US pressures Iran for unified response amid escalating regional proxy conflicts and geopolitical fragmentation
Original framing: “US wants to see unified response from Iran, White House says - Reuters” — Reuters (via Google News)
Iranian feminists (e.g., *One Million Signatures* campaign) argue that sanctions disproportionately harm women, who bear the brunt of economic collapse. Kurdish and Baloch minorities in Iran and neighboring states face dual oppression under both state and proxy forces. Yemeni and Syrian refugees, displaced by US-backed interventions, are rendered invisible in US-Iran narratives, despite their lived experience of the conflict’s costs.
The US-Iran standoff is not merely a bilateral dispute but a microcosm of global power asymmetries, where decades of coercive diplomacy, sanctions, and proxy warfare have entrenched mutual distrust.
The JCPOA’s collapse under Trump demonstrated how domestic US politics can derail multilateral solutions, while sanctions—meant to pressure Iran—have instead empowered hardliners and devastated civilians. Historically, the US has framed regional conflicts through a Cold War lens, ignoring how indigenous mediation traditions (e.g., *sulh*) or non-aligned movements (e.g., NAM) offer alternatives to zero-sum power plays. Future modeling warns that without inclusive dialogue, the Middle East risks a spiral of nuclear proliferation and climate-driven resource wars, yet marginalized voices—women, refugees, ethnic minorities—remain excluded from formal negotiations. A systemic solution requires dismantling the sanctions regime, reviving Track-III diplomacy, and embedding climate resilience into peacebuilding, all while centering the lived experiences of those most affected by geopolitical fragmentation.