Veteran war correspondent Elijah Magnier, who has covered conflicts across the Middle East from inside war zones for decades, broke it all down for me:
Iran's message with the Jordan strike is simple: the U.S. started this war without permission, and Iran will fire whenever it chooses until the MOU is implemented, not just when America fires first...
"Trump can decide when to start the war, which he did with Netanyahu in February, but he is not the one who decides when to end it."
He says Iran is deliberately distributing the pain: Hormuz, Bab al-Mandeb, Iraq, Jordan, and beyond.
The strategy? To make the economic cost felt by everyone until the world turns to Washington and says "enough."
"This will become one of the biggest strategic blunders of, at least, my generation."
And yet Elijah remains optimistic, because in his experience, things only get solved when they become everyone's problem. And that it is.
Thanks for the discussion, @ejmalrai
