Senior Saudi and Israeli defense and intelligence officials are converging on Washington this week as the Trump administration weighs potential US strikes on Iran, according to Axios. This as the same report also observes:

"A 'limited strike' is an illusion. Any military action by ‌the U.S. — from any origin and at any level — will be considered an act of war and the response will be immediate, ‌all out⁩, and unprecedented, targeting the heart of ‌Tel Aviv⁩ and all those supporting the aggressor," Ali Shamkhani, a top adviser to Iran's supreme leader, wrote on X.

Israeli officials, including IDF Intelligence Directorate chief Maj. Gen. Shlomi Binder, are reportedly presenting intelligence on Iranian targets to Pentagon, CIA, and White House officials, while Saudi counterparts are attempting to slow-walk Washington away from outright war. The Saudis lately joined the Emirates in barring the Pentagon for using airspace for any strikes.

Gen. Binder met with senior US defense and intelligence officials on Tuesday and Wednesday, while Saudi Defense Minister Khalid bin Salman - brother of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman - is expected to hold talks with Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Trump envoy Steve Witkoff later this week.

Behind closed doors, Trump is said to be considering targeted strikes on Iranian security forces and leadership figures in a bid to trigger internal unrest, Reuters has reported. Secretary Rubio yesterday floated before a Senate hearing the idea that the US must "preemptively prevent" Iran from attacking American forces already in the region, in an interesting display of war logic.

But CNN says stalled US-Iran talks over Tehran's nuclear and missile programs have only hardened Washington’s appetite for escalation - raising the odds that diplomacy is giving way to force once again, or rather, placing the diplomatic bar so high that it would be next to impossible for Iran to comply.

Currently, Trump officials are reportedly insisting that Iran be stripped of any missile capability capable of striking Israel. Israel, meanwhile, would retain its full missile arsenal - including the undeclared nuclear weapons that everyone in the world knows about - capable of hitting Iran. According to CNN:

The biggest sticking point, sources said, has been the US demand that Iran agree to put limits on the range of its ballistic missiles — an acute concern for Israel, which expended much of its missile interceptor stockpile shooting down Iranian ballistic missiles during last June’s 12-day war. Iran has balked at that and told the US it would only discuss its nuclear program. The US has not replied, leaving both sides at a dead end, the sources said.

Which leaves the so-called "sticking point" glaringly obvious: Washington is demanding that Tehran agree to unilateral disarmament, rendering itself defenseless against Israeli air and missile strikes. In other words, total capitulation - or else.

And about that supposedly "obliterated" Iranian nuclear program?

It’s not clear why Trump has since shifted his focus back to Iran’s nuclear program, which he said last summer had been “obliterated” by US strikes. But Iran has been trying to rebuild its nuclear sites even deeper underground, according to a person familiar with recent US intelligence on the issue, and has long resisted US pressure to halt its uranium enrichment. The regime has also barred the UN’s nuclear watchdog from inspecting its nuclear sites.

Like with Venezuela before - or even hearkening all the way back to Bush's Iraq invasion - the justifications for war will keep on shifting, until something sticks in a thinly veiled effort to manufacture consent.

...And then the pretext will soon after be forgotten about when the bombs fall.

As one commenter pointed out related the several regime change conflicts of the last couple decades: "Free Iran" means exactly what "Free Iraq," "Free Libya," and "Free Syria" meant. That is the material reality, however you try to spin it. Either you’re calling for another US-engineered destruction, or you’re so politically naive your opinion can be automatically disregarded.