Perfect Timing To Raise The Tone On Iran

Heshmat Alavi , CONTRIBUTOROpinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.
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As if Iran hadn’t enough troubles in the region already, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres in recently published remarks highlighted the necessity of guaranteeing a two-state solution for the Palestine and Israel dilemma. This is a soft spot for Iran as the regime has deviously used this flashpoint region as pretext to justify its role across the region. With Trump inviting Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to the White House, Tehran understands fully how its Middle East influence is in jeopardy.
All said and done, Iran’s deepest concerns currently hover over the fate of the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC), especially after House Speaker Paul Ryan called for the designation of this entity as a foreign terrorist organization. The Trump administration has already slapped two series of new sanctions against Iran in the span of two months, and further steps are brewing in Congress as we speak. The IRGC can be described as the pulse of Iran’s regime, with significant influence inside the establishment’s politic and economic apparatus, parallel to supervising its domestic crackdown machine, support for terrorism and regional warmongering, and the ballistic missiles and nuclear drives.

Such strong rhetoric makes the regime in Tehran look weak, to say the least. From the mullahs’ point of view, this is a recipe for disaster, considering the fact that a weak posture at a time of sensitive presidential election has the potential of emboldening the powder keg society to burst into 2009-like uprisings. And this is exactly what mostly terrifies the mullahs’ regime.
Considering the Arab states’ main demand in evicting the mullahs from the region and bringing an end to Tehran’s meddling abroad, controlled mainly by the IRGC, designating this entity as a foreign terrorist organization would be an important signal to the entire Middle East that the policy of this new U.S. administration is in the interest of America and its regional allies, especially Saudi Arabia.
Such a measure will strengthen the U.S.-Middle East coalition against terrorism and extremism, defang Iran’s meddling in other countries and its support for terrorism, and distance the U.S. from an avoidable war in the region.