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benjamin netanyahu
Trump’s No-Rules International Order Fuels Death, Destruction, and Nuclearization
Trump and Netanyahu insist that Iran can never have a nuclear weapon. Yet perhaps the greatest irony of this war is that their senseless aggression is giving every country reason to develop nuclear arms.
Mar 16, 2026
At the 2026 meeting of the World Economic Forum, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney remarked that the “rules-based international order” has ended. In its place is a system where “the strong can do what they can, and the weak must suffer what they must.” Sovereignty is no longer safeguarded by international law, but rather “will increasingly be anchored in the ability to withstand pressure.”
The world Carney describes is quite familiar to the nations of Asia, Africa, and Latin America—the ones that never had the luxury of relying on international law. Where, for instance, were these rules during the decades of Israeli occupation of Palestine?
Still, while international law was always unevenly applied, the illegal war being waged by the US and Israel against Iran highlights the dangers of a world where superpowers can act without even those modest restraints.
A world where instead of just cause, the whims of the strong is enough cause for war. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says he has “longed” for this war “for 40 years.” President Donald Trump remarked, “We were having negotiations with these lunatics, and it was my opinion that they were going to attack first… I felt strongly about that.” Trump has even claimed that the war will end “when I feel it, feel it in my bones.”
What other lessons are countries to draw from this than that the US will engage in imperial violence against any non-nuclear power?
No congressional approval; no clear—or even consistent—justification provided to the public; no forewarning to America’s allies. When might makes right, why bother with the details?
Instead of the façade of proportionality, wars are deliberate exercises of international bullying. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth boosts that America “is unleashing the most lethal and precise air power campaign in history… with maximum authorities. No stupid rules of engagement, no nation-building quagmire, no democracy building exercise, no politically correct wars. We fight to win, and we don’t waste time or lives.” Trump openly jokes that military officials have told him it’s “a lot more fun” to sink Iranian ships than capture them.
Instead of any pretense of protecting civilians, the mighty strike with callous indifference. On the very first day of the war, the US struck a girl’s elementary school, killing more than 175 people—most of them small children. A US official reports that this was likely due to outdated intelligence. However, it is worth noting that the Trump administration effectively dissolved the Civilian Protection Center of Excellence, an initiative aimed precisely at reducing civilian harms during US military operations.
To date, the Iranian Deputy Health Minister Ali Jafarian reports that at least 1,255 people, mostly civilians, have been killed in the war. More than 12,000 people have been wounded, and 52 health centers and 29 clinical facilities have been either damaged or destroyed.
The cruelty is the point. Trump and Netanyahu want to make Iran into a failed state—an example of what happens to their enemies. As Trump puts it, “They really are a nation of terror and hate, and they’re paying a big price right now.” This is collective punishment with no plans or care for what comes next.
It is a war with no clear off-ramp. A peaceful resolution would be ideal, but why exactly would Iran entertain this option? Prior to these attacks, they were negotiating with the Trump administration. Omani Foreign Minister Badr bin Hamad Al Busaidi, who was mediating talks between the US and Iran, said that Tehran had made major concessions regarding its nuclear program. This included a willingness to reduce uranium levels below what it had agreed to under the Obama administration.
In a world where the pretense of international law has been unraveled, how can nations negotiate as equals? What guarantees could the world offer Iran that it will not be attacked again without provocation? This is, after all, the second war Israel has launched against them in nine months.
How will the world hold the US and Israel—two nuclear powers—responsible for their war crimes? Is it even possible? And if not, what precedent does it set?
Trump and Netanyahu insist that Iran can never have a nuclear weapon. Yet perhaps the greatest irony of this war is that their senseless aggression is giving every country reason to develop nuclear arms.
In a speech on March 2, French President Emmanuel Macron remarked, “The next 50 years will be an era of nuclear weapons.” He further announced that France will bolster their own nuclear arsenal, including the development of a new nuclear-armed submarine. On March 3, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk remarked that his administration is preparing “Poland for the most autonomous actions possible” with regards to nuclear security.
These moves, while dangerous, are unsurprising. In addition to war with Iran, Trump has threatened to annex Greenland and Canada; threatened to take the Panama Canal; kidnapped Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro; launched military strikes in Venezuela, Somalia, Nigeria, Syria, Yemen, and Iraq; as well as imposed an oil embargo that is pushing Cuba to total collapse.
What other lessons are countries to draw from this than that the US will engage in imperial violence against any non-nuclear power? It will threaten Cuba for dealing with “hostile countries” like China and Russia, while also inviting President Xi Jinping and President Vladimir Putin to be part of Trump's Peace Board. The Trump administration will condemn human rights abuses in Iran, while also sharply scaling back its annual human rights report on North Korea.
This is the reality of Trump’s no-rules international order. If Iran had nuclear weapons, neither the US nor Israel would have dared attack them. Their sovereignty would be safe.
At Davos, Carney remarked that while the “great powers can afford for now to go it alone,” other nations must work together “because if we’re not at the table, we’re on the menu.” The precedent Trump has set is clear: A seat at the table is only guaranteed to nuclear powers. That is how nations will “withstand pressure.”
Importantly, this dynamic does not end with the Trump administration. Even if a competent leader is elected in 2028, no country can rest assured that another Trump is not on the horizon. The threat of unmitigated American violence will drive further nuclearization. It will make nuclear war increasingly more likely. That will be Trump’s legacy—one of death, destruction, and nuclearization.
Future presidents will inherit the terrible burden of repairing America’s image on the global stage. For now, we must do everything we can to end this war before Trump’s madness goes truly nuclear.
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Ending the Trump-Netanyahu War in the Middle East
If not stopped soon, this war could easily turn into a global conflagration, effectively into World War III.
Mar 16, 2026
The Israel-US war on Iran is engulfing the entire Middle East and could escalate to global war. The economic consequences are already severe and could become catastrophic. The Strait of Hormuz carries approximately one-fifth of all oil traded globally, and 30 percent of the world's LNG. A sustained closure of the Strait would trigger an energy shock without modern precedent.
The conflict is likely to spiral out of control because the US and Israel are dead set on hegemony in the Arab world and West Asia – one that combines Israeli territorial expansion with American-backed regime control across the region. The ultimate goal is a Greater Israel that absorbs all historic Palestine, combined with compliant Arab and Islamic governments stripped of genuine sovereignty, including on choices as to how and where they export their oil and gas.
This is delusional. No country across the region wants Israel to run wild as it is doing, murdering civilians across the entire region, destroying Gaza and the West Bank, invading Lebanon, striking Iraq and Yemen, and carpet-bombing Tehran. No country wants its hydrocarbon exports under effective US control. The war will end if and only if global revulsion at US and Israeli aggression force these countries to stop. Short of that, we are likely to see the Middle East in flames and the world in an energy and economic crisis unprecedented in modern history. The war could easily turn into a global conflagration, effectively into World War III.
Yet, there exists an alternative. The war could stop on rational grounds if Israel and the US are decisively called to account by the rest of the world. Ending the war requires a set of interlinked steps to provide basic security for all parties, and indeed for the world. Iran needs a permanent end to the US-Israel aggression. The Gulf countries need an end to Iran’s retaliatory strikes. The Palestinians need an independent state. Israel needs lasting security and the disarmament of Hamas and Hezbollah. The whole world needs the opening of the Strait of Hormuz, and international monitoring of Iran’s nuclear program to ensure it abides by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, as Iran says it wants to do. And all countries want, or should want, real sovereignty for themselves and their region.
We are not optimistic about the likelihood of our plan. The Israeli government is murderous and Trump is delusional about US power. We are perhaps already in the early days of WWIII. Yet because the stakes are so high, it’s worth laying out real solutions even if they are long shots.
Collective security could be achieved in five interconnected measures. First, the US and Israel would immediately end their armed aggression across the entire region and withdraw their forces. Second, Iran would stop its retaliatory strikes across the GCC and resubmit to monitoring by the International Atomic Energy Agency under a revised Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which President Trump recklessly abandoned in 2018. Third, the Strait of Hormuz would reopen with mutual agreement of Iran and the GCC. Fourth, the two-state solution would be immediately implemented by admitting Palestine as a full member state of the UN. Israel would be required to end its occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem and to withdraw its forces from Lebanon and Syria. Fifth, the UN recognition of the State of Palestine would form the basis for a comprehensive regional disarmament of all non-state actors, verified under international monitoring. The end result would be a return to international law and the UN Charter.
Who would win in this plan? The people of the region, of Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Iran, and the rest of the world. Who would lose? Only the backers of Greater Israel, led by Benjamin Netanyahu, Itamar Ben-Gvir, Bezalel Smotrich, and Mike Huckabee, who have brought the world to the brink of destruction.
Here are the five steps in more detail.
First: End the US-Israeli Armed Aggression.
Israel and the US would stop their aggression and withdraw their forces. In turn, Iran would cease its retaliatory strikes. This would not be a mere ceasefire. Rather, it would be the first step of an overall peace agreement and collective security arrangement.
Second: Return to the JCPOA.
The nuclear question would be resolved through strict monitoring by the International Atomic Energy Agency, not through bombing campaigns that merely put Iran’s enriched uranium beyond international monitoring. The UN Security Council would immediately reinstate the basic framework of the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), under which Iran must strictly comply with IAEA monitoring and agreed limits on its nuclear program, while economic sanctions on Iran would be lifted.
Third: Reopen the Strait of Hormuz in an Iran-GCC Framework
The Strait of Hormuz would be quickly reopened, with safe passage jointly guaranteed by Iran and the GCC. The GCC countries would assert sovereignty over the military bases in their countries to ensure that the bases would not be used as launchpads for renewed offensive strikes against Iran.
Fourth: The Two-State Solution.
The two-state solution would be implemented, by admitting Palestine into the UN as the 194th permanent member state. This requires nothing more than the US lifting its veto. Palestinian statehood is in accord with international law and with the Arab Peace Initiative, which has been on the table since 2002. In turn, the countries in the region would establish diplomatic relations with Israel, and the UN Security Council would introduce peacekeepers to ensure the security of both Palestine and Israel.
Fifth: An End to Armed Belligerency.
In conjunction with the two-state solution, all armed belligerency in the region would end forthwith, including the disarmament of Hamas, Hezbollah, and other armed non-state actors. In the case of Palestine, the disarmament of Hamas would underpin the authority of the Palestinian state. In the case of Lebanon, the disarmament of Hezbollah would restore Lebanon's full sovereignty, with the Lebanese Armed Forces as the sole military authority in the country.
The disarmament would be verified by international monitors and guaranteed by the UN Security Council.
The key point is that the Israel-US war on Iran has not occurred in a vacuum. The Clean Break strategy, developed by Netanyahu and his American neocon backers in 1996, and implemented since then, calls for Israel to establish hegemony in the region through wars of regime change, with the US as the implementing partner. As NATO Supreme Commander Wesley Clark revealed after 9/11, the US drew up plans a quarter century ago to overthrow governments in seven countries: “starting with Iraq, and then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and, finishing off, Iran.” We are therefore living through the culmination of a long-standing plan by Israel and the US to dominate the Arab world and West Asia, create a Greater Israel, and permanently block Palestinian statehood.
We are not optimistic about the likelihood of our plan. The Israeli government is murderous and Trump is delusional about US power. We are perhaps already in the early days of WWIII. Yet because the stakes are so high, it’s worth laying out real solutions even if they are long shots. We do believe, however, that the non-Western world—the part that is not vassal states to US power—understands the urgency of peace and security.
Who, then, could champion a peace plan that the US and Israel will resist with every means at their disposal, until the weight of global opposition and economic catastrophe leaves them no choice but to accept it?
There is one main group, and that is the BRICS nations.
Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, and the bloc's expanded membership, which now includes the UAE, Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia, and Indonesia, represent approximately half of the world's population and more than 40 percent of global GDP (compared to 28 percent for the vaunted but overblown G7 countries). The BRICS have the credibility, the economic weight, and the absence of the historical complicity in Middle East imperialism to bring the world to its senses. The BRICS should convene an emergency summit and present a unified framework incorporating the conditions for peace and security, which in turn would be pressed at the UN Security Council. There, world opinion would tell the US and Israel to stop pushing the world towards catastrophe, and would remind all countries to adhere to the UN Charter.
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From Lebanon to Iran, Says Sanders, US Must End Complicity in 'Netanyahu's Wars'
"In less than two weeks, Israel has killed 570 people and displaced 750,000—over 10% of the entire country," the senator said of Lebanon. "Residential buildings are being bombed with no warning."
Mar 11, 2026
Just a day after tearing into US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for "unraveling international law, the Geneva Conventions, and the legitimacy of the United Nations" with their illegal war on Iran, Sen. Bernie Sanders stressed that "it's not just Iran."
"It's Lebanon," Sanders (I-Vt.) said on social media Wednesday. Since Trump and Netanyahu began bombing Iran a dozen days ago, Israel has also ramped up attacks against its northern neighbor—claiming to target the Lebanese political and paramilitary group Hezbollah—despite a November 2024 ceasefire deal.
That agreement to protect the Lebanese people was struck just over a year into Israel's retaliation for the October 2023 Hamas-led attack, which has also left the Gaza Strip in ruins. Despite the Lebanon truce, and another for Gaza reached this past October, Israeli forces have continued to slaughter civilians in both places.
In Lebanon, Sanders noted Wednesday, "in less than two weeks, Israel has killed 570 people and displaced 750,000—over 10% of the entire country. Residential buildings are being bombed with no warning."
"The US cannot continue to be complicit in Netanyahu's wars," declared the senator. His comments came after the White House tried to walk back Secretary of State Marco Rubio's suggestion last week that Trump followed the Israeli prime minister's lead on Iran.
Sanders has also criticized and even attempted to curb US complicity in Netanyahu's genocidal assault on Palestinians in Gaza—under the Biden and Trump administrations—by forcing unsuccessful votes to cut off some weapons to Israel.
The Israeli government has used the operation against Iran—which experts argue violates the US Constitution and UN Charter—to again cut off necessary humanitarian aid to Gaza, claiming last week that "the existing stock is expected to suffice for an extended period."
Philippe Lazzarini, commissioner-general of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, called the move "a new chokehold on Gaza," adding that "after more than two years of unspeakable suffering and a spreading man-made famine, people still lack the most basic supplies, despite increases in aid since the ceasefire.
As for Lebanon, Axios reported Monday that "the Lebanese government proposed direct negotiations with Israel—through the Trump administration—aimed at ending the war and reaching a peace agreement."
However, the Financial Times reported Tuesday that "Israel has rejected diplomatic overtures by Lebanon," with one unnamed source saying that the Lebanese "are ready to talk to Israel, but under the condition of a cessation of fire. Not a ceasefire, but a cessation... so talks can get going in Cyprus."
"Israel has so far refused and says it will only negotiate 'under fire,'" according to that unnamed source.
Trump's ambassador to the United Nations, Mike Waltz, made US support for Israel's bombing of Lebanon clear in his Wednesday remarks to the UN Security Council.
"The United States condemns the attacks that Hezbollah, a long-time proxy of the Iranian regime, has launched against Israel. Hezbollah has yet again made it clear that it does not represent nor does it defend the people of Lebanon. It defends the interests of the Iranian regime," Waltz said, stressing Israel's "right to defend itself."
Waltz also welcomed the Lebanese Council of Ministers' recent decision "to immediately prohibit Hezbollah’s military and security activities," and declared that "now is the time for the government of Lebanon to take back control of the entirety of its country."
Meanwhile, Tom Fletcher, United Nations under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator, noted to the Security Council that UN Secretary-General António Guterres "has insisted... we need the protection of civilians, de-escalation, an immediate cessation of hostilities, and genuine dialogue and negotiations towards a peaceful settlement, in line with the charter."
Fletcher concluded his comments at the briefing on Lebanon with calls for the protection of "all civilians throughout the region," "generous funding for a principled, scaled-up humanitarian response," and "a revival of strategic, calm, rational, hopeful diplomacy."
"Lebanon is exhausted by other people's wars," he said. "It is not asking for help, but for oxygen. Its people can defy the history, the geography, even the politics. They can be stronger than the forces pulling them apart. But they can only do that if Iran and Israel stop fighting their war in Lebanon."
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