WASHINGTON—Tuesday’s election, in which a Democratic wave took out many Republicans who had previously been considered in “safe” seats, went beyond a typical midterm loss for a sitting president. This outcome could have only occurred with a combination of strong Democratic turnout atop a disillusioned Republican base. President Donald Trump’s policies toward the Middle East undoubtedly contributed to both factors, and he recognizes it.
Trump has publicly acknowledged that his war with Iran contributed to the Republican loss. Moreover, his surprising announcement early on Election Day that he would end the roughly four billion dollars in annual US military aid to Israel in two months—a declaration that shocked his political allies in Washington and Jerusalem alike—proved that he sees US support for Israel as a pressing political problem for him on both the right and the left. In Israel, Trump’s statement was seized upon by opposition leader Gadi Eisenkot, who, in the wake of Israeli elections last week, is expected to get the first chance to form a new government. The shock of the prospect of losing US aid could focus the mind of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s opponents and, on the margins, improve Eisenkot’s chance of forming a government.
Back at home, Vice President JD Vance declared that there were four reasons why Republicans lost, and at least two of them directly concerned the Middle East. Alongside affordability, he cited the need to “end the war,” to “change our relationship with Israel,” and to “put America first.” More bluntly, he wrote that “everyone knows why we lost” and “the reason we lost is the war.” Donald Trump Jr. agreed.
For several years now, some of us have been warning our friends in Israel that the critically important bilateral relationship between our two nations was at increasing risk, a direct consequence of policy choices driven by an Israeli government that relies on Kahanist politicians and abets what has long been described in Israel as terrorism against Palestinians in the West Bank. Far too many in Israel have long dismissed the concern altogether or believed it was a problem only on the far left, ignoring growing anti-Israel sentiment on the right. The strategic threat to the US-Israel relationship was not a major issue in the Israeli elections; it will now have to be priority number one for the next prime minister.
Before the elections many were concerned about the possibility of Trump restarting major military operations against Iran soon after the midterms. Trump has already reviewed war plans and ordered the forward deployment of forces to conduct such operations—decisions that carry momentum of their own. It was easy to speculate how even a close loss in the midterms might prompt an escalation against Iran. Last week, a US official was anonymously quoted along these lines: “If he feels embarrassed or disenfranchised he will do something bold.”
The Iranian regime, which strongly values its self-perception that it can inflict political pain on US presidents—as it did to Jimmy Carter during the hostage crisis, Ronald Reagan during the Iran-Contra affair, and George W. Bush during the Iraq War—will undoubtedly see the results as another example of its form of “regime change” in Washington. If Iranian leaders make this view public, they risk encouraging a Trump decision to escalate. Thus far, encouragingly, statements from Tehran about the US election results have generally been de-escalatory rather than incendiary.
While it’s always difficult to psychoanalyze him from afar, taking all of this into account offers reason to hope that the imminent threat of Trump reacting to the election results by escalating with Iran has diminished. That said, the risk may increase again after this moment passes. Iran has a relatively consistent track record of miscalculation and overplaying its hand, and Trump has already said, “I don’t want to be just sitting there for two years vetoing everything.” A Democratic-controlled Congress has the power to stymie Trump’s domestic legislative agenda, but it doesn’t have much ability to stop a president from exercising his powers as commander in chief.
The concern is that Trump will eventually conclude that he is facing his worst nightmare for the next two years: going down in history as a “loser,” in a circumstance of his own making. While Vance will push for a diplomatic agreement with Iran, Trump must recognize that any such pact would necessarily be along the lines of the previous memorandum of understanding that Vance negotiated, which critics argued deeply threatened US interests. Such an agreement would only reinforce the perception that Trump’s war was an unmitigated disaster that damaged US national security, the Republican Party’s electoral prospects, and his personal legacy.