The US has been trying to leave the Middle East for years, especially after the controversial wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. However, the region has a way of always calling America back.
In reality, America still has substantial national security interests in the region that will not depart anytime soon. It is not a binary choice between pivoting to an adversarial China or remaining engaged in the quagmire of the Middle East.
The United States is a superpower, and its engagement in the region is essential for US safety, decreasing the risk of war, and providing more protection for its homeland.
One can be forgiven for thinking the region’s problems are intractable. But who would have thought a year ago that the Islamic Republic of Iran, the world’s leading state sponsor of terror, would be so vulnerable, with its air defense in tatters?
The visceral hatred for Israel led the mullahs to launch the two most lethal ballistic attacks in the modern era, which Israel was able to thwart with the help of the US and its allies.
Israel degraded the lethality of Iran, one of the US’s most hostile adversaries – with so much American blood on its hands – by destroying Iran’s anti-missile defenses. This has created leverage for the Trump administration to negotiate a new nuclear deal or, if coming to terms with Tehran is impossible, to destroy their nuclear program.
Israel has put the US in a much stronger position to act or negotiate with Iran.
Hezbollah in Lebanon, the principal Iranian proxy and an American-designated terrorist group, also has the blood of American soldiers and civilians on its hands, most notoriously the 241 Marines killed in Beirut in 1982.
In September 2024, Israel decimated the leadership of the terror organization. It eliminated most of its missile capacity, reaping justice for itself and its best friend, America, something the Americans have not been able or willing to do for decades. Hezbollah has also kidnapped US citizens and kept them in inhuman conditions, like the Israeli hostages taken by Hamas, another US-designated terror group.
If the Israelis had not degraded Hezbollah, the genocidal Assad regime, supported by both Iran and Hezbollah, would likely not have fallen. Israel’s actions and strength in the region have done more as a catalyst for positive change and the possibility of a more stable region than we have been able to do with longstanding failed diplomacy.
Israel has given the US an opportunity in Syria that no one could have imagined a short time ago, weakening Iran and Russia, two members of the Axis of aggression.
Window of opportunity must be managed carefully
THE CAVEAT is that the newly created window of opportunity must be managed carefully, as the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham rebels who now control Syria are Islamists, until proven otherwise. That means no sanctions relief until we get assurances that they will not open hostilities to Israel to their south or our Kurdish allies to their north.
As for the Muslim Brotherhood jihadists of Hamas, who have killed many Americans over the last 30 years, they are on the run, because Israel did what the Biden administration said they couldn’t do: massively degrade the terrorist group, opening up the possibility for President Trump to reimagine a Middle East in ways not confined to the failed recommendations of past decades.
Israel stands on the frontlines against radical Sunni and Shi’ite jihadism. In the future, Israel will present even more potential solutions in a region that seems, at first glance, to only offer problems.
America’s Gulf allies admire Israel’s strength; normalization with Saudi Arabia, with its economic benefits for both Israel and the US, will become possible as the projection of power by Iran, the number-one threat to Saudi security, is weakened.
On both sides of the aisle, Congress and the president know that the US’s national security interests align with Israel’s.
I am not Pollyannaish about the road forward. After two days of briefings in Congress and the State Department last week, I realized we handicapped advancing our interests by focusing only on problems and not new possibilities.
In the Congress of old, we accepted that “winning” was being satisfied with getting three-quarters of a loaf. Middle Eastern solutions aren’t pretty, but getting much of what you need to advance your interest should be considered a win.
However, ignoring the history of violence and religious zealotry that has cursed the region is a prescription for failure.
Taking advantage of opportunities
HOW SHOULD America take advantage of the opportunities Israel has made possible?
Israel has created the possibility of real change in Lebanon with its humbling of Hezbollah. But we must not have false illusions. Too many in Congress and the State Department think the new Lebanese government and the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) are willing and capable of reining in Hezbollah.
Before the US starts throwing money at the LAF, it needs to create benchmarks for the army to prove they are on a sustainable path to take on Hezbollah terrorists, who have controlled the nation for decades. As an example, a good start would be identifying Hezbollah-controlled officers in the LAF and demanding they be removed from any role in the reconstituted LAF.
In Syria, another opportunity created by Israeli strength, the US needs to recognize that the new Syrian leader is more likely to Islamize Syria as he did in Idlib province over the last seven years. The US should not prematurely end sanctions until it has a written guarantee for an armistice between Israel and Syria, and that Syria will not ethnically cleanse our Kurdish allies who help us fight ISIS and still control tens of thousands of ISIS members and their families in Syrian Kurdish territory.
ISIS will rise again if the new Syrian leader Ahmed al-Sharaa and Turkey try to ethnically cleanse Kurds from northeast Syria, as Turkey did to the Kurds in northwest Syria a few years ago.
Keeping Israel strong is in America’s interest because the Jewish state is the US’s only reliable regional ally, creating opportunities to advance US interests and opening possibilities for solutions to longstanding problems.
The writer is the director of the Middle East Political Information Network (MEPIN) and is the senior security editor of The Jerusalem Report. He regularly briefs members of the US Congress and their foreign policy aides.