Kicking off in Israel

[_Os_]

"When someone tells you who they are believe them" update ...

Awhile back there was a bulldozer vid, an IDF armoured bulldozer has impaled dead Palestinian/s on it, the driver is having a whale of a time (raising and lowering the dozer blade with the corpse/s dangling, and so on). I wonder if this is the same guy. There was also the tank vid, of a Merkava crushing to death someone who was clearly a civilian. To be clear "terrorist" is often used by Israelis to refer to any Gazan Palestinian.

https://edition.cnn.com/2024/10/21/midd ... index.html

[_Os_]

"When someone tells you who they are believe them" update ...

This is a documentary made by UK journalist Mehdi Hasan. There's no Palestinians in it, no analysis, not much editorial at all really. IDF soldiers who have been in Gaza are interviewed and allowed to explain the conflict in their own words. They say the goal is genocide, "kill a million", "there should be no life left in Gaza". It's not available for free, but the trailer shows a lot, and the first 10 minutes can be watched for free on the website:
https://zeteo.com/p/israel-documentary-social-media

[epwc]

Definitely morally superior.

[epwc]

In the circumstances I think it’s unfair to call the (clearly morally superior) Israelis genocidal maniacs, especially as they would never perpetrate on another people the suffering that their forefathers bore.

There must be a better, maybe softer term than genocide to describe what they’re doing?

[Guy Smiley]

In the circumstances I think it’s unfair to call the (clearly morally superior) Israelis genocidal maniacs, especially as they would never perpetrate on another people the suffering that their forefathers did.

There must be a better, maybe softer term than genocide to describe what they’re doing?

I believe their own term for it is trimming the weeds.

[epwc]

That sounds more like it, we all do that dont we?

[Guy Smiley]

Only in self defense

[epwc]

Them brambles and nettles are fucking lethal

[Guy Smiley]

Them brambles and nettles are fucking lethal

Well, it was a semi controlled plantation but Bibi the farmer went nuts with a packet of seeds

[epwc]

More like Japanese Knotweed then; no problem in Japan, highly invasive and destructive in the UK. Just need to find somewhere where the Palestinians won’t be a problem

[mat the expat]

Drone targets Israeli prime minister's house

But the useless buggers missed. Wouldn't it have been great to remove both of the evil buggers in one week? (Not sure if I have ever even thought that before).

The squeals from Netanyahu when he realised they got through Iron Dome....

Goose, Gander, etc

[_Os_]

In the circumstances I think it’s unfair to call the (clearly morally superior) Israelis genocidal maniacs, especially as they would never perpetrate on another people the suffering that their forefathers did.

There must be a better, maybe softer term than genocide to describe what they’re doing?

I believe their own term for it is trimming the weeds.

"Mowing the lawn".

But it's probably not necessary to talk around the subject. The vid I posted of the blunt Irish Channel 4 News journo asking the settler leader about the oddness of a Jew talking like a Nazi. The settler was cool with the comparison, said it was fine because the Russians are killing civilians and displacing Ukrainians so why can't he, then said Palestinians should move to the UK and Ireland.

If you start trying to find what actual Israelis are saying, what IDF soldiers are saying, auto translating from Hebrew. They're completely comfortable calling for the mass slaughter of everyone in Gaza and their replacement with Israeli settlers. It's a mainstream Israeli view.

[Sandstorm]

If you start trying to find what actual Israelis are saying, what IDF soldiers are saying, auto translating from Hebrew. They're completely comfortable calling for the mass slaughter of everyone in Gaza and their replacement with Israeli settlers. It's a mainstream Israeli view.

[_Os_]

There is a dark humour to Starmer's repeated canned line "Israel has the right to defend her borders" (not at "my father was a toolmaker" levels of repetition but getting there) ... err chief, quite a lot of the problem is Israel cannot decide where its borders are, some Israelis talk about settling South Lebanon.

The UK outsourced its foreign policy to the US State Department from Blair onwards. Massive foreign policy disasters have come from this. The UK gets not much out of the arrangement, not even the vague hint of a trade deal. Those with not so long memories will know it was controversial to ask for a ceasefire to this conflict in the UK ("hate marches" etc), which then became okay to say when the US took that position.

Heath and Thatcher took far stronger positions against Israel for far less. Full arms embargos and the banning of any US shipments transiting through the UK. Thatcher (who was pro-Israel, the first UK PM to visit Israel) said their invasion of Lebanon was "barbaric", opposed all settlements on Palestinian land, implemented a full UK arms embargo that lasted from 1982 to 1994 and refused to return the calls/letters of Israeli PMs that complained. Pre-Blair the UK position on the madhouse was pro-Israel but anti much of what they get up to. The world didn't cave in on US-UK relations.

[Calculon]

There is a dark humour to Starmer's repeated canned line "Israel has the right to defend her borders" (not at "my father was a toolmaker" levels of repetition but getting there) ... err chief, quite a lot of the problem is Israel cannot decide where its borders are, some Israelis talk about settling South Lebanon.

The UK outsourced its foreign policy to the US State Department from Blair onwards. Massive foreign policy disasters have come from this. The UK gets not much out of the arrangement, not even the vague hint of a trade deal. Those with not so long memories will know it was controversial to ask for a ceasefire to this conflict in the UK ("hate marches" etc), which then became okay to say when the US took that position.

Heath and Thatcher took far stronger positions against Israel for far less. Full arms embargos and the banning of any US shipments transiting through the UK. Thatcher (who was pro-Israel, the first UK PM to visit Israel) said their invasion of Lebanon was "barbaric", opposed all settlements on Palestinian land, implemented a full UK arms embargo that lasted from 1982 to 1994 and refused to return the calls/letters of Israeli PMs that complained. Pre-Blair the UK position on the madhouse was pro-Israel but anti much of what they get up to. The world didn't cave in on US-UK relations.

so what's the reason for UK governments becoming more pro Israel since thatcher's time? I don't really follow UK politics but i gather the tories are even more pro israel than labour

[Sandstorm]

There is a dark humour to Starmer's repeated canned line "Israel has the right to defend her borders" (not at "my father was a toolmaker" levels of repetition but getting there) ... err chief, quite a lot of the problem is Israel cannot decide where its borders are, some Israelis talk about settling South Lebanon.

The UK outsourced its foreign policy to the US State Department from Blair onwards. Massive foreign policy disasters have come from this. The UK gets not much out of the arrangement, not even the vague hint of a trade deal. Those with not so long memories will know it was controversial to ask for a ceasefire to this conflict in the UK ("hate marches" etc), which then became okay to say when the US took that position.

Heath and Thatcher took far stronger positions against Israel for far less. Full arms embargos and the banning of any US shipments transiting through the UK. Thatcher (who was pro-Israel, the first UK PM to visit Israel) said their invasion of Lebanon was "barbaric", opposed all settlements on Palestinian land, implemented a full UK arms embargo that lasted from 1982 to 1994 and refused to return the calls/letters of Israeli PMs that complained. Pre-Blair the UK position on the madhouse was pro-Israel but anti much of what they get up to. The world didn't cave in on US-UK relations.

so what's the reason for UK governments becoming more pro Israel since thatcher's time? I don't really follow UK politics but i gather the tories are even more pro israel than labour

UK Arms Industry benefits

[Calculon]

There is a dark humour to Starmer's repeated canned line "Israel has the right to defend her borders" (not at "my father was a toolmaker" levels of repetition but getting there) ... err chief, quite a lot of the problem is Israel cannot decide where its borders are, some Israelis talk about settling South Lebanon.

The UK outsourced its foreign policy to the US State Department from Blair onwards. Massive foreign policy disasters have come from this. The UK gets not much out of the arrangement, not even the vague hint of a trade deal. Those with not so long memories will know it was controversial to ask for a ceasefire to this conflict in the UK ("hate marches" etc), which then became okay to say when the US took that position.

Heath and Thatcher took far stronger positions against Israel for far less. Full arms embargos and the banning of any US shipments transiting through the UK. Thatcher (who was pro-Israel, the first UK PM to visit Israel) said their invasion of Lebanon was "barbaric", opposed all settlements on Palestinian land, implemented a full UK arms embargo that lasted from 1982 to 1994 and refused to return the calls/letters of Israeli PMs that complained. Pre-Blair the UK position on the madhouse was pro-Israel but anti much of what they get up to. The world didn't cave in on US-UK relations.

so what's the reason for UK governments becoming more pro Israel since thatcher's time? I don't really follow UK politics but i gather the tories are even more pro israel than labour

UK Arms Industry benefits

so they didn't benefit in Thatcher's time? I thought UK arms exports to Israel were pretty small and mostly componants of larger multinational sytems that might be more difficult to sanction

[Uncle fester]

There is a dark humour to Starmer's repeated canned line "Israel has the right to defend her borders" (not at "my father was a toolmaker" levels of repetition but getting there) ... err chief, quite a lot of the problem is Israel cannot decide where its borders are, some Israelis talk about settling South Lebanon.

The UK outsourced its foreign policy to the US State Department from Blair onwards. Massive foreign policy disasters have come from this. The UK gets not much out of the arrangement, not even the vague hint of a trade deal. Those with not so long memories will know it was controversial to ask for a ceasefire to this conflict in the UK ("hate marches" etc), which then became okay to say when the US took that position.

Heath and Thatcher took far stronger positions against Israel for far less. Full arms embargos and the banning of any US shipments transiting through the UK. Thatcher (who was pro-Israel, the first UK PM to visit Israel) said their invasion of Lebanon was "barbaric", opposed all settlements on Palestinian land, implemented a full UK arms embargo that lasted from 1982 to 1994 and refused to return the calls/letters of Israeli PMs that complained. Pre-Blair the UK position on the madhouse was pro-Israel but anti much of what they get up to. The world didn't cave in on US-UK relations.

so what's the reason for UK governments becoming more pro Israel since thatcher's time? I don't really follow UK politics but i gather the tories are even more pro israel than labour

Blair was a Tory in Labour robes.

Starmer I reckon is partly a reaction to Corbyn and his efforts to distance himself and the party from Corbyn.

Also the right wing meltdown in the US has dragged everybody else with them.

[Uncle fester]

Couple of reasons for this.

1. Gaza might be tiny but it is extraordinarily densely populated.

The Gaza Strip is 41 kilometres (25 miles) long, from 6 to 12 km (3.7 to 7.5 mi) wide, and has a total area of 365 km2 (141 sq mi). With around 2 million Palestinians on approximately 365 km2 (141 sq mi) of land, Gaza has one of the world's highest population densities.

2. The US delivered an unholy amount of firepower upon the Vietnamese but they still lost that war. Why? Because they didn't understand that they were fighting an insurgency. You can't defeat an idea with bombs and bullets.

3. The IDF and Israel lack real commitment. They could put boots on the ground but instead prefer to watch and monitor from the skies or with patrols that zoom through. Essentially their approach has been to build a great big prison and throw away the key bar ad hoc monitoring, while everybody in Israel gets on with life. That worked fine as long as the only option available to Palestinians was crude rockets that didn't hurt anybody.

True. But ...

The comparison to Gaza in a military sense is far closer to Mariupol 2022 than Vietnam. The big mouth analysts who got Ukraine wrong (you know who they are), are now saying something close to what you are, that Hamas can never be defeated. It's bullshit though, size does matter, Gaza isn't North Vietnam. Hamas is surrounded on a postage stamp (really the analysis could end there). Gaza is flat as a pancake and tiny, pushed up against a coast the defender doesn't control, all like Mariupol and terrible for the defender. Gaza has some tunnels, just like Mariupol had large Soviet nuclear bunkers, that prolongs the fight but doesn't win it. If the IDF take a sector, holds it, takes the next, etc. Then Hamas is fucked. A year is surely long enough, even taking into account the ridiculous population density and resulting slower progress.

Your point 3 then explains it, and comes back to my point for whatever reason the IDF either isn't able or willing. They've failed and should be talking, but they refuse. We now get what we see on the daily news. Hamas have prepared for this battle for a long time, whatever strength they have has also had a year of real experience. If Hamas is never squeezed they empty everything they've got onto the IDF then melt back into the population. Reckon you're correct on the overuse of force multipliers, in that vid of Gaza there's a tiny hand held drone floating by one of the semi-naked Palestinian men they're using to detect mines at gunpoint in a combat zone (filmed by the IDF, and an extremely obvious war crime: cannot treat a POW like that, cannot treat a civilian like that). Taking and holding ground needs young men willing to get into bayonet range and more of them than the defenders have (3:1 is the ever popular ratio).

Your Vietnam comparison works more with Hezbollah and the Houthis. The Houthis still regularly hit shipping, B2 stealth bombers are being used against them now. Netanyahu is trying to claim he's bombing Lebanon to make it free of Hezbollah, but that's never going to work because Hezbollah is generated by Lebanon. Israel is also using AI in a dumb way for acquiring targets, they've bombed civilians in Christian villages, which we see because unlike in Gaza Western media isn't banned from entering by Israel. You'll get something out of reading up about the Clean Break report, if you don't know about it:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Clean_B ... _the_Realm
Netanyahu is trying to repeat the Clean Break. Bombing and regime changing the ME into becoming Western aligned and supportive of Israel. Get rid of Saddam and there's a liberal democracy that supports Israel and the West. Spoilers: there's actually total chaos then an absolutely huge strategic win for Iran.

The fücking damage the neo-cons have done to this world.

[_Os_]

so what's the reason for UK governments becoming more pro Israel since thatcher's time? I don't really follow UK politics but i gather the tories are even more pro israel than labour

Are these open ended questions a form of trolling to provoke lengthy posts? Trying to be brief (yes really):

1. Tony Blair was a foreign policy moron. But he won elections so everyone that came after has copied him. After Suez the French decided to never trust the US and to keep their distance from them. The British took the opposite lesson, avoid ever being without the US, Blair took it further and subordinated the UK to their leadership to the point where opposing the US is controversial (spoilers: the US doesn't give a shit what the UK does).

2. The peace process normalised relations in the 90s, the UK arms embargo ended after Oslo. When nothing happened and everything got worse, the UK didn't backtrack on the normalisation as punishment. The Israel-Palestine peace process is going nowhere (no shit), not supported by Israel and now openly opposed by Israeli cabinet ministers who talk about forcing Palestinians to emigrate (two settler leaders have demanded they go to the UK, settlers seem keen on Palestinian resettlement in the UK). "Two state solution" is now waffle MPs hide behind, safe in the knowledge whoever is questioning them doesn't know enough to ask "the Israeli government rejects that outright, so it's not relevant, what are you going to do?", or "the House of Commons voted to recognise Palestine years ago, this has not happened, if you support a two state solution why does the UK only recognise Israel? (answer: Israel doesn't want Palestine recognised)".

3. The war on terror. Israel-Palestine was mixed up in the neocon wars in ways that aren't widely known. I posted a link to a document outlining what later happened to Iraq and Syria, years before the 9/11 attacks, which Netanyahu helped write. On the surface the Israel-Palestine conflict is religious and fits with the themes of the war on terror, but a lot like NI it's really a conflict between two nationalisms over land. Palestinians including those outside Palestine (most don't live in Palestine), tend towards what are Palestinian nationalist groups more than anything and not the ISIS/A-Q type organisations. But "war on terror = support Israel". Putin tried the same trick and claimed the Russia- Chechnya conflict was part of the war on terror, this was immediately rejected by the US.

4. The Tories are importing every US culture war position they can. Not convinced they care past Palestine being left-coded. Any of them with a brain knows it's more complex. The phrase "Gaza is an open air prison" you hear from lefty activists, was coined by David Cameron in 2010. Quite funny how Cameron politely says "wow the Israelis are utter cunts" every chance he gets, the vote was held in the Commons on recognising Palestine when he was PM.

[_Os_]

The fücking damage the neo-cons have done to this world.

Can get conspiratorial. I like to think of it as a group of lads as the Irish say (do you guys actually say lads?) going to a pub, you're all there for different reasons. One likes the snacks, another likes the pool table, another the house ale, another wants to chat up the barmaid. There for different reasons, but all there. Iraq was the pub.

Netanyahu, Perle, Wolfowitz all thought Israel's security would be increased by invading Iraq, Netanyahu and Perle authored Clean Break. Wolfowitz said "the road to peace in the Middle East goes through Baghdad", not the Israel-Palestine peace process, Iraq. The same Iraq that is majority Shia like Iran (there's very few majority Shia countries), but was ruled by a secular dictator which largely removed that as a factor. Iraq is now another Lebanon (Hezbollah is a Shia movement), Iraqi Shia militia loyal to Iran will give Iran strategic depth and become more armed to the teeth as time passes, Iraq as a real country will never be allowed to reform as it proved too dangerous for Iran.

Rumsfeld just wanted to flex American power by bombing some place whilst dropping lines like "unknown unknowns". Bush seemed to really think he could defeat the abstract concept of terrorism, maybe believed the bomb people into democracy stuff too. Cheney just wanted oil. Blair really really believed the bomb people into democracy stuff.

Was quite disappointed when Netanyahu talked about invading Lebanon to push Hezbollah back to some river or some shit, thought "chief, this isn't why you went to the pub remember, it's about bombing innocent people to spread democracy and make Israel safe, it's about the road to peace in Israel being about some whole other country! remember!". About a day later he was raving about attempting to entirely destroy Hezbollah so the Lebs can rise up to free Lebanon (no not the Lebs who support Hezbollah) and this would bring peace to Israel. Extreme mission creep, but no one cared. Commence the bombardment of Lebanon.

[Uncle fester]

They will end up as a mirror image of Russia, forever extending "buffer zones" to "ensure their security".

[_Os_]

They will end up as a mirror image of Russia, forever extending "buffer zones" to "ensure their security".

They want the opposite of a buffer zone in Gaza. They want Gaza depopulated and turned into another West Bank, where Israelis are living cheek by jowl with Palestinians separated by walls/military check points/apartheid. Not convinced there's enough Israelis up for living in a shithole, but that's the crazy plan of cabinet ministers. They think a West Bank outcome guarantees security. The ICJ advisory opinion in July was that the Israelis are guilty of apartheid in the West Bank. They seem to think if the two state solution is taken off the table, foreigners will be okay with Palestinians having no rights and be okay with apartheid so visceral there's literal walls/checkpoints/separate roads (which shocked Tutu and why he said it was worse than SA).

Lebanon they definitely want a buffer. IDF haven't done much on the ground yet, literally a few locations, push in about 500m put a flag on an abandoned house/attack the UN/find a small weapons cache. Hezbollah are doing things which showcase their capabilities, a lot of it existed in theory but had never been seen before. They shot a cruise missile at Tel Aviv (Mossad HQ probable target), Hezbollah don't just have one. The theory was they could shoot missiles from Northern Lebanon/Syria and hit targets in Southern Israel, they do one attack after Israel hits Beirut to show Israel they have that capability and could escalate. Hezbollah definitely has intact C2, cannot do what they are otherwise.

[Uncle fester]

They will end up as a mirror image of Russia, forever extending "buffer zones" to "ensure their security".

They want the opposite of a buffer zone in Gaza. They want Gaza depopulated and turned into another West Bank, where Israelis are living cheek by jowl with Palestinians separated by walls/military check points/apartheid. Not convinced there's enough Israelis up for living in a shithole, but that's the crazy plan of cabinet ministers. They think a West Bank outcome guarantees security. The ICJ advisory opinion in July was that the Israelis are guilty of apartheid in the West Bank. They seem to think if the two state solution is taken off the table, foreigners will be okay with Palestinians having no rights and be okay with apartheid so visceral there's literal walls/checkpoints/separate roads (which shocked Tutu and why he said it was worse than SA).

Lebanon they definitely want a buffer. IDF haven't done much on the ground yet, literally a few locations, push in about 500m put a flag on an abandoned house/attack the UN/find a small weapons cache. Hezbollah are doing things which showcase their capabilities, a lot of it existed in theory but had never been seen before. They shot a cruise missile at Tel Aviv (Mossad HQ probable target), Hezbollah don't just have one. The theory was they could shoot missiles from Northern Lebanon/Syria and hit targets in Southern Israel, they do one attack after Israel hits Beirut to show Israel they have that capability and could escalate. Hezbollah definitely has intact C2, cannot do what they are otherwise.

For Gaza and West Bank, they want the Palestinians to "go away". How that comes about is a matter of disinterest for most Israelis (source: I work with them daily). The younger they are, the most extreme they are and bold about voicing that extremity. I am reminded of this series frequently. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Australian_Wars

For countries neighbouring Israel, they definitely want buffer zones. They have it already with Syria. They have it with Lebanon too but some of the buffer zone is on their own territory so not ideal for them. They are quite happy to destroy Lebanon as a viable state in order to achieve this. Egypt is different. They consider Gaza to be the effective buffer zone and Sinai can be cut off from Egypt relatively easily. They don't take Jordan particularly seriously.

[_Os_]

For Gaza and West Bank, they want the Palestinians to "go away". How that comes about is a matter of disinterest for most Israelis (source: I work with them daily). The younger they are, the most extreme they are and bold about voicing that extremity. I am reminded of this series frequently. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Australian_Wars

Agreed, they want that but how possible is it? Guessing we're seeing similar stuff. Gaza to me looks like genocide: mass civilian death (the shit I've seen out of there is far beyond anything from Ukraine, they're having a great time killing random people), forced expulsions from territory, bulldozing every building flat, next up the Israeli settlers move in. It's spreading to the West Bank and they're starting to target other non-Jewish communities (I've seen vids of settlers beating Bedouin). No doubt it'll somehow end up not being called genocide because Israel.

Israel clearly has a very sick culture, I am starting to wonder what they're capable of. The actual views of Israelis and what they're aiming to do are being very poorly reported in Western media. Will probably do some more posts just showing what they're saying.

How likely do you think they are to achieve driving out/killing all the Palestinians? That's about 7 million people. It's clearly their plan, but Palestinians are determined to stay.

For countries neighbouring Israel, they definitely want buffer zones. They have it already with Syria. They have it with Lebanon too but some of the buffer zone is on their own territory so not ideal for them. They are quite happy to destroy Lebanon as a viable state in order to achieve this. Egypt is different. They consider Gaza to be the effective buffer zone and Sinai can be cut off from Egypt relatively easily. They don't take Jordan particularly seriously.

Agreed. And all the neighbours are given US aid to not attack Israel too. They're not able to defeat Hezbollah on the ground imo, so they're going to turn Lebanon into Gaza.

The problem with all this is even if they get to that point they're not going to be happy. Greater Israel is a large entity, it includes all of Jordan. They don't respect Jordan because it's majority Palestinian, the descendants of those they previously displaced.

[Guy Smiley]

Explosions in Tehran... IDF claims it is carrying out 'precise strikes on military targets', an interesting phrase to use as they seem unable to do that in Gaza, the West Bank and Lebanon.

Let's see how your theory pans out Os... how capable are Iran and how far are they prepared to go?

[_Os_]

Let's see how your theory pans out Os... how capable are Iran and how far are they prepared to go?

Ja, I'm following. They say it's only military targets, so get the feeling that report I bashed out on the back of napkin for Calculator has been vindicated. But we shall see.

How this works: Any air defence can be breached, Israel will certainly have hits. Israel isn't the US that has so much firepower it doesn't need to worry about air defence and overwhelms everything. In simple terms they're most likely going to park over Iraq, lob in their anti-radar missiles and then their air launched ballistic missiles at targets, probably do not risk going over Iran. This will be done over hours. You could tell commentators/analysts who didn't know what they were talking about leading up to this, who claimed Israel hitting an Iranian S-300 radar in response to Iran's mass drone attack meant Israel could hit anything at will in Iran, which somewhat ignored the importance of tactics (turning radars on and off, where radars are positioned) and how many radars an air defence network has.

What we know: Iran knew it was coming, Iranians were disrupting/blocking GPS over a wide area around Tehran hours back (an attempt to block any GPS missile guidance). Lots of fake news on social media (almost every video is from a previous event). Explosions heard in Tehran but no ground fires very likely is Iranian air defence missiles. Some vids of Iran putting up what could be 40mm AAA, sort of hilarious, but possible its an anti-drone measure.

[Uncle fester]

Explosions in Tehran... IDF claims it is carrying out 'precise strikes on military targets', an interesting phrase to use as they seem unable to do that in Gaza, the West Bank and Lebanon.

Let's see how your theory pans out Os... how capable are Iran and how far are they prepared to go?

A good while back, they hit some guy in Yemen in his house having just called him to let him know he was about to be hit.

They can do this when they want but apparently not for Gaza and Lebanon as you say.
As they are fond of saying "we see you".

[_Os_]

Spoiler

Show

Calculator is enjoying my posts, another one for him …

How is Israel going to strike back against Iran?

Israel has a policy of escalation dominance, they always one up their opponent in the belief the opponent backs down (but now Houthis/Hamas/Hezbollah/Iran … aren’t backing down). The expectation of some is they try to outdo Iran’s ballistic missile strike which broke Israeli/US missile defence, with something larger and more spectacular. There’s reasons that won’t happen though.

1st of April, Israel attacked an Iranian consulate in Damascus, killing an Iranian general. Iran responded through a drone and missile attack on 13th of April (the largest single drone attack in history), that was almost entirely intercepted. Israel didn’t respond through escalating, but by destroying an S-300 radar. It’s publicly known that Iran and the US held talks the month after through intermediaries, on avoiding further escalation, neither want escalation unlike Israel. The speculation is Iran and the US were indirectly talking during the incident (there’s an Oman backchannel). That’s why the US (and it was mostly the US) got an Iranian drone turkey shoot (unlike Iran’s second ballistic missile strike), because the Iranian response was given to the US beforehand. Israel was only allowed to hit an Iranian radar in response to a massive Iranian attack, they had to listen to the US and not escalate because without the US they cannot defend themselves against Iran.

Israel later went for Hezbollah (and other incidents, assassinating the Hamas political leader in Tehran at the end of July), which from Iran’s point of view was escalation. The response was Iran’s second ballistic missile strike. Iran’s military doctrine is built around three areas (its “forward defence” strategy): proxies, ballistic missiles, and advanced nuclear technology. The first two are obvious, the third not so much, Iran pursues a nuclear hedging strategy getting as close to having nukes as possible, improving their tech and capabilities, without ever getting nukes. The goal is having the advantages of having a nuke (because everyone knows they’re close/capable) without the downsides of having a nuke (more sanctions etc). It’s the opposite of Mad Mullahs rushing to nuke Israel they're often presented as, and something closer to coldly rational people mastering uranium enrichment and ballistic missile technology then letting others work out the rest.

When Trump withdrew from the (Obama era) US nuclear deal with Iran (JCPOA) in 2018 and adopted a maximum pressure posture, with the probable goal of regime change (the Saudis supported the Trump plan too, which heightened that perception for Iran). That gave Iran's nuclear programme a lot of momentum inside the regime, and enrichment was boosted. What is happening now is larger than what caused that change in threat perception. Hezbollah being attacked followed up by a massive airstrike on Iran, would radically alter Iranian calculations.

The hard part of making a bomb is fissile material, Iran now has a stockpile of 60% enriched Uranium which isn’t far from the 90% weapons grade. Bliken has stated Iran could now produce weapons grade material in a week. Iran also started tooling for producing Uranium metal (part of the weaponisation process), when they started boosting their enrichment. Any change in the threat perception from the point of view of Iran potentially pushes them towards nukes: If the Saudis started a suspicious nuclear programme (threatens the nuclear advantage part of their strategy), if Iranian proxies were massively weakened (threatens the proxies part of their strategy), if there were strikes on their nuclear facilities (threatens the nuclear advantage part of their strategy). Anything that looks like a possible threat to the Iranian regime could trigger nukes.

Because of Iran’s human capital, industrial capacity, how advanced their nuclear programme is, and their main allies all having nukes. It’s a very short journey for Iran to actually build weaponised nukes, estimates are about 6 months most of which could be conducted in secret. Problem is, there’s then potential for a chain of proliferation. The Saudis will not accept Iran having advanced ballistic missiles and nukes. The Turks will not accept not having nukes if Russia/Israel/Iran/Saudis all do, maybe Egypt won’t either. The US isn’t going to sanction Turkey/Saudi/Egypt like it does NK or Iran, for one thing part of the point in making Egypt/Saudi/Jordan/Lebanon allies is bribing them not to attack Israel. So other US allies potentially then seek nukes to improve their security position: Taiwan/South Korea/Japan/Poland. It starts looking a bit out of control.

Which all means there’s a strong chance Israel’s attack is limited to some military targets Iran can shrug off, similar to how Iran’s targets in Israel were of a military nature. The US has almost certainly been telling Israel not to go full Gaza genocide on Iran like it already has on Lebanon (what did Netanyahu say "I will turn Beirut into Gaza" or some shit?). If so that’s twice Israeli escalation dominance didn’t happen against Iran, twice they backed down after a massive attack. If Israel doesn’t do that and goes full Netanyahu instead, it has to deal with a potential Iranian retaliation which is something along the lines of a nuclear test. Then long term, a nuclear armed Iran that has already defeated Israeli/US missile defence once and has enough missiles for a saturation attack. And after that a significantly more dangerous ME the US has little hope of policing.

I'm sure one of us will come back to it. Lots of big talk from Israel about hitting nuclear facilities, oil infrastructure, the Iranian regime. Post up your call before the strike.

Calculator, if you come at me do not miss!

Israel’s response to Iran launching a MRBM strike on Israel (biggest in history?), breaking Israeli/US missile defence (20% visually confirmed getting through is a fail, if they were nukes that’s Israel wiped off the map about x5 in the first wave) ... was one notch above nothing. Big talk about targeting: leadership, nuclear, oil, infrastructure. It was a very limited strike on military targets.

On the face of it I was right, chance I was wrong.

Israeli media says hits on 4 or 5 S-300 radars, claiming that’s Iran’s air defence gone. ISW (Institute for the Study of War) says they hit 3 to 4 S-300 batteries. Iran probably have/had 8 S-300 batteries, 4 of the most modern and 4 older. They also acquired an unknown small amount of S-400 in August, unknown if they’re operational. As well as Iranian reversed engineered S-300 copies (10+ batteries). On what the IDF are claiming they didn’t destroy Iran's air defence network.

Missile propellent factories and drone production facilities were also hit. ISW says this covered 20 locations. Anything critical for Iran is in bunkers under mountains like a James Bond villain hideout, unreachable to conventional weapons.

There’s claims which cannot be confirmed (Western in origin), that Israel/US planned a 10-12 hour bombing campaign. This was cut to 3 hours when Israeli/US SEAD failed. Only evidence I’ve seen for that was IDF statements early on that it would last “several hours” which would’ve meant something much larger than happened. Iranian sources claim decoys and other tactics worked, no evidence of that.

It’s possible Israel had more objectives they wanted to hit, but couldn’t. About 100 jets basically the entire Israeli air force and US support (tankers/intelligence). Seems like a large force for not much.

Which leaves two possibilities: My pre-strike analysis was extremely accurate, Iran could call the bluff of Israel/US without much consequence. Or my pre-strike analysis wasn’t entirely correct, Israel did restrict their strike to military targets (they announced that when the strike begun) but it was intended to be larger and failed.

Whatever the case, not really seeing huge Israeli dominance in these Israel-Iran exchanges. The opposite if anything.

Israel will keep trying to provoke a conflict against Iran, which they’re completely unable to fight without the US. They’ve always done everything possible to eliminate regional rivals, regional “mowing the lawn”. Israel’s status is in being the dominant regional military power. Iran’s best move is no direct retaliation, use proxies to keep conflicts away from their borders.

… Israel knows its attempt to escalate against Iran is failing. It’s upping airstrikes on Syria (including bombing upmarket areas of Damascus) over 150 airstrikes now and the IDF is increasing ground defences in Golan. Israel seems to want to fight Syria too.

[epwc]

“We can support Israel and stand against the extremism of Israel’s government.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/ ... e-solution

[epwc]

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/ ... rk-in-gaza

[_Os_]

“We can support Israel and stand against the extremism of Israel’s government.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/ ... e-solution

The "extreme Israeli government" has nothing on their electorate. I've now spent about two weeks surfing the Israeli internet, total insane asylum, most crazy place on the internet I've ever seen. Polling confirms most of them are out to lunch.

For their own good, sanction them up to their eyeballs.

[Sandstorm]

“We can support Israel and stand against the extremism of Israel’s government.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/ ... e-solution

The "extreme Israeli government" has nothing on their electorate. I've now spent about two weeks surfing the Israeli internet, total insane asylum, most crazy place on the internet I've ever seen. Polling confirms most of them are out to lunch.

For their own good, sanction them up to their eyeballs.

This

[epwc]

For their own good, sanction them up to their eyeballs.

Never going to happen

[inactionman]

“We can support Israel and stand against the extremism of Israel’s government.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/ ... e-solution

The "extreme Israeli government" has nothing on their electorate. I've now spent about two weeks surfing the Israeli internet, total insane asylum, most crazy place on the internet I've ever seen. Polling confirms most of them are out to lunch.

For their own good, sanction them up to their eyeballs.

If I lived in a country whose immediate neighbours wanted their complete destruction (no France jokes svp) I'm not sure I'd be too level-headed.

That's not to say their views are fair or reasonable, or that they haven't visited certain things upon their own heads.

The more I see of this the more intractable it all feels.

[epwc]

The more I see of this the more intractable it all feels.

Who would have thought that South Africa would be able to move on from apartheid, sure it's not perfect but it's not daily bloodshed between blacks and whites.

[Sandstorm]

The more I see of this the more intractable it all feels.

Who would have thought that South Africa would be able to move on from apartheid, sure it's not perfect but it's not daily bloodshed between blacks and whites.

Religion isn't as big a deal in S Africa as in the Middle East. Book Bashers are always decades/centuries behind where they should be to make peace with their neighbours.

[epwc]

Mate, colour is at least as intractable problem as religion.

Have you read The Sneetches by Dr Seuss (lets not raise the issue of possible anti semitism)? People just need something, anything to coalesce around

[Uncle fester]

The more I see of this the more intractable it all feels.

Who would have thought that South Africa would be able to move on from apartheid, sure it's not perfect but it's not daily bloodshed between blacks and whites.

Religion isn't as big a deal in S Africa as in the Middle East. Book Bashers are always decades/centuries behind where they should be to make peace with their neighbours.

If the folks in NI were able to stop killing each other (and don't forget that they went through massacres where they killed ~25% of the "others"), then it shouldn't be impossible here.

[Uncle fester]

“We can support Israel and stand against the extremism of Israel’s government.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/ ... e-solution

The "extreme Israeli government" has nothing on their electorate. I've now spent about two weeks surfing the Israeli internet, total insane asylum, most crazy place on the internet I've ever seen. Polling confirms most of them are out to lunch.

For their own good, sanction them up to their eyeballs.

If I lived in a country whose immediate neighbours wanted their complete destruction (no France jokes svp) I'm not sure I'd be too level-headed.

That's not to say their views are fair or reasonable, or that they haven't visited certain things upon their own heads.

The more I see of this the more intractable it all feels.

Palestinians or the wider middle east?