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In this week’s MBN Agenda: Israel votes Tuesday on whether to keep Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in power, but the election may do little to change its hard line against Iran. And as U.S. President Donald Trump weighs another round of strikes after next week’s midterms, European and Middle Eastern governments are pushing for diplomacy – but without a clear solution to the standoff over the Strait of Hormuz.
Also this week: Washington reduces Middle Eastern embassy staffing amid growing threats, Tom Barrack’s high profile comments raise questions about whether he speaks for official U.S. policy, a new report warns the current detente with Iran could become the new normal, and Arab parties emerge as potential kingmakers in Israel’s election.
Mustafa Khatib contributed to this week’s Agenda.
Washington Signals
Iran War Colors Two National Votes
An AI-generated image of a nuclear strike on Tel Aviv, posted on the X account of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on October 25, 2026. (X/Benjamin Netanyahu)
Benjamin Netanyahu has offered Israeli voters an apocalyptic vision of what could happen if they oust him from office: a nuclear mushroom cloud over Tel Aviv.
The AI-generated image, shared on the prime minister’s official Instagram account a day before Tuesday’s election, was Netanyahu’s latest attempt to stake his re-election on his claim that he’s the country’s best bulwark against Iran. Yet though the vote could bring an end to Netanyahu’s tenure, its potential impact on how Israel wages its war on Iran may be comparatively small, by most readings.
Netanyahu’s main challenger, former military chief Gadi Eisenkot, has hardly pushed a softer line on Tehran. In a weekend interview with The New York Post, Eisenkot praised U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to attack Iran alongside Israel as “courageous.” He also warned that Iran was still seeking nuclear weapons and proposed a new formal regional security alliance under a U.S. umbrella – a “kind of Middle Eastern NATO,” as Eisenkot described it.
The leadership hopeful has sharply criticized Netanyahu’s stewardship of Israel, particularly his handling of the October 2023 Hamas attack and the war in Gaza. But on Iran, their differences seem more a matter of strategy and style than any fundamental dispute over the war’s aim or merits.
At the very least, that’s certainly how Tehran sees it.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei on Monday said that Iran’s government believed the Israeli election’s outcome would make “no difference” as far as it was concerned. He compared the contest to “Dr. Strangelove,” Stanley Kubrick’s 1964 Cold War satire in which the brinksmanship of competing world leaders spirals out of control and leads to a global nuclear catastrophe.
In Washington, meanwhile, the biggest question is what turn the conflict will take after Tuesday’s vote in Israel and the midterm elections in the United States a week later.
CNN reported that U.S. forces were prepared to launch major strikes against Iran “within 96 hours” of receiving an order from Trump. American officials said the U.S. president appeared to be leaning toward more strikes, according to the report, with a decision most likely to be made after the Nov. 3 elections.
The Pentagon did not dispute the report. “The Department is a planning organization, and its job is to develop and execute military options,” it said.
Netanyahu pushed for more U.S. strikes on Iran even before Israel’s voting day, according to CNN, but Trump refused, having publicly promised not to attack Iran before the U.S. midterms. Still, the CNN report said the two countries’ militaries were now actively preparing for joint operations.
Outside of Washington and Jerusalem, the appetite for escalation in the war with Iran appears to be in markedly short supply.
On Friday, foreign ministers from Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Pakistan met their counterparts from Britain, France, Germany and Italy in Istanbul, before issuing a joint declaration calling for new talks and de-escalation. That effort gained momentum Monday with senior officials from “Mecca Pact” countries Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Pakistan making their way to Tehran for talks.
While united in opposing new strikes, those countries have not come up with a clear path for definitively ending the eight-month war in a way that would satisfy both the U.S. and Iranian sides.
The Istanbul gathering called for more talks between American and Iranian negotiators and for free passage in the Strait of Hormuz. But the foreign ministers had scant advice for resolving the disputes over Iran’s nuclear program or Tehran’s ongoing disruption of traffic through the strait.
Importantly, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi made it clear on Sunday that Tehran has no intention of voluntarily restoring prewar arrangements.
“The shipping routes through the Strait of Hormuz will no longer be the same as before,” Araghchi said, “nor will the strait be managed as it was in the past.”
That leaves a difficult question for the U.S. partners calling for de-escalation: If renewed U.S. strikes are to be avoided, but Iran refuses to restore the old rules in Hormuz, is the current unresolved détente the best that can be had?
Quote of the Day
A further escalation between Iran and the United States would create nothing but losers.
— French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot, speaking after eight European and Middle Eastern governments met in Istanbul to discuss the conflict.
Embassy Watch
U.S. Reduces Embassy Staff Across Middle East
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio attends a press conference in Lisbon, Portugal, October 8, 2026. REUTERS/Rodrigo Antunes
The United States is reducing staff at its diplomatic missions in Lebanon, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Jordan amid growing concerns about possible Iranian attacks against Americans, a State Department official told MBN.
The decision followed an Oct. 23 intelligence memo sent to U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio that warned that Iran’s government “has substantially increased efforts to target U.S. personnel” and that Iranian plots to kill Americans had reached advanced stages both in the Middle East and elsewhere.
American missions are now also operating under heightened security measures, the State Department official said. The staff reduction came as Iranian-backed Houthi rebels intensified their attacks on Saudi Arabia, with the State Department also advising U.S. citizens to exercise “extreme caution” if traveling there.
Diplomacy Watch
When Does Tom Barrack Speak for Washington?
Tom Barrack speaks with members of the press. REUTERS/Stephanie Keith
U.S. Ambassador to Turkey Tom Barrack has raised fresh questions about whether his unusually candid public remarks reflect official Trump administration policy. Speaking in Doha, the longtime Trump confidant suggested Washington was moving away from its decades-old oil-for-security relationship with Gulf states. Days later, he predicted potentially imminent U.S. strikes on Iran.
Barrack has previously sparked controversy with remarks about Israeli control of the Golan Heights and the merits of democracy in post-Assad Syria, prompting questions about whether he speaks for the administration or himself. Notably, Trump last week distanced himself from the strike prediction, while the U.S. State Department told MBN that the approach to the Middle East had not changed.
Analysts told MBN that Barrack’s comments could be considered observations rather than policy declarations. Veteran U.S. negotiator Aaron David Miller pointed to continued U.S. military involvement in the Gulf, including operations in Hormuz. “Doesn’t sound to me like we’re in walkaway mode,” he said.
Regional Watch
Iran War Stalemate: The New Normal?
Helicopters fire munitions during what the US Central Command said was a strike on an Iranian-affiliated dhow, at a location given as the Gulf of Oman, in this still image taken from a handout video released October 14, 2026. US Central Command/Handout via REUTERS
The stalemate in the U.S.-Iran war could become a lasting feature of regional security, with Tehran using missiles, drones and its regional proxies to destabilize its neighbors rather than pursue a comprehensive settlement, according to a new report from the Middle East Institute launched in Washington last week.
Jason Campbell, a former Pentagon official and one of the report’s authors, warned of Iran “using its asymmetric capabilities as a means of deterrence and, really, stated plainly, extortion across the region.” Even sophisticated U.S.-supplied air defenses have proven unable to intercept every Iranian missile or drone, he said, leaving U.S. partners vulnerable to Iran’s attacks.
The report also warned that fears of an Iranian nuclear bomb could prompt others to explore their options. Turkey, in particular, is considering technology that would preserve its ability to develop nuclear weapons later, due to growing doubts about Washington’s ability to guarantee regional security.
Israel Watch
Arab Parties Could Be Israel’s Kingmakers
Mansour Abbas, leader of the Ra’am party, speaks at the plenum at the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, in Jerusalem, July 13, 2026. REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
Israel’s Arab parties could determine who becomes prime minister after Tuesday’s vote. Polls suggest Netanyahu’s bloc could win 50 seats against 54 for the bloc led by Gadi Eisenkot, leaving both short of the 61 needed for a majority. Two mostly Arab electoral lists are projected to together win 16 seats.
Ra’am leader Mansour Abbas has made clear he wants to replace Netanyahu, while the Joint List has signaled its willingness to support an opposition government from outside the coalition. But Eisenkot has ruled out governing with Arab parties, declaring plainly: “I will not ally with any Arab party.”
Arab parties have played kingmaker before, notably when Ra’am joined the coalition that ousted Netanyahu in 2021. Arik Rudnitzky, a researcher at Tel Aviv University, told MBN that Jewish parties’ campaign pledges against working with Arab parties could soften after the election, depending on the final results. Otherwise, another political deadlock could force fresh elections in 2027.
