America's Suez Moment? Soli Özel on Why Nothing Will Ever Be the Same Again

00:00:01 Andrew Keen: Hello, everybody. It's Tuesday afternoon, West Coast time, Pacific time, on March 24, 2026. The headlines as we speak are about the Pentagon supposedly deploying 3,000 soldiers to the Gulf, maybe for an American invasion of Iran. On the other hand, Donald Trump has suggested that the Iranians want to make a deal. The Iranians have said otherwise, and the Strait of Hormuz seems to be currently, at least, where all the action is about to take place.

00:00:42 Andrew Keen: It's very confusing, and I thought we would talk to my old friend, Soli Özel, in Istanbul. It's already Wednesday, sorry, in —

00:00:51 Soli Özel: It's midnight. One minute past midnight.

00:00:54 Andrew Keen: So you're a keen observer of all things Middle Eastern, especially when it comes to politics. Is this a Trumpian confusion? Is there any sense to what's happening? What do you make of it as we speak? I'm going to put this interview up in the next few hours, and I'm sure there'll be other headlines which will confuse us even more or contradict what one of us is saying.

00:01:23 Soli Özel: Yeah. Okay. Let's just put on record that it is March 25 for me, and it's March 24 for you. Two, just past midnight for me, and I guess what —

00:01:38 Andrew Keen: Just after two in the afternoon for me.

00:01:43 Soli Özel: So first of all, we get confusing news. Part of the confusion stems from the fact that the president sometimes — very often — contradicts himself. And now you said the 82nd Airborne. That's, of course, a very elite unit of the United States military. And this suggests that the war may yet escalate and boots may be put on the ground.

00:02:15 Soli Özel: If we look at this conflict now, one really wonders why the resort to war — which always has to be the last resort — was taken when the negotiations, based on the testimony of the Omani foreign minister and Jonathan Powell of Britain, were actually going America's way. According to the Omani foreign minister, the Iranians basically accepted conditions that were more firm than the JCPOA, the agreement that they signed with the Obama administration, from which President Trump withdrew America's signature in May 2018. And there is also a lot of debate in the States, as I try to follow, as to who convinced the president that that was the best thing to do. Was it the Venezuela success — in a few hours, decapitated, and the regime then made its peace with the United States and basically did whatever was being asked?

00:03:36 Soli Özel: Or was it the Israelis, especially the Israeli prime minister, who convinced the president that this would again be an easy thing to do, and that it would be over immediately — just like in Venezuela — if you decapitated the system? Didn't his advisers tell him that Venezuela and Iran may have nothing in common, that the Iranian regime was a far more institutionalized and far more rooted regime, in spite of the fact that it is also an enemy of a big chunk of its own population, which it massacred in mid-January? So when I look at this, I don't see why war was a necessity, and that's why, I guess, many people call it a war of choice. And so far, the picture is that Iran has, first of all, escalation control. And secondly, Iran is in a position where if the regime doesn't lose, it wins.

00:04:47 Soli Özel: And thirdly, if this thing continues on this path and the Iranian regime remains in place, then you will have an emboldened, very autocratic regime in place in Iran, and the entire climate of the Gulf will have changed — certainly for the worse — for the Gulf Arab countries. The US will not have accomplished what it presumably sought to do, although we don't exactly know what the goals were at the beginning of the war. The political goals were never really particularly well articulated. And then whether or not — what the Israelis will do, who also wanted to not just decapitate the regime but basically bring it down. And if that would then lead Iran to become more chaotic and therefore without order, I don't think the Israelis particularly cared about that either.

00:05:57 Soli Özel: And I — well, let's —

00:05:58 Andrew Keen: Leave that. I want to come to the Israelis in a second. But you've noted that most people seem to suggest that the Americans were getting somewhere with the Iranians in these pre-war talks. So should we assume — for whatever Trump says about Iran wanting to make a deal — that there is likely to be an intensification of the war, and that all these soldiers now being amassed by the US are, one way or the other, going to end up somewhere in Iran?

00:06:34 Soli Özel: Again, it's very difficult to call. Remember that President Trump gave an ultimatum, and he said, "If in forty-eight hours you don't relent, if the Strait of Hormuz is not open, we will start bombarding your civilian infrastructure." And then a few hours before the time was up, he said, "Oh no, we're talking with the top guy in Iran, and we're very close to an agreement. And of course they have accepted everything that I asked them to do."

00:07:09 Soli Özel: And the Iranians said no. There is no such thing. I don't know what the truth is, personally.

00:07:14 Andrew Keen: None of us do — maybe even Trump. But what's your sense?

00:07:19 Soli Özel: My sense is — I mean, I understand, for instance, that the Omani, Egyptian, and Turkish foreign ministers are very active, trying to find common ground so that we can avoid a ground war. And they may have been successful in getting President Trump to give that five-day respite, if you will. But then at the same time, the 82nd Airborne is coming. There are other troops that are coming. There are ships that are coming.

00:07:54 Soli Özel: And that suggests — I mean, at the least, this suggests the US wants to put more pressure on the Iranian regime to come to terms, by putting on the ground troops that are battle-tested and can do special tasks and all of that. And at worst, yes, the president is ready to actually engage in a ground war — maybe not on the Iranian mainland, but on Kharg Island, where military installations were bombed, but not the oil refinery, to the best of my knowledge.

00:08:36 Andrew Keen: Sorry. You're in Istanbul right now. You're very well connected. Turkish diplomats have been intimately involved — furiously involved — in these negotiations over the last few days, as you suggested, alongside Omani, Qatari, and Saudi diplomats. Is there — I know you can't speak on behalf of all diplomats in Istanbul — but is there a sense there that the Americans might not want a deal, and that all this diplomatic activity is just a smokescreen for, at some point, an American intervention?

00:09:13 Soli Özel: No. That is not the vibe that I see. I haven't seen anything to the contrary — I have no doubt that all three countries are genuinely seeking to reach some kind of accommodation.

00:09:31 Andrew Keen: No, I'm not doubting the Turks or the Omanis —

00:09:35 Soli Özel: I haven't seen anything to indicate otherwise. Certainly the Turkish side believes the Americans are sincere in finding an accommodation. I must say, by the way, that as of today, the Iranians have cut all gas to Turkey. And in the past three weeks, they also sent three missiles towards Turkey, which were intercepted by NATO defense systems.

00:10:03 Andrew Keen: How is the Turkish press and media reporting this story? I know it's probably not a single narrative, but what's the general sense there?

00:10:12 Soli Özel: There are many voices, but the main thing is most sane people in this country do not want Turkey to be part of this war. There is some criticism of the government for at times criticizing Israel, criticizing Iran, but not necessarily criticizing the United States — which also sent Patriot missiles for Turkey's defense, to be deployed. So the general sense in the country is: let this be over as soon as possible. We don't want to fight with the Iranians. We don't want this war to go on forever.

00:10:53 Soli Özel: And I think, like the rest of the world — you know, it's not just oil and gas. It's the fertilizers. The planting season is coming, and everybody needs fertilizers. And we may have a food crisis in addition to all these other crises. So the global interest is for this war to end, and everybody must hope that efforts to convince both parties to actually come to their senses and reach an agreement are going to bear fruit.

00:11:28 Andrew Keen: Is there any fear in Turkey that if Iran were to fragment — break up along ethnic and national lines — it might change the political power equation of the Kurds in the region?

00:11:45 Soli Özel: Yeah. I mean, the Kurdish issue was talked about in the first week of the war, and then the president said he was not interested in that. There is always talk of Iranian Kurds being armed and ready to rebel and all of that. That is part of the discussion here. But rather than an ethnically based civil war, what is — I think — feared most is a collapse of the regime, which would lead to total disorder and chaotic conditions in Iran, which would then trigger a wave of migration from Iran towards Turkey.

00:12:26 Soli Özel: After all, we do have a very long border with Iran. So far, though, friends of mine who've been to the border town of Van in Turkey said that most of the traffic was towards Iran, and very few people were coming from Iran to Van. And I suppose most Iranians who may have left the major cities such as Tehran went somewhere to the mountains or valleys and are waiting this out. And hopefully this will end soon. Now we are in the fourth week. The president said four to six weeks. Will this last another two weeks? We'll see.

00:13:07 Andrew Keen: Soli, you and I first met more than forty years ago. We both studied politics at UC Berkeley. We were TAs in a class about the Arab-Israeli conflict. Of course, this is a two-front war — or maybe a parallel war — with Israel in Lebanon and Israel's participation with the Americans in the bombing of Iran. Are there two narratives here when it comes to Israel? You're a veteran analyst of Israeli behavior in the region, in Lebanon and elsewhere.

00:13:42 Soli Özel: I mean, what I read is that the interests of the US and Israel, which may not have been identical to begin with, are diverging. On the other hand, I don't see the United States saying anything about what Israel does in Lebanon. And what Israel seems to be doing in Lebanon — or at least the declared goal of Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz — is to basically either depopulate or occupy South Lebanon all the way to the Litani River. A million people, to the best of my knowledge, are now on the roads.

00:14:27 Soli Özel: That's a fifth of Lebanon's population. And I understand that the southern neighborhoods of Beirut — populated mainly, not exclusively, but mainly by Shia who are supporters of Hezbollah — are being bombarded every night, and drones are up above twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. So that's the situation. And I think the Lebanese government is also trying to take a stronger position vis-à-vis Hezbollah. And Hezbollah, I suppose, cannot get weapons or material or money from Iran under the existing circumstances.

00:15:14 Soli Özel: So the Lebanese theater is also a very important one. And I'm not sure that after this devastation, Lebanon — I mean, I'm not sure that Israel will get everything that it wants — but this may very well destabilize Lebanon, which was trying very hard to actually get its act together.

00:15:35 Andrew Keen: Well, there's no doubt it's going to destabilize an already deeply destabilized country. Before we went live, you mentioned to me that you thought history is in a sense repeating itself — that this is another version of the 1956 Suez Crisis, in which the British and the French were humiliated, and it marked the end of a chapter in the international politics of the region. When we stand back — and it's obviously very hard to know what's going to happen in the next hour or tomorrow, let alone in the next weeks or months — Soli, is there something about what's happening now in Iran? Might it be America's Suez moment, where they're humiliated somehow and a new reality emerges in global politics, or at least in the Middle East?

00:16:25 Soli Özel: Many people make reference to the Suez War. There are similarities, but there are also important differences. To begin with, Britain and France were two spent forces that did not accept that they were spent forces. And they thought they still had a go, to protect their interests in the Middle East as they saw fit. And they made an agreement with Israel, and they came up with this plan whereby Israel would attack Egypt, and Britain and France would intervene in order to bring calm.

00:17:05 Soli Özel: And all of that was because Gamal Abdel Nasser — who was an important leader of Arab nationalism, an important leader of the Third Worldist movement — had nationalized the Suez Canal. And ultimately President Eisenhower told the big countries to basically stop, and told the Israelis to get out of the Sinai Peninsula, which they had occupied immediately when the war began. The difference is — I mean, if you will, two imperial powers were humiliated. But the difference is there were two major powers, real powers of the time, that were ready to take their place in the region and compete with one another to align themselves with the important actors in the region.

00:17:53 Soli Özel: Now that was the US and the Soviet Union. If we take this to be the US's moment — in that it makes a move and doesn't get what it really wants — there is really no other major power that can take over from the United States. It still remains the most important actor for the region, but of course with diminished — not presence, but diminished impact, if you will — in the politics. And obviously the politics of the region will evolve.

00:18:28 Soli Özel: My view, Andrew, is that once this thing is over — and hopefully it's over soon — relations between the Gulf countries and the United States, even maybe relations between Israel and the United States, and perhaps relations between Israel and the Gulf countries, particularly the UAE, will be reconsidered, put on the table, and redefined. Again, I don't think we will be going back to the status quo ante, both in terms of America's role, presence, and power in the region, and in terms of its relations with different actors in the region.

00:19:08 Andrew Keen: And what about the Arab-Israeli conflict, which has been going on now for almost a century?

00:19:17 Soli Özel: Well, it's not an Arab-Israeli conflict. It's by now a Palestinian-Israeli conflict. I mean, we have to deconstruct, if you will. It used to be called the Arab-Israeli conflict, but Israel has signed peace agreements with Jordan and Egypt. It now has the Abraham Accords with four Arab countries.

00:19:38 Soli Özel: I doubt that it will have an agreement soon with Saudi Arabia. But it's the Palestinian issue that remains. And by the way, as we look at Iran, as we look at Lebanon, things are going on in the West Bank — and there are moves to settle more people, put settlements in occupied territories, and basically de facto annex the West Bank, which President Trump has said would not be acceptable to him. So yes, the Palestinians are spent. Hamas is broken, but it's still in Gaza after two and a half years of war.

00:20:18 Soli Özel: And 53% of Gaza is occupied by the Israeli military, and God knows if this peace process is going to go anywhere. That issue will remain. And so long as it remains in place, this is going to continue to be an important issue, especially for Arab publics. And after what has happened, my view is that Arab countries will also be very reticent to truly normalize relations with Israel. Anyway, the peace with both Jordan and Egypt were basically called a cold peace.

00:20:55 Andrew Keen: What about the other great powers? The Western European interest — obviously China and Russia as well. How is this playing outside the region?

00:21:04 Soli Özel: It appears that the Russians, who are very happy that oil prices have gone up because of this war —

00:21:11 Andrew Keen: I mean, the Russians win on every front on this.

00:21:14 Soli Özel: And they may have actually supplied the Iranians with coordinates of targets to attack. And you know, the Iranians have been actually pretty successful in damaging radars, data centers, refineries, and all of that. They were able to attack the gas refinery in Qatar — Ras Laffan — when people say it will take three to five years to get it fully back on its feet. And the Russians have made a lot of money. The oil price went from the sixties to — depending on the day — sometimes over, sometimes under a hundred.

00:21:55 Soli Özel: But of course, if this thing escalates again, the oil price may go up further. And they have more room for whatever they want to do in Ukraine. The Chinese are more silent, as usual. But today I understand the Chinese have come up with a six-point proposal for ending this war, and they demand that all of this be handled in multilateral institutions. So they want the UN Security Council to do some things.

00:22:29 Soli Özel: And basically it's very cautious, but it's a serious opening on their part. On the one hand, they may be suffering because of higher energy prices, but on the other they must also be happy that the United States is diverted. It can never make this pivot to Asia, which is so important for its national security strategy for the future, and it is also depleting its ammunition and missile reserves that could be used should there be a conflict between China and Taiwan. So on balance — and also they may be benefiting from, or may think they will be benefiting from, the fact that American prestige is being lost, because this war is not being accepted as a just war by almost any country in the rest of the world.

00:23:31 Soli Özel: Some — I mean, the Japanese prime minister gave some support. Ursula von der Leyen is always there to give support. Mark Rutte is equivocating. But ultimately, when the United States called on NATO partners, NATO allies, to help open the Strait of Hormuz, nobody volunteered. Nobody came forward.

00:23:53 Andrew Keen: What about the moral issues? I mean, every side, of course, claims the moral high ground. You talked about just wars and the prestige of the United States. I'm struck — talking to you, as you know, from San Francisco — by the absence of a moral debate about whether a country has the right, morally at least, to eliminate or perhaps more accurately assassinate an entire generation of foreign leaders. You may not like the foreign leaders of another country. I can't think of another moment in history where this has happened. Are you struck by this? And are people talking about it in Istanbul or around the world outside the United States — what some people see, at least, as the injustice of all this?

00:24:47 Soli Özel: I mean, definitely in Turkey this is a topic, and I try to follow world media as much as I can as well. Most of the commentary is very critical of this war in terms of international law. And it is also very critical of the decapitation strategy, if you will — which, if the intent was that through decapitation you would have a regime on its knees, begging to make a deal ready to accept every condition under any circumstances — that's not happening. Not now. And whether or not it will happen in the future, I have my doubts.

00:25:34 Soli Özel: Therefore, it also didn't work. And of course this opens — I mean, decapitating your enemies took place inside domestic politics very often. But if you start doing this in international relations — which was a red line that should never have been crossed — it opens another Pandora's box. And the debate in the United States does not include this element. Maybe it will, after the shock is over. It's strange, it's surprising, but maybe that'll come later on. So far, my understanding is the American debate is about preparedness, about whether or not Israel had undue influence on the decision that was made, about the absence of clarity as to what the purpose of this war was and what the political goals were, and about whether or not the president — who at times suggests that he wants a way out — will be able to find it. With the moral issue taking the back seat, if you will.

00:26:44 Andrew Keen: Yeah. One of the things I'm confused about — you've mentioned red lines — is that the US and some of the other players in the conflict talk about red lines in terms of bombing and assassinating leaders. I don't quite understand why desalination plants or energy plants represent a red line, whereas murdering other leaders apparently does not.

00:27:15 Soli Özel: Well, I mean, let's say you destroy the desalination plants in Kuwait — 90% of its water comes from there. I think most of those countries get, on average, around 70% of their water from desalination plants. So you basically condemn them to be without water. It's mass murder under those circumstances. That's why I suppose this is being put forward.

00:27:47 Soli Özel: There may also be the fact that — you know, the Iranian regime is not the most likable or liked regime in the world either. Just two months ago, they committed atrocious massacres against their own population. And the sin of the population was to demand more freedom, less corruption, and a more decent life. So maybe because of that, because of the bad image that most of the leadership does have, a lot of people — maybe begrudgingly, maybe happily — say, okay, good riddance. But in terms of international law and international relations, that really does open a Pandora's box that, in my judgment, should not have been opened.

00:28:37 Andrew Keen: Yeah. Several Pandora's boxes seem to have been opened at the same time. Finally, Soli, I want to let you get to bed. It's late in Istanbul. You and I have lived through enough of these events in the Middle East — wars and invasions and one kind of terrorism or another — to say, "Well, this time it's different. This has changed everything." We've heard this about this current crisis. Is it different? Or is it just part of the same old narrative — Trump will come up with some sort of deal, claim victory, the Iranians will claim victory, and we'll go back to square one? Or has something profoundly changed in the last couple of weeks?

00:29:14 Soli Özel: I am inclined to think that things will not be the same. How profoundly things will change remains to be seen. I don't say this because I want to be cautious or because I'm not in a position to eat my words later on. But my hunch is we will see the repercussions, ramifications, and consequences of this war in time. Things will not happen immediately.

00:29:46 Soli Özel: But I think everybody will draw their own lessons from what was lived, and they will be maneuvering. And as we talk — on this, in the chapter on Suez — can the United States be a reliable ally to the Gulf countries now? I understand that now, after having opposed the war, now that the war has begun and Iran has attacked them, Gulf countries — particularly Saudi Arabia — are pushing for the United States to finish the job. So they were opposed to the Israeli position; they must now be joining the Israeli position for the termination of this war.

00:30:29 Soli Özel: All of that will leave its imprint. And especially if the Iranian regime doesn't bow or doesn't fall — and it really doesn't look like it's going to fall — and it appears that its capacity to fight and resist was a lot higher than anybody thought. Any commentator I've read or listened to — nobody thought they would have that type of defensive resilience. So my hunch is, yes, things are going to change, but we will see slow changes. Who will take advantage of all that in the region?

00:31:10 Soli Özel: That remains to be seen. The Chinese, who have extensive economic relations with the region, have been so far very reluctant to take any political responsibility and have allowed the United States to carry that burden. The Russians will benefit somewhat. But whether the United States will be able to recover and rebuild its relations with the Gulf countries — albeit in a very different framework — that remains to be seen, and that will be the challenge. And again, also Israel's relations with the rest of the region as well.

00:31:48 Andrew Keen: Wise words from one of the wise men of Istanbul, Soli Özel. Soli, this is certainly not the end of this conflict — this chapter of the conflict. So we're going to get you back on the show. As always, you've been on many times. Thank you so much.

00:32:04 Soli Özel: Keep well. Thank you, Andrew.

00:32:05 Andrew Keen: And keep safe.

00:32:06 Soli Özel: You too.

00:32:07 Andrew Keen: Thank you.