By Emil Malak — | June 15, 2026 Op-
President Trump Must Be Warned
The latest announcement of a peace-
A fundamental question remains: Is the Iranian regime setting up President Trump?
I remain skeptical that the Iranian leadership—and many of its supporters and advocates in Europe and the United States—have any intention of concluding a comprehensive and enforceable agreement within the next two months. Their historical negotiating pattern has often been characterized by delay, ambiguity, and the pursuit of strategic advantage through prolonged talks.
The danger for the White House is not necessarily outright rejection of negotiations, but endless procrastination. By extending discussions and creating the appearance of progress, Tehran may be seeking to buy time while waiting for a more favorable political environment in Washington.
From this perspective, the Iranian regime's objective may be straightforward: keep negotiations alive until after the U.S. midterm elections. If Republicans suffer significant losses and Democrats gain control of one or both chambers of Congress, President Trump could find himself politically weakened and operating as a lame-
Whether one agrees with President Trump's policies or not, any negotiator should recognize this possibility and plan accordingly. A memorandum, a declaration, or another round of talks should not be mistaken for a final agreement. The true test is whether Iran is prepared to make concrete commitments, accept verification mechanisms, and move decisively toward implementation.
Any peace memorandum that treats the current Iranian regime as a reliable partner is, in my view, dangerously naïve. This is a government that has spent decades arming proxies, threatening its neighbours, and breaking its commitments, and no signed document changes what it has repeatedly shown itself to be. This regime must change — and the West should say so plainly, keeping its deterrence credible, its alliances strong, and its support firmly with the Iranian people who have borne the worst of this government's rule, rather than investing false hope in an agreement the regime has every incentive to break.
Until that happens, the administration should approach every announcement with a healthy degree of skepticism. Diplomatic gestures are not the same as diplomatic results.
What appears to be a diplomatic breakthrough today could become a costly strategic mistake tomorrow.
Perhaps President Trump understands the risks better than the rest of us. If so, time—and events—will prove him right.
Peace with Iran Will Remain Illusory Without Regime Change
An update to this op-
By Emil Malak
On or around June 5, reports emerged of a U.S.–Iran understanding to pause hostilities — a memorandum of understanding to extend the ceasefire, reopen the Strait of Hormuz, and restart nuclear talks. Yet both history and the nature of the regime point to one conclusion: this is not peace. It is a pause, and absent fundamental change in Tehran, it will prove meaningless.
Two realities the headlines obscure. First, a memorandum of understanding is not a binding agreement; it is a statement of intent, easily stalled and abandoned. Second, an agreement is only as durable as the government that signs it. For decades, negotiations with Tehran have followed one pattern: talks, a temporary understanding, declarations of progress, violations, renewed tension, and another round of talks. The recent sequence fits the mold — a halt to hostilities, a thirty-
A genuine settlement would require three principles: no military nuclear capability, backed by enforceable oversight; no ability to threaten or close the Strait of Hormuz; and no support for armed groups that threaten Israel, the United States, and the region's governments. These are not extreme demands — they are the minimum conditions for the region to breathe. But each collides with strategies the leadership has pursued for decades. The nuclear program, the leverage over the strait, the proxy network: these are not bargaining chips the regime happens to hold. They are central to how it defines itself. To surrender them is, in its own logic, to surrender its reason for being.
This is why every negotiation runs aground on the same obstacle. The problem is not the wording. It is whether the governing ideology will accept such restrictions and implement them permanently. As long as Tehran remains committed to influence through proxies, pressure on its neighbors, and confrontation with the West, any agreement is a pause, not a peace.
Why This Pause Will Not Hold
I do not believe this latest understanding will last. Sooner rather than later, the United States will resume its military objectives — and a logical early move would be seizing control of Kharg Island, the terminal through which the overwhelming share of Iran's crude exports flow. Cut Kharg, and you cut the regime's economic lifeline at a single point. When the diplomatic track stalls, as this regime's pattern suggests it will, that pressure point becomes the obvious lever. A memorandum signed under these conditions does not end the confrontation. It merely sets the clock for the next phase of it.
What the Gulf States Have Built — and Stand to Lose
The stakes here are not abstract, and they belong to a region whose achievement deserves admiration. Over little more than two generations, the Gulf states have accomplished one of the most remarkable transformations in modern economic history — turning desert economies into thriving centers of finance, technology, aviation, tourism, and global trade. Qatar's output per person now stands near $118,000 on a purchasing-
That achievement now sits exposed. A region held permanently on edge by an unreconstructed Iran — its shipping lanes vulnerable, its investors uncertain, its skies within reach of proxy missiles and drones — cannot sustain the confidence on which such prosperity depends. Capital is mobile; it flows toward stability and away from risk. As long as the Iranian regime remains in charge, the very progress the Gulf has spent decades building is placed at risk of stagnation and decline. For these states, regime change in Tehran is not a matter of ideology. It is a matter of protecting what they have already earned.
The Path to Renewed Cooperation Runs Through Resolution
That same logic points toward a more hopeful prospect: a region of capable, prosperous states cooperating on security, technology, and trade — with the Gulf states, Israel, and Egypt anchoring a stable new order. The foundations are real. Egypt fields a serious army, air force, and navy. The Gulf states command enormous economic weight and growing diplomatic influence. Israel brings advanced technological and military capability. Together they have everything required to shape a Middle East defined by enterprise rather than conflict.
But that cooperation cannot simply be resumed by declaration. It must be earned, and the path to it runs squarely through the unresolved conflicts that still divide the region. There can be no durable, openly embraced partnership with Israel while the Palestinian question remains unaddressed and while the Lebanese front stays unsettled. These are not obstacles to be bypassed; they are the precondition for everything that follows. A credible and just resolution of the Palestinian issue, and a stable settlement on Lebanon, would remove the principal barrier standing between the Gulf and an open, confident alignment with Israel — and would strip the Iranian regime of the grievances it exploits to justify its proxies. Resolve those questions, and the door to genuine regional cooperation opens. Leave them festering, and even the most capable states will hesitate at the threshold.
History offers a sobering lesson: conflicts rarely end when only their symptoms are managed. They end when the underlying cause is removed. Real stability will not come from managing the Iranian regime more skillfully, but from its transformation — through internal pressure, sustained isolation, or political change driven from within Iran itself. The latest talks and ceasefire extensions change nothing fundamental. It is time policymakers finally applied the lesson history has taught repeatedly.
Emil Malak Op-
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