Many of the opinion pieces yesterday and today have been on the anniversary of Hamas’s attack on the Israelis. For example, in his Washington Post column David Ignatius speculates:
Perhaps Israel’s sword of vengeance has broken the power of Iran and its boldest proxies, as Netanyahu and his supporters seem to hope. But this is the Middle East. A more likely outcome is that, at a cost of so many thousands of dead, this war has restored the old paradigm of a strong Israel that can crush its enemies — until the next round.
Perhaps the saddest legacy of this war will be that it could so easily happen again. We all know the adage about those who don’t learn from history. When we see the hardened faces of Israelis, Palestinians and Lebanese, we know that many of them are thinking about the next conflict, even as they fight this one. The displaced Gazans, the stunned Hezbollah fighters, aren’t likely to forget. And in the Middle East, memory is an addictive drug, and a poison.
while the editors of the Wall Street Journal declaim:
The reply of respectable liberalism has been to urge de-escalation, cease-fires and a two-state solution, and to blame Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when they don’t materialize. It’s as if Hamas, Hezbollah and their patron in Iran don’t exist. Hamas has refused to engage with mediators for weeks, and a Palestinian state at peace with Israel has never been its objective or Iran’s. They want Israel destroyed and the Jews expelled or murdered.
As long as Iran pursues war, Israel must defend itself aggressively to survive. Mr. Biden has supported Israel, but he has also tried to cut short its defense. He withheld weapons from Israel even while Hamas ruled Rafah and its brigades controlled Gaza’s smuggling routes to Egypt.
Oct. 7 has come and gone. The one-year mark since Hamas’s butcheries brought more of what we’ve come to expect—rocket attacks on Tel Aviv, anti-Israel protests at Columbia. Not to mention the warnings about World War III if President Biden can’t persuade Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu not to exercise the right the president says the Jewish state has to defend itself. It is the perfect capstone to Mr. Biden’s legacy: a foreign policy that projects American weakness.
and
The irony is that Mr. Biden was elected president on his own version of Make America Great Again. Drawing on his foreign-policy chops, he saw himself as restoring America’s global standing by repairing alliances that had been ruptured by Donald Trump and recultivating ties with foreign leaders—many of whom he knew personally from both his days as vice president and his long service on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. But his managerial approach assumes the status quo is always worth preserving.
Thus Mr. Biden was willing to supply military arms in conflicts that broke out provided doing so wouldn’t seriously threaten the status quo, which is why he gave Ukraine what it needed to fight but not what it needed to prevail. It’s worth recalling that before Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine, Mr. Biden was assuring the world that a “minor incursion” by the Russians wouldn’t be a big deal. Unfortunately, when maintaining the status quo becomes paramount, all the initiative goes to the bad actors who are always more than willing to disrupt it.
Let’s ask a question. Is it in the U. S. interest for Israel to annex the West Bank and Gaza? I don’t think so but maybe our diplomatic experts think it is. I recognize it’s terribly indiscreet but maybe if that’s U. S. policy we should say so.
Here’s another question. Is it possible for the U. S. to encourage Israel’s attacking Iran without that transmogrifying into a direct conflict between the U. S. and Iran?
In what seems like a non sequitur I wonder if those urging the U. S. to give the Ukrainians missiles capable of reaching deep into Russia recognize that they are encouraging the U. S. to get involved directly in the conflict between Russia and Ukraine? That’s how those missiles work—U. S. technicians are required to configure them. That’s direct involvement.
A final question. Do those in favor of greater U. S. involvement in attacking Iran recognize that conflict, particularly in combination with direct U. S. involvement in the war between Ukraine and Russia, is likely to draw China as well?
To summarize my views:
- I think that Israel has a right to defend itself
- I do not believe that a “greater Israel” is a vital interest of the U. S.
- I think that radical Islamists like Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Iranian mullahocracy are our enemies
- I think we should tread lightly to avoid a regional war
Israel is a European colonial project, and the Ashkenazi are colonizers. They do not have the right of self defense, because they are the aggressors. That is simple international law.
The Israeli problem predates the Balfour Declaration of 1922. Zionism is essentially the Ashkenazi version of Naziism, and the goal of the Zionists is the complete elimination of all non-Jews from the entirety of Greater Israel, including especially the Christians. Greater Israel is everything from the Euphrates to the Nile: half of Syria up to Turkey, all of Lebanon, all of Jordan, all of Palestine, half of Saudi Arabia, the Sinai and the Nile Delta.
The radical Islamists would be our enemies, even if Israel did not exist. But they are also the enemies of Muslims who do not agree with them, especially secular Muslims, like many Turks.
The main problem in the Middle East is the attempt by the US to use the radical Islamists to control the region. These attempts go way back, but in recent decades the US has variously support affiliates of al-Qaeda, ISIS, and even Hamas. These schemes always end badly, because the radicals have their own agendas. Nevertheless, we still support al-Qaeda (al Nusra) and ISIS in Syria, and ISIS in Afghanistan and Turkmenistan.
And, of course, we support actual Nazis in Ukraine. We, the US, overthrew the democratically elected government in 2014, and installed the current junta. The junta was never legitimate, but now all the terms of office have expired, and Zelenskyy rules by fiat. And he rules tyrannically. All opposition parties have been suppressed, as well as all opposition press, radio and tv stations. Most opposition leaders have been arrested.
All the high-ranking officials of Russia, including Putin and Medvedev, but also Lavrov, and the Russian ambassadors to the US and UN, have warned that Russia will attack facilities inside the US and its allies if we launch long-range missiles into Russia. Accordingly, the US is developing plans to do so.
Still don’t see how a direct Israel-Iran would work out. Is Israel going to borrow our ships? China rent some tp Iran? At best it’s an aerial war, maybe some special ops. Anyway, dont really see how this ends. At some point I guess they stop active fighting, Israel finishes taking over the West Bank, Gaza lies in ruins and the terror groups go back to attacking Israelis.
As an aside, can we just stop paying attention to people who claim that the failure to obliterate places we dont like at the slightest provocation is a sign of US weakness?
Steve
I’m for that. My own view is that U. S. weakness is a sign of U. S. weakness but belligerence is not the same thing as strength. I think the way the U. S. projects strength is by limiting our use of the military to conflicts we’re willing to win decisively.
Dave Schuler: Is it in the U. S. interest for Israel to annex the West Bank and Gaza?
How would that work when Jews would then be a minority in Israel. Not let Palestinians vote? Expel them?
My point precisely. What’s the present trajectory? It doesn’t look to me as though it’s toward a “two-state solution” or even a “three-state solution”.
Israel doesn’t have a strategy beyond mowing the grass. Israel will respond to violence with violence and end violence with a new status quo that is at least more protective of Israel than the one that preceded it (buffer zones, killing or capturing belligerents, destroying weapons/ infrastructure). I don’t think two or three state solutions are at all relevant. I don’t think Israel wants to occupy Gaza or the West Bank, they may wish to occupy the Egypt/Gaza border, though they may be content if Egypt can be expected to improve security and the border. Israel will want to weaken Iran’s ability to project military power; I don’t see this as bringing in other actors as long as the oil flows.
Agree on Gaza. At his point it’s a vast ruins anyway. Disagree on the West Bank. They have been setting new records on settlements. It’s pretty clear, they actually say it, that they intend to take over the West Bank.
Steve
Israel will clear the land for civilization just as America cleared the land of Native Americans.
There can be no peace until Islam reforms or recedes into the ash heap of history.
This will continue in fits and stops for generations.
The cleansing of America of Natives took 300 years, the Middle East may take 3,000.
But in the end the viable culture will prevail and that is not the suicidal death cult of Islam.