That Iran is a country that exists in the cross hairs of Western regime change has long been self-evident. However since Donald Trump entered the White House, the intensity of demonization leveled at a country that has been a pole or resistance to US hegemony in the Middle East, along with a committed adversary of Israel and the Saudis, has been ramped up.
It is in this context that Washington's response to the recent wave of protests against the government in Tehran must be understood, even though said protests — at least initially — have been rooted in legitimate grievances; grievances which the country's president, Hassan Rouhani, has readily admitted to.
But given the attempt by the Trump administration to associate itself with the protests and protesters, we are fated to spend 2018 dealing with the same hypocrisy which emanated from the White House and US Congress in 2017.
Neither Donald Trump, his UN ambassador Nikki Haley, nor Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu care one iota for the welfare of one Iranian man, woman, or child, just the Bush and Obama administrations cared nothing for the welfare of the Iraqi and Libyan people in 2003 and 2011. Regime change was Washington's credo then and regime change is its credo now when it comes to Iran.
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