(JNS) “No president was willing to do what I am willing to do tonight,” boasted US President Donald Trump, speaking to the people of Iran shortly after unleashing a joint attack that may have finally ended the theocratic nightmare that has been their miserable fate since 1979.

He was right: For nearly half a century, the Iranian clerics who ruled the country with its morality police and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps did everything imaginable to deserve the retaliatory fury of the United States. Yet aside from last summer’s 12-day war, which degraded Iran’s nuclear capabilities and led to the assassination of military brass, and the war that continues right now, no other American president could make Trump’s claim.

Looking back, this failure is astonishing.

Instantly in 1979, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini made no secret of his nation’s contempt for international norms. Drunkards on radical Islam stormed the American embassy, taking and holding 52 hostages for 444 days. Jimmy Carter was the first of our presidents to cajole Iran to join the civilized world, only to look like a smiling peanut farmer with a toothless understanding of how to wield American power.

Until Trump, six American presidents nonchalantly watched Iran become a regional menace and the world’s chief instigator of terror on their collective watch. America had no business lounging on the sidelines.

After all, it was a frequent Iranian target: bombings at the American Embassy and Marine barracks in Beirut, which left nearly 300 dead; more than 600 American servicemen killed in Iraq; a Sbarro pizzeria bombing in Jerusalem that resulted in American casualties; scores picked off by drone strikes at military bases; and 40 US citizens of the 1,200 slaughtered in Hamas-led terrorist attacks in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.

No other president had the gumption to show the Islamic regime the consequences of messing with America and its Western allies. Countless times, thousands would gather on the streets of Tehran and shout, “Death to America!” as they torched the US and Israeli flags, as well as effigies of Uncle Sam.

No other nation provoked more fights and behaved in such barbaric fashion. Threats to wipe Israel from the map became the calling card of Iranian diplomacy. All the while, its scientists enriched uranium at weapons-grade levels for ostensibly “civilian” purposes. Iran was a global exporter of oil. Were they spinning centrifuges just to operate toasters?

The United States—the first victim of Iran’s terror operations—always gave the mullahs the benefit of the doubt. Slavish appeasement reached a new low with former President Barack Obama’s haughty confidence that he could charm the mullahs. Such faculty-lounge hubris led to the pathetic Iran nuclear “deal,” which had the mullahs laughing in mosques all over the country as they enriched their way toward a bomb.

The deal was a death wish in disguise. Iran’s nuclear ambitions were merely delayed. Compliance was unverifiable. Ballistic missiles remained intact. Proxies like Hezbollah, Hamas and the Houthis grew in numbers. And, as a goodwill gift, Obama unfroze nearly $50 billion in Iranian assets, which ultimately funded terror operations that Israel, nearly a decade later, would be forced to destroy.

These presidents stood frozen in fear, completely overestimating Iran’s fighting force. They never realized that Iran’s only talent was as a regional mischief-maker. It couldn’t fight its own battles. Worse still, time and again, Washington thwarted Israel’s determination to go it alone and preempt the mullahs’ provocations and enrichment of uranium.

And here we are, 47 years later, having come full circle. The latest “supreme” leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, staked everything on acquiring a nuclear weapon and lost his life to a Tomahawk missile. The same airstrike felled his defense minister, a senior adviser and the head of the IRGC, along with an entourage of 40 henchmen.

The home of the former president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who frequently taunted Israel from the rostrum of the General Assembly, received a visit from an Israeli sortie that probably ended his life, too. Wiping the Jewish state from the map is proving to be both an empty threat and a serious health risk.

In a perfect alignment of calendars, the Jewish holiday of Purim took place during “Operation Roaring Lion” and “Operation Epic Fury.” Its origins take place 2,500 years ago in ancient Persia, where Jews escaped yet another perilous biblical encounter.

The big megillah today, however, is the destiny of a post-Islamic revolutionary Iran. Will the people be able to wrest control of their homeland from religious fanatics hell-bent on hegemonic dreams of a modern caliphate across the globe?

It’s hard to imagine, but before 1979, Iran was a sane, secular state. Women wore stylish European dresses. They were not beaten or imprisoned for showing hair and skin. Even more improbable, Iran was allied with both the United States and Israel.

Speaking of that fearsome pair of allies, for those Americans who know of no greater pleasure than hating Israel, is there a more qualified military partner-in-arms than the Jewish state? A wingman nation with seamless coordination and adept intelligence-gathering, it certainly packs a lethal punch.

There is no coincidence that the very same people cheering for Hamas on university campuses and in city street rallies are now protesting the dismantling of the sugar daddy of state-sponsored terror. The fact that the ayatollahs suppressed dissent by murdering an estimated 30,000 or more of their citizens in the past two months places the humanity of Iran’s sycophants in sharp relief.

What can go wrong? Given the landscape so far, American boots on the ground and a forever war are not likely. The B-52 bombing campaign last June left nuclear fission on the table. The same can’t occur this time with Iran’s massive stockpile of ballistic missiles.

The gravest concern is the borderless track meet of unvetted immigrants welcomed by the Biden administration. Surely sleeper cells are among them. One thing all such inchoate terrorists have in common: At some point, the prophet commands the killing of Americans and Jews.

The good news is that America’s new muscularity has placed the world on notice: This is no longer the United States of Obama and Biden. Red lines will be enforced. Provocations will not be ignored. Allies will be defended. No apologies for American exceptionalism will be made. The United States will not enter a conflict it cannot finish. The days of cowardly appeasement are over.

Of course, protesters will be out in full force, carrying anti-American signs and invoking the War Powers Act. It won’t matter to Trump. He has a far weightier constituency in mind: the Iranian, Israeli and American people.

Reprinted with permission from The Jewish Journal.