{"id":570563,"date":"2026-08-01T16:53:12","date_gmt":"2026-08-01T16:53:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/570563\/"},"modified":"2026-08-01T16:53:12","modified_gmt":"2026-08-01T16:53:12","slug":"laura-loomer-lindsey-graham-and-the-deepening-iran-crisis-whats-behind-trumps-reset-with-zelenskyy-us-foreign-policy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/570563\/","title":{"rendered":"Laura Loomer, Lindsey Graham and the deepening Iran crisis: what\u2019s behind Trump\u2019s reset with Zelenskyy? | US foreign policy"},"content":{"rendered":"

As leadership pairings go, Donald Trump<\/a> and Volodymyr Zelenskyy<\/a> is not a match made in heaven.<\/p>\n

It is a far cry from the warm rapport and kindred spiritedness that defined Ronald Reagan\u2019s relationship with Margaret Thatcher<\/a>, or even the guarded pragmatic friendliness Reagan forged with Mikhail Gorbachev<\/a> to effectively end the cold war<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Yet from a calamitous start that saw Trump publicly ambush and then virtually expel Zelenskyy <\/a>from the White House after an explosive meeting in February 2025, relations between the US president and his Ukrainian counterpart have taken an unexpectedly warm turn.<\/p>\n

The thaw has coincided with the US-Israeli war with Iran<\/a> \u2013 and appears to have accelerated as Trump has struggled to end the conflict.<\/p>\n

A memorandum of understanding, signed in June and designed to institute a 60-day ceasefire, has been rendered moot as hostilities have resumed over the status of the strait of Hormuz, the strategically vital waterway that Iran has effectively closed from the start of the war \u2013 threatening the stability of the global economy.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s no question that he\u2019s warmed up to Zelenskyy,\u201d said Charles Kupchan<\/a>, a senior fellow at the Council of Foreign Relations and a former White House adviser on European affairs. \u201cWe\u2019ve gone from a phase in which he was throwing Zelenskyy out of the Oval Office, and turning his back on him, to a situation today where they seem to have a reasonably good relationship, and where there have now been a succession of meetings that have gone well.\u201d<\/p>\n

This week, the pair met once more at the White House after Zelenskyy travelled to Washington for the funeral of Lindsey Graham, the Republican senator who had staunchly backed Ukraine in its war with Russia, even as Trump and his Maga movement all but threw in their lot with the Russian president, Vladimir Putin<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The encounter followed another at last month\u2019s Nato summit in Ankara<\/a>, when Trump strikingly praised Zelenskyy \u2013 whom he had once labelled a \u201cdictator\u201d \u2013 and said he would grant licenses for Ukraine to develop its own Patriot missile interceptors, although he cast doubt on that promise<\/a> at a cabinet meeting on Friday.<\/p>\n

It also came on the heels of an arguably even more remarkable occurrence: the meeting in Kyiv between Zelenskyy and Laura Loomer<\/a>, the far-right social media influencer known to have sway with Trump, and who has previously vocally supported Russia.<\/p>\n

After meeting the Ukrainian leader, Loomer said<\/a> she had been \u201cbamboozled\u201d by Russian propaganda and admitted having believed \u201ca lot of untrue things\u201d about Ukraine. She also said she had followed the meeting with a phone call to Trump and that her change of view was affecting sentiment across the Maga movement.<\/p>\n

double quotation markSuddenly the Ukrainians are approaching him no longer asking for American charity but offering helpTrita Parsi<\/p>\n

This sea change may have several causes, from Trump\u2019s mercurial nature and preference for backing a winner to Putin\u2019s stubborn refusal to accept several favorable peace deals after Trump vowed to settle the conflict \u201con day one\u201d of his second presidency.<\/p>\n

Yet one potential factor stands out among all others.<\/p>\n

While administration officials have offered no explanation, the accelerating thaw between Trump and Zelenskyy has coincided with the US\u2019s deepening difficulties in concluding the war with Iran\u2019s hardline Islamic regime that Trump launched, along with Israel, on 28 February.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt a moment when he is stuck in a war, faced with bad military options, and suddenly the Ukrainians are approaching him no longer asking for American charity but offering help, I find it quite plausible that that could be a reason, amongst many probably, as to why Trump\u2019s attitude appears to have shifted in a rather strong way,\u201d said Trita Parsi<\/a>, an Iranian analyst who is vice-president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.<\/a><\/p>\n

Tehran\u2019s retaliation with drone attacks on US military bases and infrastructure in allied Gulf kingdoms has served to illustrate the shared interest between Kyiv and Washington. Ukraine<\/a>, too, came under sustained attack from Iranian Shahed drones after Tehran supplied them to Moscow in the early stages of Russia\u2019s invasion of the country in 2022.<\/p>\n

Ukraine has since responded by becoming a world leader in defensive drone technology<\/a>, an innovation it has trumpeted to the US and its Gulf allies since they came under fire from the weapons as Iran responded to the military onslaught on its territory.<\/p>\n

Zelenskyy told UK MPs in March that 200 Ukrainian military experts had been dispatched<\/a> to 11 countries across the Gulf \u2013 including the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait \u2013 to advise on how to combat Shahed drones.<\/p>\n

Not just a taker, but a giver<\/p>\n

Last weekend, Ukraine was accused of trying to merge the two conflicts after it struck an Iranian commercial vessel on the Caspian Sea. Kyiv justified the strike by saying that the ship was being used to transport arms to Russia. Iran said the strike had killed an Iranian sailor and threatened retaliation.<\/p>\n

Preparing to meet Trump in Washington, Zelenskyy said Iran had \u201cattacked\u201d Ukraine by supplying weaponry to Russia.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat do you expect, if Iran transferred new technologies to Russia from the first year of the war,\u201d he told<\/a> Sky News. \u201cThese were Shahed drones. They transferred thousands of these drones in the first year of the war. Then they issued licenses. What did they do? Did they attack us? I think so.\u201d<\/p>\n

Zelenskyy also vowed to share Ukrainian intelligence that he said showed Russia giving Tehran help to hit US targets. \u201cSince the beginning of July, we have recorded active Russian satellite surveillance of the Gulf states and US military facilities located there,\u201d he posted on X<\/a>. \u201cThese images subsequently appear in Iran \u2026 There is clear correlation between Russia\u2019s satellite imagery of these sites and Iranian strikes \u2013 both before the attacks, in preparation for them, and afterward, to assess the damage.\u201d<\/p>\n

skip past newsletter promotion<\/a>Free newsletter | Every day<\/p>\n

Sign up to Headlines US<\/p>\n

Get the most important US headlines and highlights emailed direct to you every morning<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Kupchan, of the Council of Foreign Relations, said Zelenskyy was being a \u201cgood salesman\u201d in persuading Trump that Ukraine was an ally worth supporting, by contributing help that the US needs \u2013 thus appealing to the US president\u2019s transactional instincts.<\/p>\n

\u201cZelensky has done a very good job of communicating to Trump that he is going to help him on Iran,\u201d said Kupchan. \u201cHe travelled in the Gulf and said, \u2018I\u2019m going to help you deal with Iran and drones, because we\u2019ve been there and done that.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s an investment in his relationships with Trump, and with Europe, because he\u2019s demonstrating Ukraine\u2019s value as an ally. And I think Trump, who is endlessly transactional, might actually agree to help Ukraine a bit more because Ukraine has stepped up when America\u2019s chips are down in the war with Iran.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe case for helping Ukraine is even stronger now, because Ukraine has demonstrated that it is not just a taker, but a giver.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, the US president\u2019s apparent vacillation over his Patriot missile pledge shows that cultivating Trump is always at the mercy of his mercurial nature.<\/p>\n

Some analysts warn that Ukraine risks turning two local localized wars into a global conflict by \u201cmerging the battlefields\u201d – thereby inviting Tehran to widen the scope of any retaliatory measures.<\/p>\n

Sina Toossi<\/a>, a fellow at the Center for International Policy, said Ukraine\u2019s intervention bolstered the view in Tehran that the Russia-Ukraine war, and Iran\u2019s confrontation with the US, are becoming a single, interconnected conflict.<\/p>\n

\u201cTrump\u2019s apparent warming toward Zelensky only strengthens this perception,\u201d he said. \u201cThe likely implication is not an immediate missile strike on Ukraine, but a broader expansion of where Tehran believes it can legitimately impose costs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Recognition of such dangers appeared to spur Andrii Sybiha, Ukraine\u2019s acting foreign minister, to call his Iranian counterpart, Abbas Araghchi, immediately after Zelenskyy\u2019s latest meeting with Trump.<\/p>\n

double quotation markThe centre of gravity in the Maga movement is still skeptical of foreign wars, and of sending large amounts of money to UkraineCharles Kupchan<\/p>\n

\u201cI stressed that our goal is to avoid unnecessary escalation,\u201d Sybiha wrote<\/a> on social media. \u201cAll of Ukraine\u2019s actions are aimed solely at defending our country from Russian aggression and never intended to target civilian vessels or people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Parsi said Ukraine\u2019s involvement could have the effect of \u201creframing\u201d the Iran war, so that it would no longer be perceived merely as serving an agenda set by Israel, but as helping to defend Ukraine.<\/p>\n

That might appeal to European countries, and Democrats in the US, who have broadly opposed the Iran war, but supported Ukraine. Yet, even with Loomer\u2019s belated conversion to the Ukrainian cause, it seems far less likely to impress Trump\u2019s base.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe centre of gravity in the Maga movement is still skeptical of foreign wars, and of sending large amounts of money to Ukraine, and I don\u2019t see that changing,\u201d said Kupchan.<\/p>\n

Matt Duss<\/a>, vice-president of the Center for International Policy, warned that Zelenskyy\u2019s efforts to help Trump with Iran risked undermining support for Ukraine.<\/p>\n

\u201cTrying to draw closer to Israel in the war on Iran really undermines a lot of Ukraine\u2019s case, because Israel is effectively trying to do to the Palestinians precisely what Russia has been trying to do to Ukraine, which is to erase them as a people,\u201d said Duss, a former foreign policy adviser to Bernie Sanders. \u201cThat could potentially diminish what has been up until now pretty good bipartisan support for Ukraine.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As leadership pairings go, Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy is not a match made in heaven. It is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":570564,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-570563","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/570563","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=570563"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/570563\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/570564"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=570563"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=570563"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=570563"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}