The Iranians have a new deadline, and another lease on life.
President Donald Trump had given Iran until 8 p.m. Eastern Tuesday to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, or face the destruction of the country’s power plants and bridges. Just ninety minutes before the deadline expired, the Iranians were given a reprieve. This is the third time the president has extended his deadline, each time offering Tehran another off-ramp before escalating further.
For decades, Iran’s response has been predictable: stalling, posturing, and zero meaningful movement toward the only outcome that matters: the end of the regime and its nuclear and ballistic missile programs.
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Iran has a long history of failing to negotiate honestly with the United States, including in 2015 under the JCPOA, where Europe’s own governments ultimately found Iran in “consistent and severe non-compliance.”
Every pause, every diplomatic opening, every moment of American restraint has been treated by Iran as an opportunity to regroup, resupply their proxies, and buy time.
The mullahs are not confused about what they are doing: They are running out the clock.
We have been here before. In June of last year, the U.S. and Israel struck Iran’s military and nuclear infrastructure, and the world was told the threat had been degraded. Less than a year later, here we are again: the same regime, the same provocations, the same brinkmanship over the Strait of Hormuz.
The cost of delay is measured in American lives. Since the war began, 13 U.S. servicemembers have been killed, and roughly 200 more wounded. Over the weekend, we watched the daring rescue of the F-15E’s weapons systems officer, pulled from a mountain crevice in the Zagros range while the IRGC closed in. His rescue was a testament to American courage, but it should also be a warning: every week this war drags on without a decisive conclusion, more American servicemembers are put in harm’s way for a half-measure that leaves the regime intact.
The Islamic Republic of Iran has been a vicious and cruel opponent to America and the Western world, not just over the last few weeks of open conflict, but for the entire 47 years of its existence. It was born in blood, with its opening act being the abduction of the U.S. Embassy staff in Tehran, the regime holding them hostage for 444 agonizing days. Iranian forces and proxies have targeted and murdered hundreds of American civilians and servicemembers across the region and beyond.
Unsurprisingly, those who doubt the worthiness or prospects for success of the American-Israeli intervention point to Iran’s influence over the price of oil. This is exactly the pain point Iran has been plotting to exploit for years: the ability to hold the global economy hostage by threatening the Strait of Hormuz.
We can’t allow them to blackmail their way out of this war.
The markets have already demonstrated that oil prices will return to healthy levels the moment the regime is removed. Consider that when Trump announced that the U.S. was entering negotiations with Iran, the price of oil plummeted. Simply put, when a threat remains in power, it persists.
Is it theoretically possible to share a planet, in the short term, with a regime that believes it has a role to play in the end of the world? Yes, but we must ask ourselves: what is the cost?
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Opponents of this conflict paint it as a “forever war,” ignoring the fact that once hostilities end, the likelihood is that the Iranian people will rise up and be able to remove the mullahs, putting the final nail in the coffin of the regime.
Victory in this conflict has only one definition: a regime that can no longer play these games, that can no longer threaten the free world, that can no longer hold the global economy hostage through its chokepoints and its proxies. That means the end of the Islamic Republic and the long-suffering Iranian people at long last empowered to breathe free.
Dr. Sheila Nazarian is a Los Angeles physician whose family escaped from Iran to America. She starred in the Emmy-nominated Netflix series “Skin Decision: Before and After.“