One hundred legal scholars signed a letter arguing that President Donald Trump’s threat to target Iranian power plants and bridges could amount to war crimes if carried out.
Calling “The attack was a clear violation of the United Nations Charter,” the scholars declared. “The conduct of the war, and statements of U.S. officials, also raise serious concerns about violations of international humanitarian law, including potential war crimes.”
On April 5, 2026, Trump wrote, “Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. There will be nothing like it!!! Open the F***in’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell.” If the goal is to help free Iranians from an odious regime, Trump’s polemics can backfire. After all, the problem in Iran is not the country or its people, but rather the regime that represses them. The minute the regime falls, the same infrastructure Trump threatens will become essential to rebuild and reintegrate the economy. Military necessity might require targeted destruction, but the United States should wield its power with the precision of a scalpel, not an axe, let alone a flame-thrower.
Still, the accusation of war crimes, now accepted as fact by the New York Times among others, is ignorant, hypocritical, and overblown.
First, the ignorance: Few if any of the signatories understand the nuances of Iran or its economy. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps or its subsidiaries control and profit from the power plants Trump threatens to destroy. That alone makes them legitimate targets.
Since the end of the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq War, the Revolutionary Guard has expanded its reach throughout the civilian economy, slowly taking over most industries. The independent labor union in Iran erupted largely because the Guard ignored labor regulations, failed to pay salaries, and ignored safety standards. Today, Khatam al Anbiya, the economic wing of the Guard, controls up to 40% of Iran’s gross domestic product. Extracting the Guard’s tentacles from the civilian economy will be the major challenge of the post-Islamic Republic era.
Second, the hypocrisy: If Trump’s mean words and threats of destruction amount to possible war crimes, where have these legal scholars been over the past 47 years, when, on almost every Friday, the Islamic Republic’s leaders led chants of “death to America?” Nor did the Iranian leadership limit itself to rhetoric. Their support for terrorism and proxies across Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, and Yemen led to the deaths of more than 100,000 people. Indeed, while the American legal scholars salivate about the possibility of labeling Trump as a war criminal, they remain silent that the regime he tries to oust massacred 40,000 over two days in January 2026; launched cluster munitions at Israel and specifically target civilian apartment buildings; and then attacked hotels and economic infrastructure in Gulf Arab states that had not joined the conflict with the U.S. and had forbidden Americans from using their bases. The closure of the Strait of Hormuz and the targeting of civilian tankers from third nations only adds to the litany of Iranian crimes.
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The legal scholars’ rhetoric is in some ways as overblown as Trump’s. While they talk about the conflict as risking genocide, they ignore basic metrics. In many wars — Syria and Libya, for example — conflict drove mass displacement. Millions became refugees. During the Iran conflict, United Nations officials acknowledged that more Iranians returned to their country than fled to it. The reason? Iranians understood U.S. and Israeli bombing was precise; they faced little risk from it.
The irony today is that while legal scholars seek to promote and reinforce international humanitarian law, their subjectivity and political agendas now undermine it.
Michael Rubin is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential. He is the director of analysis at the Middle East Forum and a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.