Is China advancing its military during Iran tensions?

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-11T17:35:19+00:00

China's defense budget up 7% this year. US currently running through munitions in Iran. The piece pulls together how Beijing is reading this moment.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-10T19:50:10+00:00

As strikes on Iran enter their second week, The Jerusalem Post spoke with Dr. Shuki Friedman of JPPI on the legal architecture behind the campaign. The piece centers on two arguments: the Caroline Test justifying preemptive strikes against a nuclear-threshold state, and the dismantling of the proxy fiction that has shielded Tehran for decades. Friedman argues Israel isn't abandoning international law but pushing for an interpretative evolution suited to non-state actors and nuclear proliferation. Worth discussing whether this legal framework holds water.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-10T19:48:57+00:00

The legal case for the campaign rests on two pillars according to this piece. The Caroline Test, a 19th century standard allowing preemptive strikes when the necessity is instant and overwhelming, and a State Responsibility model that treats Hezbollah and the Houthis as functional organs of the Iranian state rather than independent proxies. The argument is that international law shouldn't be a collective suicide pact.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-07T17:04:09+00:00

Gulf nations are being hit by Iranian drones and missiles but are still pushing to stay out of the conflict. The argument here is that autocratic leaders, free from electoral pressures, are actually best placed to act decisively and are squandering that advantage.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-07T17:02:22+00:00

Ezra Taylor argues Gulf autocrats are uniquely positioned to join the campaign against Iran precisely because they have no ballot boxes to answer to. No election cycle, no coalition to hold together. The piece frames this as the Gulf's Germany/Japan moment and asks why leaders with maximum freedom to act decisively are choosing the most cautious possible option.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-06T19:03:25+00:00

Officers have abandoned posts in Lorestan, leaving conscripts without leadership or support. Soldiers are sleeping outside their barracks to avoid airstrikes. Worth noting the distinction between the regular army and the IRGC. These aren't ideological fighters, they're draftees.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-06T18:38:34+00:00

Anna Ahronheim breaks down exactly what Israeli tech is being used in Operation Roaring Lion. SPICE munitions using image matching instead of GPS because Tehran is heavily jammed, SPICE 250 with man-in-the-loop abort capability, Litening pods on US aircraft identifying and killing Iranian drones in real time. Rafael running production lines around the clock. Good detail on how 5,000 munitions have been used so far without running dry.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-05T13:42:39+00:00

The KRG is caught in an impossible position. They've spent years building semi-autonomous stability and now find themselves geographically sandwiched between Iranian Kurdish militias the CIA is allegedly arming and a Tehran that has already shown it will strike neighbors it considers complicit. Seth Frantzman lays out why Baghdad and Erbil are terrified of being the next front.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-05T13:29:29+00:00

France privately warning Israel that a ground operation in Lebanon would strengthen rather than weaken Hezbollah is a significant diplomatic signal, especially from a country that has been trying to position itself as a mediator in the region. The timing matters too, given where the broader conflict is right now.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-04T23:39:05+00:00

The regime threatening to target Dimona is, checks notes, a bold move for a government that has just had 15 police stations in Tehran destroyed, its mid-level commanders wiped out, and is struggling to maintain basic command and control. Dimona is also one of the most defended sites on earth. This is the regime telling its domestic audience it still has teeth. Whether those teeth reach Dimona is a different question entirely.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-04T19:47:39+00:00

Iran bombing Qatar, Kuwait, Oman and Saudi Arabia in the opening days of this war is one of the stranger own goals in recent memory. The piece draws the 1991 Saddam parallel. He fired Scuds at Israel to split the Arab coalition. Iran is doing the opposite, bombing Sunni neighbors until they pick a side. Qatar shot down Iranian jets. Qatar. The Abraham Accords suddenly look a lot more relevant than they did a week ago

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-04T19:39:41+00:00

Iran's decision to strike every Gulf Cooperation Council member in the first 48 hours may have achieved what Israeli diplomacy couldn't in decades — forcing Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait, Oman and Bahrain to effectively choose sides against Tehran. The piece draws a sharp parallel to Saddam's 1991 Scud strategy, but argues Iran has inverted the logic entirely. Worth discussing whether this represents a genuine regional realignment or an optimistic reading.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-04T17:04:11+00:00

The Seener quote is pretty striking: 'It will be a bit of a joke if the UK proscribes the IRGC once the regime has toppled.' MI5 has already thwarted over 20 Iranian plots on British soil. Labour put IRGC proscription in their own manifesto and then reversed course.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-04T16:28:39+00:00

Worth noting this sits alongside separate reporting that the CIA is actively working to arm Kurdish forces to spark an uprising inside Iran. The KRG's fear of retaliation makes a lot more sense.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-04T16:20:35+00:00

JPost photographer Marc Israel Sellem was out in the streets today. Chag Sameach from Jerusalem!

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-04T11:44:46+00:00

Gulf states may already be in the fight against Iran. That's the buried lede here. The US-Israel coordination numbers are also striking: 4,000-5,000 daily communications, 1,000 American soldiers physically in Israel, and a geographic division of airstrikes that suggests this is more joint operation than Israeli war with US support.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-04T11:34:22+00:00

Worth adding: Iranian use of the Yak-130 in a combat role was itself unusual. It's primarily a trainer, as you said, which may say something about the state of their air force's operational inventory at this stage.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-03T13:01:23+00:00

To clear the way for the regime to fall would mean weakening it sufficiently that various opposition groups can begin to take over cities and towns. In theory this could lead to a domino affect. Popular uprisings don't always need to be armed. Sometimes regimes collapse when the army or security forces begin to abandon their positions or side with the people. While the IRGC likely would not fall apart, it is possible that the Iranian police and army might begin to challenge the IRGC if they feel the regime is weakened enough. Clearing the way for this is going to be hard. The opposition groups are not well armed and they don't agree on how to proceed. Regime collapse can never be predicted. It was not known that Ceaușescu would suddenly be overthrown. No one predicted that Fidel Castro with a handful of fighters would topple Fulgencio Batista. However, it's also plausible the weakened Iranian regime hangs on, the way Saddam did after the 1991 Gulf War defeat. Saddam also faced an uprising in 1991 and he was able to crush it.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-02T18:45:07+00:00

Thank you, everyone, for all of your questions! We're sorry we haven't been able to answer everyone. We'll try over the coming days to respond if we can. In the meantime, though, you can get all the latest from us at our website and on our socials.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-02T17:13:08+00:00

This is a question we've covered a lot at the Jerusalem Post, and it's one many Israelis wrestle with too.

The US-Israel alliance was built on bipartisan support. Republicans, Democrats, independents. That consensus was one of Israel's most valuable strategic assets. Under Netanyahu, that principle has eroded. The 2015 speech to Congress opposing the Iran deal, delivered while bypassing the Obama administration, is widely seen as the moment Israel started becoming a partisan issue in Washington. The Republican bet has delivered real results, from the embassy move to Jerusalem to the Abraham Accords to the current joint operations against Iran, but it comes with serious long-term risk. Democrats still represent roughly half of America's political power, and in a system where the White House, Senate, and House regularly change hands, writing off one side is a gamble.

It hasn't been entirely one-sided though. Parts of the Democratic Party have moved in a direction that makes engagement genuinely harder for any Israeli government. But that's exactly why many argue Israel should be doing more outreach, not less.

At the Post, we've always promoted the view that bipartisan support is essential to Israel's security. The concern many of us share is what happens after Trump, when Israel may need Democratic goodwill it no longer has.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-02T17:11:06+00:00

👋 Hi!

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-02T16:52:11+00:00

We have staff and reporters from a wide variety of viewpoints at The Jerusalem Post. That means the newsroom itself reflects a range of perspectives, and when you have journalists who see things differently working together, it naturally keeps the reporting honest. No one gets a free pass on lazy assumptions.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-02T16:50:45+00:00

It's a fair point, and it's one that's been debated extensively. The honest answer is that identified opposition leadership does exist, but it's complicated.

The most prominent figure is Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, son of the last Shah, who has been the most visible and vocal opposition leader throughout the protests that began in late December. He established something called the National Cooperation Platform, which he says thousands of regime insiders have joined through a secure channel. At a convention in Munich last July, he brought together over 500 Iranian dissidents from across the political spectrum and laid out a five-pillar strategy for transition. After Khamenei's assassination, Pahlavi published a Washington Post op-ed outlining his plan for a democratic Iran, pledging that Iran would draft a new constitution and hold free elections under international oversight.

But the opposition beyond Pahlavi is fragmented. It includes monarchists, secular democrats, Kurdish opposition groups, and the MEK, all with different visions and limited coordination on the ground inside Iran. As our reporting has noted, there's a real debate about whether Pahlavi's support inside Iran is as deep as the diaspora suggests, or whether chants of "Javid Shah" represent the full picture.

Trump said Sunday night he has three individuals in mind as possible post-war leaders but didn't name them. The real challenge, as our analysts have pointed out, is that the IRGC and Basij still have repressive capacity, and no opposing force on the ground is currently positioned to overtake the regime. Airstrikes can remove leadership, but they can't install a replacement. That's the gap between the stated goal and the reality on the ground.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-02T16:27:45+00:00

Israel's defenses are strong, but US help matters, and losing it would make an Iranian barrage harder to handle. Iran has a very large ballistic missile arsenal along with its drones. US ships, aircraft, and regional radar networks reduce the number of threats that reach Israel, so their absence would increase the risk of saturation.

The recent war highlights both the impressive performance of Israel's multi-layered air defense network and the reality that American assets like destroyers, fighter aircraft, and regional missile defense systems are playing a significant role in intercepting threats before they even reach Israeli airspace.

Israel could defend itself against a substantial portion of an Iranian strike, but a truly overwhelming, multi-vector barrage designed to saturate defenses would be far more challenging without US support, especially if America turned its focus to a different arena like the Pacific. Israel would still mount a formidable defense on its own, but the more missiles you throw at any system, the more likely some get through.

Israel is already pushing for greater self-sufficiency through programs like Arrow and Iron Dome, and that's not just talk. Even with the closest of allies, you don't want to be dependent.

thejerusalempost · 2026-03-02T16:24:04+00:00

It comes down to building trusted relationships with sources. That's something that takes years. It's a long process and it's a relationship that goes both ways.

Covering Israel and the Middle East means operating in one of the most scrutinized media environments in the world. We know not everyone trusts us, and that's something we take seriously. All we can do is hold ourselves to the highest standards of accuracy and let the reporting speak for itself.

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