Rym Momtaz, Pierre Vimont, and Maha Yahya discuss how the war on Iran is reshaping the Middle East and why Europe has sacrificed its influence in the region and the world.
The Iranian nuclear deal was the last issue where Europe could realistically claim to have diplomatic influence.
Rym Momtaz, Pierre Vimont, and Maha Yahya debate whether the war in Iran has left Europe irrelevant on the global stage.
[00:00:00] Intro, [00:00:51] The Current Situation in Lebanon and the Region, [00:09:16] Is Europe Now Irrelevant in the Region?, [00:25:54] The Role of the Gulf and the Future of the Region.
Maha Yahya, March 4, 2026, “How Is the War Playing Out in Iran?”, Inside Story, Al Jazeera English.
Pierre Vimont, March 3, 2026, “Europe on Iran : Gone with the Wind”, Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.
Rosa Balfour, February 8, 2026, “Dependence on the United States is Deeply Rooted in the European Mindset”, Le Monde.
Rosa Balfour, January 6, 2026, “The Cost of Europe’s Weak Venezuela Response”, Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.
Pierre Vimont, October 15, 2024, “The EU Needs an Interagency Process for Foreign Policy”, Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.
Pierre Vimont, October 10, 2023, “Europe’s Moment of Powerlessness in the Middle East”, Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe.
Rym Momtaz
Hello and welcome to this episode of Europe Inside Out. I'm your host, Remontaz, editor in Chief of Strategic Europe, Carnegie Europe's blog, where twice a week we publish punchy, short analysis on all things strategic in Europe. I'm happy to be back on the podcast after a short leave. But alas, the world is confronted to an escalating war that the United States and Israel launched against Iran and that is already, already having repercussions far beyond the Middle East. I'm therefore thankful that Maha Yahya, Director of Carnegie Middle east center, is joining us from Beirut, along with Pierre Vimont, M. Senior Fellow at Carnegie Europe from Paris. Hello, both.
Pierre Vimont
Hello.
Maha Yahya
Hi. It's good to see you.
Rym Momtaz
We'll attempt over the next half hour to unpack the impact of this war on obviously the Middle east and of course on Europe, because it's all connected. I see it after the Iranian people and obviously the people of the Middle East, Europe is the place that will be the most impacted and will pay the highest price for this war that was launched by Europe's most important ally, the United States, without any consultation or coordination. But before we delve into the European side, Maha I want to go to you first. You're in Lebanon. Israel is once again bombing heavily, it seems set to carry out at least a ground incursion, maybe in the view of occupying more Lebanese territory. And it has been carrying out pretty massive bombing in Beirut, in the southern suburb of Beirut to be precise, but also targeted killings in Beirut as of this morning. Give us a sense of the situation right now.
Maha Yahya
Good morning, Rym. Good morning, Pierre. It's good to see you both and to be on the podcast, again actually with the both of you. just very briefly, the situation here is incredibly tense. Lebanon has become part of the Iran, Israel warfront. Iran, Israel, U.S. warfront. Very clearly the involvement of Hezbollah in this conflict came at the BS of the IRGC in Iran. What we saw after the assassination of Sayyid Hassan Nasrallah, the former Secretary General of Hezbollah, is that the IRGC went from being involved in the macro affairs of Hezbollah down to the micromanagement of the military, at least aspects of it. So that's one. The response and the bombardments that we've seen are of course, completely unproportional, or there's no proportionality here. The ceasefire that was declared in 2024, November 2024, has been unilateral. Israel has continued carrying out targeted attacks over the past year and something, as well as bombings more than 400 and something members of Hezbollah, but also another hundred civilians have been killed in the past year and a half. And now this new bombing campaign. What we're seeing with this new bombing campaign is that it's a Dahya doctrine which was taken to Gaza, refined in Gaza or made far more brutal, and that's being brought back to Lebanon.
Rym Momtaz
So what's the Dahya doctrine?
Maha Yahya
The Dahya doctrine was about flattening the southern suburbs on top of the head of people. what we're seeing today is flattening plus mass evacuations. In the space between March 2 and March 3, Israel or the IDF issued evacuation notices for about 100 towns and villages across Lebanon in the south. and in the big car,
Rym Momtaz
That's how many people at least I would say maybe a million, 700,000. Well, right now we have 750,000 people displaced. One notice alone was about the displacement of the southern suburbs, which is half a million people.
Rym Momtaz
Right, in a country where the government doesn't have the means
Maha Yahya
In a country where the government not only doesn't have the means, this is a country that still has not recovered from a massive economic and financial collapse that occurred in 2019. Bank you know, the collapse of the banking system. People have lost their savings. The country was hit by like the rest of the world by Covid, the port Beirut port explosion, the war with Israel in 2024. Reconstruction hasn't even happened. after the last war with Israel and now massive destruction again, people are exhausted. And many of those that are fleeing have already lost whatever cushion they had left in 2024. They reinvested in making their homes habitable again. So, the destitution is horrific. What we have seen though, is the government has been far more prepared than before. They were able to absorb large numbers very quickly, and yet still people are preferring to sleep. and we're hearing this directly from officials. Many people are preferring to sleep in their cars close by to their neighborhoods, near their neighborhoods, and the hope that they can get to their homes quickly when the bombing stops. And many of them are doing that actually. They go home during the day and then come back.
Rym Momtaz
So you're talking about the displacement of around, you know, 750,000 people at least in a country. Obviously, it would be hard for any country to handle this kind of exodus so quickly. Do you have a sense of the public sentiment at least among those who are having to evacuate their homes toward Hezbollah and why Hezbollah felt the need to enter this war knowing that it would bring so much destruction onto Lebanon yet again.
Maha Yahya
For the community itself, the displaced, I think there are a range of feelings. I don't think one can represent them with kind of one sentiment. There's obviously a lot of anger and angst at having to be displaced. People truly are exhausted. The kind of bombing we're seeing in the southern suburbs and the destruction we're seeing in the South is worse than 2024, much worse. So, a lot of people are realizing they may not have homes to go back to, and there's no one there to rebuild for them. There's no one there to take responsibility for this. So, there is a lot of anger and there is a lot of angst, but at the same time, the sense that this is not just a war on Lebanon, but it's a war on the Shiite community, specifically, because this is where, you know, much of the bombing has been happening. And these evacuation notices, these targeted attacks have placed kind of a bullseye on the entire community. They're being forced to evacuate en masse. And then the targeted attacks have created levels of paranoia in the country where any displaced person is seen with suspicion, not because they're about to do something wrong, but the fear that Israel may want to target that person has created this environment of paranoia. So, we're seeing a lot of tensions on the ground around these issues. How this is going to play out later, we don't know. Vis-a-vis Hezbollah, there is a mixed sentiment. There's on the one hand, a sense of, why did you get us involved in this? But there's also an understanding that Israel was preparing to invade Lebanon. I mean, now it's out in the open. it has been for a while, frankly. We've been hearing this, that they've been preparing for a military operation on Lebanon. Again, with or without what's happening in Iran. The question then becomes to Hezbollah, to Hezbollah now, is, then why did you preempt it? If they were coming, then just wait until this happens, and then you can defend. But this sense that Hezbollah is still kind of defending Lebanon no matter what one might think of that is also pervasive within parts of the community. And I think in part it is because the state institutions and the army are not at the level that they need to be Again, it's a state that's been struggling with multiple crises. There still isn't the confidence that, for example, the Lebanese army would be able to protect this community in Lebanon.
Rym Momtaz
There was a conference that was supposed to happen last week in Paris in support of the Lebanese military's capabilities in order to be able to disarm Hezbollah and uphold the state's sovereignty over all of its territory. And because of this war, it was scuttled and it was postponed. And we're also seeing the French president you know, try to activate yet again his contacts and try to leverage, I guess, his political capital in order to prevent what you were just saying, which is an Israeli plan to invade and occupy parts of Lebanon. Yet again. How is the role of France perceived in Lebanon, and is it taken seriously? Do people believe that it could lead to something?
Maha Yahya
I think people here are desperate enough for any initiative as you know, French- Lebanese relations have always been excellent. The Lebanese call France are, you know al-umm al-hanun, our affectionate mother. So, there is a very warm relationship. And frankly, the Lebanese are desperate. But at the same time, there is an understanding that the only person that is capable of stopping this is President Trump. It's the United States. They're the only entity that's capable of stopping the escalatory path on which Lebanon is on. You asked earlier why Hezbollah did this, despite knowing the cost and despite, by the way, offering promises not only to the speaker of Parliament, but also to the government that they would not do this. I believe that there is, and this is, again, we were hearing this even before from various contacts, that there was. There is a schism within Hezbollah. Not everybody was on board when it came to this, and in fact, they wanted to stay out of this. But again, this was a, I believe, an Iran decision that was taken by the IRGC. And the military part of Hezbollah that is directly managed by the IRGC were given the, you know, the green light to go ahead. And they were given the green light because Lebanon shares a border with Israel. So they can reach. They can send drones that are more likely to reach certain targets in Israel than whatever is sent from Iran.
Rym Momtaz
Just to remind our listeners, that's what happened in 2023 after the October 7 terrorist attacks against Israel. Based on discussions with all of our contacts, yours and mine, the Secretary General of Hezbollah, Nasrallah, did not want to enter the war. And then he didn't have a choice. And it, it just goes to show that Hezbollah, at the end of the day, is submissive to the IRGC and doesn't get a choice. It is not a sovereign, Lebanese patriotic group that is only about defending the Lebanese territory against Israeli occupation. And I think that is one of the issues that is always coming up. We also saw them send drones to attack Cyprus and, you know, an EU country. And I want to bring you in, Pierre, because you, you were a diplomat for a long time, I think I can say that. and you wrote last week, a piece for Strategic Europe, a searing article about the disunited and meek European response, as you put it. you know, what do you make of the Europeans position so far? You know, I mentioned a bit what the French president is doing. What about the rest of the Europeans, but also what about the EU?
Pierre Vimont
First of all, thank you for inviting me and it's always a pleasure to see you both again. To answer your question, Rym, disunited and giving an impression of powerlessness. This is what I see with the EU. And one could take precisely the instance of Lebanon where France and of course, but also the EU have been very active in the past. And this is what always strikes me at the moment. If you compare with 10 years ago or more when you had instances of an open conflict between Israel and Lebanon, usually France and the EU rushed into that crisis to try to mediate, find ways of moving out, start a diplomatic process to bring both sides together at least give the impression of being active agile as possible and trying to help find a sol, if only listening to what Maha was saying calling Washington day and night and over again to convince President Trump to stop Israel from doing what they're doing at the moment in Lebanon would seem to me to be a natural diplomatic channel. Are they doing this? I'm not at all sure. they're witnessing, you know what I'm saying? The way I would summarize the European position is that they have become observers, commentators of the international scene. They're not actors and players anymore in it. And I think this is moving in the wrong direction, to be honest.
Rym Momtaz
And we're not even just talking about the international scene. We're talking about the Southern neighborhood of the EU. Like this has a real impact on the EU.
Pierre Vimont
Of course, our direct neighborhood. and you know, this is part of the Middle east, where we have been very active in the past in the piece I made for Carnegie, I was reminding the history of the negotiation on the Iranian nuclear program. It all started with the Europeans. They were instrumental in playing a major role for the whole 15 years of the negotiation. When President Trump, during his first mandate, decided to withdraw, they stayed on and they said that they would protect this agreement. And unfortunately, they failed. \
Rym Momtaz
Because, as you said, they were architects of the JCPOA. Why did the EU and E3, France, Germany and the UK fail in protecting the JCPOA after President Trump withdrew the United States
Pierre Vimont
Because it was at some stage being ready to stand up to the United States and to say, we're going ahead despite the sanctions, finding the proper instruments to oppose the sanctions and to protect our enterprises against the American sanctions. And here I could go even further back in history. Ronald Reagan, 1980, when was it 82 or 83, when Ronald Reagan asked Europeans to stop the construction of the gas pipeline with the Soviet Union at the time because of what was happening in Afghanistan. You had Margaret Thatcher, by the way, the German Chancellor, Helmut Kohl, and Francois Mitterrand saying, no way. We will not allow. We will not stop. We think this has nothing to do with Afghanistan. And therefore, they just said no. And then, of course, it was different. It was Ronald Reagan. Ronald Reagan decided that, okay, he would let the Europeans go on with their gas pipeline. So, it's a matter at some stage of standing up and having a little bit of political courage. but I think it's more than that today, because I recognize it's very difficult with the diversity of the European Union, the fact that we're 27 member states who don't have the same vision of the Middle East, the same interest in the Middle East. Look at how the Eastern and Central European countries have reacted to the war in Iran, saying that some of them have supported the American and Israeli intervention. Some of them have even applauded at the death of Ayatollah Khamenei.
Rym Momtaz
That also includes the German Chancellor, who seems to be constantly contradicting himself. Like, one day he thinks it's a good thing, the other day he doesn't. And I was struck, sorry to interrupt you, but I was really struck by something, and I really want to get both of your reactions to this. The German Chancellor's first reaction was basically to say the Europeans shouldn't be lecturing the United States on the legality on international law, the legality of this war that is being waged by the United States and Israel against Iran. And yesterday, two days ago, the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, in her speech to ambassadors of the EU basically said that the EU can no longer be sort of a pillar of this order that is based on international law. Isn't that a sea change? Like how, how do your expert ears react to this? I'll go to Maha and then to you, Pierre.
Maha Yahya
Look, it's part of the erosion that we're seeing in anything. It began, I would say it began with Gaza, but probably it began much earlier than Gaza. But to me, the most kind of flamboyant or in your face example of this is what has been happening in Gaza over the past two and a half years. It's, I often say it's ground zero for international human rights, for international law and order, for all of these concepts. So, to question the legality or not legality of this attack, I think it's illegal by all international standards, it is illegal. There's no two way about it. When people are comparing it to 2003, the invasion of Iraq. At least the U.S. at the time went through the motions and tried to get some sort of international consensus around this and went in with the UN and etc. This time it was a unilateral thing.
Rym Momtaz
Saying that it's illegal is not saying that the Iranian system is one that is, you know, that that hasn't been engaged in a lot of illegal activities themselves.
Maha Yahya
No, no two evils do not make a right. It’s as simple as that. Saying the war is illegal has nothing, is not a defense of what the Iranian regime has done to its own people first and foremost, and to people in this region, including Lebanon. So here we are, we're in the middle of yet another war because this was a war of choice for the Americans and for the Iranians in terms of Lebanon. Lebanon had no say in this, and the region had no say in this. and Europe had no say in this. And I just got off a call just a few minutes ago with some Gulf counterparts and they're like, you know, we're the ones paying the price for this where the immediate neighborhood we are being bombed and we had no say in this war of choice.
Rym Momtaz
Because the Gulf, it's a really interesting point, and I think there are some similarities with the EU. But I want to get your response, Pierre, to this, because the EU is supposed to be a normative project. The strength, the superpower of the EU is its normative power. And when you hear the President of the Commission say what she said, or the Chancellor of Germany say what he says, what does that mean? Are they weakening their own power? At the end of the day.
Pierre Vimont
Yes, maybe but I think there is a distinction to make here that maybe neither the German Chancellor nor Sullivan van der Leyen have made. It's the distinction between international law that must be respected and we must all abide by it. And definitely like Maha was saying, it has been violated, whether in Lebanon, whether in Iran or elsewhere. I think there's very little doubt about this. And then there is the issue of the world order and the multilateral system that has become very ineffective today, and that needs to be reformed. And I guess this is what Mrs. vo n der Leyen was trying to say. Let's wake up and just not pretend that we can go back to the old world order a little bit along the line of what the prime Minister from Canada said it’s not a transition. I think, yes, they're right in saying this, but they mustn't throw the baby with the.
Rym Momtaz
With the bath water
Pierre Vimont
With the bathwater. And this is what sometimes they're doing a little bit under emotion of, of whatever. I think we have to be aware of this. Could I add one point? The point you were making, Maha, which I think is very true. It's not that because we are criticizing America and Israel for intervening the way they're doing, that we are supporting the Iranian regime. Of course, nobody is supporting the Iranian regime. But what I sense here is that today we're not able to be any more nuanced in the evaluation. The assessment we're making today of world politics is either or, you can't walk on two feet, on two legs. This is not allowed anymore. It's all about emotion. And I think this is also maybe one consequence of the way the world is being ruled today. And let's put it that way, the Trump administration, which is exactly moving into that direction. You're for us or against us, you're not allowed to have any kind of nuanced and balanced judgment of what is going on. It’s making the life of diplomats rather complicated today.
Maha Yahya
No, I just, I wanted to add to this, and I think this is why it's. And it's very important for people like us and others, I mean, our colleagues, this insistence that, no, we need to offer a nuanced reading of what's happening. It's not an ideological position. If I'm going to be ideological about anything, it'll be about international law and upholding international law, but not more. And the other thing I would say, why I keep insisting on this being a war of choice, is the repercussions of this are going to reverberate. I mean, let alone the horrific damage we're seeing in Iran, the cost to Iranians themselves. But we don't know where this is going to go. The political objectives, at least from the United States, from what we've heard from U.S. diplomats and policymakers, have shifted. We don't know what they want out of this war. one minute it's regime change. Another minute it's the ballistic. Another third minute it's the nuclear. And meanwhile, we're looking at a country that is of 90 million people where if there is chaos, if there is internal descent, if there is fragmentation, the ripple effects on the region and on Central Asia and far beyond are huge. And if this regime maintains survives in the way it. It is right now, the likelihood after the end of the war is it's going to be even more brutal with Iranians internally. So at the end of the day, an entire war was launched that Iranians are paying for and the region is paying for. And we don't know what political outcome of this or what the intention of all of this is supposed to be, other than the global economy. I mean, one can talk about all the other repercussions.
Rym Momtaz
So, I mean, as you said, 90 million Iranians who have been living under this repressive system for almost 50 years are now doubly victims because they also will pay the price of this war. They are paying the price. And again, I mean, all of us agree here that the Iranians, the Iranian system and regime engaged in illegal activity when it comes to enriching uranium, a nuclear program that was outside of the bounds of legality, engaged in illegal activities through regional influence groups and militias in Iraq, in Lebanon, in Palestine, in the Palestinian territories, in Syria, wreaking havoc for decades now and leaving so much death and destruction. Again, it doesn't mean that what the United States in Israel during today is more legal. And as you said, you were talking about your contacts, Maha, with Gulf countries and Gulf officials and people who live in the Gulf. They are paying a massive price because a big part of their model is predicated on security and stability. And that security obviously relies on American security. And today we're seeing that model be brought into question because as you were pointing out as well, if the United States doesn't win, quote, unquote against the Iranian regime, it is going to survive and be even more extreme than it was before. And the United States will have squandered its strategic position as a guarantor of security. And it's a bit the same thing that the Europeans are actually experiencing with the United States as the underwriter of their security for the past 80 years. and I just wonder, just to end this podcast on perhaps, you know, because our job is to also think about opportunities and what can be done. Is there space today at some point, despite all of the pretty bad case scenarios that we're all looking at and staring at? And we didn't even get into the impact on energy prices for Europe, the impact on the industrial sector in Europe and far beyond, but also the impact on food security because of the fertilizers that aren't coming out through the Strait of Hormuz, putting that to the side. But I do wonder, and I want to get your thoughts, both of you, on this. After the end of this war, is there a space for the Gulf countries and the European countries to come together and basically take stock of the fact that their most important ally is no longer as reliable as they need it to be, is actually endangering them by taking you know unilateral action without coordinating with them, even though it has direct impact on their security at every level. Is there something to be done there? Maybe. Pierre, you could start.
Pierre Vimont
Yes, but I would say, Rym, that this is not entirely new. just. You're talking about the Gulf country. Look at Saudi Arabia. You remember after the big hit they suffered from Iran, I think it was in 2019, this was under Trump 1.
Rym Momtaz
A big hit by the Houthis that are a militia that is Yemeni, that is connected to Iran, that hit the biggest oil field in Saudi Arabia.
Pierre Vimont
Never knew exactly if it was the Houthis or the Iranians themselves. But anyway, the Saudi Arabia started a paradigm shift that was quite interesting. This is the moment when they thought that the American protection was not enough because in fact the Americans did nothing during that attack. And they decided to start reaching out to Iran. And we got this agreement between Iran and Saudi Arabia under the tutorship of China. You remember, signed in Beijing. That was the whole purpose of the Saudi diplomacy. And they were not the only ones. Of course. Qatar was there also. The Emirati started to look at how to find some kind of stable relationship with Iran. So you had a shift for the last three or four years that was quite interesting to follow on. This is why all these countries pleaded for America not to start that war with Iran. And of course this has been totally shattered. This has disappeared. What are they going to build on top of this in the future? Remains the big question, of course can the Europeans be partners in the kind of stable economic template they want to reveal? Because it's all about having political stability in order to build a new economic model at the post oil area that they are desperately looking for. yes they will have to start thinking about that. And the Europeans could be useful partner for that, no doubt if they start moving and being a little bit more agile that they have been here today. But of course it's, it's quite too early to discuss this because much will depend on where Iran is whenever this conflict stops. Will we have the same regime? Maybe even harder than it was up to now. It's moving that way with the election denomination of the of the Ayatollah Khamenei's son, who is considered as to be a hardliner. you could have a very strong nationalistic Iranian population after what happened. Contrary to what was expected from America and Israel. Through the many contacts I'm still having with Tehran, uh today I got a little bit of that feeling. Even from staunch opponents to the Iranian regime, there is a sense of the nation itself being attacked and the need to protect it. So one must um be very careful about how Iran at some stage will come out of this war. and the war of choice brings about, as usual, the same question is that um war starts to roll dice, to roll the dices. You never know what will be the outcome of a war. And you know, the ones who are, know the best about this are the military people. And we should listen more to them.
Rym Momtaz
And you know, as the saying goes, your enemy also gets a say in a war. And so you start a war, you don't control all of the parameters. And the United States, even if they wanted to stop today, Iran gets a say in this. And of course, Israel gets a say in this because we, we're not going to get into that. But Israel and the United States don't share the same objectives in this war, even though they're prosecuting it together. Maha, what's the view from the Gulf? Because Pierre mentioned a very important, I think moment, which was when that attack happened on the big Saudi oil field. Greece and France sent radars to. To help at their own level, right in the. Within the bounds of their own mea ns. And we're seeing the same thing play out again today with France trying to honor its strategic partnerships with the uae, with Qatar, with Saudi Arabia. So what's the perception in the Gulf?
Maha Yahya
I'll talk about that in one second, but I wanted to say that while Israel and the US Are, do not necessarily have the same objectives in Iran, fortunately or unfortunately, they do have it in Lebanon. And this is what, for me is a major concern, that even when the guns stop in Iran in the war there doesn't mean this is going to translate into the Lebanon arena. And we have to wait and see. And much of it will depend on, as Pierre said, how the war in Iran ends. Perspective from the Gulf specifically is one. I mean, there is a sense of having been let down by the Americans. we've heard this publicly, frankly, from even prominent businessmen saying we've spent billions of dollars on defense cooperations buying, you know, defense systems, etc. from the United States and that, and investments in other arenas. And yet the only country that the United States was interested in protecting was Israel. So there is a sense of having been let down. And the conversations I've had, they talk about their strategic allies, but there's never a mention of the U.S. it's always about Europe, it's about France, it's about other countries, the UK and other countries in Europe. Where I also see perhaps an opportunity here is that the war has made all of the Gulf countries feel that their collective security is at stake. And you hear this repeatedly, that, you know, we have our differences internally within Gulf countries, however, we will sort them out when it comes to our security. It's a collective security. We're all being attacked here. It's not that one is being privileged over the other. Some are bearing the brunt more than others. the UAE, for example, but still they're all being attacked, collectively
Rym Momtaz
They're Getting closer to this much talked about, you know, collective security in, in the Gulf?
Maha Yahya
I don't know whether they're getting closer, but at least it's an opening of. And there is a realization, and you're hearing it across the board, that this is a question of collective security and they need to invest in that more.
Rym Momtaz
Just on that, that’s interesting because the Europeans are also at a moment of realization of that. So again, another place they could look, look, because, you know, the 27 countries, as Pierre was saying, do have a lot of differences, even more than exists between the GCC. So maybe, maybe they can have, you know, a lessons learned, shared lessons learned on both sides of the Mediterranean.
Maha Yahya
I think what Mark Carney was getting at in his now famous speech in Davos which honestly others had also been saying, which is fine, the multilateral, the international order, all of this edifice, the post-World War II edifice, is crumbling. There's no going back to it. However, we need to maintain, you know, it's our job as middle powers to try and find where are the areas we converge on and push on them collectively, whether it's climate, whether it's collective security, whether. Whatever it is. So I think there's a big opportunity here for a kind of coordination, cooperation on what this effectively means for Gulf countries, for European countries, and what a kind of an understanding between, a cooperation agreement between those two regions could look like, and one that hopefully would also include the rest of the, at least Middle East, the Levant, et cetera, it needs to include, because that such an approach like that will also include Cyprus among, among others. The other issue that I've heard is that whatever peace negotiations come out of this, if there are going to be negotiations, I mean, there's going to be a negotiated end to this. President Trump is going to have to pull the plug sooner or later on this operation. It, I think, will be pushed by the three M's, kind of munitions, midterm elections and markets. That's what's going to force that decision. But there's going to be some sort of negotiated end that also gets Iran to stop and that gets Israel to stop. So it's not. I mean, it's his decision, but other parties have to agree. So the, what the Gulf countries are saying now we want to seat on that table, this is not going to be just a, you know, a JCPOA where it's the U.S. talking to the Iranians leaving us out in the cold, where we've relied in the past on what they say. And, you know, we were fine with that this time. This is our own security. We're the neighborhood. We're the ones who are bearing the brunt of this. and we need to be sitting at the table discussing not just what is of interest to the United States, but what matters to us. And this includes the ballistic, the drones, and the region.
Rym Momtaz
I wonder where I've heard that one before. Perhaps a French president who keeps saying that, you know, Europeans need to be at the table of Russian-American discussions, but also on arms control. Pierre, you get the last word, and then, unfortunately, we're going to run out of time.
Pierre Vimont
I don't want to go back to the past, but I'm quite interested in what Maha would say, because you may remember when the whole thing was launched in 2003 by the three foreign affairs ministers from Europe Germany, UK, and France. It was the idea of having three baskets being discussed. There was the whole issue of the Iranian nuclear program. There was the idea of economic cooperation with Iran. And the third basket was collective security in the region, where we started a track with the Gulf countries didn't go very far. And when the Americans joined the group, they said we should only focus on the nuclear program. But the idea of promoting collective security in the region from the European side, proposed by the European side, was there from the beginning, when we the three European leaders discussed that. So, it comes back time and again, and I think we're back at it once again.
Rym Momtaz
Well, from both your lips to the ears of policymakers on both sides of the Mediterranean and in both continents, I want to thank you both for joining us. Of course, we could have spent another half hour discussing all of these issues. And we will have you both back on, perhaps when this war ends, hopefully sooner rather than later. Thank you so much.
Pierre Vimont
Thank you.
Maha Yahya
Thank you Rym, thank you Pierre.
Rym Momtaz
And thank you, the listeners, for joining this month’s episode of Europe Inside Out. For those who are interested in learning more about Europe’s role in this war, I encourage you to read Pierre’s article headlined “Europe in Iran: Gone with the Wind?”. And follow the work of Carnegie Europe and Carnegie Middle East on X and LinkedIn as we will be publishing more articles on the issue in the coming days and weeks. Our producer is Mattia Bagherini.