Analysts Warn a Third Round of the U.S.-Iran War Could Be the Deadliest Yet

Analysts are warning that the United States and Israel may restart their war with Iran once the ballots are counted in the U.S. midterm elections on Nov. 3, and that a third round of fighting could be more destructive than the first two. "A renewed war seems almost inevitable," said Danny Citrinowicz, an Israeli analyst who studies the Middle East and Iran.

Citrinowicz spent more than two decades as an intelligence official in Israel's military and now works with the Institute for National Security Studies. He earlier cautioned that attacking the Islamic regime would not produce regime change and would instead draw the whole region into a wider conflict, a prediction events largely confirmed. He told CBC News that view still holds, and that U.S. President Donald Trump has "only bad and worse options" in the Persian Gulf.

Under Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the two countries have fought Iran in two separate wars over the past 18 months. The first began in June 2025 with strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities, lasted 12 days and ended in a fragile ceasefire. Fighting returned in February after a large U.S. military buildup, opening with Israeli strikes on Iran's senior leadership, including Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Based on what Iranian officials are signalling, Citrinowicz expects a third round to hit Gulf energy facilities, civilian infrastructure and communications, including internet lines running beneath the Strait of Hormuz. He also raised the possibility that Iran could send part of its large land army into limited attacks on Gulf states that host U.S. bases, such as Kuwait and Bahrain, aiming to inflict maximum damage on the American economy.

Since the summer truce collapsed, both sides have largely held off on fresh strikes against each other's bases or territory, but the conflict has not gone quiet. The U.S. has blockaded Iranian ports, and Iran has kept targeting commercial ships in the Strait of Hormuz, pushing up global energy costs. On Thursday, Trump accused Iran on Truth Social of trying to inflate oil prices before the midterms, claiming it was "making up fake hits, mines and everything else." A report from the Critical Threats Project and the Institute for the Study of War reached a similar reading, saying the attacks on vessels are meant to pressure Washington into meeting Iranian demands.

Those demands include relief from sanctions, reparations for earlier strike damage, the release of billions in frozen assets and the right to keep its enriched uranium. Mediators from Pakistan and Qatar have spent weeks trying to restart talks without success. Suzanne Maloney of the Brookings Institution said the war has probably pushed Iran's leadership to double down on the revolutionary ideology behind the regime. She warned that retaliation would come from proxies such as the Houthis in Yemen and Hezbollah in Lebanon, and could target soft economic sites like airports. Karim Sadjadpour of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace said Trump lacks a clear goal and that no military "knockout punch" will force Iran to capitulate.

The human toll is already heavy. Western NGOs say more than 7,000 people have died in Iran, while Lebanese media report over 4,000 deaths in Lebanon. Twenty-one U.S. service members have been killed, mostly in Iranian strikes on bases in the Gulf, along with more than 70 Israelis. Deaths have also been recorded in the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Yemen. The New York Times and other U.S. outlets report that the Pentagon is drafting a new battle plan, though it is unknown whether Trump would approve it.

Netanyahu has openly spoken of "finishing the job" and bringing down the Iranian regime, and he faces voters in the coming days in a race that could be very close. Citrinowicz said a widening crisis could help him stay in power by enabling an emergency unity government with opposition members. The danger, he said, is that political calculation combines with an Iranian development that Netanyahu may inflate, producing an unnecessary attack.

Sadjadpour argued that diplomacy is not dead but has been narrowed by Trump's maximalist aims. In this view, Iran's government would compromise only under existential economic pressure paired with a clear, limited diplomatic exit. "If you're asking them to change their identity, that's not going to succeed," Sadjadpour said.