A round of shooting between Iran and Israel obscures the real war being waged quietly to defeat the Iranian mullah regime.
America continues to squeeze the mullah regime in Iran:
On June 2, the US Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) tightened its controls on Iranian dark-fleet activities by designating Iran's leading crypto trader, Nobitex, and the three next largest firms (Wallex, Bitpin and Ramzinex) operating in Iran. The move will not only complicate Iranian attempts to conduct financial transactions for its dark-fleet oil-trading activities, but also make it harder for the Iranian authorities to receive payments from shipowners seeking to use Iranian channels to enter and leave the Gulf using the so-called Persian Gulf Strait Authority (PGSA).
US President Donald Trump earlier on Monday told both Iran and key ally Israel to stop fighting, against the background of reports of an increasingly testy relationship between the US leader and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Iran fired dozens of missiles at Israel overnight and Israel responded by targeting military sites in the Islamic republic, sparking fears the escalation could usher in a new full-scale conflict after the April 8 truce.
Trump can act as the "good cop" to Israel's "bad cop" because the blockade of Iran is the main effort to defeat Iran after the air campaign crippled Iran's military capabilities. And it is biting:
The Islamic Republic of Iran suffered a devastating blow in May, with the American blockade and sanctions biting deep into the regime’s bottom line.
Sure, Iran acts like it is winning. Why wouldn't it? What else can they do? And we might fall for it and hand them victory! Yet the clock is ticking for Iran in more ways in the financial war:
The Treasury Department will use Iranian assets to help U.S. Gulf allies recover from damage caused by Tehran's regime during the Iran war[.]
My hunch is that America resumes large-scale strikes on Iran only if it looks like the regime might fall to internal resistance, including the Iranian army. I wonder how that Israeli operation is going?
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