The killing of Iran’s leadership has intensified tensions across the Middle East, reviving debate over decades of US intervention – from coups and regime change to wars that reshaped the region
Ali Khamenei, Ali Shamkhani, Mohammad Pakpour, and several other senior figures in Iran’s leadership have been killed in the US-Israeli strikes on the Islamic Republic. Their deaths mark a seismic moment in the region: never before has Washington been accused of directly killing a sitting, internationally recognized leader in the Middle East.
Yet while the scale of the escalation is unprecedented, the logic behind it is not. For decades, US administrations have intervened – covertly and overtly – in the political and military affairs of the Middle East, reshaping governments, toppling adversaries, and redrawing the region’s balance of power.
The current crisis suggests the cycle is repeating once again.
Strangling Iranian democracy
US ambitions to subordinate the Middle East began in the 1950s with the questions of oil and trade. As Washington forged its wartime partnership with Saudi Arabia to secure oil supplies and strategic footholds, Iran moved to renegotiate its own oil arrangements with Britain. In 1951, the Iranian parliament, led by the charismatic prime minister, Mohammad Mossadegh, sought to limit the authority of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and reclaim control over the country’s vast petroleum resources. Mossadegh nationalized the oil industry and challenged royal power at home, triggering a British blockade and deepening political confrontation inside the country.
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