By: Hira A. Malik
Once again, the world watches in real-time as the boundaries of global order are tested — and broken. Israel’s latest strike on Iran’s nuclear-linked infrastructure feels less like a shocking escalation and more like the next inevitable chapter in an age of impunity.
We’ve seen this play before. In 2003, the U.S. invaded Iraq, justifying the war with tales of weapons of mass destruction that never existed. Evidence was flimsy, inspections were cut short, and diplomacy was cast aside. The result: a shattered nation, untold suffering, and a global order scarred by the hypocrisy of power. Today, two decades on, the same script unfolds — faster, bolder, more cynical. The target now is Iran.
With Gaza in ruins and international outrage swelling over Israel’s brutal campaign, Prime Minister Netanyahu has turned outward. Under the banner of preemption, Israel has attacked Iran — not in response to an attack, but to an imagined future threat. The logic: strike first, justify later. The risk? That this “preventive self-defence” becomes a new norm, hollowing out international law and eroding what little remains of nuclear non-proliferation efforts.
When aggression wears the mask of defence
Let’s be clear. International law, from the UN Charter to decades of precedent, sets a high bar for the use of force: self-defence applies only when an armed attack is happening or is truly imminent. Israel’s strike doesn’t meet that bar. There was no imminent Iranian attack. No active threat. Just suspicion, speculation, and strategic timing.
And yet, the response from many Western capitals was not outrage, but muted approval — or worse, tacit endorsement. Legal scholars like Dr. Ben Saul warn that this marks a turning point: “Preventive war has been rejected for decades. Now, with Israel’s action, that rejection is weakening. And once that door opens, it will not easily close.”
This is how global norms die — not in dramatic declarations, but in exceptions quietly carved out for allies.
The ripple effect: diplomacy as a dead end
There’s a deeper danger here. If Israel’s strike is allowed to stand as “legitimate,” it tells the world’s states — especially those already insecure — that negotiation is futile. Dr. Ashok Swain puts it starkly: “The message is simple: even transparency won’t protect you. Even compliance invites attack.”
Why stick to a nuclear deal, if you can be bombed anyway? Why open your facilities to inspection, if the reward is sabotage? In this climate, the incentive tilts dangerously toward covert nuclear programs. Not because states want war, but because they no longer trust in peace.
Impunity as policy
From the Osirak reactor in Iraq (1981) to Syria’s suspected reactor (2007), preemptive strikes have long been part of Israel’s doctrine. But this latest assault comes at a perilous moment: war in Gaza, rising settler violence, a far-right Israeli government, and fading U.S. restraint. Netanyahu’s strike was not just about Iran’s nuclear file — it was about changing the narrative, shifting attention from Gaza’s devastation to Iran’s specter.
Dr. Ori Goldberg, an Israeli scholar of Middle Eastern studies, calls it what it is: “This wasn’t about deterrence. It was about impunity.” The strike, he argues, was designed to remind the world — and the region — that Israel will act where and when it pleases, with or without international approval.
A dangerous precedent for the world
The implications stretch far beyond the Middle East. If preventive war becomes acceptable, the global order we’ve relied on since 1945 — one that sought to replace conquest with law — crumbles. What stops other states from following suit? What stops arms races in unstable regions? What stops the return of rule by force?
Israel, it’s worth remembering, already possesses an undeclared nuclear arsenal. Iran, by contrast, has not made the political decision to build a bomb — at least according to U.S. and international intelligence. And if Tehran ever did, it would know that the price would be annihilation.
And yet, Israel’s strikes and the West’s indulgence only fuel Iran’s hawks, strengthen hardliners, and make a future nuclear Iran more likely, not less.
The West’s complicity — and the cost
Western democracies once decried preventive war. Today, they accommodate it — so long as the aggressor is a friend. As Dr. Saul notes, this permissiveness didn’t apply to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, or to apartheid South Africa’s adventures. But for Israel, exceptions are made. This selective application of law and morality doesn’t just tarnish Western credibility — it deepens the divides between North and South, between the powerful and the rest.
Even regional allies are alarmed. Saudi Arabia and the UAE, no friends of Iran, condemned the strike. Their fear? That Israel’s impunity could one day target them.
What’s at stake
At its core, this is bigger than Iran, Israel, or even the Middle East. The world is at risk of slipping into a new era of unilateralism — where might makes right, where restraint is for the weak, and where the rules-based order is little more than a slogan.
If we allow preventive war to become standard practice, we abandon the principles that kept nuclear weapons in check for generations. We abandon smaller nations to the whims of the strong. And we abandon hope that diplomacy can ever work.
The lesson of this moment is clear: if we shrug off this breach, we invite more of them. And in doing so, we edge closer to a world where war, not law, settles disputes.
