ASSASSINATION/IRAN/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT/WAR: “In the hours after an American drone strike in Iraq killed Iran’s most important military leader, Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, a question has dominated discussion in the Middle East, in Congress and on social media. Could this lead to war between the United States and Iran? In a sense, it already has. The killing of General Suleimani, the commander of Iran’s Quds Force, its elite security and intelligence unit, meets virtually any definition of an act of war, a categorical difference from the shadow conflicts that the United States and Iran have engaged in for years. To Iranian eyes, it is akin to Tehran ordering the death of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. But it remains uncertain where this attack, which follows weeks of tit-for-tat escalations between the two countries, will lead.”
-Max Fisher, “Is There a Risk of Wider War With Iran?,” The New York Times online, January 3, 2020