\n<\/p>\n
Washington, DC \u2013<\/strong> On Monday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio provided a looping justification for the US launching a war against Iran: Israel was planning to strike Iran, which would have prompted Tehran to strike the US assets in the region, requiring Washington to launch preemptive strikes on Iran.<\/p>\n Even as the administration of US President Donald Trump has sought to roll back claims made by several officials in recent days, they have continued to spark dismay across the political spectrum.<\/p>\n list of 3 items<\/span>end of list<\/span><\/section>\n Rubio\u2019s statement was particularly notable, given the assessment by many Iran analysts that the US-Israel war, which has led to regional retaliation from Iran, serves the interests not of Washington, but of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.<\/p>\n Washington is seen as having outsized leverage over Israel, to which it has provided more than $300bn in military aid since 1948, including $21bn during Israel\u2019s genocide in Gaza.<\/p>\n Trump, when asked about Rubio\u2019s statement on Tuesday, appeared to offer a different characterisation, saying he launched the war because he \u201cthought we were going to have a situation where we were going to be attacked\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cThey [Iran] were getting ready to attack Israel. They were gonna attack others,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The US president has spent the days since launching the initial strikes on Saturday arguing that the holistic threat posed by Iran justified the US-Israeli strikes, a position that experts say likely stands in contravention of both US and international law. The administration has provided scant evidence of a planned attack on US assets or that either Iran\u2019s nuclear or ballistic programmes offered an immediate threat.<\/p>\n Rubio on Monday also sought to distance himself from his statements, claiming his words had been taken out of context.<\/p>\n Rubio had, in earlier comments, pointed to the broader threat posed by Iran, including its ballistic missile and drone capacity. But then he turned to what he called the question of \u201cwhy now?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe knew that there was going to be an Israeli action,\u201d he told reporters. \u201cWe knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces, and we knew that if we didn\u2019t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties.\u201d<\/p>\n The shifting messaging on Tuesday was unlikely to allay the condemnation from Trump critics and supporters alike, including several influential figures within Trump\u2019s Make America Great Again (MAGA) base.<\/p>\n Kelly Grieco, a senior fellow at the Stimson Center, told Al Jazeera that \u201cwhat he\u2019s basically publicly acknowledging would be that the United States was entrapped by the Israelis\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cThe notion that the Israelis were going to do it anyway, and so we had to do it as well \u2013 if that\u2019s the case, then there\u2019s a really serious conversation to be had here in the United States about US and Israeli interests, and where those are aligned and where they diverge,\u201d Grieco said.<\/p>\n Kenneth Roth, a former executive director of Human Rights Watch, in a post on X, questioned: \u201cWhy is it in America\u2019s interest to arm and fund Israel to draw America into an unnecessary war?\u201d<\/p>\n In an earlier post, he said Rubio\u2019s logic \u201cisn\u2019t even close to a legal rationale\u201d for launching the war.<\/p>\n The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), meanwhile, called Rubio\u2019s words on Monday a \u201cstunning admission\u201d.<\/p>\n In a statement, it said Rubio had revealed \u201cwhat was clear from the start: the United States did not attack Iran because Iran posed an imminent threat to our nation. We attacked under pressure from Israel for Israel\u2019s benefit\u201d.<\/p>\n The organisation called on Congress to pass war powers resolutions to rein in Trump\u2019s ability to wage war.<\/p>\n Lawmakers have pledged to introduce the legislation in both the House of Representatives and Senate this week, although it is likely to face an uphill battle amid Republican opposition.<\/p>\n Trump\u2019s party maintains razor-thin majorities in both chambers, and most Republican lawmakers have rallied behind the war and the reasons the administration has given for launching attacks.<\/p>\n War powers resolutions would require a two-thirds majority in both chambers to override a presidential veto, although advocates have long argued they offer an opportunity for lawmakers to put their stance on the record.<\/p>\n In a statement on Tuesday, progressive US Senator Bernie Sanders was among the lawmakers condemning the administration\u2019s war.<\/p>\n \u201cNetanyahu wanted war with Iran. Trump just gave it to him,\u201d Sanders said.<\/p>\n The Israeli prime minister has, for more than two decades, called for the toppling of Iran\u2019s government, and has been a leading opponent to diplomacy related to Iran\u2019s nuclear programme.<\/p>\n During that time, Netanyahu has repeatedly pushed claims that Iran was on the immediate precipice of developing a nuclear weapon.<\/p>\n \u201cAmerican foreign and military policy must be determined by the American people,\u201d Sanders wrote. \u201cNot the right-wing extremist Netanyahu government.\u201d<\/p>\n Thomas Massie, a Republican representative who has spearheaded the war powers push, connected Rubio\u2019s statement to Trump\u2019s \u201cAmerica First\u201d pledges to prioritise domestic issues in the US.<\/p>\n \u201cBefore it\u2019s over, the price of gas, groceries, and virtually everything else is going to go up,\u201d Massie posted on X. \u201cThe only winners in [the US] are defence company shareholders.\u201d<\/p>\n Several influential figures in Trump\u2019s MAGA base said Rubio\u2019s statements were further inflaming the growing discontent over the war.<\/p>\n Daily Wire podcaster Matt Walsh said Rubio was \u201cflat out telling us that we\u2019re in a war with Iran because Israel forced our hand. This is basically the worst possible thing he could have said.\u201d<\/p>\n Responding to Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson\u2019s reiteration of Rubio\u2019s claims, former congressman and Trump attorney general nominee Matt Gaetz said: \u201cIn making these statements, which are undeniably true, America looks like such a supplicant.\u201d<\/p>\n Pro-Trump brothers Keith and Kevin Hodge, who run the influential pro-Trump X account HodgeTwins, with 3.5 million followers, also decried the administration\u2019s actions.<\/p>\n \u201cWe did not vote for send[ing] Americans to die for Israel\u2019s wars,\u201d they posted on Tuesday. \u201cWe won\u2019t stay silent about this.\u201d<\/p>\n Ali Harb contributed reporting.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n Washington, DC \u2013 On Monday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio provided a looping justification for the US launching a war against Iran: Israel was planning to strike Iran, which would have prompted Tehran to strike the US assets in the region, requiring Washington to launch preemptive strikes on Iran. Even as the administration of US […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13839,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13838","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle-east-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13838","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13838"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13838\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13839"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13838"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13838"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13838"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Recommended Stories <\/h2>\n
\u2018Stunning admission\u2019<\/h2>\n
Looming war powers vote<\/h2>\n
\u2018Worst possible thing he could have said\u2019<\/h2>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"