When the United States launched its unprecedented bombings of Iran, in the middle of negotiations over its nuclear program, President Donald Trump was following a pattern established during the Islamic Republic’s war with Iraq. A new article in Middle East Policy examines how US officials and domestic media created a discourse during the 1980–88 Iran-Iraq War that established Tehran as an enemy.
Middle East Policy has just published its Summer 2025 journal, featuring 10 original articles investigating Iran’s existential struggle, Syria’s regime change and Hezbollah’s money trail, the Israeli government’s domestic and regional backlash, and the strategies of middle powers. Six pieces and one book review are free to read, even without a subscription.
In her analysis of Washington’s development of an essentially hostile posture toward the Islamic Republic, Annie Tracy Samuel of the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga synthesizes nearly 1,200 reports on the Iran-Iraq War published in newspapers between the victory of the Iranian revolution in February 1979 and the end of the war in August 1988. “The narrative constructed by policy makers and the press significantly impacted US-Iran relations, and this established patterns of discourse and action that have persisted to this day,” Tracy Samuel writes. “This process helped solidify the official and popular conception of Iran as a dangerous threat antithetical to US values and interests, necessitating a policy of enmity and confrontation.”
In the early days after the revolution, the rich trove of evidence shows, US media revised their view of the deposed shah, portraying him as “popular,” while the civilian and clerical forces who opposed his brutal reign were cast as irrational zealots. This was especially true of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which the nascent republic relied on to save itself from Iraq and Saddam Hussein. Despite the effectiveness of the Revolutionary Guards, Tracy Samuel demonstrates, Western journalists considered them to be “‘fanatic’ ‘diehards’ ‘who not only do not fear death but welcome “martyrdom” as a great accomplishment.’”
Such portrayals crystallized throughout the conflict, resulting in an ideology
premised on the rightfulness and necessity of US interventionism, which is key to understanding the conflict between the United States and Iran. From Washington’s perspective, the shah’s primary asset, the thing that made him a viable client, was that he was willing to take US power as a given. The positive and supportive yet fictional narrative constructed around him derived from and reinforced that fact. So, too, did the negative and belligerent, yet equally fictional, narrative deployed to denigrate the regime that replaced him.
The discourse created a path down which all US administrations have followed. “Making Iran the villain is both easy and expedient,” Tracy Samuel asserts, “as it rests on a narrative that has been consolidated and deployed over many decades and serves US interests.” The article is free to read for the next two months.
Middle East Policy’s summer edition is anchored by Thomas Juneau’s open-access analysis of the Islamic Republic’s “annus horribilis” in 2024. From there, the journal continues its coverage of Israel with an examination of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s political turmoil at home and military and diplomatic challenges abroad. Guy Ziv reveals the political power of Israeli reservists; Emir Hadžikadunić and Marko Ćuže conduct a sweeping probe of Netanyahu’s speeches over the first year of the war to understand his belief system and how this has affected his approach to retaliation for the October 7 attacks; and Mahmood Monshipouri, Manochehr Dorraj, and John Fields show that Netanyahu and his far-right government have largely foreclosed the potential for expanding normalization with Arab states.
Among the open-access articles in the Summer 2025 issue are Iftah Burman and Yehuda Blanga’s examination of Hezbollah’s criminal enterprise from 1985 to 2005; Chen Kertcher and Gadi Hitman’s explanation of how middle powers like Israel and Syria try to achieve their interests; and Fred H. Lawson and Matteo Legrenzi’s analysis of the shifting relationship of the United States and United Arab Emirates, a dyadic protectorate that has allowed the smaller state to slowly gain confidence in forging its own path.
In addition to the journal’s summer installment, Middle East Policy’s special issue, The Israel-Iran War, continues to be available for free, even for those readers without a subscription. The mix of new and archival articles provides a comprehensive look at how the conflict developed, and how it could have been avoided.
Middle East Policy, Summer 2025
THE LONG ARC OF THE ISLAMIC REPUBLIC
Iran’s Annus Horribilis in 2024: Beaten, but Not Defeated
Thomas Juneau—open access!
Conjuring an Enemy: US Discourse and Policy on Iran, 1979–88
Annie Tracy Samuel—free to read!
ISRAELI POLITICS, AT HOME AND ABROAD
Military Reservists and the Resistance to Netanyahu’s Legal Overhaul
Guy Ziv
The Impact of Benjamin Netanyahu’s Beliefs on Israel’s War against the Axis of Resistance
Emir Hadžikadunić, Marko Ćuže—free to read!
The Gaza War and the Future of the Abraham Accords
Mahmood Monshipouri, Manochehr Dorraj, John Fields
WAR AND REBUILDING IN THE LEVANT
Hayat Tahrir al-Sham: Voices of Syria’s New Leaders
Rasim Koç
Lessons from the Syria-Hezbollah Criminal Syndicate, 1985–2005
Iftah Burman, Yehuda Blanga—open access!
THE RESOLVE OF SMALL STATES
Middle Powers and Limited Balancing: Syria and the Post‐October 7 Wars
Chen Kertcher, Gadi Hitman—open access!
Antinomies of Alignment Redux: The United Arab Emirates and the United States
Fred H. Lawson, Matteo Legrenzi—open access!
The Making of a Ruler: Haitham bin Tariq on the Omani Throne
Joseph Albert Kéchichian
BOOK REVIEWS
Omar Ashour, How ISIS Fights: Military Tactics in Iraq, Syria, Libya and Egypt
Reviewed by Manoug Antaby
Birol Başkan, The Politics of Islam: The Muslim Brothers and the State in the Arab Gulf
Reviewed by Gökhan Çınkara
Mohammad Dawood Sofi, The Tunisian Revolution and Democratic Transition: The Role of al-Nahdah
Reviewed by Mohammad Irfan Shah
Hilmi Ozan Özavcı, Dangerous Gifts: Imperialism, Security, and Civil Wars in the Levant, 1798–1864
Reviewed by Hasim Tekines
Max Boot, Reagan: His Life and Legend
Reviewed by A.R. Joyce—free to read!