The election of Donald Trump has added a new layer of complexity to the Middle East conflict. The incoming administration is likely to revert to Trump’s previous policies – a hawkish stance towards Iran and permissiveness with Israel – but those policies will be tested by a region vastly changed since Trump’s first victory.

Two factors will help either facilitate or stymie Trump’s Middle East policy: Iran’s loss of coercive edge against Israel, and Arab states’ rapprochements with Iran. Those issues intersect with ongoing challenges to US policy and to the interests of US partners in the region, such as Iran’s unsolved nuclear programme, and the Palestinian issue. How the new administration will navigate these issues will determine whether the United States gets pulled deeper into the evolving Middle East conflict or is able to make do on its campaign promise to ‘end the wars’.

In its first term in office, the Trump administration adopted a strategy toward Iran billed as a ‘maximum pressure campaign’. That initiative entailed withdrawing from the 2015 nuclear deal and reimposing economic sanctions on Iran. The goal was to compel Iran to capitulate on its major strategic enterprises – nuclear enrichment, ballistic missiles, and support for proxies – in exchange for total sanctions relief and normalised relations with Washington. It was a maximalist demand that promised a maximalist reward.

The maximum pressure campaign was not something that could be enacted by the United States alone. Rather, it rested on the premise that Washington could successfully press allies, partners, and even adversaries to abide by its sanctions, and therefore alienate Iran and its economy from much of the world.

The Trump administration had some success in that regard, particularly in rallying support from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), who had been unhappy with the limited nature of the nuclear deal, and were eager to weaken Iran’s regime. That choice put those states in Iran’s crosshairs, and rather than seek compromise with Trump, Iran turned up the pressure against its neighbours, using both direct and indirect military force to punish them for collaborating with the hostile West. Iran’s actions, which spread the pain of the maximum pressure campaign to its Arab rivals, were effective and eventually compelled them to sue for peace. The UAE was the first to seek a détente with Iran, securing a deal to normalise ties in August 2022. Saudi Arabia followed suit, and in an agreement brokered by China, restored relations with Tehran in March 2023.

Since then, most Arab states have lost their enthusiasm for hostility with Iran and its proxies. Instead, they have become focused on economic development, which has also included seeking closer integration with China and Russia. Israel’s war in Gaza has brought Arab and Iranian positions on the Palestinian cause closer together, and Arab states, who were once the victims of Iran’s aggression, were even moved to condemn Israel’s retaliatory strikes against Iran. As Arab states seek to keep Iran close and placated, they are unlikely to be receptive to any US policies that harken back to the maximum pressure campaign. Iran’s improved regional standing and strengthening ties with Saudi Arabia and the UAE in particular, will make it difficult for the Trump administration to replicate its previous strategy toward Iran. Although Washington might try, Iran can no longer be as easily marginalised, and America’s Arab partners are unlikely to want to assist in the reinforcement of existing sanctions on Iran.

With the Arab states on the sidelines, Israel will be the Trump administration’s main asset for getting tough with Iran. Israel’s war against Iran and its proxies has inflicted heavy damage, and threatens to further undo Iran’s regional gains. On 7 October 2023, Iran and its proxies were ascendant in the region, and US influence in the region was in decline. One year into the conflict, however, Iran’s grasp on the region has weakened. Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad – Iran’s allies in Gaza – have been militarily decimated by Israel. Hizbollah’s leadership has been killed, and its weapons stockpiles and resources continue to be degraded by the Israeli military. The taboo of using direct military action against Iranian territory – something no US administration has done, and a line that Trump would not cross – was also broken by Israel with its military strikes in October.

That attack crossed a new threshold in the Middle East conflict. With the exception of the single missile that Israel fired at an anti-air battery near Isfahan in April, it was the first time that Israel had struck Iran through an overt military operation since Tehran proclaimed Israel as an enemy after the 1979 Islamic revolution. It was also the first time that Iranian military sites had been hit by enemy missiles since the Iran-Iraq war. The damage inflicted by Israel remains unclear, and only truly understood by the Iranians, but the prevailing assessment based on open-source satellite imagery, Iranian officials, and Israeli statements, is that Israel succeeded in hitting a number of sites associated with Iran’s production of ballistic missiles and drones, and possibly destroyed or took offline a bulk of Iran’s air-defence batteries, including its most advanced Russian-made systems. The destruction of air-defence systems not only allowed Israel’s attack to succeed without sustaining losses, it leaves open the option for follow-up attacks against Iran’s military and nuclear infrastructure.

That attack followed Israel’s surging war against Hizbollah. Over the last three months, Israel’s campaign has targeted Hizbollah’s leadership, command structure, and weapons stores across Lebanon and western Syria. It is difficult to assess how much damage Israel has done to Hizbollah since its northern campaign began. Hizbollah is a sophisticated organisation and replacing its civilian and military leadership will not be impossible. Yet, it will take time; and given the extensive pressure that Israeli is exerting on the group, it also won’t be easy. When Israel’s campaign slows down or ends, Hizbollah should be able to rebuild its leadership, and eventually regain at least a semblance of its previous organisational capacity. Rearming, however, will be more difficult. Israel has expended considerable effort to target Hizbollah weapons caches, storage sites, and production facilities, and a further dismantling of Hizbollah’s arsenal is likely to come. Although the group will probably retain a substantial amount of arms, much of the advanced weaponry that it relied on to threatened Israeli population centres could be lost in the fight. And if Israel continues to interdict Iranian weapons shipments in Syria, then it will be a steep challenge for Hizbollah to return to its previous strength.

Hizbollah’s decline will have ramifications for Iran. Hizbollah has been Iran’s primary coercive tool against Israel, and used to both aid Iranian expansionism and serve as a primary component of its deterrence matrix. As with Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, should Hizbollah be decimated, Iran will have lost much of its frontline presence against Israel.

Iran could still shift its attention and resources to Syria, Iraq, and Yemen, where its allies dominate, but those countries bring their own constraints. Syria already chooses to limit Iran’s offensive actions, and because Israel contests Iran’s presence in that country, it is unlikely to become the same sort of staging ground that Lebanon once was. Rather, Iran is more likely to double-down on its investments in Iraq and Yemen, where it could build up the arsenals of its allies and forward deploy greater numbers of missiles and drones. Yet, those proxies are far away from Israel, and cannot exert the same level of pressure as Hizbollah.

Through Israel’s multi-pronged war, Iran has become more vulnerable than at any time since the American invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq following 9/11. Iran’s greatest strength came when its military capabilities and those of its allied clients, were unused. It was the threat of those weapons that constrained Israel, but now that Israel has learned to manage those threats, Tehran’s deterrence has been lost. Iran also must contend with the possibility that its missile stockpile cannot be quickly replenished, which makes the prospect of an attritional war more dangerous for the regime to pursue.

Iran is left in a difficult position, and it must now also contend with the return of President Trump, and the high probability that his administration will once again prioritise pressuring Iran.

Iran’s strategy for dealing with Trump following the onset of sanctions in 2018, after the US withdrawal from the nuclear deal, was to escalate both against US regional partners, and against US forces in Syria and Iraq. Iran’s aggression during that period, which included strikes on Saudi Arabia’s oil facilities in 2019, and a large ballistic missile attack on US forces in Iraq in 2020, brought the country perilously close to war. But the United States under President Trump did not respond to either attack. America’s hesitancy emboldened Iran’s aggression, leading to more assertive and risky behaviour. It also loosened the effect of the maximum pressure campaign, because the more Iran probed US redlines, the more Iran’s leaders became convinced that despite his strong rhetoric, Trump had no appetite for war with Iran.

Now Iran is in a much weaker position and its risk calculus might be changing. Iran could still choose the path of resistance, and meet any pressure from Washington with force. But in such a scenario, Iran would be doing so without the benefit of its key proxies and with Israel already on a war footing. Given the heightened context, any Iranian aggression against Israel or US interests, would likely force the Trump administration to consider employing military action.

Although Trump’s inclination has been against war, that feeling is not set in stone. His position could change, particularly were Israel to advocate for further military strikes and take the lead in attacking Iran. For instance, in January 2020, Trump authorised a drone strike that killed Qasem Soleimani, who served as the commander of the Quds Force, the elite unit of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps responsible for extraterritorial operations. Soleimani was instrumental in extending Iran’s influence across the Middle East by orchestrating its involvement in conflicts in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen. This decisive action showcased Trump’s willingness to use military force against key Iranian figures when provoked. An easy argument for Israel to make is that while it started the job against Iran, it needs the help of the United States to finish it. With Iran up against the ropes and Israel at the ready, Trump could put his worries aside and use military power to pursue a definitive end to Iran’s nuclear aspirations.

Yet, as much as Trump has positioned himself as an Iran-hawk, he is also someone who values deal-making. Iran will therefore have a decision to make. Should the Trump administration once again turn up the pressure on Iran through sanctions enforcement and other soft measures, Iran could seek to negotiate, and test the president’s willingness to engage. Iran is unlikely to seriously consider any sort of maximalist agreement, but it might be willing to compromise on its nuclear programme, particularly because should a nuclear deal be negotiated by a Republican administration it would likely survive scrutiny from the Democrats. For Tehran, that could be a risk worth taking.

Depending on how one reads the tea leaves, there are reasons to be either concerned that war in the Middle East will persist, or cautiously optimistic that it might not. Even if the odds are that conflict will continue, with change coming to Washington, there is an opportunity to reset the game. The chances for peace are slim, and Iran holds a lot of the cards. But should Iran step back from the escalatory cycle, and make diplomatic overtures to Washington, the Trump administration, by wanting to avoid being sucked into another war, acknowledging that Arab partners no longer want confrontation, and realising that Iran has already been weakened by Israel, could be willing to listen.