More than a year has passed since the 12-day war of June 2025, when Israel attacked Iranian military facilities, killed senior military officials and nuclear scientists, and was joined by U.S. strikes on three major Iranian nuclear sites. Iran responded with missle attacks on Israel and on a U.S. base in Qatar before a ceasefire was announced. More than six months have also passed since the 39-day war that began in February 2026. That conflict resulted in the killing of Ali Khamenei, the leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI), and numerous senior political and military figures, as well as Iranian attacks on U.S. bases in the region. It also produced diplomatic efforts culminating in a memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the United States and Iran, signed by Presidents Trump and Pezeshkian.

As discussed elsewhere, both wars emerged from three interrelated dynamics. First, the United States sought to maintain and extend its global hegemony. Second, Israel’s right-wing government and Jewish and Christian Zionist movements sought to advance a vision of Greater Israel. Third, the Islamic Republic’s clerical, military and economic oligarchy sought to preserve and expand its regional influence.

This article argues that, faced with war and escalating domestic instability, the Islamic Republic has pursued a three-pronged strategy: military responses to continued confrontations, engagement in diplomacy, while intensifying repression at home.

Although the wars killed thousands, damaged Iranian infrastructure and eliminated much of the Islamic Republic’s senior leadership, they failed to produce regime change. Instead, they exposed the limits of U.S. and Israeli coercive power and left the region facing continued clashes and the possibility of another major war.

The 14-point MOU, which, among others, promised the termination of military operations on all fronts, including in Lebanon, removal of the US maritime blockade, a $300 billion reconstruction and economic development plan, and removal of all types of sanctions against the Islamic Republic, including the United Nations Security Council resolutions, was a success for the Islamic regime, and a relief for the botched policy of the Trump administration. In return, the IRI, while maintaining the current status quo of its nuclear program, agreed not to procure or develop nuclear weapons. It also allowed commercial vessels to pass without charge for 60 days between the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Oman, and vice versa.

The agreement was never implemented, and now the 60-day deadline for the US and Iran to negotiate the final deal has passed. The Netanyahu government, following its long-time policy towards the Islamic Republic, was vehemently opposed to the deal and was prepared to take whatever measures were necessary to derail it. Among others, on June 14, two days after the MOU was agreed upon, it bombarded the Shia-dominant district of Beirut. At the same time, the Trump administration appears to have believed that by delaying implementation and increasing economic pressure on Tehran, it could compel the Islamic Republic to make further concessions. Tehran, for its part, appears to have calculated that keeping the Strait of Hormuz closed would pressure the Trump administration to make further concessions, particularly as the midterm elections approached and American public disenchantment with the war increased.

Aside from its offensive missile and drone capabilities, threatening neighbouring Arab countries that host US bases, the Islamic regime’s........

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