If Israel were to cease to exist tomorrow, the war would not end. It would simply cross the Atlantic. I grew up in Iran. The regime forced us to chant "Death to America." Western observers often operate under a comfortable delusion. They believe that the hostility consuming the Middle East is merely a localized territorial dispute. They convince themselves that Israel is the provocateur, creating enemies where none previously existed. This is a fatal strategic error. To the revolutionary ideologies fueling the regime I lived under, the hierarchy of hatred is explicit. In their doctrine, Israel is merely the "Little Satan," a forward operating base. You, the United States, are the "Great Satan." You are the ultimate prize. The goal of these movements is not to liberate people. It is a revolutionary, expansionist theology that demands universal submission. Israel is not the source of their rage. It is simply the frontline. It acts as a kinetic buffer, absorbing the blows intended for Western civilization. When Americans call for the abandonment of their ally, they are not voting for peace. They are voting to remove the only obstacle standing between the enemy and their own shores. The enemy knows exactly who their main target is. It is time you knew it too.

I grew up under a system that tried to teach us that Israelis were our enemies, yet every year it became clearer that the real threat to our lives was the ideology ruling over us. Ordinary Iranians were never at war with ordinary Israelis. Both peoples have been cornered by the same violent doctrine that glorifies death and demands obedience instead of freedom. One nation has endured its attacks for decades and the other has endured its rule, but both know the truth. They want a future built on life, dignity, and the right to escape the suffocating grip of clerics who decide destiny for everyone else. You can see this shared understanding in the way Iranian protesters cheer for any blow against the IRGC and in the way Israelis distinguish between a people and the regime that cages them. A bridge between these two populations exists today in small acts of courage and in the everyday rejection of the propaganda we were raised with. It is a bridge the regime cannot sabotage because it grows every time Iranians and Israelis choose each other over the lie that was forced on us since childhood.

The word imperialism gets thrown around casually, but it has a very specific meaning. It describes a system in which an outside power rules a population that never chose it and has no ability to remove it. That was the structure of Rome governing Jerusalem. A foreign authority made the laws, controlled political outcomes, and denied the local population any real sovereignty. That is not the situation people describe when they talk about external action against Venezuela. When a government has lost democratic legitimacy, when it no longer represents the will of its own citizens, and when it blocks them from choosing their leaders or shaping their own future, the absence of sovereignty already exists before any foreign actor arrives. Removing an unelected regime does not impose foreign rule. It restores the political space for the population to exercise the sovereignty that was taken from them. Calling that imperialism misunderstands the concept. Imperialism is the domination of a people by a power they did not select. A transition that returns decision-making to the citizens is the opposite. It is a move toward national self-determination rather than away from it.

It is running away from the religion it spent decades exporting to the entire world. The royal family realized too late that the same ideology they weaponized has now become the biggest threat to their survival. So they are trying to distance themselves from Islam in every possible way. They silence clerics. They strip power from the religious police. They flood the country with concerts, influencers, and Western entertainment so people forget the Islamic movements the monarchy created. But none of this means the Islamists are gone. They are only silent because they were crushed. They are humiliated, angry, and convinced the royal family betrayed Islam. If the Saudi economy hits a crisis, if oil prices fall, or if the regime shows one moment of weakness, the people who have been forced underground will come back with a level of vengeance this monarchy has never seen. They will tear the royal family apart if they ever get the chance. This is why investing in Saudi Arabia is a gamble. It is built on oil, suppression, and a fragile social contract. Israel is different. When you invest in Israel, you are investing in a society that stands on real institutions and real stability. Saudi Arabia is fighting its own past. Israel has already built its future.

As an Iranian, I know our country is not drying up by accident. It is being systematically looted and mismanaged by a regime that never cared about the land or the people living on it. For decades, they have drained our groundwater, built pointless dams, ignored our own scientists, and handed control of rivers and reservoirs to cronies who treat them like private fortunes. Climate change hurts many countries, yet very few have watched their lakes and wetlands turn into dust bowls as quickly as Iran. That speed is the fingerprint of this regime’s choices. Meanwhile, just across the region, Israel has developed some of the most advanced water and desalination technology in the world and built a model of how to live with scarcity. If the Islamic Republic falls and Iran and Israel become allies again, that experience could help my country repair its rivers, lakes, and aquifers and give Iranians a chance to reclaim their land instead of watching it die.