There are 90 million Persians living in Iran, and the vast majority of them despise the radical Islamic regime that hijacked their country. They have endured unspeakable suffering and want their country back.
The Shah of Iran was overthrown following an oil strike. History teaches us that Iran’s oil infrastructure is the regime’s economic lifeline; Disabling it would bankrupt the regime and make it impossible for them to continue funding global terrorism. I’ve been calling for this strategy for more than a decade.
U.S. President Donald Trump understood this better than anyone. His administration implemented maximum pressure policies, withdrew from the disastrous Iran nuclear deal and devastated the Iranian economy. In doing so, he didn’t just weaken a regime; he saved Israel from the threat of nuclear annihilation.
Let’s not forget how we got here. Iran’s current regime was empowered by the naiveté of former President Jimmy Carter. Believing that Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini would be a Gandhi-like figure, Carter plotted the Shah’s overthrow by enabling the exiled Khomeini’s return in 1979.
Farah Pahlavi, the shah’s wife, read my book, Jimmy Carter: The Liberal Left and World Chaos, which exposed this plot. I interviewed more than a hundred individuals involved in the events. Carter himself threatened to sue me to block publication.
Pahlavi told me that on one Persian New Year, Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter visited the royal palace and told the shah to release political prisoners, allow religious freedom and freedom of the press, and permit Khomeini’s return, or he would be denied vital military parts for helicopters and aircraft. Carter reportedly added, “Under a new law, I have the authority to suspend foreign aid based on human-rights violations.”
Former French President Valéry Giscard d’Estaing told me that during the 1979 Guadeloupe summit, Carter informed European leaders of his intent to remove the shah. Giscard said to Carter: “You are a bastard of conscience. You betrayed an ally. Khomeini is a terrorist.”
On Sept. 23, 1980, I was with Israeli intelligence founder Isser Harel and Reuben Hecht, a senior adviser to then-Prime Minister Menachem Begin. I asked Harel three questions.
First: What will happen to Egyptian President Anwar Sadat? He answered: “The Muslim Brotherhood will assassinate him.”
Second: Will terrorism come to America? Harel replied: “America has the power but not the will. The terrorists have the will but not the power. That can change over time.” He added ominously: “The first attack will be in New York City, targeting its tallest building.”
The third: Who would be America’s next president? Though Carter was leading in the polls, Harel predicted: “When Ronald Reagan places his hand on the Bible, the hostages will be released.” That’s exactly what happened. Unbeknownst to us, Carter was secretly offering Iran billions via Algerian intermediaries, up to $7.9 billion wired from the U.S. Federal Reserve to the Bank of England, to buy back the American hostages in Iran.
As former Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres once told me, the wars of the 21st century would be economic, ideological, media-driven and fought through proxies. Trump waged an economic war and won. He bankrupted a murderous regime and gave hope to people who love freedom.
No population in the Middle East is more pro-Israel than the Persian people. Yet they remain under the grip of the Twelver mullah clerics, the largest branch of Shia Islam, who believe that it is their Divine duty to usher in the return of the Mahdi, an Arabic term meaning “the guided one,” through apocalyptic war.
To my knowledge, I’m the only Zionist to have met with an Iranian president. I spent more than an hour with former leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at the Warwick Hotel in New York. At one point, he told me that when he spoke at the United Nations, a green light appeared, and nobody blinked for 28 minutes because the Mahdi was in the room.
Ahmadinejad also shared bizarre and antisemitic theories. He told me that Iranians live to age 62 and Zionists to 82 because “Zionists poison rats, send them into our fields, and we eat the crops.” When I asked how the rats swam across the Persian Gulf, he suggested that I read The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.
This is the twisted ideology the West is dealing with and the reason Trump’s actions were nothing short of historic. He confronted the threat directly, empowered Iran’s freedom-seeking citizens, protected Israel and reshaped the Middle East for the better.