, a US armada of two aircraft carrier strike groups and scores of advanced aircraft, together with the Israeli air force, launched a sustained military attack on Tehran and other Iranian cities, destroying military and other official targets and killing the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and several high-ranking members of the clerical regime.
In response, Iranian forces launched missiles and armed drones against Israel and US military facilities in all six Gulf Cooperation Council countries. In Israel, Iranian missiles caused serious damage, killing and injuring scores of people. Iran also struck civilian infrastructure in the Gulf, including ports and airports. The hostilities effectively forced the closure of the strategic Strait of Hormuz, through which no less than 20 percent of the world’s oil supply passes. US President Donald Trump declared that the aim of the attack on Iran was regime change in Tehran—an objective that, if achieved, will change the strategic outlook for the entire Middle East, and a US goal that well may change.
Arab Center Washington DC (ACW) asked its fellows and experts to provide their perspectives on the current US-Israel-Iran conflict.
The Legality of Attacking Iran
Susan M. Akram, ACW Non-resident Fellow; Professor, Boston University
The US-Israeli attacks on Iran cannot be legally justified under any theory of the laws of war. All members of the United Nations are prohibited by Article 2(4) of the UN Charter from threatening or using force against the territory or independence of another state. Under the Charter, only the Security Council has the authority to trigger the use of force against a member state if that state has breached international peace. The sole exception to this is under Article 51, which permits the use of force in self-defense, but only in response to an armed attack. Whether a state can attack another because it believes it will be attacked has been heavily debated, but what is clear is that international law does not justify attacking another country for any of the shifting reasons that the United States has suggested for the war. So far, these are: changing the regime; protecting Iranian citizens from their own government’s atrocities; ending Iran’s ballistic missiles program; or preventing the development of putative nuclear weapons for which there is no credible evidence.
Iran has neither attacked the United States nor threatened to do so without being attacked first. The United States cannot therefore use self-defense as a legal justification for starting the war. The United States has carried out regime change in many countries before, including helping to overthrow Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh in 1953. Yet none of these instances was authorized by the UN, as regime change has no basis in international law and cannot be used to justify the use of force. Protecting Iranians from mass atrocities similarly lacks support in the UN Charter. In 2005, all UN member states committed to a document known as the Responsibility to Protect (R2P), which asserted that collective action might be needed when citizens of a country were facing mass atrocities at the hands of their own government. However, R2P was a re-commitment to collective action under the UN Charter, not outside of it; any such intervention would still require UN authorization. The alleged threat of nuclear weapons being developed by Iran has been debunked by negotiators of the 2015 Iran deal themselves, the US Defense Intelligence Agency’s own 2025 assessment, and the assessments of international nuclear watchdogs.
In attacking Iran, the United States and Israel reportedly hit a school, killing more than 100 children, and carried out an extrajudicial assassination of the country’s leader who, as a civilian, is not a legitimate target in warfare. International humanitarian law would characterize these acts as war crimes. If the conflict continues, the United States and Israel are very likely to commit more war crimes unless Congress acts in its constitutional capacity to halt President Trump’s aggression against Iran.
Will the Current War on Iran Precipitate Regime Change?
Charles W. Dunne, ACW Non-resident Senior Fellow
When US President Donald Trump, prior to launching war with Israel on the Islamic Republic, was asked about the possibility of regime change, he replied, “Nobody knows…It would be nice if we could do it without [military force].” His comment was his administration’s most insightful explanation so far of its aims for the US-Israel military campaign. It is difficult to know whether the killing of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei will genuinely result in regime change, but his death is likely to cause serious instability in Iran. The lack of any apparent plan for post-regime governance, including especially the absence of any international partners other than Israel, increases the risk of violent chaos.
Pure military-led regime change, analogous to the George W. Bush administration’s professed intent in going to war in Iraq in 2003, would require a ground invasion for which the United States has no political appetite, particularly among Trump’s MAGA base. The population of Iran exceeds 90 million and the country’s terrain is extremely difficult to penetrate. The Islamic Republic has a highly motivated security apparatus that is intent on its own survival, and its people have not demonstrated any particular desire for an American savior to set things to rights. A ground invasion would require hundreds of thousands of troops, cost trillions of dollars over many years, and face an insurgency that would likely make post-2003 invasion Iraq look manageable.
The Iranian regime managed to survive the economic devastation wrought by US sanctions, the 2009 Green Movement protests, further protests in 2019-2020, and the 2022 Woman Life Freedom uprising. It then survived major anti-regime protests in 2025 and early 2026, mainly through state violence that killed thousands of Iranian citizens.
To put it simply, Iran’s government is a hard target. Despite its unpopularity, the Islamic Republic will not collapse easily. Attacks on regime targets risk gutting state authority and undermining its control, opening the possibility of heavy violence directed against civilians in a grim struggle to reassert authority, as well as violence among armed state actors striving to claim power. While killing Khamenei might appear to some in Trump’s Washington as an easy way forward, it accomplishes little except creating a power vacuum that various armed factions will try to fill. The most likely outcome in the current scenario is military rule, probably under the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which would not only fail to solve the Trump administration’s problems with Iran but actively make them worse.
Unintended Consequences Are the Only Certainty
Amy Hawthorne, ACW Publications Editor
The massive US-Israeli military assault on Iran is likely to badly, perhaps even mortally, wound the Islamic Republic, eliciting joy from the regime’s many victims and a typically hyperbolic declaration of US victory from President Donald Trump. But like previous US military interventions in the Middle East the “success” of which Washington rushed to celebrate, this war will sooner or later produce serious negative consequences not anticipated by its proponents. Some past examples of this phenomenon include:
- The 1982 US-backed Israeli invasion of Lebanon and the associated US military deployment achieved the expulsion of the Palestine Liberation Organization, but spurred the creation of Hezbollah and the expansion of Iranian influence.
- The 1991 US-led liberation of Kuwait initially seemed to confirm the United States as the sole global hegemon. But within a decade, that war had contributed to the growth of Al Qaeda and the September 11, 2001, attacks, as well as to the rise of a US surveillance state that eroded Americans’ civil liberties.
- The 1990-91 Gulf War also set in motion regional dynamics that led to the US-championed Oslo Accords and “peace process,” whose fundamental flaws ultimately benefited Hamas and the Israeli right wing and left the prospect of Middle East peace even more distant.
- The 2003 US invasion of Iraq created conditions in which the so-called Islamic State and its reign of terror emerged, destabilizing the Middle East, providing a pretext for the further erosion of US democracy, and indirectly helping Trump win the 2016 election.
- The Biden administration’s insistence on unconditionally arming Israel in its war on Gaza after October 7, 2023, dealt a severe blow to the so-called liberal international order that Biden purported to value, in the process also destroying the Strip, aiding Trump’s return to the White House, and deepening division and mistrust among the American electorate.
History should remind us that significant unintended consequences from US-led and backed Middle East wars are not the exception but the rule. Such wars—including the reckless and unpopular one that the United States has just launched against Iran—always trigger political earthquakes with unpredictable and dangerous aftershocks.
Hezbollah Joins the Fray
Patricia Karam, ACW Non-resident Fellow
With Iran struck, its supreme leader and senior command killed, and the regime forced into a chaotic reorganization, the entire “Axis of Resistance” is in flux. Operationally, Hezbollah is more vulnerable than at any time in decades. Still, the party decided to enter the fray and launched missiles at Israel, specifically citing the killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei as casus belli. Israel responded with attacks on Lebanon that killed scores of civilians in the south and Beirut’s southern suburbs. Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam called for an emergency cabinet session to meet with President Joseph Aoun to discuss developments, and subsequently announced a formal government ban on Hezbollah’s military activities. This step signaled an unprecedented assertion of Lebanon’s state authority over decisions of war and peace.
In recent years Hezbollah has suffered heavy losses and knew that Israel would respond if the party joined the war. Lebanese leaders have urged restraint, emphasizing that national stability must take priority over regional confrontation. The government’s decision to prohibit Hezbollah’s armed operations underscores the growing gap between the state’s priorities and the party’s unilateral military posture. Even before the start of the US-Israeli strikes on Iran, Hezbollah officials signaled that they might stay out of conflict unless Iran faced an existential threat. It is now obvious that the killing of Iran’s supreme leader crossed a “red line” that triggered the party’s response.
The strategically “smart,” albeit ideologically difficult, move for Hezbollah would have been to avoid escalation and cooperate fully with the Lebanese state. Doing so would have helped avert devastating retaliation while positioning the group for a shifting regional landscape in which Iran’s role is diminished. The Lebanese government’s latest decision frames the question as one of compliance with state authority as opposed to continued unilateral militarization. The party’s long-term relevance hinges on transitioning from an armed actor to a primarily political party operating under the authority of the Lebanese state and within the framework of state sovereignty.
Whether Hezbollah ultimately prioritizes ideological loyalty to Iran or its own political survival in Lebanon will determine not only its future, but also whether Lebanon itself is pulled into a wider regional war.
War As Part of Netanyahu’s Election Campaign
Khalil E. Jahshan, ACW Executive Director
The public rationale offered by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for waging war against Iran, whether the June 2025 “Operation Rising Lion” or its latest reincarnation, “Operation Lion’s Roar,” is based on his firm, long-held, and obsessive conviction that Tehran is determined to follow in Israel’s footsteps by pursuing its own covert nuclear program. Netanyahu has constantly viewed this prospect as an existential threat to Israel’s survival and persistently attempted to convince all those willing to listen to join him in using force to end that perceived threat.
In fact, Omani mediators in the talks taking place in Geneva were on the verge of announcing a potential breakthrough to stop Iran’s ability to develop nuclear weapons and acquire ballistic missile systems (both of which would challenge Israel’s monopoly in those domains).
Netanyahu played a principal role in trying to derail those talks and for months coordinated with an eager Trump administration to get the green light and political cover to proceed with the February 28, 2026, attack on Iran. Like Washington, Israel saw a rare opportunity to resume war with Iran and decided to opt for a war of choice disguised as a preemptive act of self-defense to destroy Iran’s nuclear capabilities, whether real or imagined.
Netanyahu, the longest-serving prime minister in Israel, has made regime change in Iran the central theme of his 18-year political career. The issue has served him well in his campaigns to win votes, detracting public attention from his legal battles with charges of bribery, fraud, and breach of trust, and potentially securing his political victory at a time when his popularity is sagging. Netanyahu and his government are behind in the two most recent public opinion polls: his coalition is projected to win just 49 or 52 seats in the legislative elections scheduled for October 2026, compared to 57 or 58 seats for the opposition. Mr. Netanyahu no doubt believes the war with Iran will narrow that gap, if not entirely reverse the fortunes of his coalition.
War Without Congressional Authorization
Annelle Sheline, ACW Non-resident Senior Fellow; Research Fellow, Quincy Institute
President Trump has willfully violated US law. In the absence of an imminent threat to the United States, the president has no legal authority to initiate the use of force without congressional approval. Although Trump tried to justify military action by falsely asserting that Iran was developing missiles that could reach the United States, in reality Tehran poses no such threat to the country. Although US media coverage has for years focused on the Iranian nuclear program, Tehran has never developed nuclear weapons. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has pushed for the United States to attack Iran since the 1990s: his seven visits during Trump’s first year in office have now clearly paid off.
Congress is expected soon to vote on a War Powers Resolution introduced by Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA) and by Representatives Ro Khanna (D-CA) and Republican Thomas Massie (R-KY). Yet even if enough Republicans conclude that the war on Iran is sufficiently unpopular to approve measures to rein in the White House, Trump will likely veto the legislation. Achieving the requisite two-thirds majority to overcome his presidential veto would be unlikely. Many members of Congress, including Democrats, receive significant support from the Israel lobby; they see the war on Iran as serving Israel’s interests.
In February 2026, polling showed that only 21 percent of Americans supported strikes on Iran, while 49 percent saw them as unnecessary and expensive (30 percent were unsure). Trump appears to believe that attacking Iran will be a political win—or at least a welcome distraction from the Epstein files. Having campaigned on a ticket of “no new wars,” and with more Americans now saying they sympathize with the Palestinians than with Israel, savvy members of Congress ought to conclude that opposing Trump’s war will offer the best bet before this year’s midterm elections.
Impact on the GCC States
Kristian Coates Ulrichsen, ACW Non-resident Senior Fellow
All six Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states have now been struck by Iran’s retaliatory strikes against military facilities and civilian infrastructure such as airports, ports, hotels, and high-rise buildings in Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates. Iran’s decision to respond immediately to the US and Israeli attacks by targeting the Gulf is a major departure from the June 2025 12-Day War, a scenario about which GCC defense planners have long warned. Having been dragged into a war of choice that many around the world will see as a US war of aggression, GCC states find themselves bearing the brunt of the Iranian response on the frontline.
Ever since the October 7, 2023, attacks by Hamas and other Palestinian militants on Israel, Gulf policymakers have sought to avoid the regionalization of a conflict that would leave them squarely in the middle. Each of the escalations between Israel and Iran—in April and October 2024 and (together with the United States) in June 2025—has brought the region closer to all-out war. Iran’s responses to the opening two days of “Operation Epic Fury” have signaled that the relative restraint it showed during the 12-Day War is now off the table. Cornered and fighting for its survival, the Iranian regime is lashing out and seeking to share the pain with its Gulf neighbors.
While Gulf air defense systems have neutralized most of the incoming Iranian attacks, and damage and casualties have so far been limited, the intangible, psychological impact of attacks on densely populated cities may profoundly damage the image of GCC states as safe places to live, work, and do business. This is especially the case for Dubai, which has marketed itself as an oasis of stability and an important hub for business and tourism, but is true for all the Gulf states. A prolonged conflict or sustained Iranian missile and drone fire may cause logistical problems that quickly strain the global networks sustained by Gulf airlines and raise the costs—and risks—of transporting essential goods such as food, oil, and gas through the Strait of Hormuz.
The views expressed in this publication are the authors’ own and do not necessarily reflect the position of Arab Center Washington DC, its staff, or its Board of Directors.
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