Guardian’s Simon Jenkins: “Nor would the "coward's war" of economic sanctions be any more effective. Refusing to play against Iranian footballers (hated by the clerics), boycotting artists, ostracising academics, embargoing commerce, freezing foreign bank accounts - so-called smart sanctions - are as counterproductive as could be imagined. Such feelgood gestures drive the enemies of an embattled regime into silence, poverty or exile.”

One can’t be more right. Many of these have already been in effect of course, resulting in the empowerment of the government and the weakening of the general public.

As an small example, the commerce embargo means that most IT companies will not be able to outsource anything to Iran, resulting in the only viable business strategy of local companies to be selling to the government. Vendor monopolies are bad, sure, but guess how bad is a customer monopoly.

Silence, poverty, and exile? So accurate.