Over the past two years, Iran’s network of allies in the Middle East has taken painful blows. In Syria, the regime of President Bashar al-Assad collapsed. In Lebanon, Hezbollah was forced to lay down its arms under a United States-brokered ceasefire and now faces pressure to disarm. In Yemen, the Houthis were forced to stop disrupting maritime traffic through the Red Sea after massive bombardment of infrastructure and civilian areas by US forces. On Thursday, an Israeli attack killed their prime minister, Ahmed al-Rahawi, along with several other ministers.

Iran’s once-formidable deterrence has spectacularly shrunk. And now it seems it may diminish even further as its influence in Iraq hangs by a thread. The Iraqi government faces increasing pressure from the US to rein in Iranian allies

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