What Trump’s midterms setback could mean for Iran, Israel and Ukraine

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The US midterm elections could have consequences far beyond the country’s borders. President Donald Trump has spent nearly two years overturning decades of American foreign policy, unsettling allies and adversaries alike. Now, both are watching to see how an electoral setback at home will shape his actions abroad.

For Iran, Israel and Ukraine, the stakes go well beyond who controls Congress. The result could influence whether Trump pursues a deal with Tehran or more war, how much Washington’s longstanding support for Israel erodes, and how hard he pushes Kyiv to accept terms to end Russia’s war.

Democrats will have new tools to challenge Trump. But he still has considerable freedom to act abroad, leaving world leaders with a question: Will defeat make him more willing to compromise, or more determined to get his way?

Here’s how the vote could impact Washington’s most pressing foreign policy concerns:

Iran is celebrating Trump’s midterm setback, but it is bracing for what comes next: a possible new US strike or a fresh push for a deal.

Trump admitted in a call with Fox News that the war in Iran was partly to blame for the Republicans’ losses but Vice President JD Vance was more explicit, saying in a lengthy X post Wednesday that “the reason we lost is the war.”

After eight months of striking the region’s economic lifelines to turn American voters against the war, Tehran has hailed the Republican loss as a public verdict on it. Trump acknowledged that war-driven price hikes played a role.

“If the US government betrays their public will to serve international paymasters and blackmailers, it will learn our NO comes with a Nightmare,” parliamentary speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who has led negotiations with the US, wrote on X.

Fatemeh Bahrami/Anadolu/Getty Images

Tehran is not betting on a change of course in Washington. Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei said anyone who believes the results will shift US policy is “deeply mistaken,” and officials say Iran’s strategy doesn’t hinge on American elections as they prepare for more war while intensifying diplomacy.

The risk of escalation is real. Reports that Trump might order new, more intense strikes are fueling anxiety across the region, and Tehran has warned that its retaliation would be much wider in scope than in earlier rounds. This week, Trump told some journalists he is considering striking Iran hard, and others that he has no immediate plans to escalate.

Top Republicans blame Iran war for midterm results

“The Iran war has become a political albatross around his neck, leaving (Trump) with a stark choice: cut a face-saving deal and declare victory, or double down militarily to reclaim the initiative,” Ali Vaez of International Crisis Group told CNN. “The danger is that a president weakened at the ballot box may seek redemption on the battlefield.”

Diplomacy offers another path. Talks that stagnated over the summer have picked up in the past week, with Tehran sending officials to Qatari mediators who are circulating proposals with Washington. Before the vote, Iran offered to open the Strait of Hormuz within two days if Trump agreed to its seven conditions.

Sanam Vakil of Chatham House said Iran’s leadership “might feel vindicated,” but that “does not necessarily solve their problems.” Trump needs a diplomatic victory yet may be reluctant to appear weak, she said, while Tehran could read his setback as a chance to demand greater concessions. She expects intensified diplomacy alongside military threats, with an interim Strait of Hormuz deal “more realistic” than a comprehensive one.

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In Israel, the election day announcement that Trump would abruptly cut off US military aid to the country was the first surprise. The results, with Democrats sweeping both chambers of Congress in what has been called a “blue tsunami,” are a five-alarm fire in Israel.

Bipartisan support for Israel in the US had already been eroding, with Democrats outraged at Israel over the death toll in the Gaza war and a growing number of Republicans believing the US has given it too much support.

“The only bipartisan issue right now is criticism of Israel,” said Michael Oren, a former Israeli ambassador to the US. “It’s an organizing principle for the Democratic Party,” he told CNN. “And it’s becoming an organizing principle for much of the Republican Party.”

Oren said the end of US aid is just the beginning of a process that has only started to play out. He said it’s conceivable that the US could end intelligence sharing with Israel and the joint development of critical military systems, such as the vaunted Iron Dome aerial defense system. He also pointed to the United Nations Security Council, where Republican and Democratic presidents have protected Israel with the US veto.

“We are at the end of an era,” he said.

Alex Wong/Getty Images

Trump’s Election Day bombshell on Israel points to historic shift in US politics

Yaakov Katz, a former editor-in-chief of the Jerusalem Post, warned there is more to come. “What Trump announced about the military aid yesterday is just the tip of the iceberg of what can change – arms sales could be blocked, sanctions will be proposed and joint economic programs defunded,” he said on X.

The anti-Israel sentiment only hardened during the Iran war, with segments of the US electorate viewing the joint US-Israel strikes as a war that Netanyahu sold to Trump. Even now, Netanyahu has been pushing to resume strikes on Iran, which would reignite a war that drove gas prices and the cost of living higher and contributed to Republicans’ devastating midterm performance.

Netanyahu also faces turmoil at home. In elections a week before the midterms, he lost his majority in parliament, but his main rival, former military chief of staff Gadi Eisenkot, does not have an outright majority and would likely need to cooperate with Arab parties, who saw record turnout.

Yair Golan, leader of the left-wing Democrats party, warned that Israel “does not have time to waste” in replacing Netanyahu and leading the country away from sanctions and isolation.

Jim Lo Scalzo/EPA/Bloomberg/Getty Images

For Kyiv, the reaction came before the election. And on Wednesday there was relative silence.

For weeks, President Volodymyr Zelensky’s relationship with Trump has been in freefall. Trump has demanded Zelensky be replaced; courted energy deals to benefit Russia; and watched as Ukraine’s tech and intel dependencies on the US were inexplicably thwarted. And so Kyiv was forced to take a position early: wait, with urgency, for a post-Trump world.

And when it began to dawn on Wednesday, there was little official comment from Kyiv, Zelensky perhaps happy for the memes of him, sat with a beer and popcorn in front of the mid-term TV coverage, to do the job for him.

A deputy in his office, Sergiy Kyslytsia, pledged on Ukrainian TV that the country would continue to “develop genuine, normal and stable relations” with whoever is in office, seek Patriot interceptors, and navigate both a new Congress and the likely flurry of executive orders that may try to obviate it.

But there can be no disguising that a crestfallen Trump, and the slow clock now loudly ticking on his worldview and presidency, is in Kyiv’s favour. He had claimed a peace was easy to fashion, yet proceeded to punish Ukraine for not agreeing to the demands of its invader. He humiliated, scolded, and then occasionally made up with, Zelensky, while massaged by European allies, aghast at the breakdown in decades of security alliances.

There is still a lot that Ukraine needs Trump and the United States to do. Provide arms, money, and a wider assurance it is on their side. But Kyiv has calculated it cannot depend on Washington, after months of hostility.

There is one downside of the ticking clock however: that Russian President Vladimir Putin determines he has likely a year to pursue, at any cost, the best outcome possible in his war of choice, before the 2028 fight drags Republican policy back to the pro-Ukrainian mainstream. Putin has so far failed to use his apparent great ally, Trump, to secure a battlefield win of note. He may seek to change that while the embers of Trump’s authority burn.

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美国中期选举的影响可能远远超出国界。唐纳德·特朗普总统近两年来一直在推翻美国数十年的外交政策，令盟友和对手都感到不安。如今，双方都在关注国内选举失利将如何影响他的外交行动。

对伊朗、以色列和乌克兰而言，这场选举的利害关系远不止于谁控制国会。选举结果可能影响特朗普是寻求与德黑兰达成协议还是继续发动战争，华盛顿对以色列的长期支持会削弱到何种程度，以及他会在多大程度上敦促基辅接受结束俄罗斯干预战争的条件。

民主党人将拥有挑战特朗普的新工具。但他在海外仍然拥有相当大的行动自由，这让世界各国领导人面临一个问题：失败会让他更愿意妥协，还是会让他更加坚定地坚持己见？

以下是此次投票可能对华盛顿最紧迫的外交政策关切产生的影响：

伊朗正在庆祝特朗普中期选举的挫败，但它也在为接下来可能发生的事情做准备：美国可能再次发动袭击，或者再次推动达成协议。

特朗普在与福克斯新闻的通话中承认，伊朗战争是共和党败选的部分原因，但副总统 JD Vance 的说法更加明确，他在周三发表的一篇长篇 X 帖子中表示，“我们失败的原因是这场战争”。

在花了八个月时间打击该地区的经济命脉，试图以此拉拢美国选民反对战争之后，德黑兰将共和党的败选视为公众对其战争的判决。特朗普承认，战争导致的物价上涨是造成败选的原因之一。

“如果美国政府背叛其公众意愿，为国际金主和勒索者服务，它就会明白，我们的‘不’会带来噩梦，”曾领导与美国谈判的议长穆罕默德·巴格尔·加利巴夫在X上写道。

法特梅·巴赫拉米/阿纳多卢/盖蒂图片社

德黑兰并不指望华盛顿会改变政策方向。最高领袖哈梅内伊表示，任何认为选举结果会改变美国政策的人都“大错特错”。伊朗官员称，伊朗的战略并非取决于美国大选，他们正在为更多战争做准备，同时也在加强外交努力。

局势升级的风险真实存在。有报道称，特朗普可能下令发动新的、更猛烈的打击，这加剧了整个地区的焦虑情绪。德黑兰方面也警告称，其报复行动的范围将比以往任何一轮都更加广泛。本周，特朗普一方面告诉一些记者，他正在考虑对伊朗进行强力打击；另一方面又告诉另一些记者，他目前没有立即升级局势的计划。

共和党高层将中期选举结果归咎于伊朗战争

国际危机组织（International Crisis Group）的阿里·瓦埃兹（Ali Vaez）告诉CNN：“伊朗战争已成为特朗普的政治包袱，让他面临一个严峻的选择：要么达成一项保全颜面的协议并宣布胜利，要么加倍投入军事行动以重新夺回主动权。危险在于，一位在选举中支持率下降的总统可能会在战场上寻求救赎。”

外交途径提供了另一条出路。夏季陷入僵局的谈判在过去一周有所进展，德黑兰派出官员与卡塔尔调解人会面，后者正在向华盛顿方面提出建议。投票前，伊朗提出，如果特朗普同意其提出的七项条件，伊朗将在两天内开放霍尔木兹海峡。

查塔姆研究所的萨纳姆·瓦基尔表示，伊朗领导层“或许会感到自己的判断得到了证实”，但这“未必能解决他们的问题”。她指出，特朗普需要一场外交胜利，但可能不愿示弱，而德黑兰则可能将他的挫败视为要求更大让步的机会。她预计，在加强外交斡旋的同时，军事威胁也将随之而来，达成一项临时性的霍尔木兹海峡协议比达成一项全面协议“更为现实”。

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在以色列，特朗普在选举日当天突然宣布将切断美国对该国的军事援助，这无疑是第一个令人震惊的消息。民主党横扫国会两院，掀起所谓的“蓝色海啸”，这一结果在以色列引发了轩然大波。

美国两党对以色列的支持已经开始减弱，民主党人对以色列在加沙战争中的死亡人数感到愤怒，越来越多的共和党人认为美国给予以色列的支持过多。

“目前唯一两党共识的问题就是对以色列的批评，”以色列前驻美大使迈克尔·奥伦说。“这已成为民主党的组织原则，”他告诉CNN，“而且它也正在成为共和党大部分成员的组织原则。”

奥伦表示，美国停止援助仅仅是一个开始，整个过程才刚刚拉开序幕。他指出，美国完全有可能终止与以色列的情报共享以及关键军事系统的联合研发，例如备受赞誉的“铁穹”防空系统。他还提到联合国安理会，共和党和民主党总统都曾利用美国的否决权来保护以色列。

“我们正处于一个时代的终结，”他说。

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特朗普在选举日就以色列问题抛出的重磅炸弹，预示着美国政治格局的历史性转变。

《耶路撒冷邮报》前总编辑雅科夫·卡茨警告说，未来还会有更多变动。他在X网站上表示：“特朗普昨天宣布的军事援助只是冰山一角，未来可能会发生更多变化——武器销售可能会被阻止，制裁措施可能会被提出，联合经济项目可能会被取消资金。”

伊朗战争期间，反以色列情绪愈演愈烈，部分美国选民认为美以联合空袭是内塔尼亚胡为了讨好特朗普而挑起的战争。即便现在，内塔尼亚胡仍在推动恢复对伊朗的空袭，这将重新点燃一场推高油价和生活成本的战争，并导致共和党在中期选举中惨败。

内塔尼亚胡在国内也面临动荡。在中期选举前一周的选举中，他失去了议会多数席位，但他的主要竞争对手、前总参谋长加迪·艾森科特并未获得绝对多数席位，很可能需要与阿拉伯政党合作，而阿拉伯政党的投票率创下了纪录。

左翼民主党领导人亚伊尔·戈兰警告说，以色列“没有时间浪费”去替换内塔尼亚胡，带领国家摆脱制裁和孤立。

Jim Lo Scalzo/EPA/彭博社/Getty Images

基辅方面，民众的反应发生在选举之前。而周三，局势相对平静。

数周以来，弗拉基米尔·泽连斯基总统与特朗普的关系急剧恶化。特朗普要求泽连斯基下台；为俄罗斯谋取能源利益；并眼睁睁地看着乌克兰对美国的技术和情报依赖被莫名其妙地削弱。因此，基辅被迫提前表明立场：迫切等待后特朗普时代的到来。

周三黎明时分，基辅方面几乎没有发表任何官方评论，泽连斯基或许乐见人们用表情包把他比作坐在电视机前，一边喝着啤酒吃着爆米花，一边观看中期选举报道，以此来替他发声。

他的一位副手谢尔盖·基斯利齐亚在乌克兰电视台承诺，无论谁执政，乌克兰都将继续与他“发展真诚、正常和稳定的关系”，寻求“爱国者”导弹拦截器，并应对新一届国会以及可能试图阻挠国会的一系列行政命令。

但无可否认，垂头丧气的特朗普，以及他世界观和总统任期岌岌可危的倒计时，都对基辅有利。他曾声称和平唾手可得，却又因乌克兰拒绝侵略者的要求而对其进行惩罚。他羞辱、斥责泽连斯基，偶尔又与他和好，而欧洲盟友则在一旁安抚他，对数十年安全联盟的破裂感到震惊。

乌克兰仍然需要特朗普和美国做很多事情，比如提供武器、资金，以及更广泛的支持。但经过数月的敌对，基辅方面已经意识到，它不能再依赖华盛顿了。

然而，倒计时也有一个不利之处：俄罗斯总统普京认为，在2028年的战争将共和党的政策拉回亲乌克兰主流之前，他可能只有一年的时间，不惜一切代价，力求在他选择的这场战争中取得最佳结果。迄今为止，普京未能利用他看似强大的盟友特朗普来确保一场重要的战场胜利。他可能会趁着特朗普的影响力余烬未熄之际，试图改变这一局面。