It’s not their war. But it’s becoming their political and economic nightmare. World leaders who opposed the US-Israeli attack on Iran are being torn between Donald Trump’s ire at their failure to join the conflict and electorates who are deeply hostile to the war and America’s president.

Their dilemma is shifting the dynamic between the US and its allies. Leaders who once tried to appease and flatter the world’s most powerful man are now daring to criticize him and seeking distance. They are doing so not just out of antipathy to American foreign policy, but also because of war-related pressures threatening the livelihoods of their people, and therefore their own governments and careers.

Even leaders who tried to shape Trump’s second-term behavior are reacting to his contempt. Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni on Monday said Trump’s attacks on Pope Leo XIV were “unacceptable.” British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, whose friendship with Trump shattered over the war, said last week he was “fed up” that Britons were facing higher energy bills because of Trump’s actions. Leaders are reacting to war consequences they can’t control, epitomized by an International Monetary Fund warning Tuesday that the world is trending toward an “adverse” scenario of only 2.5% growth this year, down from 3.4% in 2025.

Countries reliant on Middle East gas and oil supplies could fare worse. The IMF downgraded its growth forecast for Britain to 0.8% in 2026, down from a previous projection of 1.3%. That would be a disaster for Starmer’s imperiled government, which has failed to honor its pledge to reignite the economy.

President Donald Trump meets with Japan’s Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi in the Oval Office of the White House on March 19. Jim Watson/AFP/Getty Images Another key US ally, Japan, is also under duress because it relies on Middle Eastern energy. Higher shipping costs are pushing prices higher and threatening a modest rise in wages.

Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi never expected to face such headwinds soon after her historic election victory in February. Even before the Iran war, Trump was deeply unpopular in many allied nations. A Pew Research survey last year showed the president’s approval ratings in more than a dozen countries at 35% or below.

His approval was higher than former President Joe Biden in only a few countries, including Israel and Nigeria. The disconnect does not merely represent a breach that will last through the rest of the Trump administration. It threatens the alliances that multiplied US political and economic power for decades.

Trump’s antipathy to NATO, meanwhile, has left its mutual defense guarantees looking shaky even if he doesn’t decide to withdraw the US altogether. The Trump White House has made clear in its rhetoric and foreign policy documents that it sees the application of US unilateral power as the best way to protect US interests in the 21st century. The president seems to regard NATO not as a defensive alliance but as a tool for him to advance his foreign policy interests — for instance in a war of choice in Iran.

He has little tolerance for allies that rely on the US defense umbrella but refuse to join his wars. But signing up to fight is politically impossible for many allied leaders. They face electorates that view the Iran war as unwise, unlikely to succeed and an infringement of international law.

Trump’s disparagement of heavy allied war losses in the post 9/11 wars only deepened their voters’ antipathy to the president. Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni waits for the arrival of President of Cyprus Nikos Christodoulides at Chigi Palace in Rome, Italy, on February 26. Remo Casilli/Reuters/File How the war strained a key Trump relationship with Europe The IMF forecasts made clear that the Iran conflict is more than a distant foreign policy crisis for allied governments.

It has become a domestic and political threat. This, combined with growing antagonism between allied leaders and the US president, means that standing with him would be a liability. Italy’s Meloni leads a populist, right-wing party, and is one of the European leaders most ideologically compatible with Trump.

She had therefore positioned herself as a bridge between the White House and European allies. But her own popularity has been hit by war-induced fuel price rises. Meloni also has a unique role in a nation that has more than 40 million Roman Catholics and a special relationship with the Vatican.

She therefore had no real political choice but to criticize Trump’s attacks on the Pope. But her shift may have ruined more than a year of painful diplomacy and relationship-building. “I’m shocked by her.

I thought she had courage. I was wrong,” Trump was quoted as saying by the Italian-language Corriere della Sera in an interview. “She is the one who is unacceptable, because she does not care whether Iran has a nuclear weapon and would blow Italy up in two minutes if it had the chance.” Meloni is learning what it’