Shafaq News
Hours remain
before the expiration of the latest deadline set by US President Donald Trump
for Iran to agree to terms that would reopen the Strait of Hormuz —the
strategic waterway through which roughly a fifth of global oil passes. The
deadline, set for 8:00 PM Eastern Time Tuesday, or 3:00 AM Wednesday Baghdad
time, marks the end of a pressure campaign that has run parallel to 39 days of
active US-Israeli military operations against Iran, launched on February 28,
2026.
Since then,
Iraq has been struck daily by drones and missiles targeting military,
diplomatic, and vital installations, as armed factions aligned with Iran’s
so-called Axis of Resistance have claimed operations against American interests
inside Iraq and beyond its borders. Ten analysts and officials spoke to Shafaq
News. Their assessments converge on one conclusion: the war is not ending soon,
and Iraq is paying a compounding price.
No Deal, No
Clear Endgame
Firas Ilyas,
professor of political science at the University of Mosul, said Washington has
entered the conflict without a defined objective. “There is an American
orientation toward continuing the war without setting clear ceilings,” he
said, adding that Trump’s repeated deadline extensions reflect “an absence
of a clear vision for the war’s final objective,” Ilyas argued that Tehran
has succeeded in managing time and raising the cost of confrontation, steering
the conflict away from the swift resolution US planners had anticipated and
toward a prolonged war of attrition with growing potential to become an
extended regional crisis.
Mujashaa
al-Tamimi, a political analyst based in Iraq, said Iran will not capitulate
under pressure but will not seek full-scale confrontation either. “Iran
will rely on absorbing pressure through multiple tools —diplomatic, economic,
and military— while using its regional allies to raise the cost of
confrontation without entering an all-out war,” he said, adding that Tehran
will seek to maintain a delicate balance between avoiding economic collapse and
preventing major escalation, while keeping the door to negotiation open.
Suhad
al-Shammari, a researcher in political affairs, said the deadline points
simultaneously toward two directions. “It may open the door to mediation
efforts in the coming days, but it is at the same time an indicator that the
United States is moving toward escalation —and possibly targeting
infrastructure, particularly power generation facilities.” She assessed
the gap between the two sides as deep, with Iran insisting on its right to
enrich uranium while Washington seeks to impose strict conditions, and
described the prospects for an agreement as limited given the current
trajectory.
Iran’s
Position: The Deadline Is Illegitimate
Iranian
political analyst Saeed Shawerdi argued that Tehran views the deadline as
fundamentally unreasonable. “Iran sees this deadline as illogical, because
it is based on imposing conditions by force, in exchange for the threat of destroying
sources of life, which Tehran considers war crimes,” he said.
Shawerdi added
that Iran will not yield to this pressure, that its position will remain one of
defense and response, and that the war has demonstrated internal Iranian
cohesion contrary to US expectations.
Saleh
al-Qazwini, a researcher specializing in Iranian affairs, explained that
Washington is seeking to apply increasing pressure to force Tehran to change
its regional policies, but cautioned that Iran “will not accept, after all
these sacrifices, to be turned into a failed state.” Whether the war
continues or stops, he said, depends on Iran’s capacity to endure and respond
—and the energy file will remain directly tied to Tehran’s position under that
pressure.
Read more: Long war with Iran: A dangerous repetition of history, but with even less preparation
The Strait, the
Oil, and the Global Fallout
Ramadan
al-Badran, a political analyst based in Washington, pointed out that the
closure of the Strait of Hormuz represents the single most consequential factor
in the current phase of the conflict. “Preventing the movement of exports
has led to a significant imbalance in market equilibrium,” he said,
warning that the impact will not be immediate alone but may extend into the
medium and long term —particularly if escalation continues and attacks on oil
infrastructure in the region persist.
Al-Badran also
cautioned that Iraq faces compounded challenges, with production halted and oil
fields and installations damaged, potentially reducing the country’s productive
capacity well beyond the short term.
Ahmed Fouad
Anwar, professor of Modern Hebrew and Zionist Thought at the University of
Alexandria, described the repercussions of the current war as unprecedented,
coming at a moment when the global economy has not yet recovered from the
effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine. He said that the
closure of Hormuz and strikes on oil installations in Iran and Gulf states have
had direct global consequences —including in countries such as Egypt, which has
been forced to implement energy rationing measures. “Gulf states have been the
hardest hit, due to the destruction of oil infrastructure and the disruption of
exports.” Anwar drew a historical parallel to the aftermath of the 1956
Tripartite Aggression —the joint British, French, and Israeli military
operation against Egypt— when new powers emerged at the expense of traditional
ones, suggesting the current conflict may similarly accelerate shifts in the
regional and global balance of power.
Iraq’s
Fractured Decision-Making
Beyond the
regional military calculus, analysts told Shafaq News that the war has exposed
a structural failure at the heart of Iraq’s political and security
decision-making. Politicians and observers describe this as one of the most
dangerous periods Iraq has faced since 2003, with warnings that the country risks
becoming an arena for the settlement of international accounts.
Imran
al-Karkoshi, a member of the State of Law Coalition led by former Prime
Minister Nouri al-Maliki, insisted that Iraq’s constitutional framework remains
intact. “The decision of war and peace rests with the Iraqi parliament,
which is the exclusively authorized body for that,” he told Shafaq News,
adding that the government is working to “consolidate the foundations of
peace” and that the international community bears responsibility for preventing
Iraq from being turned into a battleground.
But researchers
say the constitutional picture and the operational reality diverge
significantly. Nawal al-Mousawi, a researcher in political affairs, pointed out
that while the government holds the legal authority to deploy security forces
and take necessary measures, it is “constrained to a degree” by the
nature of a political system built on consensus. “The real knot,” she
said, “lies in the absence of a unified political decision to confront all
parties carrying weapons —particularly those that hold representation within
state institutions themselves.”
Firas
al-Muslimawi, spokesperson for the Reconstruction and Development Bloc led by
caretaker Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani, added a further dimension by
stressing that the government is currently operating in a caretaker capacity
under exceptional regional circumstances, functioning with only half its
ministerial cabinet, including the absence of a defense minister —a portfolio
currently administered on an acting basis. Al-Muslimawi said these conditions
make it urgent to form a fully empowered government capable of addressing the
escalating challenges, while stressing that al-Sudani “is making every
effort to control the security situation and spare Iraq the dangers of
war.”
The government
formation process itself remains stalled. The Coordination Framework —the
umbrella body of Shiite political forces— formally nominated Nouri al-Maliki
for prime minister on January 24, opening negotiations over the new government.
But the process has been held up by disagreements over the election of a
president, the constitutional prerequisite for tasking the largest bloc’s
candidate with forming a government. A political source told Shafaq News
earlier that the Coordination Framework had agreed to defer the final decision
on the prime ministerial candidate until after the regional war concludes.
A Sharply
Different View from Washington
From
Washington, a distinctly different assessment of the conflict’s trajectory
emerged. Tom Harb, head of the American Middle East Coalition for Democracy and
a prominent Republican Party figure, said that the Iranian regime now faces an
unavoidable confrontation with Trump’s fifteen conditions, and that failure to
comply will open the door to military operations targeting Iran’s strategic
depth.
Harb said the
US administration is betting on changing the regime’s behavior, but warned that
if Iranian provocations continue, striking infrastructure will be firmly on the
table. “If the regime does not respond to President Trump’s conditions,
targeting the economic and military joints of the state will become a means of
forcing it to submit— and this will serve the stability of Arab states and
Israel alike.”
Asked about
warnings from US legal experts that striking civilian facilities in Iran could
constitute war crimes, Harb drew a parallel to the Second World War, when the
Allies bombed the infrastructure of major cities to bring down dictatorial
regimes, arguing that ideologically entrenched systems cannot be neutralized
without dismantling their operational capabilities.
He dismissed
Iranian threats of triggering a third world war, “Where is this war? And
who will come to support Iran? No one. The prestige of Iranian military power,
built over 35 years, has evaporated. All they have left are imprecise rockets,
while the West and the United States possess an arsenal capable of sustaining
war for months and years.”
Harb assessed
that any military conflict would not exceed 60 days, with the possibility of a
30-day congressional extension, suggesting that strikes on infrastructure would
give the Iranian people “a new spirit” to rise against the regime.
Read more: US-Iraq security agreements keep failing: The PMF, dual loyalty, and Baghdad’s sovereignty deficit
