Smoke rises as protesters gather amid evolving anti-government unrest in Mashhad, Razavi Khorasan province, Iran, released on Jan. 10, 2026, in this screen grab obtained from a social media video. Photo: SOCIAL MEDIA/via REUTERS

The statement delivered by President Donald Trump this week, was more than just another warning to a rogue state. By declaring that the Iranian regime had finally begun to cross “very strong” red lines, and noting that “people are being killed who aren’t supposed to be killed,” the administration signaled the end of a long, failed experiment in managed containment.

We are no longer witnessing a typical cycle of civil unrest in the Middle East. Instead, we are watching the mechanical, violent twitching of what can only be described as a “zombie state” — a clerical establishment that died economically and morally years ago, but continues to walk, fueled only by the survival instincts of its security apparatus and the blood of its own citizens.

To understand why Washington must now move from rhetoric to reality, one must look past the regime’s propaganda and into the overwhelmed wards of Tehran’s hospitals.

On the night of January 8, 2026, as the regime pulled the “kill-switch” on the nation’s Internet, reducing connectivity to a mere one percent, a concentrated slaughter was unleashed in the capital. Reports from medical professionals, risking their lives to smuggle out data, confirm a horrific tally: 217 deaths across just six hospitals in a single night. At Milad and Imam Hossein hospitals, doctors counted 70 bodies each, many arriving with gunshot wounds to the head and eyes — the unmistakable signature of a deliberate shoot-to-kill policy. These victims were not collateral damage in a riot; they were targets of a state that has forgotten how to lead and only knows how to execute.

This “zombie” nature of the Iranian government is not just a metaphor. It is a structural reality. In political analysis, a zombie institution is one that persists long after its social utility has vanished, now driven solely by the primary motivation to survive regardless of the cost to the world. Since the brief but intense “12-Day War” in June 2025, which saw the US and Israel puncture Iran’s aura of deterrence by striking nuclear and military sites, the regime has been in a terminal tailspin. The economy is in a “survival phase,” marked by a currency collapse and a banking system so hollowed by corruption that Bank Melli, the nation’s largest lender, recently faced a massive bank run and suspended cash withdrawals. 

Rather than addressing these failures, the clerical elite has retreated into a bunker mentality, labeling every protester a “terrorist” and an “enemy of God” — a charge that carries the mandatory death penalty in their warped legal system. Sensing that the local Law Enforcement Command was “balking” at the order to massacre their own neighbors, the regime has now unleashed the IRGC Ground Forces. Even more telling is the regime’s reliance on foreign muscle; approximately 800 fighters from Iraqi Shiite militias, including Kataib Hezbollah, have been flown in to do the work that even some Iranian soldiers are refusing to do. A regime that must hire foreign mercenaries to kill its own people is a regime that has already lost its soul.

For Washington, the strategic interest is clear: a nuclear-armed zombie is a threat to the world. President Trump’s “very strong options” must address the current “deterrence gap” in the Persian Gulf, where the absence of a US carrier strike group has encouraged Tehran to test American resolve. But the true solution lies in empowering the living movement that is already challenging the dead regime. The Iranian people are no longer asking for reform; they are flying the pre-1979 flag and calling for the return of the Pahlavi dynasty to restore their national identity.

Washington should immediately move to provide the material tools of resistance. This means bypassing the regime’s digital iron curtain with “direct-to-cell” technologies and thousands of additional Starlink terminals, ensuring the next Internet blackout fails to hide the regime’s crimes. It means facilitating financial channels that allow the global diaspora to fund nationwide strikes, effectively starving the zombie state of the resources it uses to fuel its machines of war. If military force is used, it must be surgical, targeting the specific IRGC units responsible for the hospital massacres, thereby providing the Iranian people the breathing room they need to reclaim their sovereignty.

The 217 martyrs of Tehran’s hospitals — and the many others that have since joined them — have already paid the entry fee for a new Iran. They have proven that the clerical establishment rules only through violence, an observation President Trump echoed on his return from Mar-a-Lago. The time for bargaining with a corpse is over. The “Greatest Peace” the Middle East has ever seen will not come through negotiations with a criminal regime; it will come when the Iranian people are given the support to finally bury the zombie state and build a free, stable, and democratic future.

Amine Ayoub, a fellow at the Middle East Forum, is a policy analyst and writer based in Morocco. Follow him on X: @amineayoubx

Israel’s representative to the Eurovision Song Contest, Yuval Raphael, a survivor of the deadly Oct. 7 2023, attack by Hamas on the Nova festival in Israel’s south, holds an Israeli flag in this handout photo obtained by Reuters on Jan. 23, 2025. Photo: “The Rising Star,” Channel Keshet 12/Handout via REUTERS

Israel will participate in the first semifinal of the 2026 Eurovision Song Contest in Vienna, Austria, in May and will perform during the second half of the competition, the European Broadcasting Union announced on Monday.

US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping react as they hold a bilateral meeting at Gimhae International Airport, on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, in Busan, South Korea, Oct. 30, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein

US President Donald Trump’s threat to slap a 25% tariff on countries that trade with Iran risks reopening old wounds with Beijing, Tehran’s biggest trading partner.

Iran became a flashpoint in US-China ties during Trump’s 2017-21 first term as president as Washington tightened sanctions on Tehran and put China‘s Huawei, accused of selling technology to the Islamic Republic, in its crosshairs.

The arrest of Meng Wenzhou, the daughter of Huawei’s founder, in Canada at Washington’s request sparked retaliation and a hostage crisis, with bitter recriminations lingering for the remainder of Trump’s first administration.

With Iran in his sights once again, the duty would see Chinese shipments to the US incurring levies exceeding 70%, higher than the effective 57.5% tariffs in place before Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping struck a deal in October to de-escalate their trade war.

It remains unclear which countries with Iranian business links Trump might target, and he has not named China. The US president has also made offhand remarks that threatened to upend US foreign policy without acting on them before.

“China will call [Trump’s] bluff. I can assure you that Trump has no guts to impose the extra 25% tariffs on China, and if he does, China will retaliate and he will be punished,” said Wu Xinbo, dean of the Institute of International Studies at Fudan University, “just like in Meng Wenzhou’s case.”

BACK TO THE FUTURE

Some Chinese experts questioned why Trump seemed intent on revisiting one of the most contentious foreign policy issues from his first term, despite having already made Beijing think twice about providing economic support to Tehran.

“China and Iran are not as close as in the public imagination,” said a Beijing-based Chinese academic who advises the foreign ministry on Iran policy, and requested anonymity as they were not authorized to speak to media.

China has sharply reduced Iranian imports in recent years, according to Chinese customs data, with Chinese companies wary of being sanctioned by the US government. China bought just $2.9 billion of Iranian goods in the first 11 months of last year, the latest customs figures show, compared with a peak of $21 billion in 2018 during Trump’s first presidency.

That said, Beijing moves around 80% of Iran‘s shipped oil through small independent refiners trading off the books to skirt US sanctions over the country’s nuclear ambitions.

China‘s state-backed oil majors have not done any business with Iran since 2022. Some analysts say the independents’ shipments means the total value of China‘s purchases remains in the tens of billions of dollars.

“China is just an excuse, a kind of disguise for the Trump administration, to impose new pressure [on] Iran,” said Wang Jin at the Beijing Club for International Dialogue think tank.

When asked at Tuesday’s regular press conference on Trump’s tariff threat, China‘s foreign ministry said that Beijing would “resolutely safeguard its legitimate rights and interests.”

HIGH STAKES

Still, Iran remains substantially bigger business for China than Venezuela, where Trump acted to curb Beijing’s stake with a commando raid to capture President Nicolas Maduro to face drug charges in the United States.

Analysts said Trump’s renewed push to cut off Iran from global trade flows is likely to deepen scrutiny of Xi’s flagship Belt and Road Initiative, where Iran is a strategic hub for the passage of Chinese goods to the Middle East.

It also raises uncertainty over whether Trump will visit Beijing in April as expected, with analysts anticipating the announcement of a sweeping trade agreement with Xi.

“Whether Trump’s tariffs are enforceable remains a question,” said Xu Tianchen, a Beijing-based analyst at the Economist Intelligence Unit.

“Last year he announced tariffs related to ‘illicit’ Russian oil trade, but their implementation was patchy.”

“Trump is also the kind of person who likes bullying the weak,” Xu said. “He should manage his actions to avoid these tariffs escalating into direct confrontation with China.”