2023 Israeli-Gazan War

[rj1]

From my amateur armchair general perspective:

1. 50th Anniversary of Yom Kippur War, so there's that.
2. The "Israelis getting caught by surprise in spite of, if true, an Egyptian warning them" completely mirrors the original Yom Kippur War.
3. The grand design for the reason behind the attack strikes me to stop Arabs accepting Israeli state identity. Hamas will take some casualties and life will get worse for people in Gaza and the West Bank, but from the point of view of if you want to stop recognizance of Israeli state legitimacy, the Israelis will react, the Arabs in all those other states will prioritize Arab deaths over Israeli deaths because that's what partisans in wars do, and Israeli-Arab state rapproachment will cease for a generation. If this goes on a few weeks and Israel pound Gaza, the Saudis aren't going to be able to stand up to their public outcry that much, not when Mohammed Bin Salman doesn't owe Biden much of anything to start with.
4. My gut feeling is the Iranians are involved. They tend to be in everything in the Middle East, so no more presidential administrations giving them deals okay?
5. Netanyahu being Netanyahu, I wonder if they just annex Gaza pushing all the Palestinians out into Egypt or a la Lebanon setup large neutral zones, which would drive further outcry but from an Israeli hawk's perspective, lessens a potential source of geopolitical risk.
6. No Western country except probably the U.S. are going to be able to give anything to a prolonged conflict. They already gave everything to Ukraine and haven't restocked. I don't think this will be prolonged however.

[tbm3fan]

Hopefully your information is incorrect.

Because, if taken literally, that will mean razing a dense urban area of 140 square miles and exterminating or "evacuating" 2 million human beings.

I could see Israel driving all into the sea. With intentionally killing all those civilians at the music festival I couldn't see them do anything less. Would we do the same? I can only wonder...

[Versus]

I could see Israel driving all into the sea. With intentionally killing all those civilians at the music festival I couldn't see them do anything less. Would we do the same? I can only wonder...

Music festival was the start, you should see what they did in the next hours...

[InExile]

I could see Israel driving all into the sea. With intentionally killing all those civilians at the music festival I couldn't see them do anything less. Would we do the same? I can only wonder...

I see the Liberal world order getting weaker. Ethnic cleansing seemed unthinkable in most of the world just a few years ago, but it just happened last week in Azerbaijan of the Armenians. The United States is more preoccupied inwardly and is no longer able or willing to take the lead in maintaining International rules or norms and other major powers like Russia and China now have an active interest in undermining it.

One aspect of the Liberal world order was the freezing of conflicts like Israel-Palestine, or Kashmir or until last week Nagorno-Karabakh as International rules prohibited steps like mass expulsions or ethnic cleansing, but this might no longer be the case.

Nevertheless, I don't see Israel going as far as the destruction of Gaza and the expulsion of all Palestinians there, the death toll would be in the tens or even hundreds of thousands. That would definitely lead to all out conflict in the West Bank and with Hezbollah and perhaps even a war with Iran. Even countries like Egypt or Saudi Arabia would be forced to freeze relations with Israel and maybe even take a hostile stance against Israel. The Europeans would treat Israel as a pariah state and even the US might find it difficult to continue to support Israel and provide it with arms and supplies in this scenario.

I see options such as devastation of the Gaza Strip, toppling of Hamas, perhaps establishing a buffer zone around Gaza as more likely. They might try depopulating the Gaza Strip to some extent but as no Arab countries would probably be willing to take the Gazans the only options might be to deport part of the population to the West Bank.

[Amled]

Hopefully your information is incorrect.

Because, if taken literally, that will mean razing a dense urban area of 140 square miles and exterminating or "evacuating" 2 million human beings.

Joe I really…really hope that you are right!
But I’m equally afraid that this is going to be real bad!
If Hamas had been satisfied with the rocket attacks, then there would probably have been a lot of high level diplomatic discussion…!
But the slaughter; and hostage taking, at the festival grounds changed all that!
Here we are dealing with the mind-sets similar to those that went on-line with beheadings?
What do you think that public reactions will be, once the technical and forensic from the festival site is released?
People shot at point blank range…in the back while fleeing…and all the rest.
Those twisted mind-sets, now have what…150 hostages???
Already the threats against them have started…
https://thehill.com/policy/4246128-h...rning-on-gaza/

Hamas threatens to kill Israeli hostages over strikes ‘without prior warning’ on Gaza

[TopHatter]

Joe I really…really hope that you are right!

If that happens, then peace in the Middle East will be poisoned for the next one hundred years. Or forever.

[Versus]

Hopefully your information is incorrect.

Because, if taken literally, that will mean razing a dense urban area of 140 square miles and exterminating or "evacuating" 2 million human beings.

The level of rage on Israel side is mind boggling and these are not my words, but compilation of their thinking. Simply the atrocities that Hamas did were too much and the line has been crossed. Its even surprising for me, but understandable. They want Hamas but if the lobbing of heads starts, well 2 million, 2 million it is.

[Monash]

sir, how would you see 150,000 rockets and other holdings by Israel's opponents, last post#38? we see in television that few hundreds rockets have made Israel use its best air defence against rivals.
the holding of 150,000 rockets? our Aaj Tak journalists, online in my laptop, would now run from Israel, i think?

150,000 is an impressive number but its physically impossible for Hezbollah to fire them all at once, a lot but not all so it would be a drawn out barrage not a blitzgkrieg. Of those missiles that do launch a large % of HB's less sophisticated rockets will land in open country and at least at first some will be intercepted (Israel doesn't have nearly enough interceptors to get more than a tiny % of that total). Depending on HBs determination to continue the fight they will eventually inflict serious damage and casualties on Israel.

Israel in turn has time to identify and hit launch crews while their setting up or transporting rockets and can hit storage depots (hard to do but possible). They can also attack other targets including HB training camps, HQ's and the homes and business interests of senior HB members. If HB continues it's offensive it then has the option of following up with a full scale invasion of southern Lebanon designed to push HB back from the border and out of rocket range while killing or capturing as many HB members as possible. As I mentioned earlier it also has the option of hitting Assad's regime where it hurts as punishment for its complicity with HB. That will enrage Russia but at the moment they have distractions elsewhere. Finally as I noted they might hit back at Iran as well. I would suggest their oil terminals on the Persian gulf would be tempting targets because it hits the Iranian Government where it hurts while minimizing civilian casualties. If pressed further and backed into a corner Iran might then consider launching rockets directly at Israel. After that things start to go down hill.

[Monash]

Hamas has entrenched its people and equipment deeply among civilians in Gaza. They have also supposedly distributed the hostages within Gaza. Any retaliation from Israel more intense than what's happening now will require whole scale slaughter of Gazan population along with hostages. If this is necessary then it has to happen immediately. The longer this conflict prolongs, the demands will start coming for Israel to limit retaliation.

I don't buy the story of Israel getting duped. The whole thing stinks of incompetence and complacency. I also think Israel got distracted by the political in-fighting.

It's perfectly possible to be both duped and incompetent. The warden may not think any of his prisoners are planning an escape but that's still not an excuse to give most of his guards the weekend off!

[Monash]

And I just realized who else might benefit from this if it lasts long enough. Putin. The US will be expected to provide munitions to Israel and a lot of the types required will be exactly what is currently in short supply because of the war in Ukraine. The Republicans will go ape shit of course and will start demanding anything Israel needs be re-diverted to them! Putin will be smiling over breakfast this morning. He can and will try to exploit this for all it's worth.

[667medic]

[667medic]

Screen grab from a video at the dance festival with the Hamas fighters paragliding towards them, those grey patterns in the sky. This was like painting a big red cross and screaming attack me...

[667medic]

I see the Liberal world order getting weaker. Ethnic cleansing seemed unthinkable in most of the world just a few years ago, but it just happened last week in Azerbaijan of the Armenians. The United States is more preoccupied inwardly and is no longer able or willing to take the lead in maintaining International rules or norms and other major powers like Russia and China now have an active interest in undermining it.

One aspect of the Liberal world order was the freezing of conflicts like Israel-Palestine, or Kashmir or until last week Nagorno-Karabakh as International rules prohibited steps like mass expulsions or ethnic cleansing, but this might no longer be the case.

Nevertheless, I don't see Israel going as far as the destruction of Gaza and the expulsion of all Palestinians there, the death toll would be in the tens or even hundreds of thousands. That would definitely lead to all out conflict in the West Bank and with Hezbollah and perhaps even a war with Iran. Even countries like Egypt or Saudi Arabia would be forced to freeze relations with Israel and maybe even take a hostile stance against Israel. The Europeans would treat Israel as a pariah state and even the US might find it difficult to continue to support Israel and provide it with arms and supplies in this scenario.

I see options such as devastation of the Gaza Strip, toppling of Hamas, perhaps establishing a buffer zone around Gaza as more likely. They might try depopulating the Gaza Strip to some extent but as no Arab countries would probably be willing to take the Gazans the only options might be to deport part of the population to the West Bank.

The Egyptians were keen to get rid of Gaza during peace negotiations with Israel. I am hearing that they are a different breed compared to West Bank Palestians. Deporting them to West Bank might be the best approach.

[santosh10]

Israel ‘will return Lebanon to the Stone Age’ if Hezbollah starts a war | Conflict News | Al Jazeera

[TopHatter]

Israel ‘will return Lebanon to the Stone Age’ if Hezbollah starts a war | Conflict News | Al Jazeera

Not terribly surprising. Might explain why Hezbollah hasn't gone whole-hog on Israel like Hamas did.