The most startling word in the resolution is “unprovoked,” which any clear-eyed observer would see as an out-and-out lie.
It was sheer audacity to include that word when the whole world can see that the United States and Israel carried out an unprovoked attack and that Iran is defending itself according to the U.N. Charter. The demand that Iran stop using its proxies to help defend itself is egregious.
This resolution brings further shame on the Security Council after its endorsement last November of the genocidal Trump/Kushner takeover of Gaza.
Wednesday’s resolution passed by 13-0-2, with Russia and China abstaining. Either of the two veto-wielding powers could have killed it.
China said the sovereignty of the Gulf states must be respected, but the resolution “does not fully reflect the root cause and overall picture of the conflict in a balanced manner.”
After its passage, a Russian draft resolution was put before the Council. It was a reasonable, neutral measure calling for an end to the war
I might have missed it. What did Bahrain do to “provoke” an attack from Iran? Or the UAE? Or Jordan?
No one would say that Iran’s responses to the U.S. and Israel were “unprovoked.” But the attacks on the other Gulf States? Those other states did not attack Iran.
Unprovoked means: “happening without motivation”. Iran’s motivation is clear. Israel’s motivation is clear. The U.S.'s motivation is unknown to many observers.
Not to be pedantic, but “unprovoked” means “happening without provocation.” I might have a motive to beat you up and steal your wallet, but that doesn’t mean that your mugging was “provoked,” by any common understanding.
It’s expressed in the passive, but in context it’s pretty clear that the UN meant that the various Gulf states had not themselves attacked Iran. So Iran’s attacks on those states, without any prior military action by those states against Iran, was “unprovoked” for the purposes of evaluating their legitimacy under international law. Iran was attacked by the U.S., to be sure - but their attacks against Bahrain (for example) were unprovoked.
Those nations had US bases that were utilized in the attack upon Iran. Those bases were hit. It is part of the Iranian strategy to spread the war horizontally.
Iran’s strikes cannot be dismissed as acts of scattered retaliation, the flailing lashing out of a dying regime. Rather, they represent a strategy of horizontal escalation, a bid to transform the stakes of a conflict by widening its scope and extending its duration. Such a strategy allows a weaker combatant to alter the calculus of a more powerful foe. And it has worked in the past, to the detriment of the United States. In Vietnam and Serbia, U.S. adversaries responded to overwhelming displays of American airpower with horizontal escalation, eventually leading to American defeat, in the former case, and, in the latter, frustrating U.S. war aims and spurring the worst episode of ethnic cleansing in Europe since World War II.
Although the United States has hugely battered Iran, it must reckon with the implications of Iran’s response. Otherwise, it will find itself losing control of the war it started.
Iran cannot defeat the United States or Israel in a conventional military contest. It does not need to. Its objective is to gain greater political leverage.
Iran has demonstrated resilience. U.S. decapitation strikes intended to paralyze the Iranian military. By launching large-scale retaliation within hours of losing the supreme leader and many senior commanders, Tehran signaled continuity of command and operational capacity.
It plays directly to the audience that Iran seeks to persuade: the Muslim populations across the region that may not be ideologically aligned with Iran but are generally poorly disposed toward Israel.
This attack on Gulf shows how those governments are aligned with US & Israeli interest which not know to their Muslim populations that may cause unrest in those nations.
There is no easy off ramp for the US to declare & leave. If the US leaves now it is obvious the US doesn’t have the perceived power they have projected. To actually make regime change will require boots on the ground. While it is unknown of the result. Likely it will followed the path of Afghanistan, Syria, Libya & Iraq. Not exactly victories.
They didn’t just hit the bases. They went after civilian targets as well:
Iran has shown little restraint in hitting Gulf countries’ oil facilities and putting civilians under attack — damaging freshwater resources, airports, hotels and shopping malls.
You’re not supposed to do that. In context, again, Iran’s attacks on U.S. military assets that are located in Gulf states are valid targets, but their attacks on the non-U.S. assets in those Gulf states were unprovoked and in the UN’s eyes should not have happened. Hence, the Resolution condemning them. And hence, the OP’s characterization of this as “Bizarro World” is probably inaccurate.
As has Israel & the US has done. And shown disregard to drowning Iranian naval personnel. I expect they will follow the Gaza template as Iran has not disintegrated. There isn’t any off ramp for the US. The world is in the war now. Just as we spread the WOT to Europe from refugees fleeing US interventions.
US foreign policy is really despicable. IMO
Yep - but this point isn’t about what Israel and the US have done, because I think there’s a pretty decent argument the folks who are criticizing this UN resolution’s language would regard the US and Israeli attacks as “unprovoked” as well.
The UN used the term “unprovoked” because the actual countries of Bahrain, Oman, Kuwait, etc. did not actually attack Iran. So attacks on the assets or citizens of those states (as opposed to assets or military of the US that are located in those states) are “unprovoked,” because none of the Gulf States are themselves aggressor states. Iran has every right to fight back against the U.S. and Israel, including their assets located in other countries - but not to attack other countries themselves.
Nice lawyerly defense.
The Us & Israel have a big pile of rocks but also a few rocks stored with their friend Jordan Bahrain etc. The US & Israel attacks and grabs a few rocks from their friends in the attack. Iran response by flinging rocks in all the directions the attacks are coming from. Now the friends say “Hey I’m not involved in this war!” No way pal you have facilitated the attack. They have some liability.
“Liability”? Perhaps from a moral standpoint, or a political standpoint. But those countries didn’t attack Iran. Nor did the U.S. use their “rocks” - they didn’t grab rocks from their friends but used their own rocks. Which means that from the perspective of international law and the laws of war, Bahrain and Oman and Kuwait didn’t attack Iran. The U.S. and Israel did.
Which is why the UN Resolution says “unprovoked.” You might challenge that term, but it’s hardly a “Bizzaro World” level of extreme ridiculousness to use it in this context. None of the Gulf states would be considered aggressor states under the rules of war simply because the US operates from their bases. The US assets would certainly be fair game for Iranian retaliation, but that doesn’t mean that Jordan has attacked Iran. Which makes Iran attacking Jordanian non-US targets an unprovoked attack, in that context.
Perhaps in a “rule based” world. But the US has violated that system in the removal of Venezuela’s leader & killing the Iranian leader without a peep from the UN. Now they claim foul because Iran is violating the rules? Ridiculous? Oh yes.
Being Jewish is not a reasonable provocation either, not for the Clerics or the Liberals.
The attacks by Iran against all of the other states in the ME are constant for decades now. It is not like just the US and Israel are singled out. Muslims are not Muslim enough crap.
AIUI, it wasn’t the U.S. that “claimed foul.” It was the Gulf states who were attacked who went to the UN to complain that they were hit by Iran without having been an aggressor in the conflict. Their point, which has a lot of validity, is that Iran shouldn’t just start blowing up their shopping centers and desalinization plants and civilian airports and whatnot just because the U.S. attacked them.
“Their point, which has a bit of validity , is that Iran shouldn’t just start blowing up their shopping centers and desalinization plants and civilian airports and whatnot just because **the U.S ** attacked them using bases and military operations stations in those countries.
Let’s pretend for a moment that some nearby foreign country, let’s say Cuba, had foreign troops, bases, and materiel hosted within its borders, and that such foreign power threatened the US using those bases as forward posts for the effort. Would we think twice about taking them out? Attacking that country for being a willing sponsor? Would we be doing our best to regime change-o-fi? For the answers to these questions and more, please revisit history, say, 1962.
PS: Setting up a naval blockade is considered an act of war by international law.
Very likely, but that’s not really the point at issue. We might have a security interest in pre-emptively attacking that country. But that attack would, indeed, be pre-emptive. We would not say that Cuba had attacked the U.S. They would not be an aggressor, under international law governing armed combat. If we had gone in and attacked, our actions would have been properly described as unprovoked within that context.