Two scenes from the past help explain the present. The first occurred when Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, after the victory of the Iranian Revolution, ordered the Israeli flag to be removed from Israel’s embassy in Tehran and replaced with the Palestinian flag. This act changed the nature of Iran’s relationship with the most difficult issue in the Middle East. The second scene came when the world watched Americans being taken hostage inside their own embassy in Tehran. The American hostage crisis lasted for months and reshaped the language of interaction between Tehran and Washington. The emotions and orientations were never a secret. Iran’s own constitution calls for exporting the revolution and supporting the oppressed, while chants have long called for eliminating Israel and expelling the “Great Satan,” the United States, from the region.

The victory of the Khomeini revolution was not an ordinary event. It was a revolution born outside the traditional Cold War framework in a country possessing considerable resources and located at the crossroads of vital routes, straits, and wealth. Experience suggests that overwhelming victories against regimes like that of the Shah often give their victors an extraordinary dose of arrogance and an insatiable appetite for ambition. That is precisely what happened. The victors fell into the trap of seeking to reshape the Middle East, with some aiming even further.

Saddam Hussein felt uneasy. Khomeini made no secret of his determination to topple the “infidel Baathist regime” in Iraq after overthrowing the Pahlavi monarchy. Saddam feared time itself—he feared being forced to fight Iran’s allies in the streets of Baghdad—so he chose instead to take the battle to the main stage: Iranian territory. In reality, the Iran–Iraq war postponed the process of transforming Iraq’s political order until the current century.

The war with Iraq did not push revolutionary Iran to abandon its project of reshaping the region—or specific countries within it—particularly those whose sectarian composition offered ideological opportunities. Amid the echoes of Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon, Hezbollah was born under Iranian patronage and with Syrian facilitation. Some believe that Hafez al-Assad, despite offering many explanations for his stance, was also driven by a minority’s desire to settle historical accounts with the Sunni majority in the region.

A third scene also helps explain the present. A suicide bomber known as “Abu Zainab” drove a truck packed with explosives into the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut. Washington decided to withdraw its troops from the multinational force into the sea before eventually leaving altogether. Lebanon once again fell under the influence of Assad’s Syria and Khomeini’s Iran.

Assad the father offered a golden gift to Hezbollah and Iran when his security apparatus in Lebanon—either directly or indirectly—facilitated a wave of assassinations targeting the Lebanese National Resistance Front, effectively leaving the southern Lebanese front solely in Hezbollah’s hands.

Amid ongoing clashes with Israel, Hezbollah consolidated its role within Lebanon’s political equation, eventually gaining decisive influence. At the same time, Iranian influence along the Mediterranean coast grew stronger, particularly after Syria entered the era of the second Assad. In the current century, the process of reshaping Lebanon accelerated. Israel withdrew from southern Lebanon without achieving clear gains. The U.S. army toppled Saddam Hussein’s regime. Then the assassination of Rafik Hariri deepened the transformation of Lebanon’s political landscape. The struggle to reshape Lebanon succeeded, and the 2006 war with Israel served as one of the tools to rebalance the political order established after Hariri’s assassination. Thereafter, Hezbollah held the keys to power, becoming the decisive voice in effectively “appointing” presidents and governments.

The battle to reshape the region was also decisive in Iraq. Iranian-aligned factions appeared in the Iraqi Governing Council and successive governments, while General Qassem Soleimani oversaw efforts to destabilize the system built by the United States—one constructed with a severe lack of political experience. Soleimani orchestrated the dismantling of alliances, the removal of obstacles, and the planting of explosive devices that accelerated the fracturing of the new system and expanded Tehran’s influence over Iraqi decision-making. When ISIS emerged, Soleimani succeeded in turning Ayatollah Sistani’s fatwa into cover for the creation of the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), transforming them into an official security institution. Iraq’s features changed profoundly—evidenced by Iraqi factions that later engaged in military actions in the current conflict.

The long era of Ali Khamenei has been one defined by reshaping regional dynamics. The Supreme Leader placed his bets on two figures close to both his mind and heart: Qassem Soleimani and Hassan Nasrallah. During Khamenei’s tenure, Yemen’s political landscape was also transformed, eventually culminating in the elimination of President Ali Abdullah Saleh. The Palestinian trajectory also shifted after Tehran encouraged suicide operations following the Oslo Accords and later promoted tunnel warfare, as well as the supply of rockets and drones.

Qassem Soleimani worked tirelessly to sever what he viewed as the “American thread,” which he considered the main obstacle to expanding the project of reshaping the region. Revolutionary Guard generals openly boasted about altering the balance of power in four Arab capitals. Soleimani dreamed of encircling Israel with a storm of rockets launched from multiple fronts. The actions taken by Yahya Sinwar cannot be understood without referring back to Soleimani’s strategy—a strategy that led Donald Trump to order Soleimani’s assassination in Baghdad.

Was Tehran behind what might be called “Sinwar’s flood,” even if the timing of its launch was concealed? Did it miscalculate the strength of Israel and the United States? What is clear is that Benjamin Netanyahu attempted to transform this “flood” into a historic opportunity to reshape the landscape along Israel’s borders with Arab states.

A flood of fire began. The Syrian link in the so-called “Axis of Resistance” collapsed, and Israel began implementing a new military doctrine: confronting threats before they escalate and surrounding Israel with buffer zones.

Netanyahu concluded that reshaping Israel’s immediate strategic environment would remain incomplete and vulnerable unless change also occurred within Tehran itself. He made numerous attempts to persuade Donald Trump, and eventually a threefold objective took shape: preventing Iran from achieving a nuclear capability, forcing its missile arsenal to be scaled back, and severing the connections between Iran and its regional proxies.

We are now in the most volatile chapter of the war of changing features. Iran reshaped several states in the region, while the United States—today in partnership with Israel—is attempting to reshape the Iranian regime itself, partially or entirely. What is certain is that the marks of the current confrontation will remain visible in the features of all its parties once the storm subsides.