Iran’s leaders knew immediately that one of their missiles had shot down a plane loaded with citizens and foreign nationals, but they did what came naturally — they lied, stonewalled and covered up. All allegations of regime culpability for the deaths of 176 people on board Ukrainian Airlines Flight 752 were “foreign conspiracies.” Confronted with a mountain of irrefutable evidence, they belatedly, begrudgingly acknowledged their “unforgivable mistake” — before retorting that it was all America’s fault for stoking tensions. I am constantly astonished at much of the Western world’s pathological predisposition to swallow Iranian lies. Some officials used to parrot the preposterous line that Iran would never use an atomic bomb because Ayatollah Ali Khamenei — a man with the blood of hundreds of thousands on his hands — had declared such a thing to be un-Islamic. When a swarm of armed drones was launched from Iranian territory last September to attack Saudi oil installations, Tehran instructed its Houthi stooges in Yemen to dissemble that they were responsible; all suggestions to the contrary were devilish “foreign conspiracies.” The latest round of shadow boxing between the US and this compulsively duplicitous regime changes nothing. It is simply a matter of time until the next bout of skirmishes, and then another. Iran’s leaders have set the world on a course that — in the absence of a radical change of direction — can lead only to war, by any one of several paths. First, experts are warning that by late 2020 Iran could be no more than three months from having a nuclear bomb. This would make military action inevitable if America and Israel fulfil pledges to prevent Iran becoming a nuclear state. Iran’s leaders have set the world on a course that — in the absence of a radical change of direction — can lead only to war, by any one of several paths. Baria Alamuddin Second, the accumulation of missiles and paramilitaries on Israel’s borders with Lebanon and Syria dictates that Tel Aviv will eventually act to neutralize this threat. Next, Iran’s proxies in Baghdad continue to consolidate political and military control. Threats to evict US forces have halted operations against Daesh. Sunnis, Kurds and minorities are more disenchanted than ever, while Shiite areas boil with mass protests; Iraq’s continuing disintegration imperils the entire region. Meanwhile the Syrian conflict grinds on; while Iranian proxies quietly consolidate under the cover of Erdogan’s ethnic cleansing of Syria’s Kurds, Assad, Hezbollah and Russia continue crushing the life out of Idlib. Finally, since Iran’s attacks in 2019 on Saudi oil installations and shipping in the Gulf, few tangible steps have been taken to reduce Iran-GCC tensions under the shadow of the continuing Yemen conflict. An Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commander caused consternation last week by holding a news conference in front of the massed banners of Iran-aligned militias, including Hezbollah, Pakistani and Afghan proxies in Syria, the Houthis and Al-Hashd Al-Shaabi. Iran mendaciously claims that it wants to calm tensions, but instead of distancing itself from militants and terrorists, it literally drapes itself in their flags. Iraqi and Lebanese protesters against Iranian meddling are not a handful of middle-class arts students; they include hundreds of thousands of working-class Shiites from traditional strongholds of pro-Iranian sentiment, families who lost sons and nephews fighting with Hezbollah in Syria. This cratering of grassroots support has fundamental implications for how Iran wields its regional influence. Before, pro-Tehran factions were able to win sufficient votes, while also relying on client politicians from Christian, Sunni and other demographics, with Qassem Soleimani bribing and threatening political leaders. If Iran can no longer count on dominating the ballot box and mobilizing its puppets, it must resort to increasingly coercive techniques, or see its influence wither away. In Iraq, this would mean subverting parliament, forcibly entrenching Hashd allies in power, and unleashing paramilitaries to crush protests. Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani is right to call for an end to foreign meddling and for the protection of Iraq’s sovereignty, but US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is also correct to insist that US troops remain. In the absence of radical political reform in Iraq, the withdrawal of foreign troops would summarily deliver the country to the twin plagues of Iran-aligned paramilitarism and Daesh. The West must also do everything possible to neutralize a conflict that it scarcely appears to realize is hurtling toward it. Boasting about killing Soleimani has become a central plank of Donald Trump’s pre-electoral grandstanding, and many observers justifiably fear that the US president’s foreign-policy decision making throughout 2020 will be similarly driven by myopic domestic calculations. This is a dangerous dynamic when we are already so close to wider conflict. Trump’s accumulated barrages of sanctions have only encouraged Tehran to further dig in with its transnational paramilitary strategy. Instead, there must be redoubled muscular diplomatic efforts to block Iranian expansionism in Arab states. Even if war is unavoidable, global powers should at least constrain the number of fronts Tehran can fight on. Although recent escalations may have killed off any immediate prospects for diplomacy, Europe should not pin its hopes on an eventual resuscitation of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, the effectively defunct 2015 deal to curb Iran’s nuclear program in return for easing sanctions. The myriad shortcomings of this agreement (over-reliance on Iran’s good nature for implementation, releasing frozen funds without preventing their use for regional aggression) prevented it becoming a viable tool to comprehensively address Tehran’s misbehavior. Iranian citizens’ loathing for their mendacious, dictatorial regime means that an end to this tyranny is only a matter of time. Ordinary Iranians have more at stake than anyone in avoiding a war that would cost tens of thousands of their lives, just like the innocents who died senselessly on that downed Ukrainian passenger jet. Iran’s incompetent attempts to cover up its culpability for the crash have triggered yet more anti-regime protests, with demonstrators shredding images of Soleimani and demanding Khamenei’s downfall. This is surely a leadership that has burned its last vestiges of credibility, at home and abroad. The ayatollahs, and Soleimani’s successors, must recognize that their deranged ambitions are unachievable. Iran’s dysfunctional, sanctions-shattered economy cannot afford this megalomaniacal vision of region-wide supremacy. Palestinians have been struggling for over a century for their right to a homeland; Arab citizens too will fight for as long as it takes to free their nations from Iranian domination. If there is a war in which America, Israel and Western allies directly confront the Islamic Republic’s decrepit military capabilities, there can be only one outcome. The regime cannot escape this fate through vague messages about not desiring conflict, while redoubling overseas subversion and terrorism. It is not Iran’s words that make conflict inevitable, but its actions. The ayatollahs are thus at a moment of decision: If they retreat from their terrorism and warmongering, perhaps their regime can limp on for a few more years before dying an unlamented death. If, instead, they stubbornly accelerate efforts to build a nuclear bomb, dominate neighbors, and threaten peace-loving nations, they are simply choosing the quickest way to dig their own graves. *Baria Alamuddin is an award-winning journalist and broadcaster in the Middle East and the UK. She is editor of the Media Services Syndicate and has interviewed numerous heads of state. Disclaimer: Views expressed by writers in this section are their own and do not necessarily reflect Arab News" point-of-view