The Axis of Resistance is legitimate anti-Israel/anti-US liberation

In this position, the Axis of Resistance, the network of Iran-aligned forces that includes Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis, is a legitimate movement of anti-imperial liberation against Israeli and US domination. Its advocates describe Israeli action in Lebanon as aggression, Houthi naval pressure as solidarity with Gaza, and Iranian retaliation as asymmetric deterrence by a side that cannot match its opponents conventionally.

Iranian voices carry it. It appears in the dispute on the Israel-Lebanon border, in the role of Iran-linked armed groups, in direct US-Iran strikes, in Israel-Iran strikes, in the conflict around Yemen and the Red Sea, in missile and drone strikes against Gulf states, and in Israeli strikes on Syria, where it calls for defending Syrian sovereignty.

Two positions answer it: that Israel's campaigns are existential self-defence after the attacks of October 7, and that Iran is an illegitimate, existential threat whose nuclear ambitions and proxies justify pressure from an Israeli-US-Saudi coalition. Recent events show direct exchanges of fire between the US and Iran around the Strait of Hormuz, Iranian claims of attacks on US bases, Israeli strikes on Beirut and a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah.