NO WAR The World That Chose Violence When It Had Every Reason Not To

On 28 February 2026, the United States and Israel launched Operation Epic Fury — a surprise attack on Iran conducted while nuclear negotiations were, by all credible accounts, on the verge of a breakthrough. Thirty-three days later, the Strait of Hormuz is effectively closed, Lebanon and Yemen are again in flames, Dubai has lost its status as the world’s safe haven, and a American president is threatening to bomb Iran’s power stations while simultaneously claiming the war is “nearing completion.” This is TBMag’s editorial position: we are against this war. We always were. And the evidence of the past month has not given us reason to reconsider.

How It Started — and Why That Matters

The timeline is important, because it has been obscured. By late February 2026, Oman’s foreign minister was telling the world that Iran had agreed to cap uranium enrichment, accept full IAEA verification, and irreversibly downgrade its stockpile. He called peace “within reach.” Talks were scheduled to resume on 2 March.

They never did. On 27 February, the night before the strikes began, the Omani foreign minister was still describing active negotiations. The following morning, American and Israeli aircraft were already in the air.

The surprise US-Israeli attack was launched during the nuclear negotiations, killing Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and several other Iranian officials, as well as inflicting dozens of civilian casualties. The Omani foreign minister said afterwards that he was “dismayed” and that “active and serious negotiations” had been undermined.

This is the foundation on which everything that followed was built. Not a war of necessity. Not a war of last resort. A war chosen at the precise moment when the alternative — an imperfect, provisional, but real diplomatic settlement — was within reach.

Thirty-Three Days: What Has Actually Happened

The war that was supposed to be swift has become something else. Before the US-Israeli war on Iran, approximately 130 ships a day passed through the Strait of Hormuz. The latest figures show six or fewer ships transiting a day. Iran has not simply closed the strait — it has demonstrated that it can keep it closed, and that the cost of forcing it open militarily would be enormous.

Trump told Americans that the Iran war is “nearing completion,” projecting another two to three weeks of involvement. He has been saying variations of this for weeks. Meanwhile, Trump extended a deadline for Iran to open the Strait of Hormuz, pausing the threatened destruction of Iran’s power plants until 6 April. The extension itself tells you something about the actual state of the war.

Iran has demanded a guaranteed ceasefire to end the war permanently. Intermediaries contacted Iran with discussions focused on continuing diplomacy, but no talks have taken place via mediators for a temporary ceasefire. The gap between the two sides’ positions — America demanding Hormuz open first, Iran demanding security guarantees before anything — remains as wide as it was on day one.

Lebanon and Yemen are again active fronts. The UAE’s Ministry of Defense said its air defences have intercepted 438 ballistic missiles, 19 cruise missiles, and 2,012 drones since the start of Iranian attacks. Gulf states that built their modern identities on stability and commerce are now absorbing missile strikes on their airports, desalination plants and hotels.

And Dubai — the city that marketed itself to the world as the place where geography and conflict could not reach you — has discovered that no city is truly an island.

The British Position: Against the War, Carrying the Cost

Britain opposed this war before it began. London lobbied Washington against military action. It was not listened to.

Britain’s Prime Minister Keir Starmer said 35 countries have signed a statement committing to work together on restoring maritime security in the Strait of Hormuz. He said Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper would lead a conference on the issue, and that military planners were working on potential plans to implement once the war ends.

That is the British position in miniature: against the war, committed to its diplomatic resolution, preparing for the aftermath. It is a position of considerable frustration, because Britain has influence but not control, and because the economic consequences of a conflict it opposed are landing on British households with full force.

Energy prices in the United Kingdom were already elevated before 28 February. Since the Hormuz closure, they have risen further. The LNG shipments that Britain depends on to heat its homes and power its industry pass through or around the Gulf. Every week the strait remains effectively closed adds to an energy cost burden that will take years, not months, to fully unwind.

The British public did not choose this war. Neither did most of the world. Millions took to the streets — in Washington, in London, in Berlin, in Seoul — to say so. They are using 2,000-pound bombs to take out entire city blocks, one analyst told Al Jazeera. This is not a surgical operation. It is a war, with everything that word means.

The Turkish Position: Neutrality Under Pressure

According to a March 2026 survey by MetroPoll, 68 percent of Turkish respondents want Turkey to remain neutral in the conflict, 22 percent favour supporting Iran, and only 2 percent back aligning with the US and Israel.

Erdoğan has read this clearly. Turkey has been pushing hard for an end to the US-Israeli war on Iran since the campaign began. In the weeks leading up to February 28, Turkey joined Gulf Cooperation Council states in lobbying the Trump administration to settle issues with Tehran through diplomacy, not war.

Iran is assumed to have targeted Turkey with three missile attacks, and all three attempts were neutralised by NATO interceptors. Turkey has sought to downplay these incidents, stressing that it remains outside the conflict. But the missiles landing in Turkish airspace are a reminder that neutrality in a regional war is not simply a political posture — it is something that must be actively maintained, and which others can choose to undermine.

Trump called Erdoğan a “fantastic leader” and noted that during operations against Iran he “did not enter areas that Washington considered undesirable.” The compliment was noted in Ankara with the mixture of gratitude and wariness that Trump’s praise typically produces. BlackRock’s Larry Fink visited Erdoğan in Istanbul in late March — Turkish neutrality and refusal to interfere in certain areas are “goods” that Erdoğan exchanges for promises of large-scale investments and participation in the post-war reconstruction of the Middle East.

This is Turkey’s calculus, stated plainly: stay out of the war, mediate where possible, and position Ankara for the reconstruction and investment flows that will follow whenever the shooting stops. Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan has been visiting Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar, hoping to build pressure and momentum among the Muslim world to pressure Washington and Jerusalem to end the war.

Turkey should maintain this position. Not because neutrality is always the morally comfortable choice — it is not — but because Turkey’s most valuable contribution to this crisis is as a credible interlocutor to both sides. The moment Ankara chooses a side, that capacity is gone.

The Wider Reckoning

A year ago, more than 100,000 Palestinians had been killed in Gaza. The international community expressed horror, passed resolutions, and largely watched. Now the same logic of military force — the belief that sufficient firepower can resolve political problems — has been applied to Iran, and the results are visible to anyone who cares to look.

Iran has not been destroyed. It has been wounded, its leadership decimated, its nuclear infrastructure damaged. But it retains the capacity to close the world’s most important energy chokepoint. Its missiles still fly. Its proxies are still active. And its population — which was protesting against the regime in January 2026, a genuinely popular uprising — has now been handed, by American bombs falling on schools and hospitals, the most effective possible argument for national unity against a foreign aggressor.

Wars are easier to start than to stop. This one was started when it did not need to be. That is TBMag’s editorial judgement, stated clearly and without apology.

We stand with the millions who took to the streets. We stand with the diplomats who were told their work was finished before it was. We stand with the civilians — Iranian, Israeli, Lebanese, Yemeni, Emirati — whose lives have been upended by decisions made by people who will not bear the consequences.

No War.