President Trump has been harsh on the Middle East policies of former Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden. He has good reasons for that. The Obama-Biden era saw the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood and political Islam, the empowerment of Iran, the creation of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria and the deadly Oct. 7 terrorist attack in Israel and ensuing war in Gaza.
In contrast, Trump’s first term had brought stability to the region. Trump led efforts to destroy the Islamic State, repaired fractured relations with the Gulf States and Israel and restored deterrence to the region through shows of force.
Now, in Trump’s second term, he should make sure he doesn’t make the same mistakes as his predecessors, which could embolden Iran and political Islamist movements. Specifically, the president should avoid public conflicts with the government of Israel, take a strong stance against Iran and restore the deterrence that the Biden administration eroded.
To do this, he must take on the isolationist wing of his own administration.
Officials including Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for the Middle East Michael DiMino and other isolationist adherents have strongly pushed against any sort of U.S. intervention in the region. But avoiding intervention at all costs is perceived in the Middle East as weakness.
Trump’s rhetoric signals he understands the true meaning of peace through strength, yet some of his actions have signaled something else. Washington halted strikes against the Houthi rebels in Yemen, for instance, after the Houthis promised not to strike U.S. ships. Trump and his secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, have also failed to hold Iran accountable for Houthi actions; even during Trump’s recent visit to Saudi Arabia, the Houthis launched rockets at Israel over Saudi airspace.
Administration officials told the New York Times that the operation was costly and the United States was unable to establish air superiority. Such claims seem strange, considering the United States spends more than the next nine countries combined on its military.
Trump also avoided a stopover in Israel during his recent Middle East tour, inspiring reports of a widening gulf between Washington and Jerusalem. This is dangerous, as Israel plays a key part in establishing regional deterrence. While the U.S. prematurely aborted its attacks against the Houthis, Israel has decimated Hezbollah — Iran’s greatest deterrent — destroyed Iranian air defenses and carried out targeted assassinations against top Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps officials. Washington still urgently needs Israel as an enforcer.
The danger of such policy is that regional adversaries like Iran stop taking U.S. statements seriously.
Take, for example, how Iran has scoffed at the Trump administration’s avowed red line in negotiations: zero tolerance for nuclear enrichment. Over the past weeks, Iranian authorities have signaled their defiance. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called the U.S. demands “nonsensical, ” Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Tehran was considering whether to participate in talks, and Iranian members of parliament issued a statement saying Iran would “never back down on our nuclear rights” followed by chanting “death to America” and “death to Israel.” Iranian state media called the administration’s most recent proposal “far from reality.”
Such impudence may seem strange for a country whose economy is in shambles, whose proxy network has been smashed and whose air defenses have been obliterated. Yet as Iran watches the administration’s policy divisions and leaks, its leaders believe they can spot weakness, and have shown they are willing to gamble on its nuclear enrichment program. For Iran, the stakes are high; the ayatollahs do not want to share the fates of deposed Arab dictators Saddam Hussein or Muammar Gaddafi, and nuclear proliferation is their guarantee of existence.
Trump’s modus operandi is using economic incentives and punishments to shape policy. While such policy may work with the Gulf nations, whose prime concern is building a wealthy and stable society, history has shown that the ideologically driven actors of the region, including Iran, only respond to credible threats.
Trump proved this concept himself when he ordered the assassination of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force chief Qassem Soleimani. What followed was a drop in Iranian proxy activity and what then CENTCOM commander Kenneth McKenzie Jr. referred to as “reestablished … deterrence.”
But while Trump understands this concept, many of the isolationists in his Cabinet do not. Gabbard argued that even building up U.S. weaponry in the region could “spark a wider conflict with Iran.” Such logic is exactly what led the Obama and Biden administrations before, and what caused the current chaos in the region: de-escalation at all costs.
But such policy doesn’t lead to peace.
Peace has historically been achieved through the unipolar dominance of a single power, as seen during the Pax Romana, Pax Mongolica and Pax Britannica. These eras of stability endured as long as that dominant influence remained strong, and they unraveled when it began to decline. In the case of Iran, the assassination of Soleimani proved the opposite: decisive action leads to submission while de-escalation leads to further aggression. In the meantime, the White House asked agencies to pause new sanctions against Iran — a move that will only further embolden the Islamic Republic.
As Trump likes to bring up, Biden proved this concept through the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan. Kremlin officials later confirmed that the resulting perceived U.S. weakness inspired Russian President Vladimir Putin to invade Ukraine.
While many of Trump’s isolationist advisers believe that the U.S., despite having the strongest military and economy in the world by far, is incapable of “policing the world,” they do not consider that Washington is not alone. A U.S.-led world order is much more appealing to most of the world than what China might offer. In the case of the Middle East, Israel would carry out the bulk of any operation against Iran. The key to U.S. hegemony without being overstretched is relying on and supporting alliances.
If Trump wants to be the president of peace, he should take lessons from his own first term. If he listens to the voices denouncing “forever wars,” he may end up repeating the mistakes of his predecessors.
Joseph Epstein is director of the Turan Research Center, a nonpartisan research program at the Yorktown Institute focused on the Turkic and Persian worlds.