Trump and Harris must weigh in on the dangers of Iranian influence

Here’s a crucial topic for Tuesday’s presidential debate: How will the candidates handle the intensifying danger of the Islamic Republic of Iran?

It’s not news that the Iranian regime is a global threat to the Jewish people. That’s been the case for decades. But it is news that Tehran is vastly expanding its campaign against America while it races toward building a nuclear weapon.

For more than 40 years, the Iranian regime has been the largest state sponsor of antisemitism in the world. It was central to Khomeini’s worldview. His toxic anti-Zionism was evident in his writings long before the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

For decades, Tehran has cultivated a network of terror proxies across the Middle East with a shared ideology of anti-Jewish bigotry. It rests on a few key planks — dehumanizing Israelis, rationalizing antisemitism, and working actively to destroy the Jewish state.

The results are a bloody trail of deadly acts and foiled plots against Israeli interests and Jewish sites around the world. The list is long: Argentina, Bulgaria, Colombia, Cyprus, India, Kenya, Sweden, Thailand, Turkey, and more. Now we can add France and Germany to that list, too.

And, of course, the Iranian regime directly assisted Hamas for years and contributed directly to the horrific brutality, mass kidnapping and genocidal violence on 10/7. More than 100 Americans were among the casualties. Others remain in captivity.

Meanwhile, Tehran has widened its ambitions. It increasingly seeks to undermine, not just the moral legitimacy and territorial sovereignty of Israel, but the social cohesion and political fabric of America. In other words, the Iranian regime actively is waging war against the United States.

Targeting Americans and American sovereignty isn’t novel for the Islamic Republic. There are countless examples — the 1979 hostage crisis, the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing; numerous arrests of US citizens in Iran on fabricated charges; training foreign militias to strike American GIs, etc. It happened again earlier this year when Iran-backed militia groups attacked US troops in Iraq, Syria and Jordan.

What is new is conducting major operations on US soil.

Earlier this year, ADL saw indications of the Iranian regime’s influence on the anti-Israel, pro-Hamas movement on college campuses. Some scoffed when we warned about this. However, this past summer, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence confirmed that Tehran is “seeking to encourage protests, and even providing financial support to protesters.”

The Islamic Republic has long hired hitmen to do their dirty work overseas. They’ve targeted their perceived opponents around the world. This includes regime critics here in the US like Ambassador John Bolton and Iranian dissidents such as Masih Alinejad.

Now the regime is targeting US presidential candidates – the very individuals we are voting on to lead our country. In August, Asif Merchant, a Pakistani national with ties to Iran, was charged in connection with a foiled plot to assassinate a politician or US government officials.

And it arguably gets even worse. Last week, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency published a rare joint statement laying out how Tehran is seeking “to stoke discord and undermine confidence in our democratic institutions.”

But wait, there’s more. Google recently discovered that Iranian hackers tried to penetrate former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden’s campaigns. Axios reported that “Iran, not Russia, is proving to be the biggest nation-state threat to the US presidential election.”

In summary, the Islamic Republic of Iran is aggressively militating against America: trying to assassinate our political leaders; actively interfering in our domestic affairs; tampering with our political system; serially seeking to kill our servicemen.

But we shouldn’t be surprised. This is a ruthless regime that slaughters its own citizens, and champions the idea of genocide against the Jewish state. For all these reasons, it is time for a new approach to the Iranian regime — before it’s too late.

The US has tried negotiations, outreach and overtures. Tehran has responded with belligerence, threats and violence. All the while, their march to nuclear weapons has accelerated.

All sides need to acknowledge the reality: the Islamic Republic has rebuffed appeals for détente and peace. Instead, the regime and its so-called Axis of Resistance is a direct threat to the US, our allies, and our interests.

It is long overdue for a fact-based, non-partisan, reasoned conversation as to how we should confront and curb this rogue state before it obtains nuclear weapons and expands its militarism any further.

Despite what some might claim, this is not empty alarmism. This is not warmongering. This is stating the obvious.

Stopping Tehran and its terrorist proxies must be a central topic in the presidential debate this week. The candidates must be pressed for concrete plans. We need honest policies rooted in reality.

But it’s not just about the aspirants for the Oval Office. Congress needs a bipartisan, consensus policy — and fast. The Iranian regime must be on the top of the agenda for serious think tanks, scholars and national security experts, and others who care about our country. Scholars and national security specialists need to sketch out plans.

It is time. This won’t be easy. But let the conversation commence on Tuesday night.