Weekly essentials

In Iran, the fate of the new Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei is in question, and a highly strategic Iranian island has been targeted by US aviation. On the Lebanese front, Israel continues its ground offensive despite some diplomatic breakthroughs in recent days around the idea of direct negotiations with Israel, launched by the Lebanese government; a proposal that remains dependent on the situation on the ground. For the second consecutive week, the Middle East is living as if in fast forward. The attack on Iran by the Israeli and American armies continues, with intensive bombings reaching, on March 14, the highly strategic Iranian island of Kharg, north of the Persian Gulf. This island houses large oil infrastructures that were intentionally spared by the Americans, while President Donald Trump indicated that military installations had been reduced to nothing. The attack on this island constitutes a fundamental development as it poses a potential threat to Iran's oil exports.

From the kickoff, on February 28, of the Israeli-American offensive against the Iranian mullahs' regime, marked by the assassination of the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic Ali Khamenei, until the flare-up of the South Lebanon front, at dawn on the 1 st March, including Iranian strikes on all Arab Gulf countries, the first week of the new Middle East war is undoubtedly historic in more ways than one. There are years that can be summarized in a few words, and weeks that seem like years. The days from January 28 to March 8, 2026, have been so full of twists and turns that they could be described as a transition from one era to another.