Americans feel pinch of continued Iran war: ‘It’s screwed everything up’

Gas prices displayed at a gas station on 7 July 2026 in Pasadena, California. Photograph: Mario Tama/Getty Images View image in fullscreen Gas prices displayed at a gas station on 7 July 2026 in Pasadena, California. Photograph: Mario Tama/Getty Images Americans feel pinch of continued Iran war: ‘It’s screwed everything up’ Whether in favor of or against the US-Israel war on Iran, people across the country are left holding the bill and wondering on its purpose F ive months after the United States and Israel started a historically unpopular war against Iran that was going to supposedly last weeks, the fighting has refused to resolve in victory, defeat or peace. Iran’s Supreme Leader had been killed in the opening strikes, ceasefires broke down, and the strait of Hormuz has been closed and re-opened. For voters interviewed across the country, while the damage may be distant, the residual effects have shown up at the pump, on the grocery bill and in a phone call telling a spouse they have a day to report for deployment. And for a country still absorbing the aftermath of Israel’s war on Gaza – funded to the tune of billions of dollars by the United States – the war in Iran lands on top of an already raw argument about what American power is for. In North York, Maine , Lydia Stone, 31, works in the logging industry and is raising an 18-month-old daughter. She describes an industry being squeezed from both directions: fuel costs rising while the price customers pay for wood staying flat. “It’s been a huge jump in prices, and makes life a lot harder,” she said. Trump administration’s revision of Iran war casualties ‘huge disrespect’, say veterans Read more That squeeze shows up in the data, with the average price of gasoline pushing above $4 a gallon for the first time in years, according to AAA . Analysts have also noted the pain is not evenly shared: lower- and middle-income households spend a larger share of their budgets on fuel, meaning the same price spike lands harder on them than on wealthier consumers. Stone’s frustration isn’t only economic. “A huge part of what has been so frustrating ... is like the fact my tax dollars are going to fund murdering people, at the same time that it’s cutting social services, it’s cutting Snap benefits for my neighbors.” She said the line at her local food pantry has grown noticeably longer and her best friend’s husband, she said, was deployed on little notice. US economic indicators during the war in Iran charted That sense of a war without justification reverberated among voters who described themselves as independent or progressive. Terrence Dahmen, 73, a retired, independent-leaning voter from Cable, Wisconsin , who said he usually ends up voting Democrat, called American involvement “a huge mistake”. “We weren’t provoked into that fight, and we weren’t attacked,” he said. “I saw no reason to go there other than possibly controlling oil somehow.” He argued the country should be investing in solar, wind and g