Iran: ‘This War Will End Only When It Ends in Lebanon as Well’

Now that peace is once again dawning and our enemies have once again become our friends, Fox News’ Peter Doocy asked President Donald Trump: “Do you want to meet with the new Ayatollah, the new Supreme Leader?” He answered: “I don’t want to meet, but if I did meet, I’d be honored to meet him. I’d like to see if we make a deal. But if we make a deal, it’s possible that I would meet him. I’d be okay with it.” Honored to meet the putative leader of one of the world’s most repressive regimes? Why?

The follow-up question was “Would that happen here in the U.S.?,” to which Trump responded: “Oh, I don’t know, Peter. I haven’t really heard too much about it. I didn’t suggest it, but some people have suggested it. happened, it would be happening. I’d be respectful.”

That’s good. Respect is so very important. Mojtaba Khamenei is the front man for a regime that just massacred 40,000 of its own people. He thus commands a respect that Trump clearly doesn’t think is owed to, say, Benjamin Netanyahu, who is just trying to save his tiny country from annihilation.

Trump was then asked: “Do you think because Epic Fury killed his dad and his wife and his kid, that he’s got hard feelings and wouldn’t want to meet?” He answered: “Well, I would say I’m not his favorite person. But with that being said, he’s probably a profe— I don’t know him. He’s probably a professional. In some circles, he has a very good reputation, actually. You know, sometimes some people say bad, but a lot of people say bad about me. It’s totally false, of course.”

Trump didn’t say what kind of “professional” he thinks Mojtaba Khamenei is. A professional assassin? A professional Sharia enforcer? In any case, the foreign minister of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Abbas Araghchi, peremptorily dismissed talk of a meeting: “I saw a report which apparently said that he (Trump) had stated that he was ready for a meeting or that he wanted to hold a meeting. I think we should be realistic and think and live in the real world.”

Araghchi said nothing about any “honor” in meeting Trump, or of any “respect” he might be accorded. He just waved away the idea of a meeting, behaving for all the world as if he is the man who dictates terms to Trump, and not the other way around. On Friday, he reinforced that idea. Fox News reported that Araghchi declared: “This war will end only when it ends in Lebanon as well.” He added: “The end of the war on Lebanon must be accompanied by the withdrawal of Israeli forces from the territories they have occupied.”

Mohsen Rezaei, an adviser to Iran’s supreme leader, agreed with Araghchi, saying: “Today we again warn this sinister regime to leave Lebanon. They should know that Lebanon will be an inseparable part of any agreement and any ceasefire.”

Araghchi said this, Fox notes, “after Hezbollah rejected a U.S.-brokered ceasefire deal between Lebanon and Israel,” while Trump was still going on about honor and respect.

The victors are the ones who dictate terms after a war, and Araghchi and Rezaei know that the Islamic Republic has won this conflict. The leaders of the Islamic Republic are well aware that Trump is desperate for a peace agreement that will allow him to continue to style himself as the great peacemaker. They know that he is so desperate that even as Iran shows unremitting hostility to the U.S., Trump is praising ostensible Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei and saying it would be an “honor” to meet with him.

The leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran know that all they had to do in order to emerge victorious from this conflict was wait out the United States until the conflict became politically too costly, or potentially costly, for the Trump administration to pursue. And so now that they have the alleged leader of the free world groveling and continually giving the Islamic regime second and third and fourth and fifth and sixth and seventh chances to make a deal, they’re dictating terms: Not only are they to be allowed to continue their jihad against the U.S. and Israel, but they want to make sure that their proxy in Lebanon remains alive and in place as well.

And Trump, mad for a deal, mad for low gas prices, mad for a Nobel Peace Prize, will agree.