Opinion Archives - Page 37 of 40

Domination Space For Common Space

Dr Khairi Janbek
September 27, 2024

By Dr Khairi Janbek

When we think of contemporary Iran, one always believes that the Arab Middle East had always been dominated by the three Non-Arab American allies; Iran under of the Shah, Turkey and Israel.

One thinks that those “neighborhood police stations’ were the guarantors of stability through their convergence, and at times contradictions, in the age of Cold War and oil. However, the Shah of Iran was deposed and the Anti-communist Cold War ended, but that didn’t mean that oil stopped becoming important nor that Russia and China were no longer threats.

One would say, that the rehabilitation of Iran and possibly turning it into a negotiations partner aims at keeping the third angle of the police stations triangle going, because non of the Arab countries, no matter how much they tried, could never replace Iran, because no Arab police station is permitted to emerge as a third angle.

Having said that, it would be beyond naive to think that the expansion of Iran’s power and influence happened by stealth or escaped the notice of the US and NATO.

As the butcher of Gaza, Netanyahu, address the UN, Israel has launched a massive military strike in Beirut. Mobilize the working class against the escalating US-Israeli war in the Middle East, backed by the Democrats & Republicans! Stop the genocide in Gaza! #Lebanon #StopTheWar pic.twitter.com/KJ4LZWLdmF
— Joseph Kishore (@jkishore) September 27, 2024

After after all Iran grew to become a Red Sea country through its influence on the Houthis in Yemen, a Mediterranean country through its influence in Syria as well Lebanon through Hezbullah and the major Gulf country through its supporters in Iraq.

In fact this Iranian domination of space is what has created a common space between all its long-arm organisations in the region.

Essentially, if we compare Iran to an octopus, all those various groups are its tentacles, and they all serve the purpose of Iran’s strategic interests, albeit not through a push-button approach, but through not taking any action which would not please their Persian master.

Of course, this puts Iran in a strong position to be a major player in the region and an inescapable negotiations partner for the US, which is also convenient for the Americans, in order to remind their Arab allies who is their protector in a region policed by Turkey, Israel and Iran.

Of course this takes us to the point of saying that, for all intents and purposes, for the Americans a trusted adversary is more important than distrusted friends, and that it would be absurd to think that all those long arms of Iran in the Arab world can be amputated by military means; they certainly can be weakened, but without the consent of Iran and without the right price, so long as it remains behind them, nothing much can change.

At this point, from what one can only see, is that no one in their right mind or otherwise, will permit a war to emerge in which Israel is pitted against Iran and the US as well as NATO putting all their weight behind Israel and forcing the Arabs to choose their camp.

That would be the scenario of the end of the world as we know it, or with major civil wars in the Arab countries controlled by the tentacles of Iran, and which no one wants.

Dr Khairi Janbek is a Jordanian writer based in Paris, France

Opinion

Yitzhak Brik: Israel is Being Led to Ruin

CrossFireArabia
September 26, 2024

Retired Israeli General Yitzhak Brik said the political and military bosses are leading Israel “toward ruin through a path with no exit.”

Brik explained despite the tactical achievements against Hezbollah in Lebanon, Israel’s strategic situation is deteriorating in terms of security and economy, as well as its relations with the countries of the world.

He added that Hezbollah, despite the targeting of its weapons and leaders, its missiles continue to destroy every part of northern Israel without stopping.

"جيشنا مهترئ وينشر الأوهام، ولن يتمكن من هزيمة #حماس".. لواء احتياط في الجيش الإسرائيلي يحذر من انهيار دولة إسرائيل على خلفية #حرب_غزة pic.twitter.com/1Xfl5hmRDi
— قناة الجزيرة (@AJArabic) May 31, 2024

Brik stressed that the only way forward for Israel is to reach an exchange deal and stop the war in the Gaza Strip, in the hope that Hezbollah will stop firing.

It is noteworthy that since Monday morning, the Israeli army launched the most violent and extensive attack on Lebanon since the beginning of the confrontations with Hezbollah about a year ago, and the bombing resulted in the killing of more than 600 people, including children and women, and the wounding of more than 2,500, while official estimates indicate that about 400,000 people have been displaced according to Al Jazeera.

In return, Hezbollah launched rocket barrages targeting Israeli military bases and airports and areas in the Galilee, Safed, Haifa and others, causing material and human losses and the outbreak of fires.

The Israeli occupation army continues its aggression on the Gaza Strip for the 11th consecutive month, which has left 41,495 martyrs, in addition to 96,006 wounded, in addition to an unprecedented health and humanitarian crisis.

Opinion

Nasrallah: ‘No Lebanon-Gaza Separation’

CrossFireArabia
September 25, 2024

CEOSSFIREARABIA – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his military establishment led by Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi are determined to separate the Lebanese and the Gaza fronts.

To do that the Israelis are bombing Lebanon in all sorts of directions right, left and center, in the south of the country, its east and of course, southern Beirut – considered the prime Hezbollah stronghold – as hard as they can to achieve their illusive objectives which are nowhere near to being realized.

Israeli air raids, bombings, killing of civilians and murder of claimed Hezbollah fighters have increased in the last 48 hours with death knocking on the door of the Lebanese. Last Monday alone Israeli warplanes killed 274 people and injured 1024 in 1100 air raids all over Lebanon with the number of those killed rising daily.

“Regards for Beirut”

Palestinians create a large sand drawing on Gaza Beach, in support of the Lebanese civilians. pic.twitter.com/5AEXzpGbsZ
— Quds News Network (@QudsNen) September 24, 2024

But in contrast, Hezbollah attacks – through missiles and drones – have been tough on northern Israel including its cities like Haifa, Tel Aviv, in the Galilee, Safad, Jewish colonies/settlements and military bases have continued non-stop where reports of fires, deaths and hundreds of thousands hiding in underground shelters.

Secretary-general Hassan Nasrallah has been very clear in his approach. In this escalation which started last week through the so-called pager and wireless massacre when Israeli killed around 3000 people in the southern neighborhood of Beirut, Hezbollah quickly regrouped and started firing on the north and center of Israel in unexpected moves.

He said there will be no separation between the Lebanese and Gaza fronts until the Israeli military machine stops bombing Gaza once-and-for-all. Hezbollah and Gaza has long become an unparalleled equation, he maintains. The war must stop in Gaza so that Fadi I, Fadi II and more recently Fadi III as well as more missiles stop landing on the different and sensitive areas of Israel.

However he tried to be reasonable saying that if a settlement is reached within the Palestinian groups and be acceptable to them his party would stop firing on Israel. Nasarallah couldn’t be more clearer than that.

Meanwhile the ‘trading over the border escalation’ between Hezbollah and the Israeli warplanes continues with missile swaps and bombs continuing. Despite the war utterings from certain quarters, Israel doesn’t want a northern front as their leaders keep saying and is not expected to start a ground troop offensive into southern Lebanon because of what is being termed as their ‘debilitating’ ability and exhaustion of their soldiers after their nearly 12 months of fighting in Gaza.

But in this respect too, Nasrallah has been clear too saying if the Israeli army wants to enter south Lebanon, Hezbollah would be ready for them, going all the way of inviting them to invade and see the real force of the resistance in Lebanon that had been fighting Israel, albeit on a ‘low level’ since Israel started its war and onslaught on the Gaza Strip soon after 7 October, 2023.

🔹 Land and natural resources

There’s a physical separation between Palestinians living in Gaza and those in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem. Israel bars any movement between these areas.

🔗: https://t.co/Y3bWM5O6Zs pic.twitter.com/JYqluUYDRD
— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) May 15, 2024

All indications suggest Israeli will not be able to separate this front from the Gaza one. Though Israeli planes are in a state of bombing momentum believing if they bomb certain regions of Lebanon fiercely enough, and aim to kill their top caders by bombing south Beirut, Hezbollah will eventually give up by themselves and wrap up the war.

But the situation is particularly fluid, neither side is budging from their positions. With Hezbollah termed to be recruiting 40,000 fighters from Iraq, Syria and Yemen, it insists that this front is their to support Gaza while Netanyahu refuses to accept a ceasefire deal on the enclave.

Both parties are in “military deadlock”, while a third party, the Biden administration, is walking in the middle. Its officials right from US president Joe Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and other lowley staff stated many times they want a deal on Gaza, and don’t want the war to spread to the region, to Lebanon, possibly Iraq, Syria and even Yemen which have been up till now low key operators.

In this war first on Gaza, and now developing into Lebanon, the US has been a constant behind-the-scene player, politicking in Lebanon through its special envoy and Qatar and Egypt acting as mediators in the past months to work a ceasefire that didn’t work mainly through Israeli intransigence, Washington must take much of the blame.

This is because Washington has been a constant supplier of weapons to the Israelis in this war right after 7 October, 2023 through an active air and sea bridge to Tel Aviv. It has, till this day, been providing Israeli with technical advice on the conduct of the war with at least 2000 US military personell and many would argue, the United States has not been forceful enough with Netanyahu who worked to disrupt the talks and make sure the war on Gaza continues.

With the war switching to the Lebanese-Israeli border, it seems that the US would continue to supply Israel with weapons, increase its intransigence even further, keep up the Hamas-Hezbollah ante up and suck the regional into an even bigger regional war.

Opinion

A Middle East Powder Keg

Dr Khairi Janbek
September 25, 2024

By Dr Khairi Janbek

Like Dorian Grey in Oscar Wild’s novel, we hated the face of Arab political realism in the 20th century when we saw it, and hated it more in the 21st century when we stopped seeing it.

Without much ado, the current ongoing war, or perhaps more accurately wars, in the Middle East, started by opportunists for opportunistic goals that converged. Hamas with its 7th October attacks knowing only too well that Israel has the most right-wing and racist government in its history, and must have known that the its retaliation would be most severe.

It stands the reason to think the more severe the better, because this is likely to involve what is called as the axis of resistance in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and as a bonus Iran as well. But closer to home, Israel by making Gaza uninhabitable to the people is expected to cause an exodus towards Egypt thus bringing it into the conflict, and the inevitable thought of Israel moving into the West Bank, and the likely push out of the Palestinians towards Jordan will bring the country into the conflict as well.

For Israel, with its most extremist right wing and racist government, the attacks couldn’t have come at a more opportune time. The situation presented them with the opportunity of attempting to put what were merely theoretical ideas in their minds, into practical policies. Of course the root of what became a policy, is the rejection of an independent Palestinian state and the death of the two-state solution, by starting with breaking the Hamas grip in Gaza and transforming the area into a buffer zone with possible rebuilding of colonies/settlements on the area.

Here’s a little reminder for when you hear things like, Israel has shown “restraint” or its indiscriminate bombing and terror attacks in Lebanon are “self defense.”

Over 80% of the attacks between Israel and Hezbollah after October were carried out by Israel. pic.twitter.com/jcvQDMn37I
— Assal Rad (@AssalRad) September 24, 2024

This is while the Gazans can be completely dependent on the good will of Israel for their survival, however, if the Arabs want to rebuild Gaza then by all means, but let them this time protect their investments by keeping actively the peace, and if Egypt can be persuaded to voluntarily taken in some Gazan refugees all the better!

Of course all eyes are also on the West Bank. Here Israel’s aim, one would say, is to turn the area into a “bantustan” totally dependent on Israel, with the trimmings of municipal power to the PNA to manage internal affairs while real control of the economic, political domains remain in Israel’s hands.

The Palestinians here would also be dependent on the Israeli economy, and relations between the West Bank and Jordan would be only possible with Israeli consent. If of course, Jordan would accept taking displaced Palestinians from the West Bank voluntarily, all the better as well.

Having said all that, where do we stand now after so much recent death and destruction? A total war? Whatever does that actually mean when Jordan has already its own war against drugs, Egypt and its problems with Ethiopia, Somalia, Syria between the hammer of Israel and the anvil of Iran, Iraq a soup for Americans, Iranian partisans and a non-descript government, Yemen teetering on the brink of losing the existential battle, while Iran obsessed with its nuclear programme. One would hazard a guess that total war means, the killing of Israeli civilians by Hezbollah.

Dr Janbek is a Jordanian writer based in Paris, France

Opinion

Yossi Hadar: ‘Netanyahu Lost The War to Hamas’

CrossFireArabia
September 21, 2024

Israeli political analyst Yossi Hadar, in the Jewish Maariv newspaper, said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lost the war to Hamas, and instead of signing a prisoner exchange deal with it, he is trying to drag Israel into a war of attrition that will keep him in power.

The analyst harshly criticized Netanyahu for trying to dismiss Defense Minister Yoav Galant, describing it as a political move to preserve his position, ignoring the military failures in the Hamas attack of 7 October, 2023.

L’éminent chroniqueur du journal Maariv, Yossi Hadar, a déclaré que #Netanyahu avait perdu la guerre contre le #Hamas 🔻#Guerre_de_Gaza #GazaGenocide #GazaHolocaust pic.twitter.com/eQlAKmTKPw
— Le Centre Palestinien D'Information (@PalinfoFr) September 20, 2024

The writer began his article by referring to the operation attributed to Israel of blowing up the wireless devices in Lebanon and Syria, which resulted in the death of 32 Lebanese and the wounding of hundreds, according to the latest statistics.

“If the attribution of this operation to Israel is correct, it reveals another aspect of Israel’s enormous military capabilities, but at the same time it could bring us closer to a real war with Hezbollah, while the war in Gaza continues, the Houthis attacks on Israel, and Iranian threats continue, with operations growing in the West Bank and inside Israel,” he added.

The analyst accused Netanyahu of deliberately prolonging the war for political reasons, ignoring the serious security implications for Israel, and described him as the most failed prime minister in Israel, and that he “is leading an approach of political baseness and exhaustion and implementing a Machiavellian plot aimed at tightening control over the country by pushing the public to despair.”

Hadar stressed that Netanyahu’s escalation in the north is “the way Netanyahu seeks to maintain his rule, not in order to do something beneficial for the citizens of Israel, but only for his personal and political interests, just so he can continue to exhaust us.”

Political Maneuver

The writer then went on to assert that Netanyahu’s attempt to dismiss Galant is part of a political maneuver aimed at strengthening his power, rather than addressing the military failures that were evident in the 7 October attack, which puts Israel in a weak position in the face of the growing threats.

“All this does not prevent Netanyahu from hatching a plot to overthrow the defense minister at this critical moment for the security of the state, and in the midst of a war that could expand,” he said.

He explained Netanyahu’s move as a bid to replace his defense minister because of his opposition to the Haredi conscription law that the Orthodox parties insist on, in exchange for appointing the head of the Right-wing Israel Party, Gideon Sa’ar, because the latter will pass this law, referring to Sa’ar’s volatility, who was previously quoted as saying, “If you want Netanyahu as prime minister, don’t vote for me.”

Hadar also denied Netanyahu’s followers’ marketing of the reason for Galant’s dismissal as a “weak leftist,” saying that Galant himself offered, just four days after the 7 October attack, to attack Hezbollah as a preemptive move, but Netanyahu refused, in a state of panic over the events.

The writer recalled that Netanyahu is the one who divided Israel by leading “an attempted coup against the judicial system that he created before 7 October,” and he is the one who brought upon Israel “the catastrophe of 7 October,” and now he is dragging another catastrophe by dragging Israel into a war of attrition.

He said, “Instead of waging a short and intense war, he chose a dangerous and failed war of attrition that goes against all strategic logic, and dragged Israel into the worst state it has been since its founding, because what matters is only the logic of political survival,” according to Jordan24.