标签： Asia

A major controversy has engulfed the British Museum’s high-profile Bayeux Tapestry exhibition after revelations that its lead sponsor, Belarus-born billionaire Igor Tulchinsky, has provided core funding for a community resilience center located in Efrat, an illegal Israeli settlement in the occupied West Bank that is now subject to UK sanctions.

Tulchinsky, whose backing for the iconic medieval tapestry exhibition is reportedly valued at £5 million ($6.75 million), publicly unveiled a purpose-built therapy yurt at Efrat’s Mondlak Center in November 2025, appearing alongside the settlement’s far-right mayor Dovi Shefler for the ceremony. Public records from the Efrat Development Foundation, the nonprofit organization that operates the Mondlak Center, confirm Tulchinsky as the primary sponsor of the facility, which serves the entire Gush Etzion settlement bloc, a cluster of illegal Israeli settlements located just 12 kilometers southeast of Jerusalem.

According to an Instagram post from the foundation documenting the event, Tulchinsky dedicated the new facility to “Israel’s brave warriors and their families” during his opening remarks, where he famously described the therapy space as “Israel’s inner Iron Dome.”

Efrat, a settlement of roughly 12,000 Israeli settlers, was constructed on land seized from four indigenous Palestinian villages. It serves as the administrative capital of the expanding Gush Etzion bloc, which continues to push its boundaries toward the Palestinian city of Bethlehem. The Mondlak Center operates as a project of the Efrat Development Foundation, a nonprofit that states its mission is to advance Efrat’s social, cultural and physical development. The foundation’s public website outlines three tiers of donor partnership, with its top-tier “Vision Partner” designation requiring contributions of more than $50,000 and granting donors access to participate in strategic planning for the organization. The foundation also explicitly advertises support for “pioneer family support in Givat HaEitam” – a reference to the highly controversial E-2 hilltop settlement expansion that peace campaigners warn will cut Bethlehem off from the southern West Bank, effectively ghettoizing the Palestinian city.

The full scope of Tulchinsky’s support for the center, whether financial or in-kind, remains undisclosed. Middle East Eye attempted to reach Tulchinsky’s global investment firm WorldQuant for comment multiple times, but received no response. When contacted directly, the Efrat Development Foundation confirmed Tulchinsky is a donor but said his contribution was channeled through an unnamed third-party organization. A photograph of Tulchinsky at the yurt’s opening ceremony remains publicly displayed on the foundation’s official fundraising webpage.

The revelations about Tulchinsky’s connection to the illegal settlement come just 48 hours after UK Foreign Secretary Ed Milliband announced a sweeping new package of sanctions targeting individuals and entities linked to illegal Israeli settlement expansion in the occupied West Bank. Speaking to UK parliament, Milliband accused Israeli settlers of carrying out “ethnic cleansing” against Palestinian communities in the West Bank, stating that the Israeli occupation is unlawful due to Israel’s entrenched control, stated aim of claiming permanent sovereignty over the territory and expansionist agenda driven by illegal settlement building. “We will take action against specific companies and individuals who provide services such as construction, infrastructure financing or real estate for settlement expansion,” Milliband told lawmakers. “So to those who finance or facilitate illegal settlements, let me say this: You will face the full force of UK sanctions. Settlements are illegal. They should not be promoted in our country.”

Efrat’s mayor Dovi Shefler, who appeared alongside Tulchinsky at the yurt opening, has a long public record of vocal support for the full Israeli annexation of the occupied West Bank. The municipal council he leads has repeatedly violated even Israeli military regulations to expand Efrat into territory administered by the Palestinian Authority, and Shefler has openly boasted that Efrat’s eastward expansion has irreparably damaged any prospect of a viable contiguous Palestinian state. “We are physically blocking the connection between Bethlehem and Hebron,” he stated in an April 2025 interview. “Whoever is plotting to establish a terrorist state here – we are simply cutting off their dream through construction.”

Efrat is widely recognized as a stronghold of far-right religious-nationalist ideology in the West Bank. During Israel’s 2022 national election, nearly 48 percent of Efrat voters cast ballots for Religious Zionism and Jewish Power, the two extreme far-right parties led by Israeli cabinet ministers Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben Gvir – both of whom were sanctioned by the UK in June 2025 for repeated incitement to violence against Palestinian communities. In May 2025, Smotrich appeared in a public video with Shefler praising the mayor’s settlement expansion work, and the pair called for new Israeli settlement construction in the Gaza Strip.

Roughly 50 to 60 percent of Efrat’s settler population are native English speakers, and in April 2025 investigative outlet Declassified UK exposed an Israeli organization caught on camera offering assistance to British citizens seeking to relocate to the settlement. The organization Shivat Zion told potential migrants, “You’re next to the Arabs; you’ll hear their mosques. But apart from this, it’s a great living standard.”

The Mondlak Center, named after British-born immigrants Moshe and Lina Mondlak who settled in Gush Etzion, provides specialized mental health services to the settlement community. The therapy yurt unveiled by Tulchinsky features three private therapy rooms and an outdoor space dedicated to yoga, mindfulness and breathing workshops, according to reporting from the Jerusalem News Syndicate. Demand for the center’s services from Israeli soldiers and settlers increased dramatically following the outbreak of the 2023-2025 Gaza war, which has been widely described as a genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.

In his dedication speech, Tulchinsky reaffirmed his support for Israeli forces, saying, “the war after the war being fought by therapists, volunteers and by soldiers and their families who are learning to breathe again.” Additional reporting from Middle East Eye published this week revealed that Tulchinsky runs a defense technology-focused venture capital fund based in Israel, led by a recently retired senior Israeli army commander who has publicly promoted the use of remote-controlled combat vehicles in Gaza. Israeli remote-controlled vehicles have been labeled a “direct tool for committing genocide” by one leading human rights group, and have been implicated in the systematic destruction of entire civilian neighborhoods in Gaza and southern Lebanon, including irreplaceable cultural heritage sites. In a March 2025 interview with the *Jerusalem Post*, Tulchinsky confirmed he has provided direct financial support to the Israeli army since the 7 October 2023 Hamas attacks and the start of the Gaza war, noting that he visits Israel on a regular basis.

The British Museum has so far declined to respond to multiple requests for comment about Tulchinsky’s sponsorship, which opened to the public this Thursday. Artists for Palestine UK, a prominent network of UK-based artists and cultural workers, has condemned the museum’s partnership with Tulchinsky as “outrageous.”

For weeks leading up to a historic diplomatic announcement, tensions simmered between the United Kingdom and its closest transatlantic ally over a planned UK crackdown on illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories. British media had been saturated with reports that the Trump administration was gearing up to forcefully block the Andy Burnham-led UK government’s sanctions plan, sparking fierce domestic pushback from opposition lawmakers and pundits who warned the move would provoke Washington and leave Britain isolated on the global stage.

Behind closed doors, the pressure campaign was real: senior government sources confirmed to Middle East Eye that U.S. officials had repeatedly lobbied the Burnham government to abandon the plan ahead of Tuesday’s scheduled announcement. The pressure campaign reached extraordinary heights last week, when U.S. President Donald Trump openly suggested the U.S. would not defend the Falkland Islands if Argentina launched an invasion, a comment widely interpreted as a veiled threat tied to the settlement dispute. Over the weekend, U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee escalated the rhetoric further, accusing the British government of “Jew hate” and warning that U.S. states could retaliate by sanctioning British firms.

But when Burnham spoke directly with Trump to outline the UK’s plan on Monday afternoon, the expected pushback never materialized. What Washington had not anticipated was that Burnham and Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband had quietly built a broad international coalition ahead of the announcement: France and Canada, both core U.S. allies, had already committed to enacting their own bans on Israeli settlement goods alongside the UK. In total, 12 Western nations signed on to a joint public statement released Tuesday: alongside the UK, France and Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Ireland, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain and Sweden added their signatures. The document confirmed participating nations either intended to introduce national trade restrictions on illegal settlement goods, back broader European Union-level restrictions, or were actively evaluating such measures in line with domestic legislative processes.

In a landmark address to UK Parliament on Tuesday, Miliband went further than any Western government has gone in recent decades, formally recognizing the ongoing ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, declaring Israel’s 57-year occupation of Palestinian territory illegal under international law, and announcing a full package of measures: comprehensive sanctions on Israeli settlements, plus an immediate ban on all arms licenses and exports that could “materially contribute to the occupation.”

Unsurprisingly, Israel responded with immediate, fierce anger. Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar announced a slate of retaliatory measures, including closing the British consulate in East Jerusalem and banning 11 sitting British MPs from entering the country. Most notably, however, the U.S. reaction was far quieter than observers had predicted. On a working trip to Colombia, Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters the administration had been notified of London’s decision in advance, acknowledged the UK’s rationale, and stated only that the U.S. shared the goal of avoiding renewed violence and rising tensions in the already volatile West Bank. Significantly, Rubio declined to issue any formal criticism of the British move. Trump has not yet commented publicly on the decision, a silence that itself signals reluctance to publicly condemn three key U.S. allies simultaneously – even amid existing trade tensions with Canada.

While British diplomats privately told U.S. counterparts that the new sanctions are largely symbolic, with too small an economic footprint to force an immediate shift in Israeli policy, analysts widely frame the move as a consequential turning point with broad geopolitical implications. For the UK, the decision marks a stark shift in official rhetoric: the explicit recognition of ethnic cleansing and war crimes in Gaza and the West Bank sets a new standard for Western governments, one that government sources say is just the first step in a broader policy shift toward the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The coordinated 12-nation action also represents a major diplomatic rebuke of long-standing U.S. policy in the Middle East, and signals a tectonic shift in Western attitudes toward Israeli settlement expansion. Even historically pro-Israel Western European nations like the UK and France have now taken formal punitive action, leaving Germany as an outlier in its continued strong support for the Netanyahu government, a shift that has left Israeli officials particularly outraged.

Beyond the Middle East, the coordinated effort also puts into practice the so-called “Carney Doctrine” coined by Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, which calls for a coalition of middle-sized global powers to act as an independent counterweight to larger great power influence – particularly the United States. By successfully building and leading this coalition on an issue where Washington holds an opposing position, the UK has effectively projected independent soft power and established itself as an agenda-setting global actor. The move has already won broad praise from Arab nations: Qatar and Jordan, both key British partners in the region, were quick to welcome the sanctions, followed shortly by the Arab League. Far from isolating Britain, as domestic opposition leaders warned, the bold stance is expected to boost the UK’s global standing, particularly across the Middle East.

For now, the Trump administration has held back from public rebuke. It remains to be seen whether that stance will hold in the coming weeks, and if pressure does mount, whether Burnham and Miliband will maintain their ground in what would be an unprecedented test of post-Brexit British diplomatic independence.

For months after Hezbollah launched its war with Israel on 2 March, the militant group adhered to a revised guerrilla doctrine: abandon rigid defense of fixed frontline positions to avoid the crippling casualties that marked its 2024 campaign. One critical outlier broke this pattern: the windswept hill of Ali al-Taher in southern Lebanon.

Hezbollah’s shift to flexible, maneuver-based warfare grew directly from hard-won lessons of earlier 2024 fighting. When the group attempted to hold static border positions against Israeli incursions, it suffered severe troop losses without stopping Israeli forces from pushing into southern Lebanese territory. Prolonged brutal battles for towns like Khiam convinced Hezbollah’s leadership that tying fighters to specific terrain played into Israel’s advantages in firepower and air dominance. Instead, the group prioritized preserving its fighting force, enabling continued operations even after Israeli advances. Even Bint Jbeil, long mythologized by Hezbollah as the site of the “mother of all battles” against Israel, was not deemed a position that required defense to the last fighter by April.

Ali al-Taher was different. In June, just days before a temporary ceasefire took hold, a senior Hezbollah official speaking to Middle East Eye confirmed the group would defend the strategic ridge “until the last man” rather than cede it to Israeli control. The official emphasized that tactics shift with changing battlefield conditions, noting the commitment reflected the demands of full-scale war at that time.

The ridge’s unique strategic value cannot be overstated. Sitting roughly 15 kilometers from the Israeli border at an elevation of 600 meters, Ali al-Taher overlooks the densely populated Nabatieh region and Iqlim al-Tuffah, holding dominion over key travel routes and military approaches across southern Lebanon. The hill is widely suspected to house Hezbollah’s underground command centers and weapons stockpiles, and Israeli military officials have confirmed they discovered hidden tunnel routes and extensive military infrastructure dug beneath its slopes.

For Hezbollah, the site’s importance stems from three interconnected factors: the extensive underground facilities carved into the ridge, the network of connections these tunnels share with other key Hezbollah positions across the south, and the unrivaled geographical surveillance advantage the high ground provides. The Hezbollah official explained that losing the ridge would flip the strategic balance of threat: for years, Hezbollah has used territory north of the Litani River to maintain pressure on northern Israel, but Israeli control of Ali al-Taher would give Jerusalem a forward base to surveillance and pressure the entire Nabatieh and Iqlim al-Tuffah regions.

This calculation explains why Hezbollah continued to fight for the hill long after the June ceasefire paused most hostilities across other parts of the front. For weeks after the ceasefire agreement, Ali al-Taher remained the site of daily Israeli airstrikes and Hezbollah drone counterattacks, even as the U.S. pushed a proposal that would see Hezbollah hand control of the outpost to the Lebanese military as part of a broader Hezbollah disarmament framework.

What followed was a grinding war of attrition. Israel maintained constant aerial surveillance of the ridge, carried out repeated targeted strikes, and gradually tightened its blockade around the underground complex. By August, Israeli officials were openly discussing plans to expand air and ground operations around the hill, with Israeli media reporting that dozens of Hezbollah fighters remained hunkered down in the hill’s tunnel network.

After Israel announced on 3 September that it had secured “operational control” of Ali al-Taher, the Hezbollah official pushed back against framing the withdrawal as a decisive defeat. “The hill stood for nearly three months with total aerial and operational oversight from Israel, constantly bombarded, and yet our men stood their ground,” he said. He added that the eventual decision to pull out was a pragmatic cost-benefit analysis, not a rejection of the hill’s strategic significance.

The Israeli military says its forces cleared Hezbollah fighters from two key underground passageways and established full control of both the surface and subterranean sections of the ridge. Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz framed the capture as a key step in consolidating Israel’s new security buffer zone in southern Lebanon.

But the term “operational control” does not equate to permanent, uncontested occupation. Hezbollah has not issued an official public response to Israel’s announcement, but anonymous group members rejected Israel’s claim the day after it was made, asserting no permanent Israeli force is present on the ridge and that Hezbollah fighters remain deployed in the area ready to repel any deeper Israeli advance.

This dispute over terminology carries major strategic weight. Israel has proven it can operate on and beneath the ridge, while Hezbollah works to deny that this achievement amounts to a irreversible strategic defeat. The question now turns to how Israel will use its new advantage. Israeli officials have stated they intend to hold their southern Lebanese security positions until Hezbollah is fully disarmed, turning Ali al-Taher from a battlefield win into a key bargaining chip in future negotiations with Lebanon.

For Hezbollah, the core challenge is to absorb the loss of one critical strategic outpost without allowing it to trigger a wider erosion of its military presence north of the Litani. The group’s next move will likely focus less on an immediate attempt to retake the hill, and more on containing any Israeli expansion from the outpost into surrounding territory. The Hezbollah official stressed that Ali al-Taher remains within surveillance range of other strategic hills still controlled by the group, noting that any Israeli attempt to use the ridge as a launching pad to push further north toward the Litani will be met by both Hezbollah and its key backer Iran.

This brings the conflict to its next critical turning point: will the loss of Ali al-Taher remain a contained tactical setback for Hezbollah, or will Israel turn control of the ridge into a broader military and political advantage across southern Lebanon?

The outcome hinges on two competing forces: whether Israel can solidify its hold on the outpost, neutralize the remaining Hezbollah underground network, and use the ridge to restrict Hezbollah’s ability to move and operate across the south, while Hezbollah works to prove that withdrawing from one key position does not mean the collapse of its wider military network in southern Lebanon.

Recent on-ground reporting confirms the contest is far from over. Israeli strikes around Nabatieh have continued unabated, and reports of Hezbollah attacks on Israeli forces in the area persist. In the end, Ali al-Taher’s true significance may lie not in who holds the hill itself, but in what the battle for it sparks across the surrounding region.

Israel’s declaration of operational control closes out a months-long battle for one of Hezbollah’s most important fixed positions. But whether it marks a full strategic defeat for Hezbollah, the start of a new Israeli offensive north of the Litani, or simply a transition from conventional frontline combat to a more dispersed, low-intensity confrontation remains unresolved. While the hill has changed military hands in the manner Israel claims, the larger struggle for control of southern Lebanon’s terrain, underground military networks, and long-term security architecture is still unfolding.

A major diplomatic clash between the United Kingdom and Israel erupted this week after Jerusalem unveiled a package of retaliatory measures against London, including a entry ban on 11 British MPs, following the UK’s historic decision to sanction illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories. The escalation, which marks one of the most significant rifts between the two allies in recent years, unfolded on Tuesday as Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar announced a series of punitive steps in response to London’s policy shift.

Alongside the entry ban on lawmakers, Saar confirmed Israel would shut the British consulate in occupied East Jerusalem, withdraw British representatives from the International Gaza Support Center, and end all British training programs for Palestinian security forces. The banned British parliamentarians include high-profile critics of Israeli policy: former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, independent MP Zarah Sultana, Labour MPs Naz Shah, Diane Abbott, John McDonnell and Richard Burgon, and all sitting Green Party of England and Wales MPs – Carla Denyer, Adrian Ramsay, Ellie Chowns, Sian Berry and Hannah Spencer. The list also extends to Fahad Ansari, an Irish-born lawyer who has represented legal efforts to reverse Hamas’ proscription as a terrorist organization in British courts; Ansari, who is not a UK citizen or MP, noted he already considered himself persona non grata in Israel and called the ban a badge of honor.

The retaliatory measures came hours after the British government made a landmark policy announcement: it formally recognized ongoing ethnic cleansing of Palestinians by settlers in the occupied West Bank, declared Israel’s decades-long occupation of Palestinian territory illegal under international law, and imposed sweeping sanctions on entities linked to illegal Israeli settlements. The government also enacted a full ban on all arms licenses and exports that could materially contribute to Israel’s occupation. France and Canada quickly joined the UK’s initiative by announcing their own bans on trade with Israeli settlements, a move widely seen as a major diplomatic win for London. Eleven additional nations – Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Iceland, Ireland, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain and Sweden – signed a joint statement with the UK affirming their plans to introduce national trade restrictions or support European-level measures against settlement goods, in line with international legal obligations.

The UK’s formal adoption of the International Court of Justice’s 2024 advisory opinion, which ruled the Israeli occupation unlawful and required all states to act to end it, was laid out by Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband in parliamentary remarks Tuesday. Miliband emphasized that the British government confirms settler-perpetrated ethnic cleansing is occurring in parts of the West Bank, adding that the Israeli government has not only turned a blind eye to the violence but has repeatedly supported forced displacement of Palestinians through official statements and policy.

Rather than being intimidated by the entry ban, the targeted British MPs have responded with open defiance, vowing to double down on their advocacy for Palestinian rights. In a statement following the announcement, Corbyn, who has made multiple visits to Palestinian territories to document conditions on the ground, said he had directly witnessed the violence of occupation and the systemic apartheid that curtails Palestinian freedom. He called Israel’s pattern of barring UN investigators and international journalists a deliberate attempt to hide its actions from the world, stressing that critics would never abandon efforts to expose the truth. “They are the ones who suffer from Israel’s apartheid. It is their freedom which is egregiously curtailed, alongside thousands of Palestinian refugees who are denied the right of return,” Corbyn said.

Naz Shah, one of the banned Labour MPs, described the selection of banned lawmakers as “rather random and, frankly, bizarre,” but added she was proud to back the UK government’s new sanctions, which align with the country’s international legal obligations. She reaffirmed her longstanding commitment to upholding international law, peace, security, and equal rights for both Palestinians and Israelis. Richard Burgon, another banned Labour MP who has campaigned for stronger action against Israeli policies and presented evidence of alleged war crimes to the International Criminal Court, said the ban would not silence him. “The decision by the Israeli government to sanction me today will not intimidate me into silence. I will continue to do what is right, speak out in defence of international law and stand up for justice for the Palestinian people,” Burgon said.

Zarah Sultana, the independent MP who left the Labour Party last year in protest over Keir Starmer’s refusal to take stronger action against Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, called the ban from the “fascist government presiding over genocide, apartheid and an illegal occupation” a badge of honor. She echoed other lawmakers in saying the punitive measure would only strengthen her resolve to speak out. “If anything, this ban only strengthens my resolve to keep speaking out against Israel’s genocide and against the UK’s complicity,” Sultana said.

All of the UK Green Party’s sitting parliamentary representatives were included on the banned list, a reflection of the party’s uncompromising stance calling for full sanctions on Israel, recognizing allegations of genocide in Gaza, and supporting proscription of the Israeli military as a terrorist organization. A party spokesperson said the Israeli government’s threats would not force the Greens into silence, praising the party’s MPs for standing up for Palestinian rights and demanding an end to British complicity in illegal occupation and violence. The Green Party called on the British government to go further than its current limited measures, imposing a full arms embargo and wide-ranging sanctions against Israel. Green Party leader Zack Polanski added that the party’s MPs had consistently stood “on the right side of history” by opposing ethnic cleansing, occupation and genocide, a position he said all British lawmakers should adopt.

Mass public protests have erupted across South Korea in fierce opposition to the Seoul government’s potential plan to deploy military forces to support U.S.-led security operations in the strategically critical Strait of Hormuz, deepening a domestic and international debate over the country’s role in escalating tensions between the U.S. and Iran.

South Korean officials confirmed on Friday that the administration is actively evaluating options for what it frames as “contributions” to U.S. security initiatives in the strait, a chokepoint that handles nearly a fifth of the world’s daily oil trade. Just days later on Tuesday, a South Korean fact-finding military delegation was dispatched to the region to assess on-ground conditions, according to government statements.

The prospect of a South Korean military deployment has already drawn a sharp rebuke from Tehran. Iranian officials have issued a clear warning that any introduction of South Korean forces to the region would be “regarded as direct support for the party responsible for that aggression and will have serious consequences,” a statement that has amplified anxieties over potential retaliation against South Korean interests.

On Wednesday, hundreds of demonstrators gathered outside the U.S. Embassy in central Seoul, carrying hand-painted placards that called on the South Korean government to reject participation in what organizers labeled a “war of aggression” against Iran. Video footage shared widely across major social media platforms showed local police moving to push back dozens of protesters who had gathered close to the embassy compound, leading to minor scuffles in some instances.

Jung Kyung-jik, a representative of leading South Korean civic group People’s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy, told reporters from Agence France-Presse that he fully understood Iran’s perception of any foreign military intervention as a direct threat to Iranian national security. “As Iran has said, the deployment of our troops to the region would amount to direct participation in an illegal war,” Jung stated. He added that “there have been numerous violations of international law arising from US attacks on Iran, including the bombing of an elementary school and energy infrastructure.”

South Korea has been subjected to mounting diplomatic pressure from Washington for months to formally join the U.S.-led coalition operating in the Strait of Hormuz. Former U.S. President Donald Trump had previously publicly criticized Seoul for failing to back U.S. policy toward Iran, tying the disagreement to broader frictions in the bilateral alliance that have persisted in years since.

For South Korea, the strategic stakes of any decision are exceptionally high: the country’s entire economy relies heavily on energy shipments that pass through the Strait of Hormuz. Data from 2023 shows that 61 percent of South Korea’s total crude oil imports and 54 percent of its naphtha imports traveled through the waterway last year alone, making stability in the region a core national economic priority.

According to reporting from The Guardian, the specific deployment options currently under review by South Korean military planners include sending a P-8 Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft and a naval logistics support vessel. Local South Korean broadcasters have additionally reported that an elite navy explosive ordnance disposal team is also being considered for deployment.

South Korea’s presidential office has clarified that any final decision to deploy new military forces to the Strait of Hormuz would require a multi-step domestic approval process: first a review by the country’s National Security Council, followed by a cabinet resolution, and ultimately formal approval from the unicameral National Assembly.

This is not the first time Seoul has adjusted its military posture in the region amid U.S. pressure. Back in 2019, the South Korean government expanded the operating area of an existing anti-piracy naval unit deployed off the coast of Somalia to cover waters surrounding the Strait of Hormuz, a move that fell short of full participation in the U.S. coalition.

In a recent development, South Korean President Lee Jae Myung held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron this week on Tuesday to discuss the situation in the Strait of Hormuz. However, Seoul’s presidential office emphasized that the discussions focused exclusively on potential South Korean contributions to broader international efforts to uphold freedom of navigation, not any specific plan to deploy combat troops to the region.

Six months after the United States and Israel launched a military campaign aimed at forcing Iran into political submission, a dramatic shift in the dynamics of the Middle East conflict has emerged: Tehran is no longer just reacting to external pressure, it is actively escalating tensions to shift the balance of bargaining power in its favor. The most visible sign of this new approach is Iran’s recent threat to target American warships operating in regional waters with its upgraded solid-fuel Qassem Basir ballistic missile, a development that marks a potentially more dangerous phase of the ongoing standoff.

Tehran has framed the Qassem Basir as a game-changing capability that allows it to “take action against any threat, even before it is carried out.” Multiple intelligence reports point to this weapon being used during claimed Iranian tests targeting US vessels near the Strait of Hormuz on September 5. While Washington confirmed that an attack targeted its nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS George Washington and a nearby guided-missile destroyer, US officials have not confirmed whether the new advanced missile was deployed, and noted that all American ships successfully evaded the strike.

Beyond the missile test, Tehran has also announced plans to sign an agreement with Oman to establish a new shipping corridor through the Strait of Hormuz extending into the Persian Gulf, a move that remains unconfirmed as of press time. Taken together, these moves signal a clear break from the largely retaliatory strategy that defined Iran’s actions in the first half of the conflict. Today, the Islamic Republic is increasingly willing to raise the stakes on its own terms.

This shift does not mean Iran holds military superiority over the US – far from it. But Iranian leadership has concluded that prolonging and expanding the conflict increases the economic and strategic cost of the standoff for Washington and the global community, strengthening Tehran’s hand at any future negotiating table. This represents a stark reversal of the original goals of the US-led campaign, which was framed to force major changes in Iranian policy and even open the door to regime change. Despite massive military superiority that has inflicted severe damage on Iranian infrastructure and military capabilities, the US and Israel have failed to achieve their core political objectives.

Today, Iran’s political regime remains intact, its missile programs are still operational, the status of its nuclear program remains unresolved, and its network of regional proxies retains full offensive capability – a fact demonstrated by recent attacks on Saudi targets carried out by Houthi rebels. Most critically, Tehran has turned the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most vital energy chokepoints, into a powerful tool of economic leverage.

Over the past six months, the conflict has settled into a repeating cycle: escalation, diplomatic outreach, tentative agreements, renewed coercive action, and a return to diplomacy. Far from forcing Iranian capitulation, this pattern has taught Tehran that sustained resistance to US pressure ultimately yields better negotiating terms. The latest escalation is a direct result of that lesson.

Tehran does not need to destroy the US Navy or seize full control of the Strait of Hormuz to achieve its goals. It only needs to make commercial navigation through the waterway risky enough to force shipping companies to avoid the route, push up global marine insurance premiums, and embed persistent disruption risk into global oil prices. Recent shipping data already confirms that commodity traffic through the Strait of Hormuz has fallen to its lowest level since May. Tehran has further warned it will implement wider navigation restrictions and launch what it calls “economic warfare” if Washington continues its campaign to strangle the Iranian economy via sanctions and blockades.

This new approach upends the original logic of the conflict. Former US President Donald Trump’s strategy was designed to make continued Iranian resistance progressively more costly. Today, Iran is making continued US coercion progressively more costly for Washington and the world. While Iran can never match American raw firepower, it holds an unassailable geographic advantage that no military force can eliminate: control over the world’s most critical energy transit corridor.

Measured against the original political goals of the US-led campaign – dismantling Iran’s political system, eliminating its nuclear program, destroying its long-range missile capability, and breaking its network of regional allies – the six-month conflict has fallen far short. None of these core objectives have been achieved decisively. The unresolved status of Iran’s nuclear program in particular highlights the fundamental limits of military power: airstrikes can destroy physical facilities, but they cannot eliminate the political incentives that drive states to pursue strategic nuclear deterrence.

This dynamic carries significant ripple effects across the Middle East and beyond. If regional governments conclude that developing independent nuclear capacity offers protection against external regime change campaigns, global nuclear non-proliferation efforts could face new, growing pressure. Saudi Arabia, for example, has long sought domestic uranium enrichment capabilities. Ultimately, analysts note, the nuclear issue will inevitably return to the negotiating table, the same place it started.

The costs of the ongoing stalemate are already being felt globally. Energy, marine insurance, and shipping costs have all risen, with inevitable political consequences for economies around the world. Meanwhile, the conflict has created unintended benefits for other major powers: Russia gains from higher global hydrocarbon prices, while China benefits strategically as US military assets, munitions, and political attention are diverted away from the Indo-Pacific region. For Gulf states, the conflict has delivered an uncomfortable reality: US military bases hosted to guarantee their security can also turn them into targets in a conflict they did not initiate.

Again, this does not mean Iran is winning militarily. The Iranian economy and domestic infrastructure have suffered enormous damage, and the US retains the capability to inflict far greater destruction if it chooses to escalate further. But Iran does not need to defeat the US militarily to achieve its core goals. It only needs to prevent Washington from using military superiority to force it into political submission, while raising the cost of continued conflict incrementally for the US and its allies.

This leaves Trump caught in an escalation trap partially of his own making. If he tightens the blockade on Iran, Tehran can further disrupt traffic through Hormuz. If he intensifies airstrikes and bombing campaigns, Iran can expand retaliatory strikes against US allies across the Gulf. If he chooses to enter negotiations, Iran now has every reason to demand stronger guarantees and better terms than it would have accepted six months earlier. Repeated cycles of escalation followed by a return to talks have also eroded the coercive power of US threats over time.

Iran’s latest moves are therefore far more than just another exchange of fire in a long-running conflict. Six months after the US and Israel launched their campaign to force Tehran into submission, Iran has learned that the longer it withstands pressure, the greater the costs it can impose on its adversaries, and the stronger its bargaining position will be when talks eventually resume. While the US retains the capacity to escalate far beyond anything Iran can match, it can no longer take for granted that more escalation will bring victory closer. Iran’s latest actions make clear that Tehran now believes the opposite is true.

At the outbreak of the US-Israeli military campaign against Iran, few policymakers in Beijing or Moscow predicted that Tehran would be able to sustainedly withstand coordinated military pressure from two of the world’s most militarily advanced powers. In the conflict’s opening phase, the overwhelming air, intelligence, and technological superiority of US and Israeli forces inflicted heavy losses on Iranian military and infrastructure targets. What was initially planned as a rapid operation to cripple Iran’s core military capabilities has however evolved into a protracted, increasingly costly conflict that has defied early expectations.

Against all odds, Iran has retained intact its core governing political structure and a substantial portion of its operational military response capacity. This outcome delivers a clear demonstration that inflicting widespread physical damage does not equate to forcing a targeted state into unconditional surrender. Iran’s unexpected battlefield resilience is far more than a regional military development – it has become a real-world stress test for the outer limits of American global power for both China and Russia. While the two countries hold divergent core interests in the conflict, neither can dismiss a decisive Iranian defeat as a regional issue isolated from great power competition. Both Beijing and Moscow recognize that if the United States can leverage its military dominance to strategically neutralize one of West Asia’s most prominent independent powers, the regional balance of power will shift dramatically, with ripple effects extending into the broader geopolitical and geoeconomic rivalry between Washington, Beijing, and Moscow.

### China’s Balancing Act Between Economic Pain and Strategic Interests

Of all major global powers, China faces the sharpest economic incentives to push for an immediate end to the conflict. Decades of deep energy trade ties have made China Iran’s largest crude oil buyer, so disruptions to energy transit and rising insecurity in the Strait of Hormuz directly impact Chinese economic performance. Data from Reuters confirms that China’s seaborne crude imports fell to roughly 7.14 million barrels per day in August 2026, a nearly 40% drop from pre-war levels. This supply disruption has cut off major Chinese refineries from a critical, low-cost source of crude oil.

Yet this immediate economic pain sits at the heart of Beijing’s core strategic dilemma: while a prolonged war harms Chinese economic interests, Beijing cannot accept a outcome that leaves Iran strategically defeated. For China, Iran is far more than just an energy supplier – it is a core node in the broader web of political and economic partnerships China has built across West Asia to expand its influence without relying on the formal military alliances that underpin US power in the region. A strategic collapse of Iran would not only reshape bilateral relations between Tehran and Washington; it would entrench far greater US influence across West Asia and erode the strategic space China has painstakingly built in the region.

China’s policy over years of maximum US pressure on Iran has reflected this balancing act. Beijing’s support for Tehran has never been limited to rhetorical political statements. China has consistently remained one of the largest buyers of Iranian crude, with independent Chinese teapot refineries continuing to import Iranian oil even amid threats of harsh US secondary sanctions. This persistence is why US officials have made Chinese crude purchases a central focus of their economic pressure campaign against Iran. This economic relationship has grown even more critical since the outbreak of full-scale war: as Washington moves to cut off Iran’s oil exports and global financial access, China stands as one of the only major economies capable of absorbing excess Iranian supply and easing economic pressure on Tehran. For Beijing, continuing to import Iranian oil is not merely a commercial transaction – it is a test case for resisting the ability of US sanctions to dictate the policy of major economies outside the American orbit, which explains why the issue has remained a persistent source of bilateral friction between Washington and Beijing.

China’s engagement extends beyond energy trade. US intelligence reports in recent years have documented that Iran has gained access to certain dual-use technologies, including components critical to its drone and missile programs, through commercial networks linked to Chinese companies. While a clear line must be drawn between official Chinese government policy and the independent activities of these commercial networks, their operations demonstrate how sustained economic ties have helped preserve a large portion of Iran’s technological and industrial base even under strict international sanctions. Diplomatically, Beijing has also refused to back Iran’s full isolation from the international community. Alongside Russia, China has repeatedly called for a negotiated political resolution to the conflict and opposed what it views as unilateral US-led pressure campaigns against Tehran.

This does not mean Beijing is prepared to commit to direct military defense of Iran. China’s core priority remains ending the war to restore stability to global energy trade routes. Yet there is a critical difference between ending the conflict and ending it on terms that leave Iran severely weakened and the regional balance of power decisively tilted toward Washington. It is here that Iran’s battlefield resilience carries the greatest strategic weight for China: the longer Tehran demonstrates it can retain operational military capacity after repeated heavy attacks, the more complex Beijing’s calculation of the consequences of an Iranian defeat becomes.

Crucially, China does not need to enter the war directly to support Iran. Its existing toolkit of economic, commercial, technological, and diplomatic tools allows it to prevent Iran’s total isolation without becoming a formal belligerent in the conflict. Perhaps the most valuable outcome for China from the war, however, is not energy trade or preserved influence in West Asia – it is the opportunity to observe firsthand the operational performance of US military forces in a high-intensity conflict. Beijing has gained unfiltered insights into US long-range strike capabilities, air operations, ammunition consumption rates, logistics sustainment, and missile defense performance. For a country whose long-term strategic competition with the US centers heavily on the Taiwan scenario, this real-world observational data is strategically invaluable.

### Russia’s Divergent Strategic Calculations

Russia’s core interests in the conflict differ substantially from China’s. Unlike Beijing, Moscow does not rely heavily on West Asian energy imports, and elevated global energy prices actually create short-term economic benefits for Russian export revenues. For the Kremlin, the Iran conflict is tied directly to Russia’s standing as a Eurasian power and its long-term goal of building a multipolar global order.

For Russia, Iran is more than a regional partner: it is one of the few major powers openly locked in full-scale conflict with both the US and Israel, capable of drawing significant American geopolitical and military attention away from Europe and the ongoing war in Ukraine, easing pressure on Moscow. A 2026 analysis published in *Middle East Policy* argues that the conflict has created clear short-term strategic advantages for Russia, while also elevating Iran’s importance to both Russia’s regional influence and its bilateral partnership with China.

Evidence of deep military cooperation between Moscow and Tehran extends far beyond rhetorical political alignment. Reporting from the *Financial Times* confirms that Russian military experts have participated in a secret collaborative program with Iran since 2023 to develop propulsion technology for hypersonic cruise missiles, a cooperation that has continued into 2026. Additional independent reporting has documented ongoing cooperation in satellite technology and transfers of complementary military equipment between the two states. This cooperation does not amount to a formal mutual defense alliance, and neither China nor Russia has offered Iran a binding security guarantee comparable to the commitments of a formal defense pact. But this informal, flexible cooperation has emerged as the defining feature of their current alignment: both powers can use economic, technological, and diplomatic tools to strengthen Iran’s defensive capacity and constrain US pressure without committing to open direct war with the United States.

### Contours of an Emerging Multipolar Global Order

Ultimately, the long-term significance of the US-Israeli war on Iran does not depend solely on which side gains the upper hand on the battlefield. The larger, more consequential question is whether the United States still retains the ability to use its combined military and economic superiority to impose its preferred political outcome on a defiant regional power. For China and Russia, the answer to this question carries sweeping implications. If Iran can sustain its resistance despite intense military pressure and crippling economic sanctions, the conflict will confirm that US ability to inflict widespread damage does not translate into ability to dictate political outcomes – a lesson that carries particular weight for China as it prepares for long-term strategic competition with Washington.

At the same time, the policy approaches of China and Russia demonstrate that challenging US hegemony does not require the creation of a formal anti-US alliance. Purchasing Iranian oil, sustaining bilateral trade, transferring dual-use technology, engaging in informal military cooperation, and wielding Security Council vetoes are all tools that raise the strategic and political cost of unilateral US power projection. Most recently, in April 2026, China and Russia jointly vetoed a UN Security Council resolution on the Strait of Hormuz, with Beijing explicitly arguing that the council should not legitimize unauthorized military operations by unilateral coalitions.

This does not mean a cohesive China-Russia-Iran geopolitical axis is emerging. The three countries hold divergent interests on many regional and global issues, and none is willing to bear unlimited costs to advance another power’s goals. Even so, the war in Iran has accelerated a broader global shift: moving from a post-Cold War order where the United States unilaterally sets the rules and determines outcomes for international crises, toward a new order where competing great powers can systematically raise the cost of unilateral US power projection.

The conflict has brought the contours of this emerging order into sharp relief. For Beijing and Moscow, Iran’s fate is not merely the future of a single regional partner. It is a critical test case: can the United States still unilaterally determine the outcome of a major regional war, or can other global powers use resistance, informal partnership, and counterpressure to raise the cost of US hegemony high enough to push the international system irreversibly toward multipolarity?

A major diplomatic rift has erupted between the United Kingdom and Israel after London imposed sweeping new sanctions on illegal Israeli settlement activity in the occupied West Bank, triggering immediate retaliation from Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing government and deepening accusations from Israeli opposition that the current administration has pushed the country into historic global isolation.

Announced by UK Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband, the new measures mark a significant escalation of international pressure on Israel over its decades-long occupation of the West Bank. Miliband confirmed that the UK will officially designate Israel’s entire occupation of the West Bank as unlawful, and will implement a full ban on imports of goods produced in Israeli settlements. Additional sanctions include asset freezes and travel restrictions targeting individuals and companies involved in settlement construction, infrastructure development, financing, and real estate projects tied to expanding settlements. The UK will also bar advertising of settlement-based properties within its borders, sanction extremist settlers linked to violence against Palestinian communities, and suspend new weapons export licenses that could materially support the occupation, maintaining over 30 existing arms suspensions already in place.

Miliband emphasized that the sanctions target only illegal settlement activity, not the state of Israel itself, noting that the UK will continue normal trade with Israel within its pre-1967 internationally recognized borders. “Today we refuse to be bystanders to further suffering and to the destruction of the two-state solution,” he said, adding that the UK could no longer merely condemn injustice without taking concrete action. Miliband also accused Israeli settler groups of carrying out ethnic cleansing against Palestinian communities, saying Netanyahu’s government has deliberately turned a blind eye to this violence.

The UK announcement was backed by a joint statement from 12 European and North American nations including France, Canada, Spain, Denmark, Ireland, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Poland, Portugal and Sweden. The coalition called on Israel to immediately halt settlement expansion, hold perpetrators of settler violence accountable, and launch investigations into alleged abuses by Israeli forces, warning that ongoing Israeli actions in the West Bank have eliminated any viable path to a two-state solution that would deliver permanent peace for both Israelis and Palestinians.

Netanyahu’s government responded with swift and sweeping retaliatory measures. Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar announced the closure of the British consulate in Jerusalem, the expulsion of British representatives from the US-led International Gaza Support Centre (tasked with monitoring the Gaza ceasefire), and the termination of UK-led training programs for Palestinian Authority security forces. Israel also issued entry bans targeting 11 British parliamentarians known for their criticism of Israeli policy, including former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, and one British human rights lawyer.

Saar denounced the UK sanctions as “morally distorted” and “a blatant interference in the affairs of a sovereign state”, arguing that the measures were an inappropriate attempt to sway Israel’s upcoming October national elections. Claiming that the Israeli public overwhelmingly rejects the establishment of an independent Palestinian state, Saar warned that Israel would retaliate against any other country that follows the UK’s lead. “The message to every government that harms us: whoever acts against Israel – Israel will harm them, and they will lose their influence and relevance,” he said.

Israeli President Isaac Herzog also condemned the sanctions, calling them “a gross interference in the democratic elections of a sovereign nation, and a decision that will fall on the wrong side of history.” In a post on X, Herzog called on foreign governments to halt punitive measures, urging instead “constructive dialogue and cooperation.” Far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir went further, urging Netanyahu to immediately close the British consulate in East Jerusalem, claiming the facility operates on behalf of the Palestinian Authority, and arguing that a hardline response is needed to push back against British “audacity”, reminding London that the British Mandate for Palestine ended decades ago and Israel is now a fully sovereign state.

Inside Israel, opposition politicians have pinned the blame for the diplomatic fallout squarely on Netanyahu’s far-right coalition, saying the government’s unapologetic expansion of settlements has left the country more isolated globally than ever before. Former Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid, who leads the main opposition bloc, called the British decision wrong but directed his criticism at the current administration. “[The government] is leading Israel into unprecedented diplomatic isolation, and doing nothing but issuing rebukes and threats that no one takes seriously,” Lapid said.

Knesset member Gilad Kariv of the left-wing Democrats party echoed that assessment, saying Netanyahu’s government is directly responsible for the sanctions due to its ongoing seizure of Palestinian land in the West Bank. Kariv added that Netanyahu has become politically “leprous” on the global stage, and argued that ordinary Israeli citizens should not be forced to pay the price for the prime minister’s “corrupt alliance with nationalist fanatics” in his far-right coalition.

Even some former senior Israeli officials have broken with the government to back the UK measures. Michael Ben-Yair, a former Israeli attorney-general, wrote in the Financial Times that while he does not support punitive action by a close Israeli ally, the sanctions are necessary to preserve the possibility of a two-state political solution that could deliver lasting peace and security for the seven million Jews and seven million Palestinians living between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River. Ben-Yair argued that the measures correctly distinguish between the legitimacy of Israel as a sovereign state and its ongoing occupation of Palestinian territory, which he described as “morally, politically and legally unacceptable.”

Netanyahu’s government has faced growing international condemnation this year for accelerating settlement construction across the occupied West Bank. Earlier this year, the government opened tenders for more than 1,200 new settlement homes in the strategically sensitive E1 corridor, a plan that would connect Jerusalem to the large Ma’ale Adumim settlement and cut off the territorial contiguity of any future Palestinian state, a move widely seen as a fatal blow to the two-state framework.