The Second Time As Farce?

The bombing of Al-Qard Al-Hassan shows how precise the Israelis are. Their every killing is intentional. They do not cause collateral damage. They goad the Iranians for "failure" to inflict civilian casualties.

As to whom the Israelis would impose on Iran, affections have lately been transferred to the ridiculous fantasist Reza Pahlavi, who is supported by a mostly elderly three per cent of Iranian-Americans, heavily concentrated in and around Los Angeles, and by almost no one else in the world. They have been prominent in the off-the-books state and institutional violence against the pro-peace encampment at UCLA.

Throughout this century, the Israeli flag has been prominent at Far Right events the world over, while the Iranian monarchist flag may also be seen at the small but vicious pro-Netanyahu counterdemonstrations in London. Those habitually assault the Police, who nevertheless have to tolerate them under political pressure to provoke a confrontation with the peaceful marchers for peace, and thus to provide a pretext for banning those events and for rounding up tens of thousands of dissidents. Life in Iran must be intolerable.

The Democrats, who are now the Dick Cheney Republicans, may retain a residual attachment to the longstanding neoconservative and liberal-interventionist aim of installing as Iran's new regime the weirdest political cult in the world, which had been based in exile since 1981, leaving it no constituency in a country of which half the population was under 30 years of age.

The Americans relocated that People's Mojahedin Organisation of Iran (Mojahedin-e-Khalq) to Albania between 2013 and 2016, not without local resistance, although it also maintains a considerable presence in the France of Emmanuel Macron, as well as an office in Cricklewood.

Consider how the world turns, since that outfit was headquartered for many years in Saddam Hussein's Iraq, where it participated in atrocities committed by the Iraqi Revolutionary Guard. During the Iraq War, Biden's, Bush's and Blair's Boys bombed the PMOI/MEK into surrender, as part of a deal with Iran to hand over certain al-Qaeda suspects who were of course in any case opponents of the Iranian regime. Oh, how the world does turn.

Opponents of the Iraq War were screamed down as Islamists and revolutionary Marxists due to the presence of a few of each in our enormous ranks. But now the plan is to hand over Iran to the people who really do manage the remarkable feat of being both, yet who were nevertheless closely allied to Saddam Hussein.

But if Israel now wanted the Pahlavis instead, then the Americans would presumably have to jump to it. Donald Trump would be glad to do so, recognising kindred spirits. Half the American electorate would now vote for Donald Trump if he were dead, and will vote for his dynastic successors at every opportunity. At last, the United States has a conservative movement and party in the purest Old World sense, straightforwardly loyal to rule by a particular House. But it is not, as had once seemed likely, the Bourbonesque Bushes, but America's Bonapartes. Or Pahlavis. Like Napoleon, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi even crowned himself. Your move, Donald.