The regional war that has opened as a result of the Israel\u2013US attack on Iran is shaking the region and sending shockwaves across the world. Tens of millions in Iran, Lebanon and throughout the Middle East are under the terror of the bombings and the war. The imperialist offensive, whose leaders threaten that may continue for weeks longer, is already a catastrophe on a massive scale. Thousands killed, tens of thousands wounded, over 4 million displaced, enormous environmental damage, a global energy crisis, a rising likelihood of recession in the world economy, and even warnings of a food crisis and expanding hunger worldwide due to impact on the fertiliser industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At least 3,220 have been killed in Iran (as of 20 March) in the bombings carried out on the orders of the governments of Israel and the US, including around 1,400 civilians, among them at least 210 children, according to the Iranian opposition human\u2011rights activist network HRANA<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThey are striking buildings where families live. After each explosion, people rush to help \u2014 and then another bomb hits the same area\u201d<\/em>, testified Kamran, a resident of Tehran, describing \u201cdouble\u2011tap\u201d bombings in an interview with the British Telegraph (3 March<\/a>). He explained: \u201cMany people are trapped under the rubble. Hospitals are filled with injured patients, and staff are overwhelmed. They [the Israeli and US militaries] are even striking hospitals where the wounded are being treated\u201d<\/em>. The World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed damage to 18<\/a> hospitals and clinics (as of 11 March) in the Israel\u2013US attack on Iran, including the Gandhi Hospital in Tehran, whose operations were completely shut down. Eighteen medical staff were killed in the bombings, according to a statement by the Iranian Medical Association<\/a>. \u201cIf they don\u2019t stop now, Tehran will turn into Gaza\u201d<\/em>, said Farzad, 36, who fled Tehran (Guardian, 6 March<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n In addition to the bombing of residential neighbourhoods, the Israel\u2013US offensive targeted civilian infrastructure, including the desalination facility on Qeshm Island, which led to disruption of the water supply to around 30 villages in the area. The offensive is a mega\u2011attack on a regional scale. Among other things, the top ranks of the Israeli military, under the direction of Netanyahu\u2019s government, carried out an environmental and economic attack when they bombed dozens of fuel reservoirs and a refinery in Tehran on 7 March. The prolonged giant fires released clouds of oil that created toxic acid rain falling on an area where millions of people live. The World Health Organization clarified that the damage to soil, water, food and air pollution will have long\u2011term health and environmental consequences. Over 3 million people in Iran have been displaced from their homes by the terror of the US and Israeli bombings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Meanwhile, in Lebanon, over a thousand have perished, including women and children, and dozens of medical and rescue workers, in the bombings led by the Israeli death government since the beginning of the month. More than 1.3 million people, around a fifth of Lebanon\u2019s population, have been displaced from their homes<\/strong> under expulsion orders by the Israeli army. Residential neighbourhoods in Beirut were bombed, buildings flattened. But the death government threatens to carry out an even larger bloodbath on Lebanese soil, while expanding the Israeli occupation in southern Lebanon. The war minister Katz threatened that \u201cLebanon will lose territory\u201d. At the same time, Israeli occupation forces continue to deepen intervention in Syria, and dozens have also been killed in Israeli and US bombings in Iraq.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Iranian counter\u2011offensive, despite the arrogant war propaganda of Netanyahu\u2019s regime, shows no signs of subsiding even around the start of the fourth week. In the territories controlled by the State of Israel, the strikes included symbolic hits on the Bazan refinery in Haifa and in the area of the nuclear reactor in Dimona. The cluster munitions, even if they cause far less damage than the firepower the Israeli army has been raining down for around two and a half years on the heads of civilians across the region, tend to penetrate through missile\u2011defence systems. So far, 15 people have been killed within the Green Line, including 4 migrant workers, and in the West Bank 4 Palestinian women were killed by an Iranian launch that struck the town of Beit \u02bfAwwa near Hebron \u2014 where Palestinian residents under occupation have no sirens or protection at all. Within the Green Line, more than 3 million civilians have no access to proper protection, with the Palestinian Arab public facing the most severe hardship \u2014 only 0.5% of public shelters within the Green Line are located in Arab local authorities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the Gulf states, more than 20 people have been killed so far in the Iranian counter\u2011offensive. Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and other Gulf states hit in the counter\u2011offensive are threatening to join the military campaign against Iran. Such a scenario would of course be yet another significant escalation in the regional military confrontation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The regional campaign is a continuation of the war of annihilation in Gaza that the death government opened through the cynical exploitation of the 7 October massacre. Under the cover of the fog of war, the attacks in Gaza continue and intensify; Israeli army forces have killed 45 Palestinians in Gaza since the beginning of the attack on Iran (as of 19 March), according to reports by the Palestinian Ministry of Health. The siege has been tightened, and the number of aid lorries permitted to enter the Strip has plummeted by around 80%. Food prices have soared and shortages have been reported in products such as cooking oil and tinned goods \u2014 and there is growing fear of the return of mass hunger \u2014 as well as a worsening shortage of medical equipment. The closure of the Rafah crossing since the beginning of the attack on Iran has completely halted the already\u2011limited exit of critically ill and wounded patients who require urgent medical treatment outside the Strip. Around 18,000 of them have been waiting for months for approval, and for many the damage caused by the denial of treatment is irreversible, sometimes fatal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the West Bank, the terror actions of settlers and the army are receiving a tailwind from the regional imperialist offensive, as part of a campaign to uproot the Palestinian population and push it into a more restricted area, while establishing new settlements and \u201coutposts\u201d. A pogrom by a Kahanist terror gang against the Palestinian community in Khirbet \u1e24um\u1e63a in the Jordan Valley on 13 March included tying up families, beating girls and boys, severe sexual assault, and threats of murder and rape \u201cif you don\u2019t leave\u201d. The shooting to death of four members of the \u02bfOdeh family in \u1e6cammun \u2014 two parents and two children \u2014 by the Israeli army again demonstrated that the bulk of the massacres and terror against the population is carried out by the army itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Iranian regime made clear in advance that it would respond by striking targets within states in the region that host US army bases, and even that it would close Hormuz \u2014 a central artery of the global economy. Despite the unequal military balance of forces, so far the armies of the global superpower and the strongest power in the region have failed to prevent the closure of the strait. Even after the destruction of most of the Iranian fleet, Iran is halting the passage of goods in the strait using missiles, UAVs, unmanned vessels and naval mines. In normal times, around a fifth of the world\u2019s oil and gas supply passes through Hormuz. Now that this enormous quantity of oil and gas has been cut off from the market, energy prices have soared and the effects on the global economy are immense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The economies of East and South Asia are being hit the hardest, with almost 90% of Gulf oil exports going to them. In Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Myanmar, Vietnam and the Philippines, governments are already taking steps to reduce fuel and electricity use<\/a>, including in some cases imposing travel restrictions, partial shutdowns of public institutions, and even quotas limiting fuel refilling and planned power cuts. Recently Slovakia also announced fuel rationing for citizens \u2014 the first country in Europe to do so, in light of the spike in energy prices on the continent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Fuel prices in the US have risen by 30% since the start of the war. Thirty\u2011one member states of the International Energy Agency, including the US, have opened their strategic oil reserves in the hope of curbing the price rise, but the process will take time and the results are limited. The Trump administration has even temporarily lifted sanctions on Russian and Iranian (!) oil tankers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The bombing of Iran\u2019s giant gas field \u201cSouth Pars\u201d \u2014 the largest of its kind in the world \u2014 by the Israeli army on 18 March damaged around 12% of Iran\u2019s gas output, worsened Iran\u2019s internal energy crisis and led to the shutdown of gas exports to Iraq (around a third of whose energy needs come from Iran).<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Iranian regime responded with strikes on energy facilities in the Gulf states, including the port of Yanbu in Saudi Arabia on the Red Sea coast, which is Saudi Arabia\u2019s only oil export point that bypasses the Strait of Hormuz.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the strike on the Bazan complex in Haifa, damage was caused but hazardous materials did not leak (at least according to the authorities). In the \u201c12\u2011day war\u201d in June, the complex was hit and two workers were killed by a missile strike. Since the beginning of the current offensive, all of Israel\u2019s gas rigs have been pre\u2011emptively shut down in order to prevent their ignition and destruction in counter\u2011attacks by Iran and Hezbollah \u2014 and electricity production has shifted largely to more polluting and more expensive alternatives, especially coal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The war and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz are also paralysing a huge part of the global fertiliser industry in the middle of the planting season in the world\u2019s main growing regions, which is expected to lead to rising food prices and even to damage to crop yields later on. The UN has warned that a prolonged war could increase the number of people suffering from extreme hunger worldwide by tens of millions<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Trump initially promised that the US navy would escort and secure ships in the strait, but in practice the US army currently has no ability to guarantee safe passage. Trump\u2019s attempt to appeal to Japan, South Korea, Britain, NATO states and even China to create an international coalition that would send military forces to open the strait \u2014 failed. Despite economic damage, even the US\u2019s allies do not believe it would be worthwhile for them to become entangled in the military campaign of US imperialism and the Israeli regime against Iran.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Public opposition to the war is a significant factor restraining the joining of some of those regimes. Thousands demonstrated against the war in Britain, Greece, Italy, Spain and France. Hundreds demonstrated in Seoul against responding to Trump\u2019s call for South Korea to send military forces to the Strait of Hormuz. Public opinion in Italy against the war even forced Giorgia Meloni, the far\u2011right prime minister, to distance herself from supporting the war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The US army bombed the military facilities on Kharg Island, from which 90% of Iranian oil is exported, and Trump threatened that if Iran did not submit to his dictates and open the Strait of Hormuz, he would destroy the oil facilities on the island and thereby inflict a fatal blow on Iran\u2019s economy. But even according to the logic of the imperialist aspiration to replace the regime in Iran with a puppet regime of the US and Israel, it will be necessary to preserve economic infrastructure for the sake of \u201cthe day after\u201d. This may be the reason that Trump and his partners are considering, in their words, the possibility that the US will not destroy the oil\u2011export infrastructure on the island but will seize it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent referred to Kharg Island in an interview with Fox Business<\/a>: \u201c\u200bWe will see what happens, whether that becomes eventually a US asset\u201d<\/em>. In Tehran they threatened in response that an attack on the island would be met with an expansion of operations to the point of blocking trade routes in the Red Sea \u2014 another important artery of the global economy. In addition, occupying the island would require sending ground forces, and holding it over time would make US army forces more exposed to attacks from Iranian territory. It was also reported<\/a> that the Trump administration is considering the possibility of a military takeover of the Iranian coastline in the area of the Strait of Hormuz, which could lead to greater losses for the US army and entanglement in a prolonged ground war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The assessments are that around 450 kg of weapons\u2011grade enriched uranium required for developing a nuclear weapon are buried beneath a mountain in Isfahan, after in the \u201c12\u2011day war\u201d in June US army bombings collapsed the entrance tunnels to the site. In Washington they are considering carrying out a complex, and potentially lengthy, military operation during which ground forces would invade Iran to extract the uranium from the ground and thus deny future access to the Iranian regime \u2014 or at the very least produce a propagandistic victory image regarding the supposed denial of future nuclear capabilities from the regime. The potential for entanglement in any of these ground operations is very great, and the consequences for escalating the bloodbath are expected to be dramatic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Already now the rise in fuel prices in the US may increase opposition to the war, and raises the chances of losses for the Republicans in the midterm elections in November. Most polls show that a majority of the public in the US opposes the war. Among registered voters, support is slightly higher, and among Republican voters there is indeed a majority that supports the war, but even this support is relatively fluid and not unconditional. Thus, a poll published on 18 March<\/a> showed that among Trump voters a solid majority supports the decision to go to war, but 58% oppose sending ground forces to Iran, 55% are worried about rising fuel prices as a result of the war, and 79% would support \u201ca decision by Trump to declare victory in Iran and quickly end this war\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Joe Kent, head of the US Counterterrorism Centre, who belongs to the separatist far right and the Trumpist MAGA movement, resigned from his position in protest against the war in Iran, in a step that indicates a growing dispute among US government officials in light of the prolongation and entanglement of the war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On the first day of the offensive (28 February) Netanyahu indulged in pompous declarations: \u201cThe day is not far when Israel and a free Iran will join hands for the sake of security and peace, for the sake of progress and prosperity\u201d<\/em>. But at the press conference two weeks into the war, in response to questions, he already sounded different: \u201cWe are creating the optimal conditions for the fall of the regime, but again, I\u2019m not denying that I cannot tell you with certainty that the Iranian people will topple the regime. Regimes are ultimately toppled from within\u201d<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe intensification of the attacks in Gaza and the West Bank under cover of the regional war<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Global energy crisis<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Ground forces and public opinion in the US<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Netanyahu retreats rhetorically: \u201cRegimes fall from within\u201d, \u201cthreats rise and fall\u201d<\/h3>\n\n\n\n