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US President Donald Trump arrives for a "Keep America Great" campaign rally at Huntington Center in Toledo, Ohio, on January 9, 2020.

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President Donald Trump scored a "modest win" this week in the way he handled escalating tensions with Iran, according to a former American ambassador to Singapore.

"It's not over yet, but I think Trump has more or less prevailed this past week," said Frank Lavin, who is currently the CEO and founder of business consultancy Export Now.

"I think it is a modest win, but look, Iran's not going away," he told CNBC's "Capital Connection"Friday. "Iran's been in this business of mischief and wars and terrorism for 40 years now, so they're going to have another time, another go at this as well."

Simon Baptist, global chief economist at the Economist Intelligence Unit, agreed with the sentiment. "Iran is still pushing toward a nuclear bomb in the same way as North Korea," he said. "They can get there, and it's going to be tough to stop them in a confrontational way."

"Without negotiations, I see that conflict simmering for now, but probably boiling over in the future," he added.

Relations between the two countries were thrown into crisis last week after an American airstrike killed Tehran's top commander. Iran responded by firing more than a dozen ballistic missiles at U.S. targets in Iraq, but the situation appeared to ease when Washington chose to impose more sanctions, instead of taking further military action.

Lavin said: "My suspicion is (that) what Trump did, his actions were popular and I think they're going to be proven to be the right set of actions." That, however, may put Democrats in "a little bit of a difficult spot," he said.

Just two days after Iran's retaliation, the Democrat-held House passed a resolution to limit the president's war powers against Tehran.

"The Democrats and the House have trouble endorsing or supporting him ... that's sort of understandable, but I think they're overcorrecting a bit by saying we're going to formally chastise or formally reproach what he's doing," he said.

Separately, the ambassador weighed in on reports that an Iranian missile may have shot down a passenger plane headed for Ukraine from Tehran. He said that, if confirmed, it would not cause tensions to escalate.

"But if anything, it creates this image of the Iranian military being trigger happy and not being overly concerned about deaths of civilians," he said of the tragedy that left 176 people dead.

"I think it's going to subdue the Iranian military for the short run, to say think twice before you pull the trigger."

CNBC's Dan Mangan and Leslie Josephs contributed to this report.

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Trump has 'more or less prevailed' this week but Iran tension isn't over, ex-US ambassador says - CNBC

Journalist Frank Rich, an executive producer for HBO shows Veep and Succession, on Thursday warned Donald Trumps Republican collaborators of the price their families will one day pay for unwavering devotion to the president.

Theres going to be a reckoning, Rich said on MSNBCs The Last Word With Lawrence ODonnell. They will be implicated, so will their children and their grandchildren, he added. Theres going to be a stain.

Rich said that, when it comes to Trump, it is a cult because people who in some cases did have reputations that they have now destroyed, good reputations, have made fools of themselves for their dear leader.

The cult leader is never going to be reformed or see the problems of their ways, he added.But the people who swirl around them and were taken in, theyre going to pay a price, a human price and a reputational price forever.

Rich, in an article for New York magazine(where he is a writer-at-large), published on Tuesday, wrote that once Trump has vacated the Oval Office, and possibly for decades thereafter, his government, like any other deposed strongmans, will be subjected to a forensic colonoscopy to root out buried crimes, whether against humanity or the rule of law or both.

With time, everything will come out it always does, he added, claiming Trumps collaborators, our Vichy Republicans, will own all of it whether they were active participants in the wrongdoing, the so-called adults in the room who stood idly by or those elite allies beyond the White House gates who pretended not to notice administration criminality and moral atrocities in exchange for favors like tax cuts and judicial appointments.

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Donald Trump Jr. posted the photo Sunday on Instagram with a nod in the caption to the controversial design, which included a Crusader Cross -- also known as a Jerusalem Cross -- and helmet on the lower receiver, as well as a magazine featuring the image of the former secretary of state and Democratic presidential nominee.

"Nice day at the range. @rarebreedfirearms and @spikes_tactical adding a little extra awesome to my AR and that mag," Trump Jr. wrote, tagging the companies that design and sell the gun.

While symbols and references to the Crusades still hold religious and historical significance -- the Crusader Cross is included on the flag of the country Georgia -- far right groups have seized upon them, using them to represent an anti-Muslim ideology, according to the Anti-Defamation League and the Southern Poverty Law Center, two organizations that study hate groups.

A spokesman for Trump denied on Monday that the symbol on the gun, named by its manufacturer the Crusader Rifle, carried a white supremacist meaning and cited its presence on the Georgian flag and on a medal bestowed by the Pope.

"Symbols on firearms depicting various historical warriors are extremely common within the 2nd Amendment community. Don's Instagram post was strictly about him using a famous meme to mock Hillary Clinton, as he and many others have done on numerous occasions and will surely do again in the future, so long as it continues triggering humorless liberals," Trump spokesman Andy Surabian told CNN.

An avid hunter, Trump has posted other images of himself with weapons on his social media feeds. His affinity for controversial memes has helped bolster his own popularity among a Republican Party reshaped by his father.

History of the symbols

Symbols and references to the Crusades -- the Middle Ages campaign by Christian armies to reclaim the Muslim-controlled Holy Land -- have circulated for years inside the far right movement, making appearances in a manifesto written by a far-right gunman who killed dozens in Norway in 2011.

"The adoption of these symbols is meant largely as a way of signaling anti-Muslim sentiment in particular, but also this notion that Christianity needs to retake western civilization," said Howard Graves, a senior research analyst at the SPLC.

The gun companies that make and sell the Crusader rifle say it was inspired by history.

Rare Breed Firearms -- the manufacturer of the gun -- did not respond to a request for comment, but says on their website that the design was "inspired by some of the most fierce warriors who fought in nearly 200 years of epic conflicts known as the Crusades."

"This lower honors the warrior mindset. Technology evolves, warriors never change," the company wrote.

In an email, the CEO of Spike's Tactical -- the Florida company that sells the Crusader gun -- said that the gun and another AR with a Spartan helmet on it that they sell were "referencing famed historical soldiers" and are of a design that are "common among gun manufacturers, popular with gun owners throughout the country and have nothing to do with political ideology."

"It's objectively silly and dishonest for leftwing groups, like the SPLC, to claim that this symbol on our Crusader model has anything to do with hate or an extremist ideology. In other words, these people have no idea what they're talking about and should apologize for their outrageous smears," Cole Leleux, the CEO, said.

Spike's Tactical drew criticism in 2015 when they sold another AR model that a company spokesman told news outlets at the time was built to ensure it "would never be able to be used by Muslim terrorists to kill innocent people or advance their radical agenda."

That gun, also called the Crusader, featured an etching of a Bible verse as well as the Latin phrase "Deus Vult," another medieval term meaning "God wills it" that has recently become a rallying cry for white supremacists, according to hate group researchers.

Dan Zimmerman, the managing editor of The Truth About Guns, a website about firearms with a pro-gun leaning, told CNN that adorning guns with symbols is not common, but called it a "niche design that some people find attractive."

"There are all kinds of designs for AR lowers, from skulls to Sparta helmets," Zimmerman said.

A spokesman for the ADL, Jake Hyman, said the Sparta helmet symbol has also been co-opted by some right-wing extremists, and symbols like the Crusader Cross have recently been used to deface mosques in the US, according to Graves. The man accused of killing scores of Muslims at prayer in Christchurch, New Zealand, last year inscribed his weapons with references to the Crusades.

When white supremacists appeared in the Charlottesville march with shields bearing a red cross and the words "Deus Vult,"a coalition of Medieval scholars groups denounced what they called an "appropriation" of medieval symbols in a "fantasy of a pure, white Europe that bears no relationship to reality."

"As scholars of the medieval world we are disturbed by the use of a nostalgic but inaccurate myth of the Middle Ages by racist movements in the United States," the groups wrote.

White supremacist voices have gained prominence in recent years, with analysts like the ADL and SPLC pointing to the President's refusal to condemn racial violence by alt-right protesters at a 2017 rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, as emboldening the movement.

After wide blowback to his remarks on Charlottesville, Trump later called neo-Nazis, white supremacists and other hate groups "repugnant to everything we hold dear as Americans" and a month later, he signed a resolution condemning white supremacy.

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Photo of Donald Trump Jr. holding a rifle raises flags with hate group researchers - CNN

CNN anchor Chris Cuomo delivered a stinging rebuke to both Democratic and Republican House lawmakers who on Thursday voted against limiting President Donald Trumps war-making powers against Iran.

The House voted 224 to 194 to limit the presidents ability to launch an attack against Iran without getting approval first, Cuomo explained. This is not a new idea thats what is in the Constitution. My argument, I cant believe it wasnt unanimous.

Only three Republicans in the Democratic-controlled House supported the resolution. EightDemocratsvoted against. Cuomo said it wasnt about the GOP just choosing Trump over the truth.

Theres some of that, but Democrats have been anxious to give war power to presidents as well, he noted. This has been going on for a long time and its gotten worse and it is the worse example of congressional cowardice.

Now, though, were hearing really obnoxious comments that is making this partisan, he added, citing Rep. Doug Collins (R-Ga.) claim that Democrats are in love with terrorists for not backing Trumps military escalation with Iran.

Cuomo ripped Collins for trying to divide Americans at a time that it is life and death that we come together.

Shame on you and every Trumper and never-Trumper who voted against this, he added.

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Chris Cuomo Rips Every Lawmaker Who Voted Against Limiting Donald Trump's War Powers - HuffPost

Donald Trump does not strut the world stage as Augustus triumphant. On Wednesday he might have commanded that Iran will never be allowed to have a nuclear weapon we will never let that happen. But as he slurred at his autocue, he conveyed only ritualised abuse of Iran and pleas to Nato for help, a Nato he once majestically derided. I sensed we were seeing the USs days as world hegemon dribbling away. Even Trumps Republican ally Mike Lee called the Iran briefing the worst briefing Ive seen at least on a military issue in my nine years in the Senate.

All empires outstay their declared purpose, let alone their welcome. All end messily the operative word is all be they Roman, Napoleonic, British or Soviet. All are vanquished not by superior power, but by self-delusion and geography. The British empire had neither the right nor the need to invade far-flung parts of Asia and Africa. It was defeated by them. The US has claimed the right to intervene in theatres as diverse as South America, the far east, east Africa and a portfolio of Muslim states. Justification varies from retaliation and deterrence to self-defence and the instilling of democracy.

The USs intentions have often been noble, but good intentions camouflage power projection. When your drones can kill anyone anywhere, the temptation is insuperable. If you think you can police the world from a bunker in Nevada, why not try?

Trumps instinct was once that of a classic American isolationist. As he reiterated to Congress last February, Great nations do not fight endless wars the hour has come to at least try for peace. He was announcing withdrawal from Syria and more tentatively from Afghanistan. Yet he is still there. The US is fighting six wars also in Iraq, Yemen, Somalia and Libya. None has any conceivable relevance to its own security.

Imperialism sticks to politics like glue. Even as common sense screams withdrawal, staying offers the populist an opportunity for glory. It was thus that British ministers in the 1950s and 60s fought to hold on to Aden, Kenya and Cyprus. Today Boris Johnson craves the machismo of a totally pointless carrier force in the far east. Some imperial ghost seems to sneak down from the India Office attic to stalk Downing Street at night.

Twenty years of western interventions in the Muslim world have rested on two falsehoods. One is that terrorism poses an existential threat to western democracies, grotesquely underrating their inherent stability. The other is that intervention can remedy such a threat, can enforce obedience and even democracy on victim states. I remember watching rightwing US thinktankers trying to administer Iraq from Baghdads Green Zone in the months after the 2003 invasion. By what right?

Alien intervention in the internal affairs of sovereign states is immoral, specifically banned under chapter one of the UN charter. That ban was supposedly overridden by Tony Blairs much-cited responsibility to protect civilian populations. But as the casualties mounted, protection became mere cover for ceaseless wars of western aggression. That is why the UN is all but absent from these interventions. As George Bush said, I leave the UN to lawyers.

The issue now is not whether we can any longer plant the flowers of democracy in fields we have drenched in blood. It is how to get the hell out. The sight of Trump ranting against Iran and inflicting on it yet further sanctions was like the final scene of a tragic opera. He seemed a man trapped.

Two American presidents played a significant role in the demise of British imperialism. Franklin D Roosevelt told Winston Churchill that the USs involvement in the second world war was strictly on condition that Britain dissolved its empire. The US would not defend it. John Foster Dulles, who was later US secretary of state, said in 1945 that his was the first colony to have won independence from Britain, and it expected others to follow. This advice was fiercely echoed in 1956 by Dwight D Eisenhower, appalled at Britains invasion of Suez.

Iraqi politicians this week joined the anti-imperial cause by demanding that American forces be withdrawn from their soil. All Trump could do was refuse, despite having previously pledged to do just that. Even in its hour of insecurity, 17 years of American occupation had left Iraq just desperate for it to end. It knows it must live at peace with its powerful neighbour, Iran, and this requires it to be no longer to be a tool of American presidential machismo. Likewise Afghanistan must find its own accommodation with the Taliban and with its neighbour, Pakistan.

As for Britain, its 20-year creep under Washingtons coat-tails, by Blair, David Cameron and now Boris Johnson, is humiliating and expensive. It should be offering the advice of an old and honest friend, whose history has so paralleled the USs predicament. Instead, it offers only the cringe of a lackey awaiting a reward, in this case an implausible post-Brexit trade deal.

As empires crumble, stuff happens. It could yet be that Trumps killing of Qassem Suleimani jolts every participant in this game to realise that it is just not working. The US president is a man of emotional and unpredictable responses. He could indeed pull out of Iraq, leaving it to separate from Kurdistan and do a deal with Tehran. He could leave Syria to its fate, and leave Afghanistan to the tender mercies of Islamabad. As for Britain, at last it could have nothing whatsoever to do with this mess.

Simon Jenkins is a Guardian columnist

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Donald Trumps rant against Iran is the howl of a dying empire - The Guardian