The Middle East must turn away from the abyss and toward peace

It sometimes happens that things must get worse before they get better. This could be an opportune time to avoid war in the Middle East and seek a new era of “live and let live.”

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and President Biden could follow the example of Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev and President John F. Kennedy in 1962-1963 as they stepped back from the brink of a nuclear catastrophe to create a hotline, a nuclear test ban and more trade. The momentum toward Soviet-U.S. détente collapsed in the late 1960s but returned to life in the 1970s and late 1980s.

Kennedy gave an explicit signal in his American University address on June 10, 1963 that the U.S. wanted better relations with the USSR. Khrushchev responded in kind. Once the stage was set, diplomats could and did finesse the details.

All the major actors in the Middle East nurse grievances arising from each other’s actions. Americans recall that Iranians held American diplomats captive from November 1979 until January 1981. Iranians remember that the CIA helped overthrow their government in 1953 and that the USS Vincennes shot down an Iranian passenger airliner in Iranian airspace in 1988, killing all 290 people on board. In 2018, President Donald Trump withdrew the U.S. from the nuclear deal that had promised a new era for Iran and the world. Instead of sanctions relief, Washington tightened the screws.

Iran has joined a totalitarian axis stretching from Moscow to Beijing and Pyongyang. Despite occasional signs to the contrary, Iran’s theocracy continues to crush civil rights, especially for women. The U.S. complains that Iran supports Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthi rebels, and now furnishes drones and rockets for Russia’s unprovoked war on Ukraine. In April, Iran fired sone 300 rockets against Israel, though few got through. Having tormented Israel for years, Iran now pledges revenge for the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in a Tehran guest house. In reply, the U.S. sends more ships and combat aircraft to protect Israel.

The whole situation looks like a labyrinth of zero-sum confrontations that cannot be relieved without damage to the basic interests of one or another party. Since many actors are engaged, the problems are far more complex than the essentially two-party conflict that faced Khrushchev and Kennedy.

Still, if Washington and Tehran could reach a fundamental accord — as Soviet and U.S. leaders did during and after the Cuban missile crisis — details of their confrontation could be negotiated and aggressive policies by their partners could be contained.

Now, as in the previous decade, Iran needs relief from the sanctions that repress living standards and economic development. The regime and the Iranian public should ask if their support for rebels in neighboring countries and for Putin’s war machine gains them more than opening to trade and other interactions with the West.

In late July, it appeared that Russia considered providing weapons to the Houthis in Yemen in response to the Biden administration permitting Ukraine to use U.S.-supplied arms on Russian soil. Pressured by Saudi Arabia as well as by Washington, Moscow cancelled the shipment.

Washington should not allow the personal goals of one individual, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, to block a reasonable peace settlement throughout the region. Israel must agree to a practical two-state solution that allow Israelis to live in peace with Palestinians and with neighbors such as Iran and Saudi Arabia. Ignoring President Biden and the condemnation of many allies, the Israeli prime minister seems to want a wider war.

To foster an overall settlement of Middle Eastern conflicts would require the strong enlightened self-interest of publics as well as leaders in many countries. This appears like an unattainable dream. But what if the alternative is the kind of death and destruction we have seen in Syria, in Yemen, in Gaza? Is there no way for the “People of the Book” — Jews, Christians and Muslims — to perceive their common humanity and act to avoid hurting themselves and one another?

The recent exchange of Russian and Western prisoners required compromises by many governments. The deal was not perfect, but showed that actors with overlapping as well as opposed interests can sometimes accommodate their differences for mutual gain. Not easy, but sometimes do-able.

Walter Clemens is an associate at the Harvard Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies and professor emeritus of Political Science at Boston University. He wrote “Dynamics of International Relations: Conflict and Mutual Gain in an Era of Global Interdependence.”