Iran’s evil regime has been fomenting terror and instability in the region and far beyond almost since its inception in 1979. Trampling human rights is its bread and butter. The ayatollahs who lead it have harnessed Iran’s resources to destroy Israel and advance a messianic religious vision. That is why dealing it a lethal blow is the right and moral thing to do.
In moments like these, the shameful hypocrisy of some leaders of the American and European left is plainly exposed. Instead of joining the fight against evil, they condemn Israel and the Trump administration. Those seeking to remove this regional and global threat are cast as the “aggressors.” In a world where morality and the ability to distinguish good from evil have been grotesquely distorted, this moral war could become a tipping point that redefines who the good and the bad actors are, and “resets” the West’s moral compass.
During its 47 years in power, Iran’s ayatollah regime has wrought death on millions, inside Iran and beyond. It has trampled the rights of its citizens, especially women and minorities. To eliminate Israel, entrench itself as a regional hegemon and “export the revolution,” Iran built a chain of terrorist armies across the Middle East that ceaselessly destabilize the region.
And it has not confined itself to the neighborhood; it has meddled in distant arenas as well—Africa, South America, Europe.
Above all, the regime has pursued nuclear weapons with steadfast resolve for three decades. Its unapologetic declared goal is Israel’s destruction and regional hegemony. Possession of such weapons, combined with advanced missile-delivery systems, would license Tehran’s terrorists to do whatever they please, backed by a death-dealing insurance policy.
And yet, instead of recognizing Iran as the clearest engine of oppression in the modern era, large parts of the Western intellectual elite choose the path of self-flagellation. Within a distorted post-colonial lexicon, Israeli and U.S. efforts to curb Iranian aggression are framed not as defending freedom, but as another expression of Western “imperialism.” The logic is absurdly upside down: The moral compass that should point to solidarity with the oppressed inside Iran is recalibrated, de facto, to shield their oppressors.
The current discourse on the radical left—intoned by political figures such as Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and organizations such as Jewish Voice for Peace—reflects a shameful retreat from the Enlightenment’s universal values in favor of a shallow and reductive identity politics.
When an existential struggle against a death-sanctifying axis is labeled an “illegal war” or “unjustified aggression,” the term “international law” is stripped of its original meaning and moral substance. Instead, it is transformed from a tool designed to protect humanity from barbarism into a legal instrument in the hands of those who seek to destroy the very possibility of democratic life.
What’s more, the Western reaction reveals a deep internal crisis of confidence. When former U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris chooses to emphasize the “instability” created by war rather than Tehran’s direct responsibility for the chaos, she reflects a view in which the status quo of terror is preferable to a clear moral verdict. Europe, for its part, remains mired in paradigms of “appeasement” and fear of escalation—ignoring the simple fact that the Iranian regime is not a rational actor playing by Western rules, but a force determined to rewrite the global rules of the game from the ground up.
This moral bankruptcy is especially evident in academia and in major feminist organizations. Those who have pledged themselves to fighting gender and class oppression have fallen silent in the face of Tehran’s executioners. That silence is not incidental. It stems from an intellectual inability to accommodate an uncomfortable complexity in which the West, despite its flaws, remains the last line of defense for the very values these institutions claim to represent.
This is the great test of 21st-century liberalism. The war in Iran must become a turning point in which the West recalibrates the limits of its tolerance. If Western intellectuals cannot distinguish between a democracy defending itself and a predatory theocracy racing toward nuclear weapons, then this is not merely a policy failure but a profound moral collapse.
We must restore the ability to tell good from evil, freedom from subjugation and rebuild the Western moral compass. Without this, the West will lose its ideological right to exist.
