Trump supporters who backed his promise to avoid new Middle East wars worry Iran’s attacks on shipping are pushing the U.S. toward escalation — and maybe even boots on the ground.

When the U.S. started firing Tomahawk missiles at Iran late last month, many of Donald Trump’s allies hoped it would be a quick, surgical operation, similar to last year’s strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities or the ouster of Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro in January.

Though uneasy, they were reassured by the belief that Trump’s open-ended objectives gave him the flexibility to declare victory whenever he saw fit.

Now, more than two weeks into the campaign, some of those allies believe the president no longer controls how, or when, the war ends. They fear Iran’s attacks on oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz, which have rattled global crude markets and threaten broader economic distress, are boxing Trump into a situation where escalating the conflict — potentially even putting American boots on the ground — becomes the only way to credibly claim victory.

“This is not Europe’s war,” the EU tells Washington in a bruising rebuke on Iran even as oil prices rise.

Europe's message to Donald Trump on Monday was clear: We're not helping you secure the Strait of Hormuz.

Foreign ministers from the 27 EU countries gathered in Brussels to discuss the American president’s call for European countries to help secure the narrow waterway, a vital oil shipping channel that Iran has largely blocked in retaliation for U.S. and Israeli airstrikes.

Among the ideas floated was expanding the mandate of the EU’s naval mission — Aspides — to allow European warships to be sent to patrol the strait between the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman.

Meanwhile, they're going to intentionally extinct a species of whale for the oil industry

1. 🖼️ Paging SpaceCowboy (direct link) (👍1935 👎18)

from Lemmy Shitpost (!lemmyshitpost@lemmy.world)

Posted by MTZ

2. 🖼️ sloppy one (direct link) (👍1587 👎6)

from memes (!memes@lemmy.world)

Posted by mod_pp

3. 🖼️ Imperial soldiers be like (direct link) (👍1406 👎27)

from Memes (!memes@lemmy.ml)

Posted by yogthos

4. 🖼️ When women have a crush on men (direct link) (👍1335 👎22)

from Funny (!funny@sh.itjust.works)

Posted by realitista

5. 🖼️ BREAKING: Sam Altman points out that putting out fires in orphanages also uses a lot of water. (direct link) (👍1156 👎13)

from Memes (!memes@sopuli.xyz)

Posted by STHayden

6. 🖼️ kirk rule (direct link) (👍1033 👎7)

from 196 (!196@lemmy.blahaj.zone)

Posted by qaz

7. 🖼️ We're all smiles here. (direct link) (👍865 👎4)

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Posted by The_Picard_Maneuver

8. 🖼️ The shopping cart is the ultimate test of a good person (direct link) (👍539 👎21)

from Dank Memes (!dankmemes@lemmy.world)

Posted by Sgt_choke_n_stroke

9. 🖼️ MemeID: 421856901 (direct link) (👍43 👎14)

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Posted by Viking_Hippie

10. 🖼️ Ponzo schemes... data brokering... every crisis turns a profit... fuck this economy maaan (direct link) (👍6 👎2)

from Memes (!memes@midwest.social)

Posted by bluemoon

Inactive communities 👻

These communities have had no posts in the last month:

• UK Memes
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  • Funny memes. No politics.
• Memes @ Lemy
  • Memes fun

Here is a popular post from one of the inactive communities. 🪦♻️

🖼️ ᓚᘏᗢ (direct link), posted in Non-Political Memes (👍356 👎8)

Posted by teagrrl

The main links are using lemmyverse.link which should redirect to the post on your own instance. If you have not used this before, you may need to go direct to https://lemmyverse.link/ and click on 'configure instance'. Some apps will open posts correctly when using the direct link.

Multicommunity: memes-general.json

It gets my goat that people think it's a good option. There are plenty of articles explaining some of the many issues with it, but a few are:

1. It's run by anti-LGBTQ+ crypto bros.
2. It has ads right out of the box.
3. It collected donations towards people who never signed up for them - then held them to ransom in exchange for the kind of information you should never share on the Internet.
4. They're a for-profit advertising company. "Privacy-centric" my elbow.

The feature, which is buried at the bottom of Nintendo's patch notes, allows for boosted Switch 1 games when playing in handheld, with performance akin to playing with the console docked.

Exclusive: Fixing a leak can be simple and equivalent to closing a coal power station, making lack of action maddening, say analysts

The world’s worst mega-leaks of the potent greenhouse gas methane in 2025 have been revealed by an analysis of satellite data.

The super-polluting plumes from oil and gas facilities have a colossal heating impact on the climate but often result from poor maintenance and can be simple to fix. The assessment found dozens of mega-leaks, each having the same global heating impact as a coal-fired power station.

The researchers said it was “maddening” that such easy action to fight the climate crisis was not being taken, and said people should be angry. Stopping the leaks can even be free, given that captured gas can be sold – methane is the “natural gas” that fires power stations.

Source: 'Tis Time for "Torture", Princess - season 2 episode 10

Donald Trump’s attempt to blame Iran for the deadly strike on an elementary school stemmed from an early US intelligence assessment that initially suggested the missile was Iranian but was almost immediately dismissed, according to two people familiar with the matter.

The CIA initially told the president that they did not believe the missile that struck the school was a munition used by the US because the fins appeared to be positioned too low for it to be a Tomahawk cruise missile.

Within 24 hours, the CIA realized that early assessment had been wrong after it became clear from additional videos, taken at other angles, that the missile was in fact a Tomahawk, the people said on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive deliberations.

But Trump had already settled on the explanation that Iran was responsible for the strike before he raised it to reporters on Air Force One last Saturday, even as the defense secretary Pete Hegseth was more cautious and said only the matter was under investigation.