An Open Letter to Daily Sabah: On Iran, War, and Omissions
To the Editors of Daily Sabah, Your recent report, "Türkiye says Iran open to back-channel talks amid raging war," published on March 15, 2026, presents a diplomatic overture from Türkiye's Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan regarding potential de-escalation with Iran. The article notes Fidan’s statement to the Associated Press, affirming Iran’s openness to dialogue amidst what your publication labels a
"U.S.-Israel-Iran war." While reporting on diplomatic efforts is valuable, the framing of this conflict as a three-way entanglement obscures a crucial reality: the United States and Israel are the principal aggressors, not merely participants in a symmetrical conflict. What your coverage omits is the fundamental asymmetry of power and provocation. The "raging war" you describe is, in fact, an
ongoing joint US-Israeli military campaign against Iran, characterized by decades of economic strangulation, covert operations, and direct military threats. To describe this as a multi-sided "war" with Iran as an equal actor in its instigation ignores the US’s established historical pattern of unilaterally violating international agreements, exemplified by its 2018 withdrawal from the Joint
Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which dismantled a critical diplomatic pathway and set the stage for intensified aggression. This aggressive posture continues despite the fact that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has consistently affirmed Iran's compliance with its nuclear obligations prior to the US withdrawal. The cost of US sanctions on Iran over 45 years is estimated to be