Iran devours the Ukrainian peace track: why Zelensky has a ‘bad feeling’ — and what it means for Israel

On March 18, 2026, Volodymyr Zelensky hinted that he perceives the war around Iran not as a separate Middle Eastern crisis, but as a direct blow to Ukraine’s chances of advancing negotiations. In an interview with the BBC, he said he had a “very bad feeling” about how this conflict affects Ukraine and added that peace talks are “constantly postponed” for one reason — because of the war in Iran.

For the Israeli reader, Zelensky’s mood in this phrase is not the only important thing. What stands behind it is important. Kyiv is increasingly vocal: as soon as the attention of the US and Europe shifts to the Middle East, Ukraine almost immediately feels it in three areas — in diplomacy, in military supplies, and in Moscow’s oil revenues. AP directly writes that the war with Iran has already taken away the previous momentum from negotiations on Ukraine, and Reuters previously recorded Kyiv’s concern about the diversion of Western support and rising oil prices.

Why the war with Iran hits Ukraine harder than it seems

Zelensky is not talking about some abstract “inconvenient background” now. He warns of a very specific political outcome: if the Middle East finally draws Washington’s attention, the Ukrainian track will move further back in the queue of decisions. Reuters reported on March 16 that the Kremlin denied reports of a stalled peace process related to Trump’s shift to Iran, but the very fact of such discussions already shows how closely both crises are linked today.

And here arises an unpleasant arithmetic for Kyiv.

The longer the war around Iran goes on, the more likely it is that Western leaders will start living in the mode of “first the Middle East, then Ukraine.” For Israel, this sounds familiar: as soon as the regional fire becomes the main story of the day, all other fronts automatically receive less attention, less urgency, and less political pressure on allies. AP describes the current moment exactly this way — Iran “stole the focus” from Ukraine.

Patriot, oil, and negotiation delays

The most painful issue is air defense. Reuters wrote back on March 4 that due to the conflict with Iran, Ukraine may face a critical shortage of American air defense missiles at a time when Russia is not easing its strikes on Ukrainian cities. On March 13, the agency added another important detail: Zelensky directly linked the Middle Eastern war with the exacerbation of the missile shortage for Patriot systems and said that Gulf states used more PAC-3 missiles in a few days than Kyiv received from Washington in four years.

In parallel, a second mechanism is also at work — oil. Reuters reported that against the backdrop of US and Israeli strikes on Iran, oil prices rose, which is indirectly beneficial to Russia. Zelensky in Paris directly stated that even a temporary easing of American restrictions on Russian oil does not help the world but gives Moscow additional money for the war. Kir Starmer later publicly appealed to this logic, warning that the war in the Persian Gulf should not become a gift for Putin.

Why this is already a question not only for Ukraine but also for Israel

On March 17, Zelensky was in London, where he met with Starmer, Mark Rutte, and King Charles III. AP writes that the focus of the conversation was the situation on the front, energy security, and the need to prevent Iran and Russia from benefiting from the dispersion of Western attention. On the same day, the British government formalized both a strategic dialogue with Ukraine and a separate declaration on deepening cooperation in the field of security and defense industry.

So Zelensky came to London not just to complain about the lack of missiles.

He brought a counter-proposal: Ukrainian combat experience, drone counteraction technologies, integration of defense chains, and joint developments. The British release describes this very clearly: Ukraine and the UK want to build a joint defense-technological ecosystem, expand production, develop AI direction, and work with third countries. London separately noted that British and Ukrainian specialists are already helping partners in the Gulf to fend off Iranian attacks.

And here for Israel, a key link appears. NANews — Israel News | Nikk.Agency sees in this story not just a Ukrainian complaint about “lack of attention,” but a warning about a new balance of threats: the more resources, decisions, and air defense stocks go to the Middle Eastern front, the easier it is for Russia to pressure Ukraine; the longer Ukraine remains under this pressure, the more military experience accumulates in the war with Iranian drones and Russian massive strikes, which then returns to the region in a different form.

London, Washington, and the risk of a split

According to the BBC interview, Zelensky urged Trump and Starmer to meet and develop a common position. This does not sound like diplomatic politeness, but like a signal of alarm. Kyiv is clearly afraid that public frictions between Washington and London, plus different approaches to the war with Iran, will begin to break the common Western contour. Kyiv Independent conveys his thought directly: a split among Western leaders is dangerous now precisely because the Middle East is already distracting attention from Ukraine.

Starmer, for his part, publicly stated that Britain does not want to be drawn into a wider war in the Middle East, although it is discussing with allies options for protecting shipping and regional security. This caution is understandable to London, but for Kyiv, it means one more thing: Western capitals have less and less common time, common resources, and common political space to simultaneously manage two large crises.

What Zelensky really said between the lines

His “bad feeling” is not an emotion, but a risk formula.

If negotiations on Ukraine are postponed, if Patriot missiles become even more scarce, if oil prices rise and thereby help the Russian budget, and allies argue among themselves about how to respond to Iran, then Moscow gets exactly what it needs most: time. And for a war of attrition, time is almost a currency.

For Israel, there is little theory in this conclusion. The country lives inside a hot conflict and understands well that Western arsenals, political attention, and diplomatic energy are not infinite. Therefore, Zelensky’s words are not an attempt to divert attention from Israel. On the contrary, it is a warning: if the US, Britain, and Europe do not learn to handle the Ukrainian and Middle Eastern crises as interconnected tasks of one security, they will start losing on two fronts at once.

In this sense, his London visit was extremely pragmatic. Not just to ask. To remind. And to very firmly state: the war in Iran is already changing not only the schedule of world news but also Ukraine’s real chances for peace, for protecting the sky, and for keeping the Western coalition in working condition. And for Israel, this has long been not a foreign plot.