Jeremy Scahill

There are ways in which that also is kind of a common dynamic within the institutional Democratic Party who very much actually wanted a war against Iran.

And they were happy to have Trump do it because the odds of it becoming a disaster could be beneficial to the American Democratic Party's political future at the midterm elections.

But again, my understanding is that many Iranian officials, many leaders of Hezbollah do not view this as the potential end of the war.

They view it as a phase where the crossroads is going to be how much more deeply does the United States get involved with what is ultimately going to be a war on the part of Iran, Hezbollah, potentially a broader axis of resistance against Israel as the Israelis start to ratchet up their covert operations inside of Iran.

Tests are going to be all over the place in the next week or so because the Israelis clearly want to undermine this.

Trump apparently told them he's going to stop this.

I doubt it.

I think it's going to be really tough.

And then the ball is in Iran's court.

Do we say no nuclear negotiations unless the scorched earth bombing or siege of Lebanon stops?

That really, in a lot of ways, is going to be the massive question looming over this for the coming days.

Yeah, I think that's a good point.

I think we're looking also at 2028 messaging here, and clearly Lindsey Graham doesn't want J.D.

Vance to be the nominee, at least at this point, or the successor to Trump and the MAGA movement.

But a couple of interesting details, Crystal.

One is on this issue

of Iran's ballistic missile program.

Trump and others were talking from the beginning that the Iranian ballistic missile range has to be reduced, that their ballistic missile program has to be eliminated, that their support for their regional allies has to be completely ended, that the nuclear dust is gonna be taken by American forces and removed from the country.

Now, what are we talking about?

Trump is saying, oh, it doesn't actually need to be removed.