 For more videos and people's struggles, please subscribe to our YouTube channel. US-Iran relations have long defined the politics of West Asia and the race for natural resources has meant frequent violation of Iran's sovereignty by US. The 2015 nuclear deal, facilitated by European powers, Russia and China, did raise the possibility of pacification and normalization of their relations. However, the insecurities and rival ambitions of US allies in the region saw the Arabian-Israel and Donald Trump's hypernationalism has killed all such hopes. Today, Iran is accused by the US for building proxies across West Asia and aiding to the instability in the region while supporting leaders such as Bashar al-Assad in Syria and actors such as Houthis in Yemen. Trump calls legitimate Iranian diplomatic successes in the region as deliberate attempts to dominate the region and threaten US interests. The greatest concern of the US in West Asia is rising Iranian influence in Iraq where it had great imperialist designs post the invasion of the country in 2003. Only when we look at this larger picture can we make sense of what is happening between Iran and the US since last year. The US has admitted that Iran has successfully countered its hegemony in the region and has threatened its economic and political interests. US cannot let this go without the fight even if it means large-scale destruction of the region. Since the US pulled out of the nuclear deal signed with Iran and five other countries, tensions between the two have escalated. On 8th May 2018, Donald Trump announced that his government will no longer be a party to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, popularly known as the Iran Nuclear Deal. This deal was agreed upon in 2015. It removed crippling sanctions on Iran in return for restricting Iran's nuclear program. US pulled out of the deal without showing any evidence of any non-compliance from Iran. Since then, it has tried to pressurize Iran into submitting to its demands and curb Iran's rising influence in the region. US reimposed sanctions on Iran, including on vital sectors of its economy, such as energy, oil, petrochemical products, banking, etc. US also deployed additional troops and air force bombers to West Asia as part of the then National Security Advisor John Bolton's maximum pressure policy. One year after USA's withdrawal from the JCPOA, Iran announced it will halt part of its nuclear commitments. Iran gave time to the other signatories of the agreement to protect it from the impacts of USA's sanctions, failing which it would reduce its compliance with the deal. But the US continued to impose new sanctions and the European Union countries failed to take any concrete steps to protect it from this economic war. With US breaking away from its part of the deal and EU also refusing to make trade deals with Iran under threat of secondary sanctions from the US, Iran had the right to cease performing its commitments under the JCPOA. This legal right is granted under the article 26 and 36 of the deal. With this background of strained relations between the two countries, let's look at the recent events that have brought Iran and the US to the brink of war. On December 27th, a US contractor was killed in a rocket attack on an Iraqi military base. This attack occurred amidst many such small revenge strikes that had been going on on US bases in Iraq. These revenge attacks were in response to the many drone strikes on bases of popular mobilization forces or PMF in Iraq. These strikes were meant to keep pressure on Americans but not to escalate tensions. According to US officials themselves, the December 27th attack did not intend to kill anyone. Still, the Trump administration blamed Kateb Hisbulla for this attack, a Shia militia attached to Iraq's popular mobilization but there is no evidence to prove this. Trump also traced the attack back to Iran but again without evidence. On the December 29th, the US retaliated by carrying out air strikes on five Kateb Hisbulla sites, three in Iraq and two in Syria. 32 people were killed and 45 wounded in these strikes out of which only nine were members of Kateb Hisbulla. The rest were Iraqi border policemen and regular Iraqi soldiers. The strikes were in complete disregard of Iraqi sovereignty. Despite the Iraqi Prime Minister Abdul Mehdi asking US Defense Secretary Mark Esper to call off the strikes, the US went ahead anyway. The PMF group that was hit had been on the ground fighting ISIS for years. Two days later on December 31st, protesters surrounded the US embassy in Baghdad and broke into it. Most of these protesters were family members and comrades of the Iraqi soldiers killed in the US air strikes. US troops and Iraqi security forces fired tear gas and stun grenades at the protesters. US blamed Iran for these protests. The protesters left only after assurance from Prime Minister Abdul Mehdi that the parliament will vote on a law to evict all US forces from Iraq. Then on January 2nd, Mark Esper, US Defense Secretary, said that there are indications that Iran or groups it supports may be planning attacks on US interests in West Asia. The next day on January 3rd, in the shocking and completely illegal move, the US assassinated Qasim Soleimani and Abu Mehdi al-Mohandis in a midnight drone strike outside the Baghdad airport. Soleimani was the commander of Iran's al-Quds forces, part of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps or IRGC. He was amongst the most popular leaders of Iran and he was an instrumental part of the fight against ISIS. Al-Mohandis was the deputy commander of PMF. PMF operates under the direct command of the Iraqi Prime Minister and is an official Iraqi defense force. Four IRGC and four Qatib-Hazbollah men were also killed along with them. The demand for the removal of US troops from Iraq became even stronger after this. On January 4th, Trump issued further threats against Iran, saying that if Iran attacks any American or US assets, US is ready to target 52 Iranian sites, including cultural ones. On January 5th, Iraq called the assassination of Soleimani and Mohandis a violation of its sovereignty and the Iraqi parliament asked for expulsion of all foreign troops. Other groups such as Hezbollah and the various Shia militias associated with the PMF also made it clear that they will avenge Soleimani's death and they will work towards the expulsion of US troops from the region. Iran announced that it will no longer comply with any limits set in the nuclear deal but oversight from the international atomic energy agency will continue. On January 8th, Iran struck back at US by firing missiles on two Iraqi bases housing US troops. Seventeen missiles hit the Ain al-Assad air base and five missiles struck the Erbil airport. No casualties were reported. US received an advanced warning of the attack from the Swiss embassy in Tehran, which represents the US in Iran. While Trump saw Iran's retaliation as a signal for de-escalating tensions since no casualties occurred, Iran was able to successfully demonstrate its capabilities in the event that the war does begin. Iran's attack also called Trump's bluff of targeting 52 Iranian sides. An all-out war with Iran would cost Trump much more than he would like. The same day, a Ukrainian airline's plane crashed near Tehran, killing all 176 on board. Initial reports were not able to ascertain a cause with concrete evidence. Amidst all of this, the Iraqi Prime Minister asked Washington to start working out a plan for the withdrawal of US troops. But on January 10th, the US State Department rejected this request. Abdul Mehdi told US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in a phone call that the recent US strikes in Iraq were a breach of Iraqi sovereignty and a violation of the security agreements. But the US instead wanted to discuss how to re-commit to their partnership. This refusal to comply with the Iraqi parliament raises doubts about the US's current status in Iraq and could mean that the US is now in occupying force. On January 11th, Iran admitted that due to a grave human error, the Ukrainian plane was shot down shortly after it took off. The statements of the Iranian Armed Forces General Staff suggest that the operator who coveted the error was working in circumstances of highest possible alarm level with continuous warnings of hostile cruise missiles. Because of communication failure, the plane was seen as an unknown target flying with a possible military objective. In all of this confusion, it was shot down. Then on January 14th, the three EU countries, part of the nuclear deal UK, France and Germany triggered the dispute resolution mechanism of the deal, saying that they have upheld their end, but they believe that Iran is no longer complying. What this most likely means for Iran is that the UN Security Council could decide to reinstate some sanctions. This would be unfair to Iran as while the EU did lift their own sanctions as part of the JCPOA, but the country still imposed US sanctions against Iran. So the outcome for Iran was no different than before the deal when it was facing US imposed sanctions. So the nuclear deal is not yet dead, but it could soon be.