{"id":4494,"date":"2026-06-18T09:15:31","date_gmt":"2026-06-18T08:15:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/codir.net\/?p=4494"},"modified":"2026-06-18T09:15:31","modified_gmt":"2026-06-18T08:15:31","slug":"the-recent-resumption-of-armed-exchanges-threatens-to-drag-the-middle-east-back-into-a-catastrophic-full-scale-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/codir.net\/?p=4494","title":{"rendered":"The recent resumption of armed exchanges threatens to drag the Middle East back into a catastrophic full-scale war"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong><u>By:&nbsp; Jamshid Ahmadi on 12 June 2026<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The fragile ceasefire established just two months ago to halt the raging conflict involving the United States, Israel, and Iran is currently teetering on the brink of total collapse. &nbsp;A rapidly escalating exchange of strikes across multiple fronts has shattered the relative calm that followed the cessation back in mid-April, raising fears among international observers that the region is being quickly and deliberately dragged back into an all-out, full-scale war &#8211; with all the devastation and horror this portends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>A shattered ceasefire and infrastructure destruction<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The current spiral came on the back of Iran&#8217;s launch of waves of missile attacks on Israel on Sunday 7 June following the latter&#8217;s attacks on Beirut, Lebanon that same day. &nbsp;This prompted a round of Israeli strikes on targets across central and Western Iran in the early hours of Monday 8 June. &nbsp;Huge explosions were reported in the vicinity of several major population centres, including the capital Tehran, nearby Karaj, Tabriz in northwestern Iran, and Isfahan in central Iran.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Of major significance was the Israeli targeting of the vital Karoon Petrochemical Complex in Mahshahr, southwestern Iran. &nbsp;While the Israeli military claimed the operation was intended to eliminate missile launchers and thereby expand its unencumbered freedom to operate in Iranian airspace, humanitarian and labour observers on the ground in Iran warn that the damage to this industrial hub could have catastrophic ramifications. &nbsp;The complex serves as an economic lifeline, supplying raw materials to countless domestic firms that desperately rely upon its products and associated supply lines in order to function. &nbsp;By effectively crippling this critical infrastructure, the military campaign threatens to trigger a wave of mass unemployment across manifold interconnected domestic industries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The human toll: Iranian working people and the poor pay the price<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Amid the high-stakes geopolitical manoeuvring, the primary victims of this renewed escalation are the Iranian working people and the already impoverished segments of society. &nbsp;Long before this war began, ordinary Iranians were navigating severe economic strain which directly precipitated the mass protests and unrest across the country in December 2025. &nbsp;The war, including this latest round of heavy bombing and infrastructural sabotage, has made the situation infinitely worse and pushed the Iranian population to breaking point.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The immediate fallout, particularly affecting the beleaguered Iranian working class, includes:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Mass Unemployment:<\/strong> \u00a0The destruction of key economic drivers like the Karoon Complex is wiping out livelihoods in an instant, adding to an already huge unemployment crisis, threatening to leave millions of workers without an income or means to support their families.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Skyrocketing Inflation: <\/strong>\u00a0The constantly lingering threat of all-out war has tanked the value of the national currency and severely destabilised the national economy, driving the cost of basic commodities and staples to unprecedented heights.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Supply Scarcity: <\/strong>\u00a0As industrial output has stalled and trade routes are threatened, the pricing of essential food items, medicine, and utilities has skyrocketed, placing a punishing burden on families with no safety net beneath them.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Organisations like the Committee for the Defence of the Iranian People&#8217;s Rights (CODIR) have raised urgent warnings that the war is systematically eroding societal cohesion. &nbsp;While political leaders debate military strategy, working-class communities are caught in a desperate struggle against hyperinflation and poverty, stripping them of the security and stability required to simply survive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Divergent motives and political obstacles<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This sudden escalation highlights a sharp divergence in the strategic goals of the belligerents in this conflict, often at the sharp expense of civilian lives. &nbsp;While Washington and Tehran have signalled a baseline desire to negotiate a diplomatic exit to the war, internal political pressures on all sides continue to undermine peace talks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>The US:<\/strong> \u00a0US President Donald Trump has vacillated between expressing optimism for a permanent peace deal and issuing stark warnings that Iran will &#8220;pay the price&#8221; for delaying negotiations following a drone collision that downed a US helicopter near the Strait of Hormuz in the early hours of Monday 8 June.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Israel: <\/strong>\u00a0Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appears hell-bent on pursuing the war rather than upholding any peace deal. \u00a0Facing domestic elections this coming October, critics argue Netanyahu views the continuation of hostilities as his best path to re-election, utilising the narrative of Iran as an &#8220;existential threat&#8221; to maintain political momentum, regardless of the wider human cost and ramifications.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Iran: <\/strong>\u00a0The Islamic Republic legitimately views the US and Israel as a unified axis, holding Washington directly responsible for greenlighting Israeli aggression. \u00a0Iran relies heavily on its ability to effectively close the Strait of Hormuz &#8211; a vital global chokepoint for oil and natural gas &#8211; as its primary bargaining chip, a high-stakes gamble that further isolates the country&#8217;s fragile domestic markets.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Regional fallout and the push for peace<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The fallout of this renewed friction extends far beyond the immediate borders of the countries involved. &nbsp;Iranian allies in the region have quickly mobilised, with Hezbollah engaged in intense fighting against ongoing Israeli operations in southern Lebanon &#8211; resulting in heavy civilian casualties &#8211; and Yemen&#8217;s Houthi movement threatening international commercial shipping affiliated with Israel in the Red Sea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Concerted diplomatic efforts are currently underway by regional mediators &#8211; including Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Pakistan, and Qatar &#8211; to pressure the Trump administration to rein in Israel while urging Tehran to halt its reciprocal missile salvos. &nbsp;Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and his deputy Esmail Baghaei have both warned that continued aggressions against Iran and violations of its sovereignty will force Tehran to entirely review its stance on the current peace talks.&nbsp; Meanwhile, at the time of writing, the country is facing consecutive days of heavy bombardment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Ultimately, as long as cynical political manoeuvring and military strikes supersede bona fide considered diplomatic compromises, the long-suffering working people and the poor of the Middle East will remain the primary casualties of a war they did not choose and for which they are not enthused, bearing the heavy burden of economic ruin, displacement, and systemic instability for a long time to come.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>&#8220;Nothing is agreed until everything is agreed!&#8221;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>While CODIR would welcome any development that averts the return to war and a continuation of the fierce bombardment of Iran, we, along with most civic society currents inside Iran, remain naturally sceptical on the various pronouncements of the Trump administration in this regard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Having threatened on the afternoon of Thursday 11 June to hit Iran &#8220;very hard&#8221; and move to seize Kharg Island in the Persian Gulf, and thereby take control of the country&#8217;s ability to export oil, within hours Trump announced that he had abandoned these plans and repeated once more that tangible progress had been made towards the signing of a memorandum of understanding between Iran and the US &#8211; perhaps even within a couple of days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Considering the repeated attacks previously launched on Iran while it has been participating in negotiations in good faith; the numerous 180-degree about-turns made at the eleventh hour by the Trump administration &#8211; seemingly designed to cajole Iran into abandoning its own &#8220;red lines&#8221;; the subsequent lack of any real progress or movement away from the maximalist positions of either party to the conflict; and the assertions by both Tehran and Tel Aviv that they are either unaware of, or not party to, any such imminent deal, there is understandably little cause for optimism at this point.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And until the realisation is made by Trump that terms cannot be unilaterally imposed upon Iran and that genuine negotiations that properly address the concerns of both countries, ultimately disposed towards the definitive resolution of this conflict, are the only way forward, then this deadly impasse will remain\u2026&nbsp; An impasse of &#8220;neither war nor peace&#8221; to the utter ruin first and foremost of Iran, the Iranian people and their futures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jamshid Ahmadi is Assistant General Secretary of CODIR (Committee for the Defence of the Iranian People\u2019s Rights (CODIR)<\/strong><\/p>\n<div class=\"share-this\">\n                    <a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/share\"\nclass=\"twitter-share-button\"\ndata-count=\"horizontal\">Tweet<\/a>\n                    <script type=\"text\/javascript\"\nsrc=\"http:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\"><\/script>\n                    <div class=\"facebook-share-button\">\n                        <iframe\nsrc=\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/plugins\/like.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fcodir.net%2F%3Fp%3D4494&amp;layout=button_count&amp;show_faces=false&amp;width=200&amp;action=like&amp;colorscheme=light&amp;height=21\"\nscrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none;\noverflow:hidden; width:200px; height:21px;\"\nallowTransparency=\"true\"><\/iframe>\n                    <\/div>\n                <\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By:&nbsp; Jamshid Ahmadi on 12 June 2026 The fragile ceasefire established just two months ago to halt the raging conflict involving the United States, Israel, and Iran is currently teetering on the brink of total collapse. &nbsp;A rapidly escalating exchange [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4495,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4494","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-codir-says","category-features"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/codir.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4494","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/codir.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/codir.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/codir.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/codir.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4494"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/codir.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4494\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4496,"href":"https:\/\/codir.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4494\/revisions\/4496"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/codir.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4495"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/codir.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4494"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/codir.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4494"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/codir.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4494"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}