In the space between peace and war that the Gulf crisis has now entered, and from which it may exit at any point, if only for a brief time, maybe this is a convenient moment to think about what has been gained and what has been lost so far.
In this and the next two blog posts, I look at the balance of losses and benefits in and from this war. It is, of course, a provisional sketch. First because the war is not yet over. And second because even when it is, data will be incomplete. So this is just a first stab at figuring it out (though, talking of figures, I’m not looking at economic cost except in the most general sense).
This post looks at some of the broader costs of the war. In the following posts, I take on a political assessment of gains and losses by different kinds of actors. The next post looks at the three combatant states – Iran, Israel and the USA. And the final one in the series has a look at other regional powers, the mediators, and significant outsiders.
Summary
To give you the overall balance up front, and noting the provisional nature of the exercise, with heavy emphasis on the words so far, nothing can be seen that balances the negative impact that the war has had, is having and will continue to have on people, nature, legality and human rights. Among the three main combatants, there is no clear winner, though Israel has been able to get away with various actions with less scrutiny than it would otherwise have faced, and Iran has achieved something simply by not losing. The USA is weakened in both material and non-material ways. The Gulf region is worse off, regional security is diminished, global prosperity is at risk, food insecurity is on the rise. Other bystanders partake of the general negative effects of the war but find (or might be able to find) some gains here and there. For the USA, whose leader launched the war and trumpeted victory early on, there is as yet no silver lining.
Fatalities & hunger
In any war, the greatest losses are suffered by ordinary people and by nature. Compared with the wars in Gaza, Sudan and Ukraine, the death toll in the Gulf has been low. Numbers are always uncertain but a Wikipedia compilation suggests a range of 6,000 to 8,600 deaths and 36,500 injured (excluding 4,600 fatalities and 8,730 injured in Lebanon).
However high or low the figures, with each of them goes tragedy, grief and suffering.
Beyond the direct effects, the war hurts people all round the globe. Worldwide hunger is likely to increase this year because about 30 percent of the world’s supply of fertiliser originates in the Gulf. As a result, there is a risk of food insecurity reaching record levels, worse than in 2022 when Russia escalated its war against Ukraine, and worse than during the Covid-19 pandemic. And even if the fertiliser gets out of the Gulf and to farms soon enough to be useful in the Northern Hemisphere’s planting season (now), prices for food, medicines and everything will rise. This has a direct and impossibly heavy impact on the poorest. In Somalia, for example, the price of some essential foods has already tripled.
The war hits the poorest hardest. But everybody else is carrying some extra burden too. In one way, you could call this a world war.
The natural environment is also suffering. Strikes on industrial facilities – especially in the oil industry – produce fires with the blackest smoke, meaning it is thick with pollutants, and throw from toxic debris into the air. The result is increasing particulate air pollution and declining water quality, in a region where there are already major issues with both. And then there’s the impact on the Gulf waters themselves. With the third major war in the Gulf region in three and a half decades, parts of the fragile maritime ecosystem are at serious risk of becoming unsustainable. This is the season in which marine life gathers and breeds in Gulf waters, including sea turtles, seabirds and the extraordinary-looking dugong (aka sea cow) and it is facing extreme risk.
Matters of principle
Thus, human security and ecological security are both severely damaged by the war. Is there a positive gain that could go some way towards balancing that out? If there is, it is not to be found in issues of principle for fundamental principles are also casualties in this war.
Human rights have suffered, as was predictable from the outset. If the Iranian regime stayed in power, as it did despite the deaths of senior personnel in the Israeli-US decapitation strike that opened the war, and notwithstanding US President Trump’s fantasy that regime change is just a matter of a different cast of characters, then it stood to reason that it would crack down on dissent and strengthen its grip. That is what often happens under the pressure of war.
In more general terms, the war undermines fidelity to the rule of law. It was illegal from the outset as neither Israel nor the USA faced an imminent threat from Iran. The claims by US envoy Steve Witkoff that Iran was a week away from being able to make nuclear weapons and by Israel’s premier Netanyahu that it was a month or two away from actually having a nuclear bomb are not borne out in expert analysis of the available intelligence. Nor, even if true, do they fulfil the conditions of “imminent threat”. Nor are they consistent with Netanyahu’s claim in June 2025 that attacks on nuclear installations and scientists by Israel and the US had eliminated the “existential threat” of “nuclear annihilation” by Iran. In fact, those attacks may not have “obliterated” Iran’s nuclear industry as Trump has claimed (he does seem addicted to over-statement, doesn’t he?), but there is no doubt they did serious damage, which, as a by-product, so to say, undermines any principled, legal case for starting the war in February this year.
To dwell on this issue a moment more, there is a regrettable if understandable tendency to ignore the historical facts and nuances about Iran and nuclear weapons. Iran is a party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which Israel is not. Nonetheless and despite the treaty commitment, Iran had a programme to manufacture nuclear weapons in the early 2000s. It has maintained the technical capacity to do so since scaling back the programme in 2003. However, it has not enriched uranium to weapons grade. The prospect of an additional nuclear-equipped state in the Middle East is deeply unsettling; it would undermine regional security and stability. The prospect, however, does not provide either a moral or a legal basis for Israel and the US going to war against Iran.
And there is something vaguely ridiculous and even distasteful in the notion that Israel with its undeclared nuclear weapons is taking action to prevent further nuclear proliferation.
Viewed politically
If there is no gain for important principles, then we have to answer the question about gains by assessing putative political advantage for one government or another, whether participating in the war or on the sidelines. How does it stack up politically? Whose national interests have been enhanced by the war so far? That is the topic of the next post.
Dan Smith's blog 
Time זמן גרמא for the UN to go the way of the League of Nations
Oct 7th 2023 proved the UN 2 state solution as a cracked foundation responsible for wars rather than peace.
General Assembly Resolution 181 did not have the same legal force as a Security Council resolution, and never automatically binding simply because it concerned partition. Therefore for the UN to turn to 181 as the foundation of the Two State diplomatic framework – stands on a cracked foundation. A building contractor knows the general rule: if the foundation cracked and unstable – then the entire building must come down. A building whose original plan never fully approved or constructed, followed by decades of additions, repairs, and separate agreements describes the Jordanian nationalization of Samaria and the Allah Nakba disgrace of 1967.
The UN attempt to “internationalize” the conflict performs the opposite of peace. UNRWA serves as a precise example as does the unilateral withdrawal of UN forces out of Sinai consequent to Nassar’s oath to slaughter the Jews! UN 1701 failure in Lebanon – not a failure viewed from the Arab perspective which witnessed the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Lebanon.
The Abraham Accords post the Oct7th 2023 Abomination War not one of those 4 countries have broken off diplomatic relations with Israel. No UN condemnation of Israel can make this boast of peace success. The UN functions better as a forum for legitimacy claims than as an effective peace-maker. Its record includes failed or partial peacekeeping, politicized resolutions, and institutions that can entrench disputes.
Bilateral diplomacy—such as the Egypt–Israel and Jordan–Israel treaties, and the Abraham Accords—has achieved concrete results than the stark contrast of multilateral UN one-sided condemnations of Israel. If Chapter VI resolutions qualify as binding under international law -then why Chapter VII?
Chapter VI lacks the power of enforcement. Therefore Chapter VI does not qualify as “binding under International law”. Recommendations do not by definition equal to Ultimatums – Chapter VII. Under Article 25 and Article 48 of the UN Charter, member states are legally obligated to carry out Security Council decisions made under Chapter VII.
Chapter VII the only chapter that allows for binding sanctions, economic blockades, and the authorization of military force. Contrast 242 against 678 which authorized force against Iraq after Saddam nationalized Kuwait. And compare the ICJ to British courts. No British court can declare a law passed by Parliament as un-Constitutional. If the UN wanted to legally compel a partition or a two-state solution, it would have to pass a Chapter VII resolution. Since it hasn’t the “foundation” remains a political recommendation, not a binding legal command. The “building” stands only because states voluntarily agree to it, not because the UN forces it.
Resolution 242, when read in the context of UNGA Resolution 3236 (1974) (which followed the 1973 Yom Kippur War), creates a legal and diplomatic framework where the UNWRA “refugee problem” and “territorial integrity” clauses implicitly point to a Palestinian entity, even if the word “Palestine” – absent from 242’s text. The language “Every state in the area”, served as the spring board for GA 3236 based upon SC 338. Later UN resolutions 446. 2334 and institutional practice developed an initially open-ended framework toward that political destination.
A person does not have to see the river flow into the Sea to recognizes that rivers eventually flow into the Sea. The arrogance and corruption of great power SC imperialism coupled with block voting: for example GA 3379 – biased one sided condemnations of Israel produced the fruits of an ever increasingly racist UN two state interpretation and diplomatic framework which UN propaganda styles as “international law”. The political intent of British/French 242 – its destination became clear without the original text itself exposing great power European imperialism which Ike snubbed in their attempt to seize the Suez Canal in 1956 and therein dominate the balance of power across the Middle East and North Africa. France lost Algeria in 1961. Its economic domination and manipulation of Sahel Africa remained dominant in 1956.
Never said the post UN SC 338 GA 3236 decided all questions of statehood. Rather, that these so-called “Philistine” Arabs never declared national Independence in the 1948 War. Only Jews declared National Independence. Therefore post ’67 with the defeat of both Jordan in Samaria and Egypt in Gaza – only Israel stood as a state. ICJ only follows the trend: all rivers flow into the sea. The ICJ cannot overrule UN SC Chapter VI resolutions any more than the common law courts of Britain can declare a law passed by Parliament – Un-Constitutional.
The post 1946 UN Charter recognition of right to self-determination compares to the church dogma of the Trinity! Israel does not deny self determination. All Arab wars against Israel deny Jewish self determination. Post the Oct7th 2023 massacre Israel says Arab self determination must come from Arab lands not Israeli lands. Arabs states refusal to repatriate their refugee the first cause of the lack of dhimmi towel heads ability to achieve self determinations in Arab lands assigned for the Palestinian State. Actions have their consequences and Israelis have had quite enough of these dhimmi dune coon terrorism.
The ICJ interprets the UN GA and SC resolutions. It attempts to declare what UN “law” means. The foundation cracked metaphor argues that the ICJ relies on a “trend” (following the river) rather than a binding legal command (Chapter VII) or a historical fact (the 1948 declaration). You argue that the ICJ follows self-determination? Yet all Arab wars against Israel reject that Jews have equal rights to self-determination. Arab phraseology refers to Israel as a “Crusader State”. Who judges “Human Rights”? Post ’67 PLO terrorists replaced by Hamas terrorists never judged by any Goy Courtroom for human rights violations like using their own people in Gaza as human shields and building under UN buildings. Prohibition of permanent occupation assumes guilt upon Israel but ignores Nassers attempt to throw the Jews into the Sea.
The ICJ cannot “overrule” the lack of a 1948 state declaration is a strong legal position based on state sovereignty and formalism. Self determination does not supersede the Arab nations failure to repatriate their dhimmi towelheaded refugee populations! It takes two hands to clap. Jordan nor Egypt validates the right to self determination even for the Balestinians in Samaria and Gaza. This so utterly contrasts with the pie in the sky UN refugee issue which UNWRA corrupts and profanes. The king has no clothes as he struts naked down the street with humanity intact & dignity!
The ICJ 2024 opinion biased because it ignores the human rights violations of the Palestinians (Hamas/PA) while condemning Israel. Pay for Slay the ICJ has never condemned. Arab refusal to solve the refugee problem serves as an example of the cracked UN foundations. The voting block GA and power politics SC has never possessed the moral fiber to all a spade a spade. Nations have interests not friends; the failure of the Arab world to accept its own refugees.
The “Two-State” framework: A legal fiction that ignores the real cause of the conflict. Arab rejection of Jewish equal rights to self determination (181) and employing Arab refugees as propaganda – because not a single Arab country has willingly accepted towel headed dhimmi Arab refugees as citizens of their within other Arab countries. There’s nothing “neutral” or even “legalistic” in the bias of UN GA and SC Resolutions. Proof: the UN refuses to validate Israel as a state within the Middle East community of nations. The ICJ interprets international treaties, customary law, and UN resolutions, but it lacks independent enforcement powers and cannot create binding legal dictates where the UN Charter itself grants only recommendatory authority.