On Monday, I mentioned Queen Rania of Jordan’s appearance on CNN, in which, unchallenged by Christiane Amanpour, she heaped all sorts of libels on the Jewish state, while blaming it for Hamas’s brutal attacks on its populace. But if Hamas were to take over the West Bank—one of its goals—it would directly threaten Jordan’s stability, stability Israel has helped to maintain since the 1970s. The pro-Iranian axis, moreover, already endangers Amman from Syria in the north and Iraq in the east. The queen’s rhetoric, in other words, runs directly counter to her country’s interests.Nothing could make that clearer than the cruise missile, launched at Israel by Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels, that landed in the Jordanian desert yesterday. Another Houthi missile aimed at the Negev was intercepted by the Arrow defense system. And lest there be any doubt about the group’s intentions, its spokesman issued a de-facto declaration of war on Jerusalem. Jonathan Schanzer argues that the U.S. should respond by reinstituting the sanctions on the Houthis precipitously dropped in 2021:

The Biden administration’s reversal was completely disconnected from the question of whether the Houthis met the criteria for a terror designation. . . . It is an Iran-funded group that is armed and trained by the regime [and that] has launched more than 1,000 attacks against Saudi Arabia in recent years, and the Saudis have expressed frustration that the Biden White House has been seemingly indifferent to this.

The re-listing of the Houthis, ideally done publicly alongside Saudi officials, would send an unequivocal message to the Iranians and the wider Middle East. The message: the U.S.-Saudi relationship is back on track, and a revitalized U.S.-led regional alliance—one that includes both Israel and the Saudis—is taking shape. Such a move might be exactly what is needed to get those normalization discussions back on track between Riyadh and Jerusalem, whenever this war ends.

Critics of such a move might warn that it would needlessly provoke the Houthis. My response: they appear to be needlessly provoked already. Critics might also argue that re-listing the Houthis would prevent aid from entering Yemen. This is simply not true. Look at how much aid is pouring into Gaza, where a U.S. sanctioned terrorist group has (until now, anyway) maintained control.

If Iran succeeds in obtaining nuclear weapons, the war in Gaza, let alone the protests on college campuses, will seem like a minor complication. Jonathan Schachter fears that this danger could be much more imminent than decisionmakers in Jerusalem and Washington believe. In his view, Israel seems to be repeating the mistake that allowed it to be taken by surprise on Simchat Torah of 2023 and Yom Kippur of 1973: putting too much faith in an intelligence concept that could be wrong.

Israel and the United States apparently believe that despite Iran’s well-documented progress in developing capabilities necessary for producing and delivering nuclear weapons, as well as its extensive and ongoing record of violating its international nuclear obligations, there is no acute crisis because building a bomb would take time, would be observable, and could be stopped by force. Taken together, these assumptions and their moderating impact on Israeli and American policy form a new Iran concept reminiscent of its 1973 namesake and of the systemic failures that preceded the October 7 massacre.

Meanwhile, most of the restrictions put in place by the 2015 nuclear deal will expire by the end of next year, rendering the question of Iran’s adherence moot. And the forces that could be taking action aren’t:

The European Union regularly issues boilerplate press releases asserting its members’ “grave concern.” American decisionmakers and spokespeople have created the unmistakable impression that their reservations about the use of force are stronger than their commitment to use force to prevent an Iranian atomic bomb. At the same time, the U.S. refuses to enforce its own sanctions comprehensively: Iranian oil exports (especially to China) and foreign-currency reserves have ballooned since January 2021, when the Biden administration took office.

Israel’s response has also been sluggish and ambiguous. Despite its oft-stated policy of never allowing a nuclear Iran, Israel’s words and deeds have sent mixed messages to allies and adversaries—perhaps inadvertently reinforcing the prevailing sense in Washington and elsewhere that Iran’s nuclear efforts do not present an exigent crisis.