For Iran’s theocratic government, it keeps getting worse. Its decades-long strategy of building an “Axis of Resistance” supporting terror groups and proxies around the region is falling apart. First came the crushing Israeli campaign in Gaza started by Iranian-backed Hamas’ murderous Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel. That war spawned another in Lebanon, where Israel has mauled Iran’s most powerful ally, Hezbollah, even as Israel has launched successful airstrikes openly inside of Iran for the first time after Iran twice directly attacked Israel. And now Iran’s longtime stalwart ally and client in Syria, President Bashar Assad, is gone. As dawn broke Sunday, rebel forces completed a lightning offensive by seizing the ancient capital of Damascus and tearing down symbols of more than 50 years of Assad’s rule over the Mideast crossroads. Ali Akbar Velayati, a key adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, once called Assad and Syria “the golden ring of the resistance chain in the region.” “Without the Syrian government, this chain will break and the resistance against Israel and its supporters will be weakened.” That break in the chain is literal. Syria was an important geographical link that allowed Iran to move weapons and other supplies to Hezbollah in Lebanon. Its loss now further weakens Hezbollah, whose powerful arsenal in southern Lebanon had put Iranian influence directly on the border of its nemesis Israel. “Iran’s deterrence thinking is really shattered by events in Gaza, by events in Lebanon and definitely by developments in Syria,” a senior diplomat from the United Arab Emirates, Anwar Gargash, said at the International Institute for Strategic Studies’ Manama Dialogue in Bahrain. Iran still holds the card of its nuclear program. Though it denies that intention, it can use the potential for building a weapons capability to cast a shadow of influence in the region. “Iran remains a critical regional player,” Gargash said. “We should use this moment to connect and speak about what’s next in my opinion.” It’s a dramatic reversal in Iran’s regional might Only a few years ago, the Islamic Republic loomed ascendant across the wider Middle East. Its “Axis of Resistance” was at a zenith. Hezbollah in Lebanon stood up against Israel. Assad appeared to have weathered an Arab Spring uprising-turned-civil war. Iraqi insurgents killed U.S. troops with Iranian-designed roadside bombs. Yemen’s Houthi rebels fought a Saudi-led coalition to a stalemate. Syria, at the crossroads, played a vital role. Early in Syria’s civil war, when it appeared Assad might be overthrown, Iran and its ally, Hezbollah, rushed fighters to support him — in the name of defending Shiite shrines in Syria. Russia later joined with a scorched earth campaign of airstrikes. The campaign won back territory, even as Syria remained divided into zones of government and insurgent control. But the speed of Assad’s collapse the past week showed just how reliant he was on support from Iran and Russia — which at the crucial moment didn’t come. “What was surprising was the Syrian’s army’s failure to counter the offensive, and also the speed of the developments,” Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told state television late Sunday night. “That was unexpected.” Russia remains mired in Ukraine years after launching a full-scale invasion there in 2022. For Iran, international sanctions over its advancing nuclear program have ground down its economy. […]