Hamas strike on Israel - Threadbans in op - mod warning in OP updated 19/10/23

You mean the land grabbing mass murdering Russians?

I never suggested Israel would sit back, they are doing exactly what I thought they would do.

Once the dust settles on this latest Israel-Hamas battle (and it will), the key strategic questions to be settled are;

1. is Iran's role in the Middle East diminished or strengthened after their Gazan proxy army is largely destroyed (as it will be - the force asymmetry between the IDF and Hamas is huge)? For the sake of peace in the region, you would hope 'diminished' but to a large degree that will depend on the next question
2. can the Saudi-Israeli deal brokered by the Biden administration be concluded? If 'yes', then Iran can be further sidelined.
3. can the Iranian-Russian partnership (which is one of convenience between rogue states rather than any form of ideological attachment) be weakened, and ideally severed?
4. can the rightward drift of Israeli politics be halted and reversed?

That's the chessboard - the ongoing fighting, terrible as it is, is just one of the squares.

'be sucked in'? They are already fully sucked in - Hamas and Hezbollah are Iranian proxy armies that control two statelets (Gaza and Southern Lebanon).

It’s a pretty biased view of reality and the questions posed reveal that bias. Does occupying Ukraine make Russia a rogue state? By that definition does the US occupation of Syria and Israeli occupation make them “rogue states”?

How do you think the Arab world will react to a prolonged, bloody campaign with increasing civilian deaths in Gaza?

Whether Hamas are killed to a man in big time or slug it out with the IDF over weeks I don’t see how it diminishes Iran.

The 7th October attack showed that Israel, despite American support cannot guarantee its own security. Saudi Arabia must now be rethinking the effectiveness of security guarantees with the US. If they disregard events in Gaza, normalise relations with Israel in exchange for US security then Iran becomes the de facto regional hegemon.

The Iran-Russian partnership is one of many not of “rogue states” but of states who are challenging the unipolar position of the US. China is the largest importer of Iranian oil, India is up there too.

Do you think the rightward drift of Israeli politics is likely to be reversed immediately following the gravest threat to their national security in generations?

Russia killed and displaced more Syrians than Israel did to Palestinians or US to Iraqis sorry left out brutality so Russia is acceptable

Can you point out where the Hamas sympathisers are? I have still yet to see any.

I had to check it wasn't the Russian amabassador.

Yes, it’s probably Hamas who are bombing Gaza too.

There is a difference.

Hamas crossed the border and delberately set out to slaughter as many men, women and children as possible. As long as they were Jews, they didn't care - they just wanted to slaughter Jews. The word pogrom definitely hasn't been used much in the last 80 years thankfully, but this was a pogrom in the truest sense of the word. As much as Cossacks in the 19th century, or SS stormtroopers in the 20th.

Israel has to respond (hence why we hear the conga line of politicians repeating the line 'Israel has a right to defend itself'). And like it or not, when Israel is attacked, as a state whose very existence has been denied by its enemies since Day 1, it responds with massive, overwhelming force.

As Tom Friedman astutely noted in the NYT this weekend:

The current retaliatory violence directed at Hamas is the above multiplied by ten.

This is all starting to sound very familiar, I wonder is there a literal play book.

Bibi and Putin are quite close.

Well the UN are definitely down 11 employees and 30 UN workers children after Israel bombed their school last week. Nothing to see here.

First paragraph sounds very like the US.