President Biden vowed on Monday to veto a House Republican bill that would provide $17.6 billion in aid to Israel, calling it a “cynical political maneuver” intended to hurt the chances of passage for broader legislation that would provide money for Israel, Ukraine, Taiwan and the U.S. border.
House Republicans fiercely oppose the larger bill, which was unveiled by a small, bipartisan group of senators over the weekend. It calls for $118.3 billion in spending and would overhaul some of the nation’s immigration laws to deal with recent surges of migrants at the southern border.
Neither the strike on Aleppo, nor Damascus nor Beirut were about supply lines. The attacks in Syria were a show of force and to antagonize Iran further, by showing that their forces are vulnerable there too.
Do you think Iran arming Hezbollah and Hamas and installing a network of ‘logistical advisors’ is de-escalating the conflict?
I’m losing you here.
Hezbollah made clear in the beginning, that they are not interested in a stronger escalation. Your argument was that Hezbollah was supplied through these countries. Are you now claiming Hamas is supplied through them currently? There is about 200km of Israel, including most of the population centers between Lebanon and Gaza.
But to the other point. You seem to imply that escalation is partisan, e.g. there is the “good side” that is not escalating a conflict, when it uses violence and a “bad side” where any action in the conflict is seen as escalation, even actions preceeding violence. But that is not how conflicts work. You could just as easily claim that Iran had to arm these groups to prevent an escalation through deterrence. It would be equally silly.
In the currrent iteration of the conflict Israel is escalating things through attacking places that werent involved before to cause a stronger reaction, after Hezbollah showed in the beginning, that they were only interested in a “show of support” to Hamas but not a further escalation of fights.
If you look further at the motivations and opportunities of the actors, it becomes even more clear. Israel claims that Iran would have orchestrated the attack by Hamas. If that was the case, it would have made more sense for Hezbollah and other Iranian allies to immediately attack on 07. October or right after. Israel was in disarray, and the US didnt increase it’s military presence yet. Instead Hezbollah and Iran mostly left it at words, which indicates that Hamas was not acting on their behalf.
If we look at the motivation of Israel, we see a government that is extremely fragile, with a ptime minister charged with multiple crimes, who has failed his people on his only promise of safety and hasno support left in the public. The only thing keeping Netanyahu in power is a continued war. The global sentiment is changing, as Israel is now held responsible for its actions in Gaza at the ICJ and the arguement of “self defense” is less and less accepted with the level of destruction and death in Gaza. Israel needs to escalate tensions in order to stabilize international support.
Well, that’s mainly because you’re drifting from the initial argument.
You claim that the aim of Israel is to continuously antagonize it’s neighbours to keep the conflict ‘hot’. Why would it want to do this? Through its actions it’s obvious the recent goal of Israel is to a) slowly annex the West Bank and b) move towards normalisation with its neighbours. The latter being especially succesfull with Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Jordan. The entire reason Hamas chose to escalate the conflict is because they saw this tactic working: rocket attacks out of Gaza contained; resistance in the West Bank suppressed and slowly taking more and more land; more and more countries accepting the state of Israel; …
The idea that Israel’s goals would be served by escalating into a war with the entire Arab world is absurd. Even if they did have a master plan to conquer the entire Middle East, 9 million Israelis aren’t going to get very far. They couldn’t even get 20km into Lebanon in 2006 before they had to retreat ffs. Why do you think Israel would ever want to trigger such a war, vs the much more plausible explanation that they are indeed trying to prevent the flow of Iranian weapons to Hezbollah and Hamas?
This is just something Israel says to try and garner support against Iran, comparable to Iran claiming Israel and the US were behind the jan 3 bombings. No-one with a brain believes this, not even the Israeli politicians who say it. But that doesn’t change the fact that Hamas was only or mostly able to materially carry out such an attack, and Hezbollah is swimming in munitions to shell Israel with, because of Iranian support.
Isn’t it Iran that is escalating the conflict by propping up Hezbollah and Hamas? Why is it a ‘regional escalation’ when Israel tries to stop it?
Israels goal before 07. October was to slowly annex the West Bank and normalise with the pro US neighbours.
Afterwards the goals shifted, as normalisation will be impossible for the next years, and public opinion is weakening the resolve to support them from the West. Also Netanyahus claim to power, despite his corruption and other criminal activities was always, that he would he the only one to provide safety to the Israelis. He failed on that promise and the only thing jeeping him in power is a continued war.
No answer to the questions then
Which neighbour do you think Bibi is going to invade? Do you think there is popular support for it in Israel?
I believe that they will start annexing south of Lebanon, if it is politically possible. Thats why theyneed an escalation with Hezbollah, to justifiy needing the areas as “security buffer”.
Do you think Hezbollah is weaker than in 2006?
I don’t know. Hezbollah is certainly stronger than in 2006 in relation to the rest of Lebanon. But i don’t know if they are stronger in relation to the IDF. On top there is the question how much support each side would receive.
I think that this is secondary to Netanyahu though. His political survival (and staying out of jail) depends on continuing war. And i think he expects the US, UK and Germany to support Israel no matter what. That is also why now US Elites are drumming up for war and why Iran and allies want the US military out of Iraq and Iraq wants them out to not become a warzone again.
The question will be how much support the US can muster in its population.