Trita Parsi talks about his recent article, “As Expected, Netanyahu Back Demanding More War with Iran,” recent Trump threats to intervene in Iran if the government kills anti-government protesters and the message to Iran’s leaders after the U.S. kidnapping of Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro.
SCOTT HARRIS: First, I’m very happy to welcome back to our program, Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. Trita is author of the book, Losing An Enemy: Obama Iran, and the Triumph of Diplomacy. Trita, thank you so much for making time to join us on our program tonight.
TRITA PARSI: My pleasure. Thank you for having me again.
SCOTT HARRIS: As I said a moment ago, as we begin our broadcast—our first broadcast of 2026—our nation under a second Trump administration, we certainly see a president who, in my opinion, has devolved into a violent gangster state. We’ve seen him preside over where this regime has total contempt for democracy, the U.S. Constitution, the rule of law, domestically and international law. Donald Trump’s attack on Venezuela and the kidnapping of the nation’s president, Nicholás Maduro is transparently about the U.S. takeover of Venezuelan oil, the largest reserves of crude oil in the world. Recent attacks in Nigeria and Iran—also oil states—follows a pattern of piracy and plunder that really endangers the entire future of the world that I know we’re going to be touching on, Trita.
But before we talk about the current situation in Iran, where many things are unfolding there in terms of major protests, as well as some interesting comments by government officials in Iran in reaction to those protests, I wanted to get your views on what we’ve recently seen unfold in Venezuela.
And I’d like to get your views on the impact of what we’ve seen in Venezuela have on America’s standing in the world, possibly feeding into more U.S. military interventions.
TRITA PARSI: Again, thank you for having me. I don’t think there’s any other way of describing what happened in Venezuela as something that truly is going back to some of the darkest moments of American history in terms of foreign interventions and regime change operations. This is something that hopefully we would have learned after Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya and many other examples that ultimately, even if they at the initial moment appear to be successes, they tend to backfire over time. They are wrong in principle. We should not be governing other countries. We should not be making those type of decisions for other people. So even if they were to work out favorably, they’re nevertheless wrong in principle, in my view. And I think this is very dangerous because it’s happening also at a time in which the dependency of Europe, for instance, on the United States is greater than it’s ever been before.
So if you take a look at the European reactions to this, it’s frankly quite pathetic. There’s been more arguments from their end about the illegitimacy of Maduro than looking at the illegality of this type of an operation from the standpoint of international law. In fact, the Greek prime minister even said that the questions of legality of this is something that we can discuss another day. So apparently law is something that you can just conveniently set aside when you feel like it. So we’re seeing yet another move by a major power that is more or less dismantling the system of international law, the governing system of the world that is crucial in order to be able to manage relations between states and avoid a complete law of the jungle.
SCOTT HARRIS: Well said. Thank you for that, Trita. I’m glad you’re here to talk about Iran. We’re going to be getting to Venezuela in a little bit with a report from raracas, but in recent weeks, we’ve seen major protests erupt in Iran over the economic crisis there, including high inflation and the devaluation of the Iranian currency, the rial. Protests have taken place across the country, as I’ve seen in recent news reports and some Iranian government officials have acknowledged the protesters’ legitimate demands. But there have been mass arrests and reports of at least 19 protesters killed in clashes with police. And Trump has issued some threats to Iran that I know I want to talk about with you in a moment, but tell us about what’s happened to the Iranian economy and why people are in the streets now.
TRITA PARSI: So the Iranian economy has been a very bad state for quite some time, and it’s a combination of mismanagement, corruption, but most importantly, oftentimes, the impact of sanctions. And what you saw about a week or so ago is the sudden collapsing of the … I mean, the currency has been going down steadily, but now there was a huge drop and that prompted sporadic protests by people in the Iranian bazaar, traders, etc. who … I mean, their livelihood is blowing up. They simply cannot do business when the currency is so volatile and unprotected. This to a very large extent is the result of sanctions because the Iranians do not have access to roughly $120 billion of their own reserves as a result of financial sanctions preventing them from being able to access that money. That’s a result of financial sanctions the U.S. has imposed. And it’s precisely those type of reserves that are needed in order to be able to protect the currency against speculation, etc.
And so in this specific case, the sanctions did play a very critical role. But what so oftentimes happen is that you have protests beginning over one issue. But in a society that by and large is so unhappy with the political situation, which is the case in Iran, it quickly tends to morph into other forms of protests on other grounds. And we saw that after a day or so that it really shifted towards protests against the regime as a whole.
One thing, however, that I think is very important to understand is that by any metric, these protests are not particularly large in an Iranian context in which we saw massive protests in 2009 when the Iranian government stole the elections and allowed the then-president (Mahmoud) Ahmadinejad to cover for another four years. Or the protest that we saw in 2022 over the killing of Mahsa Amini.
These protests are not of that size. It has not led to a scenario in which you have an intersection of societal sectors participating in the protest. Very little is happening in the Capitol, actually. I spoke to people there today who had seen absolutely nothing. But rather it’s happening in smaller cities, far away from the Capitol. That doesn’t mean that it’s unimportant, but it doesn’t follow the same pattern as before. And I think there’s a huge gap between how the media reporting is describing it and what the realities on the ground are. The media reporting tends to give the impression as if the Iranian regime is on the verge of collapse. That is certainly not the impression one is given when one talks to people on the ground there. I mean, clearly people are very unhappy. There are some protests taking place, but the idea that this is on a verge of collapse is certainly not the impression that I and many others I’ve spoken to who are also in contact with people inside are given.
And so as a result, it’s not to belittle this, but the reporting seems to read more into it than there actually is. That’s my impression.
SCOTT HARRIS: Thank you for that, Trita. We’re speaking with Trita Parsi this evening on Counterpoint. Trita as the executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft and we’re talking, of course, about the situation in Iran and certainly the intersection of recent events in Venezuela as well.
So after meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last week, Trump has issued a threat to attack Iran again. And this is after the U.S. and Israel launched attacks last June targeting the Islamic Republic’s nuclear facilities. Trump said that the U.S. is locked and loaded, I think is the quote, if more Iranian protesters died. Trita, what do you make of this threat? We’ve seen other Trump threats in recent days targeting Denmark and Greenland, Panama, Colombia, and of course, other countries as well. What does this say about Trump and where he intends to take U.S. policy regarding Iran?
TRITA PARSI: Well, that tweet, as well as tweets that he issued today comes after him spending two-and-a-half days with Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister who came to the U.S. on Dec. 29 for meetings with Trump. And the top of the agenda was the Israeli demand for yet another war with Iran. And Trump’s comment after some of those meetings was that he essentially appeared to publicly give a green light for the Israelis to attack again, and that the basis of the attack no longer needed to be the nuclear program, but rather also Iran’s missile capabilities. The Israelis did not manage to achieve their objectives in the summer war that they launched in June of this past year, and this is part of the reason why they want to go to war again. But they simply cannot do anything effectively without U.S. support. They absolutely need U.S. support in order to protect Israel against Iran’s retaliatory missiles.
And even with U.S. support, a very large number of those missiles went through the Israeli air defense systems. But it’s precisely because the Iranians do have the capacity of retaliating against Israel that the Israelis want to go to war again and eliminate not only that capability, but any capability the Iranians may have that enables the Iranians to challenge Israel’s growing domination in the region. And I think that’s really the core issue that this is about. Now, in that context, we see suddenly how Trump starts to speak the language of regime change even though earlier on, of course, he had been very explicit that he’s against regime change wars, that he’s against all of these different, what he called neoconservative or neocon policies that the U.S. pursued under the Bush administration, for instance. But just today, he explicitly said that regime change is not a popular word. But why shouldn’t there be regime change in Iran?
So it much indicates that the U.S. is actually getting ready to support Israel or actively participate in another strike on Iran with the aim of regime collapse at a minimum, as well as taking out much of Iran’s military capability.
SCOTT HARRIS: In a recent article, Trita, you talked about three possible scenarios for U.S. military intervention in the coming days. You talked about air strikes targeting Iranian military facilities that could be performative or symbolic or otherwise regime decapitation targeting senior government officials. You also talked about just simply, as you mentioned, U.S. support for an Israeli attack on Iran. There’s certainly varying consequences for any of these scenarios, but what do you worry about most and what do you think is most likely?
TRITA PARSI: I think all of those scenarios to various degrees have higher likelihood of leading to the U.S. getting into a full-scale war with Iran rather than the likelihood of successful regime change in Iran. That’s not to say that eventually there couldn’t be one. It’s just that it wouldn’t happen without there also in the interim being the U.S. getting bogged down in a major war. I think the perception in the Trump administration is very much impacted by the fact that the Iranians have gone to great lengths to avoid direct confrontation with the U.S. So when Trump killed Gen. Soleimani, the Iranians clearly signaled where they would strike. There were essentially performative strikes against the U.S. and making sure no one got killed, etc. Same thing after Trump bombed their nuclear facilities, Iranian retaliated after a couple of days, but it was at an empty base in Qatar and there had been clear communication between the two sides that would be performative and it would be with the aim of de-escalation.
This has, I think, led the Trump administration to be under the belief that the Iranians simply do not have the guts to strike back. And as a result, there isn’t that high of a risk for engaging in these type of military attacks against Iran. But I think the misread there is that yes, the Iranians clearly know they’re going to lose a war against the United States. They’re going to do everything they can to avoid it, but there comes a point in which they feel that they have their backs completely against the wall. And at that point, they will have no other choice but to fight back. And I think if Trump is signaling that his aim is regime change, at that point, there really isn’t any de-escalatory ladder. There is no exit ramp for the Iranians to be able to do just the performative retaliation.
And that may force them into a position in which they actually would use a lot of their capabilities, not just against Israel, but against the U.S. as well. And that’s not to say that Iran’s military could defeat the U.S. Of course, neither could the Iraqi army or nor could the Taliban on paper at least. But it doesn’t mean that it won’t be extremely costly for the U.S. And the Iranians definitely have abilities than Saddam Hussein did or the Taliban for that matter. So we may very well end up getting bogged down in yet another needless war of choice in the Middle East.
SCOTT HARRIS: Then Iran’s nuclear program has been at the heart of the U.S. verbal and as well as military attacks on Iran with Israel in June. The Iranian government, as I understand it, has been open, or at least said they are open to negotiations over reviving some kind of nuclear agreement, maybe because of their particular situation now, the U.S. or Israel could gain a lot more in a future nuclear agreement. Do you think that’s a path that the U.S. could or should follow here?
TRITA PARSI: I think diplomacy absolutely would provide a much better solution. I’m worrying that at this point, the two sides are too far away from each other on substantive issues. They are too far away from each other in terms of how they perceive the capacity and the strength of the other and what they perceive the other’s perception of their own strength is. And as a result, the risk of miscalculation is massive in terms of how diplomacy would be pursued. I think the U.S. is under the wrong impression and as a result would take extreme maximalist positions in a negotiation, which then likely will fail and then we will be back to war. I think the Iranians committed a huge mistake by not talking directly to Trump himself. I think if they had done that, I think there would be a likelihood that things could have moved in a very different direction.
The fact that the Iranians refused to do so actually makes them the only entity that has a conflict with the United States, but refuses to talk directly to the U.S. or to Trump himself. Even Hamas spoke directly to the Trump administration. The Houthis did so, the North Koreans did so. And I think this has had an impact in various ways on Trump. I think first of all, I think it’s an insult to him. He doesn’t take the Iranians seriously for diplomacy if they’re not willing to talk to him directly. But he also meant that his perception about them is filled primarily by those who are whispering in his ears and want him to go to conflict rather than getting an opportunity to actually make up his own mind by actually talking to them directly. Trump has signaled over and over again, he’s totally willing to talk to the Iranians.
On this score, it is completely the fault of the Iranians for having refused to engage directly. And at this point, I’m not so sure it would make much of a difference. After Trump has now so clearly signaled that his intent is regime change—of course, he can back off from that, but I fear that it leads to scenario in which the window for diplomacy just gets completely shut.
SCOTT HARRIS: I think you’ve mentioned this, but Trump is now surrounded by some of the same advisors who were the architects of the disastrous U.S. war and invasion of Iraq in 2003. Tell us a little bit about your concern with the people whispering in Trump’s ear, as you said.
TRITA PARSI: You have essentially two wings in the Republican Party right now. You have some who are calling themselves America First, who have in some ways broken off from MAGA, people like Tom Massie, Marjorie Taylor Green, people like Tucker Carlson, Steve Bannon, they have in general been completely opposed to these wars. They support Trump on a lot of different issues, but they are part of the base that believes that these type of foreign engagements are the wrong thing. It only makes matters worse. It’s not the business of the United States to engage in these different conflicts. And they believe that the U.S.’s decline or relative decline in many aspects is a direct result of the U.S. fighting these unnecessary wars of choice.
On the other hand, you have people, particularly in the donor class, Miriam Adelson, who’s one of his biggest donors, an Israeli American, people like Mark Levine and others who essentially are neocons and would have been completely content with George Bush or Dick Cheney, but have essentially aligned themselves with Trump, even though many of them originally supported more traditional Republicans in previous primaries and would much have preferred to see that type of a Republican.
I mean, so essentially they were not on the Trump train from the outset. They came in very late, but because of their resources, because of their influence, etc. have managed to make a big impact on Trump. And then just on the case of Venezuela, I find it quite striking to see that those are the people who have been praising Trump. Whereas his own base, both on the Iran issue and even on Venezuela, are not really on board with it.
SCOTT HARRIS: Interesting. Trita, I do have one last question for you. There was some discussion by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that Israel was in solidarity with the protesters in the streets opposed to the Iranian regime. And it’s an article of faith by some leaders opposed to Iran that the folks opposed to the Iranian government would welcome foreign intervention. What’s your sense of the way the average Iranian views attacks on the government that they may dislike, but there’s certainly a degree of nationalism in every country and resistance to foreign intervention.
TRITA PARSI: Yeah. I mean, on this case, we don’t even have to speculate because the Israelis did attack in June and it caused nationalism to really sweep through the entire country to the extent that a lot of people were surprised. I think the Israelis were surprised. I was surprised by the strength of it, but I also think the Iranian government itself was surprised because they know how unpopular they are and they did not expect that degree of nationalism to occur. I think there’s a couple of reasons as to why it happened that way. First of all, this was a very deceptive attack. It took place in the middle of negotiations two days before a sixth round of talks. And at a time when the Iranian public had seen that the Iranian government had been more flexible than ever before on the nuclear issue, it’s at that moment that the Israelis decided to attack.
There was a huge number of civilian casualties in these attacks because the Israelis were going after heads of the military, not in their military installations, but at their homes in the middle of the night, blowing up not only their own apartments, but killing their neighbors, killing people in that same building.
And same thing when it comes to Iranian scientists who are civilians. Their entire families were killed and that is in addition to a lot of other people, civilians. I mean, roughly about 1000 people were killed. And one day, the Israelis themselves announced that they had blown off five car bombs in Tehran. If the Iranians had said that they had blown off five car bombs in Tel Aviv, I think the world would correctly call that terrorism. Now that’s of course not how Western media described it, but that is nevertheless how most Iranians viewed it.
So under those circumstances, I don’t think we should be too surprised that there is no such thing as welcoming of an attack against their own country. So people are fully capable of being completely opposed to the regime in Iran and while at the same time being even more opposed to being bombed by Israel.
SCOTT HARRIS: Yeah, it makes sense. Trita, thank you so much for spending time with us on a very chaotic period of time in our country in the world. But yeah, really appreciate your pointing out some of the things I think myself and many of our listeners were unaware of with regard to these threats for a new war with Iran.
TRITA PARSI: My pleasure. Thank you so much.
SCOTT HARRIS: Leave our listeners with a website where they can find some of your writing as well as for the Quincy Institute itself.
TRITA PARSI: Sure. They can go to the Quincy Institute’s website, which is quincyinst.org. They can go to my website, which is tritaparsi.com, or go to my Twitter where I put up everything, which is TParsi.
SCOTT HARRIS: Thanks again for all you do, Trita, and for spending time with us. Thank you so much. Take care.
TRITA PARSI: Appreciate it. Thank you. Bye.
SCOTT HARRIS: That’s Treta Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.
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