\n\n“Unbeknownst to many Americans, we’ve been hurtling toward a worsened conflict with Iran for nearly two years now. The Trump administration has been quietly escalating against the country and its allies using a selection of counterterrorism laws, many of them passed after 9\/11, that allowed it to act without going through Congress or the public. Former President Barack Obama, meanwhile, left a force in the region to counter the Islamic State that the Trump administration eventually pointed against the Islamic Republic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Trump and his advisors objected to the violence carried out by Iran and its proxies across the Middle East. They also disliked Obama’s “nuclear deal,” which lifted U.S. economic sanctions on Iran in order to get international inspectors access to the country’s nuclear research program. So in 2018, the Trump administration replaced Obama’s deal with a campaign of sanctions aimed at forcing the Iranian government to change a range of foreign and domestic policies.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n