The aftermath of an Israeli airstrike on Beirut’s southern suburbs on March 3, 2026/Shutterstock

President Donald Trump’s campaign to redefine American power has escalated with a war in the Middle East triggered by the U.S.-Israeli bombing campaign against Iran launched on February 28th and the assassination of its supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. That operation expanded within days to all all-out war across the Middle East, with retaliatory strikes by Iran on Gulf State targets and Israel attacking Lebanon. Meanwhile, the search for a coherent casus belli continues. We have a selection of must-read pieces from Policy writers.

From former United Nations Ambassador and Policy Columnist Bob Rae, we have an essential piece on the context and consequences of Donald Trump’s latest unilateral military action. “No matter how many times we tell ourselves differently,” writes Rae, “we need to confront the fact that the United States under its current president and administration is in no position to lead us anywhere good.” Here’s Bob Rae on March 4th with Trump’s Consequential War.

As the world processes the implications of Donald Trump’s Middle East war, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has presented the most befuddled response among G7 leaders — arguably due in part to the perils of proximity. “While it might be tempting to attribute the Prime Minister’s evolution on this question to his political inexperience,” writes Policy Editor Lisa Van Dusen, “it is also the product of unprecedented circumstance; of the military and security version of dealing with a suddenly-more-Hyde-than-Jekyll superpower neighbour that has similarly stymied trade policy by violating all the rules of economic engagement.” Here’s Lisa Van Dusen on March 4th with Game Theory vs. ‘Death and Destruction’: Mark Carney’s Trumpian Dilemma.

From former Canadian Ambassador to the United Nations Paul Meyer, who serves as our Policy expert on nuclear disarmament (including on Iran’s nuclear capability), a piece filed hours after the bombs began falling on Tehran on February 28th, when Prime Minister Mark Carney had made his first controversial statement about the U.S.-led action with Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand. “The Carney-Anand statement,” writes Meyer, “far from challenging a world order that reflects Thucydides maxim that ‘The strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must’, appears to be endorsing it.” Here’s Paul Meyer with Trump’s Iran Strikes and Carney’s New World Order Tightrope.

From former Ambassador to Russia, the EU and Italy and former high commissioner to the UK Jeremy Kinsman, a look at a show of force as performative as the rest of Trump’s presidency, this one to register a new American approach to power. “This operation is less comparable to previous American military interventions than to the ‘massacre of the heads of the five families’ scene in the Godfather,” writes Kinsman, “the luring of parties to a bloodbath by a new don to consolidate power under the guise of a ‘bygones’ dinner.”Here’s Jeremy Kinsman with Trump’s ‘Don-roe’ Doctrine for a Whole Other Hemisphere.

From Policy Columnist and co-chair of the Expert Group on Canada-US Relations Fen Osler Hampson, a look at the implications for the looming CUSMA review of Carney’s needle-threading position on the U.S.-led war. “One can almost hear Trump accusing Carney of failing to live up to his own words about standing up to dictators,” writes Hampson. “More tariffs and other punitive measures would likely follow, as Canadians have learned, when the president is piqued.” Here’s Fen Hampson with Carney’s Iran Trap: How Trump’s War Could Become Canada’s Problem.

In Policy background links on Iran and the Middle East: 

Former United Nations Ambassador and Simon Fraser University professor Paul Meyer from July/25 with
The Future of Iran’s Nuclear Program: Could Withdrawal from the NPT be Next?

From University of Ottawa professor Peter Jones from June/25:  Will Iran be Donald Trump’s ‘Forever War’?

From Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs VP Nico Slobinsky in July 2025: 31 Years After the AMIA Bombing, Canada Must Confront the Iranian Threat.

From 2022 by Policy editor and publisher Lisa Van Dusen, Iran’s Social Revolution: A Policy Q&A with Homa Hoodfar.

And, our Middle East Coverage Package of key content from the past several years.

Many thanks to all our Policy contributors, sponsors, readers and supporters.