Compilation image of the Satanic Regime's Figureheads: Benjamin Netanyahu (Left) and Donald Trump (Right). Photo: Geopolitical Economy Report.
By Ben Norton – Feb 28, 2026
The US and Israel are waging a war of aggression against Iran. Non-existent “nuclear weapons” are the absurd fig leaf. Trump and Netanyahu admitted they want regime change, to put a puppet in Tehran.
The United States and Israel are waging a war of aggression against Iran. This is not about nuclear weapons; it’s about imperialism.
Trump published a video on social media early on the morning of February 28, announcing, “The United States military began major combat operations in Iran”.
As the US and Israel brutally bombed Tehran, Donald Trump admitted that they want regime change.
Trump ordered members of Iran’s military to “lay down your weapons”, or “face certain death”.
The US president then called on Iranian opposition supporters to “take over your government”, claiming, “It will be yours to take. This will be probably your only chance for generations”.
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed the war would overthrow the government in Tehran, to “cast off the yoke of tyranny and bring freedom and peace-loving values to Iran”. (Meanwhile, Netanyahu faces an ongoing arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court, due to the genocidal crimes against humanity he committed against the Palestinian people in Gaza, with steadfast US support.)
Iran immediately retaliated, launching strikes in self-defense against multiple US military bases in Qatar, Bahran, Kuwait, and the UAE. The Pentagon’s largest base in the region, Al-Udeid in Qatar, was hit.
The absurd narrative that Washington and Tel Aviv are promoting is that they had to carry out “preemptive” attacks (which are illegal under international law), because Tehran supposedly seeks nuclear weapons.
This is nonsense. Iran signed the nuclear deal, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), in 2015, in which it agreed not to pursue nuclear weapons in return for the US and European countries lifting their illegal unilateral sanctions.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) admitted that Iran was abiding by the nuclear deal. Nevertheless, Trump unilaterally tore it up in 2018, during his first term as US president, in flagrant violation of international law (given that the JCPOA had been endorsed by UN Security Council Resolution 2231, which even the US had voted for, under Obama).
Iran Strikes US Destroyer in Indian Ocean With Ballistic Missiles
Iran’s current president, Masoud Pezeshkian, is ironically a reformist who sought to negotiate another deal with the same US aggressors who sabotaged the previous one just a few years before.
When Trump entered office for his second term, in 2025, he oversaw several rounds of bad-faith “negotiations” with Iran. Then, during those talks, the US and Israel suddenly bombed Iran in June 2025. The Wall Street Journal admitted: “In Twist, U.S. Diplomacy Served as Cover for Israeli Surprise Attack”.
The same thing happened in February 2026. The Trump administration participated in fake “negotiations” with Iran.
On February 27, Oman’s Foreign Minister Badr Albusaidi, who moderated the talks, said they had made “substantial progress”, and a “peace deal is within our reach”.
Mere hours later, Trump and Netanyahu launched a massive bombing campaign in Iran.
The reality is that the US and Israel do not want peace.
The goal of this war of aggression is clear: Washington seeks to topple Iran’s independent government and finally overturn the Iranian Revolution of 1979, which removed one of the pillars of the US empire’s “twin pillars” strategy in West Asia.
The US empire, and more specifically the large US corporations that it represents, want to control the plentiful resources not only in Iran, but in the entire region, which is home to the world’s top producers of oil and natural gas, as well as critical minerals and other important commodities.
Washington also hopes to cut off China’s access to its top energy providers.
Wesley Clark, a former top US general and NATO commander, revealed more than two decades ago that, following the attacks of September 11, 2001, imperial strategists at the Pentagon made plans to overthrow the governments of seven countries in West Asia and North Africa.
On the US empire’s target list was Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Iran.
Washington succeeded in destabilizing governments in six of those seven. Iran is the last one standing.
With its war, the United States hopes to install in Tehran a puppet, like the son of the former shah, the murderous monarch who came to power following a CIA-orchestrated coup in 1953 against Iran’s democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh.
A Fox News correspondent reported that the CIA-linked US state media outlet VOA Persian is broadcasting propaganda in Iran in support of the so-called “exiled crown prince”, Reza Pahlavi, who has spent much of his life living in the US, and whose dictatorial father terrorized Iran, with staunch US backing, until the 1979 revolution.
Top US officials have been secretly meeting with the so-called “exiled crown prince”, the former Israeli intelligence officer Barak Ravid reported in January. On Twitter, Reza Pahlavi heaped praise on Trump, claimed “the Islamic Republic is collapsing”, and called for the Iranian people to help put him in power.
US imperial strategists believe the Iranian government is weak at this moment, and they are going for the jugular.
In doing so, the billionaire supposed “populist” Trump is fulfilling the dreams of the most ardent neoconservative hawks — even as he calls himself a “peace president”.
Ben Norton
Benjamin Norton is the founder and editor of the independent news website Multipolarista, where he does original reporting in both English and Spanish. Benjamin has reported from numerous countries, including Venezuela, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Ecuador, Honduras, Colombia, and more. His journalistic work has been published in dozens of media outlets, and he has done interviews on Sky News, Al Jazeera, Democracy Now, El Financiero Bloomberg, Al Mayadeen teleSUR, RT, TRT World, CGTN, Press TV, HispanTV, Sin Censura, and various TV channels in Mexico, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Ecuador, and Bolivia. Benjamin writes a regular column for Al Mayadeen (in English and Spanish). He was formerly a reporter with the investigative journalism website The Grayzone, and previously produced the political podcast and video show Moderate Rebels. His personal website is BenNorton.com, and he tweets at @BenjaminNorton.
