Whatever the outcome of the American-Israeli military campaign against Iran, the Islamic Republic established by Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979 cannot remain a regional power, especially in light of the Gaza war and its consequences.

That war exposed Iran and, more specifically, revealed the unofficial and unholy alliance between it and Israel aimed at destroying the Palestinian national project based on the two-state solution.

The Gaza war, which began on October 7, 2023, represents a turning point at the regional level, particularly regarding Iran’s role beyond its borders. Iran’s decline as a regional actor stems from the simple principle that what is built on falsehood is inherently unstable, especially when it involves exploiting the Palestinian cause for political gain.

Iran’s exploitation of the Palestinian issue has caused significant harm to both the cause itself and the Palestinian people. One need only recall the role Iran played in encouraging Hamas and Islamic Jihad to carry out suicide attacks targeting civilians in Israel and Jerusalem, with the aim of shifting Israeli society toward the far right. This occurred after the signing of the Oslo Accords in the fall of 1993, at a time when both the Israeli right and the Iranian regime feared that the agreement might lead to a political settlement between Israel and the Palestinians.

Just as the late Hafez al-Assad leveraged the Israeli occupation of the Golan Heights to preserve his minority-led regime, the Islamic Republic exploited every opportunity to sabotage peace efforts in the region, perpetuating a state of neither war nor peace. That situation was overturned by the Gaza war, which changed all the dynamics linking Iran and the former Syrian regime on one side, and the Israeli right on the other.

Ultimately, it cannot be ignored that Iran now finds itself, for the first time since 1988—the year the Iran-Iraq war ended—forced to face a war on its own soil. The Islamic Republic could never have imagined such a conflict, which is a natural consequence of the developments following the outbreak of the Gaza war.

The Islamic Republic believed it would be the main beneficiary of the Gaza war, which began with Hamas’s “Al-Aqsa Flood” attack on the settlements surrounding Gaza. Tehran thought it could control the expansion or containment of the Gaza war in light of the large number of Israeli and Jewish casualties caused by the “Al-Aqsa Flood,” as well as the capture of dozens of Israelis.

Iran did not anticipate the Israeli response or the depth of the relationship between the United States and Israel. There was no Iranian assessment of Hezbollah’s military weakness or the consequences of opening a front in southern Lebanon. Likewise, Iran did not fully grasp the fragility of the Alawite regime in Syria or the implications of Israel lifting its protective cover over the regime. Iran either ignored or underestimated the fact that both Hafez al-Assad and Bashar al-Assad had survived for more than half a century thanks to a deep understanding with Israel. Under the agreement Hafez al-Assad reached with Israel, the Syrian regime ensured security along the occupied Golan front and, moreover, prevented any political initiative aimed at reclaiming the Golan Heights since 1967.

In addition, Iran lost its leverage over Hezbollah after Israel was able to eliminate much of its leadership, including Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah. Iran now faces the challenge of directly managing Hezbollah and pushing it to reopen the southern Lebanon front.

The war Iran is currently engaged in will have consequences entirely different from any of its previous conflicts. The Gaza war revealed the true nature of the Iranian regime, and what this war did not expose was made clear by the American-Israeli military campaign, which cemented the decline of the Islamic Republic’s influence beyond its borders, including in Palestine.

Iran has caused the Palestinians to miss every opportunity available to them since the early 1990s. More than that, it has left them facing the Israeli expansionist project after years of being victims of Iran’s own expansionist agenda, especially in the post-Oslo period, with all its successes and failures.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed by the writers are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of Annahar