Nadim Daoud Koteich a Lebanese Shiite journalist who is an outspoken opponent to both Hezbollah and Iran explains why the "Obama/Biden" approach to Iran is "dead on arrival" and the reason for the erosion of US military deterrent against Iran and Islamists.

As long as there is no radical change in Washington's strategy towards Iran, there is no point in expecting another "Qassem Soleimani" whose elimination will restore the decisive American deterrence in the eyes of the Ayatollah regime, after the attack on the American base in Jordan.

If there is one thing Iran understands better than the language of strength, it is the language of weakness. 

Iran sees the administration of President Joe Biden as a weak, confused administration, and one that is prepared to make concessions with Iran on an unimaginable scale, based on two fundamentally wrong thoughts.

The first holds that political rationality is the right way to reach an understanding with Iran. 

The second sees preventing escalation by bribing the Iranians, either through the 'money for hostages' policy or through the lifting of sanctions on Iranian oil, as the safer choice in order not to get entangled in the troubles of the Middle East.

These two wrong thoughts are derived from a structural and central deficiency in understanding Iran's goals in the region, and in understanding its strategy for achieving them.

It is not a coincidence that the attacks carried out by the Iranian militias on the American bases happened at the same time as the debates in the US grew over the withdrawal plans from Syria and Iraq. 

This is a declared Iranian goal. Nothing makes the Iranians happier than to hear the democratic Biden administration talk about withdrawal in a clear voice, or than to identify a similar tone in the speech of the Republican candidate Donald Trump, even if Trump's approach and actions include a firmer and tougher hand against Iran and its threats.

In practice, it is clear that Tehran's strategy is based on benefiting from its support for the attacks of its allied militias in Syria and Iraq, as well as from the actions of the Houthis in the Red Sea, from the threat of opening a front in Lebanon, and from the intervention in the war in Gaza. 

All of this is intended to increase the level of pressure exerted on American interests in a variety of locations, in a way that will serve the idea of American withdrawal from the Middle East. Such a withdrawal, in turn, would strengthen Iranian hegemony in the region.

It is also no coincidence that the Iranian lobby in Washington - which consists of American academics, researchers and journalists of Iranian origin, whose ties to the Iranian government have been exposed, and the penetration of some of them into the American government itself through the diplomat suspended from the Biden administration, Robert Malley, has been extensively documented - is now raising its voice and insisting that the escalation from Iran's militias will be stopped if a ceasefire is reached in Gaza.

Iran is interested in a ceasefire in Gaza in order to fix the "Hamas" equation in Palestine, as part of fixing the militia equation and the idea of armed struggle throughout the region, as tools to establish Iranian hegemony.

The American belief that it is possible to reach an understanding with Iran, does not take into account that what it demands from Iran is in fact to give up the only factors of power that it possesses, while it lacks other factors of power of the type that its rivals in the region have, such as: economic power, a social model and/or attractiveness of prosperity, well-being, openness and peace.

So why would Iran give up its power factors as part of negotiations in an attempt to reach an understanding?

Iran has no other alternative to achieve its aim of being a world power but by exploiting the regional conflicts, such as the situation in Gaza, or to supporting the attack on American forces and threatening the interests of Washington and its allies in the Red Sea region?

Iran's direct and vital interests are inextricably linked to what the US calls "Iranian behavior". 

Therefore, the very call to change the "behavior" (of Iran) is no less than asking Iran to stop being Iran; and this is something that cannot be convinced of any regime in the world through dialogue and negotiation.

Nazi Germany did not change as a result of dialogue and appeasement, nor did Japan give up its military imperialist ideology by reaching policy understandings and showing goodwill. Fascism, too, was not defeated in the game of public opinion. These are regimes that know their interests well and guard their sources of power at all costs.

Washington's insistence on not understanding what Iran represents, and the meaning of its behavior, is the main reason for the erosion of American influence in the Middle East, and the US being in a situation where its enemies do not fear it, and its allies do not trust it.

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Nadim Daoud Koteich a Lebanese Shiite journalist who is an outspoken opponent to both Hezbollah and Iran. He is a political analyst hosting a daily commentary show on the pan-Arab channel Sky News Arabia.