China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a long recap of the meeting with the delegations from the Ministries of Saudi Arabia and Iran that Global Times also picked up on and published its own recap, “1st meeting of China-Saudi Arabia-Iran trilateral joint committee concludes; MidEast should 'no longer be geopolitical arena' for great powers
thanks karl.. it seems israels fate is inextricably linked to the usa's fate. if the usa goes down - israel goes down.. i guess this is the beauty of a small host, attaching itself to the large host... now, i am not expecting the usa to get its head out of its ass, so, i think we are in a long haul here until the usa is no longer able to sustain all its rubber stamping of israels disregard to others - specifically palestinians.. the world sees this concept of a 2 class system as not only not working, but wrong.. can we move into the 21st century please? can we get leadership that has the foresight to bring it about? i am certainly not holding my breathe with regard to the future leadership of either the usa or israel here..
Congress going into its Holiday Recess not only failed to provide more monies to Ukraine, but also failed to provide more monies to Occupied Palestine, thus begging the question: which of the two will be hurt more?
don't worry, the money will be coming soon enough! the dems and repubs know who they have to swear fealty to!! give it a bit of time... this ship is headed for an iceberg, but predicting exactly when is a fools game..
I was initially disappointed by Russia's response, & the 2-state solution. But I'm beginning to realize that regardless, Israel is doomed. And not just because they are destroying their economy.
Demographically, it will cease to exist, hopefully sooner rather than later...
The US won't be able to carry this burden forever & nobody will pick up the slack when we falter. How many will continue their personal exodus to greener, safer pastures. Not to mention that they slow-holocausted themselves when they elbowed their way to front of the line for the clot shots. After at least 5 rounds of mandatory jabs they are certain to fall to failing hearts, auto-immune diseases, cancers, permanently sterilized young women, etc. I remember reading that by '22, something like 1/3 the population had some degree of functional disability.
IMO, many fail to understand the initial policy commitment USSR/Russia made at the outset in 1948 by being the first nation to recognize the state of Israel--without--an accompanying Palestinian State as the original Mandates both stipulated. And the rest of the International Community tragically as it has become decided to follow that same path. Furthermore, Russia has Constitutional responsibilities to protect its diaspora, which further constrains its ability to act with force in this instance. However, the utterly stark difference in Russia's approach to dealing with civilians in combat zones beginning with Syria and now in Ukraine has solidified the Global Majority's decision to decline to further the West's propaganda against Russia and to more actively side with Russia against a clearly immoral West whose "values" are far from what's touted.
Yes, it's an artificial entity as I've said of Ukraine. Eventually Humanity will evolve to the point where national borders will no longer exist, but that won't happen for several hundred more years. Given the nature of living on a finite planet with a mostly closed system, Humanity will eventually need to become a universal commonwealth that sees itself as one community, one family, which it is in reality.
At least ten years ago, Russia proposed a collective security arrangement for the Persian Gulf Region based on the UN Charter and its concept of Indivisible Security. It lurked and languished in the background while the Outlaw US Empire went on its Obama Era rampage through the region that began with the Arab Spring. Then at the 2019 UNGA, Iran proposed its HOPE plan that's essentially a copy of Russia's previous proposal. If you compare HOPE with China's Global Security Initiative, you'll see many similarities, the key being the ability of the leading regional states to accomplish what the emphasized text says must be done--exclude negative external influence that harms regional interests. Ironically, Al-Aqsa Flood has given more impetus to that than what was happening the day prior.
A friend, born and raised in Lebanon, Christian tribe, lives in the US but calls his dad every day who lives in southern Lebanon. What I get from him is that Hezbollah has gained support among all factions over the years, people are scared but resolute, no more game playing. Seems that Hezbollah is the spine that the whole of Lebanon forms around. Everyone knows that Beruit will be obliterated along with most of the country if Israel and US go all out while Hezbollah destroys Israel. Nasrallah and Iranian leaders know this and are charting a "go slow" path while Israel is tied to Nutty who has Biden in a death grip and both are staring at the end of their "careers".
Yes, Understanding that parable is very important. Products stamped Made in Israel will become radioactive and the already dying Zionist economy will slowly atrophy as its residents leave for better places.
"Many readers will react negatively to the continued pursuit of the Two State Solution."
That would be me.
" Like it or not, that’s the established International Law track on the issue that provides the main point of leverage for the Global Majority."
As usual, Crooke is on the right track. He concludes that Israel will attack Hezbollah, and Hezballah will defeat Israel along with Hamas.
What he fails to mention is what happens when the US attacks Hezbollah. He acknowledges - correctly - that the US will. But he doesn't discuss what happens next. He apparently assumes that the regional actors, including Hezbollah, expect Hezbollah and Hamas to beat Israel without the euphemistic "wider war."
I am not prepared to see it going that easily. It will be nice if it does, if the US decides to bow to internal US pressure, say, from the Pentagon, or its global geopolitical isolation. But we know the neocons will not, and we know Congress will not. So a US military engagement, however lame, is to be expected.
The US may be unable to put many boots on the ground and will be loath to do so, remembering Lebanon in earlier days. But it can still send one or two more carrier battle groups to the region once it sees that the one group it has in place able to attack Lebanon is insufficient. And three CBGs in the area, along with long-range Air Force support from US bases all over the Med and as far out as Diego Garcia can do one hell of a lot of damage to Lebanon, if not Hezbollah per se.
Yes, I've heard that the US doesn't have the money to support such a deployment. It remains to be seen if that continue to be the case if Congress decides to approve some sort of "emergency disbursement". In fact, that may have been why that process was undertaken this past week to send another $100 million worth of bombs to Israel, as Judge Napolitano was so enraged over - to set the precedent. Nothing stopped that one, nothing will stop the next one.
Scott Ritter believes Hezbollah can take Galilee. Perhaps. But it will be a lot harder with the US and Israeli Air Force bombing them continuously 24x7.
And that may force the other regional actors to intervene - or perhaps to withdraw from supporting the Resistance even more. And what consequences would either of those actions have?
We just don't know. What we can expect, as Crooke rightly does, is that everyone involved, at least on the US/Israeli side, will make fatal mistakes. It's what they do. It's what people do when their fundamental connection to reality has been broken.
Crooke has said Hezbollah's response to Outlaw US Empire attacking it will be total destruction of Occupied Palestine's cities and critical infrastructure as it has the missiles to do that and has spent more than enough time determining the targets. There's also the matter of the other resistance groups in Iraq and Syria massively escalating their attacks on all US regional bases. All of that Crooke's talked about since 7 October. There's a very good reason why the Empire tried to buyoff Lebanon and Jordan's leaders but failed. Hezbollah doesn't need to take any territory, nor does Hamas.
Agree with all that, last sentence in particular. I think Ritter may be correct as to Hezbollah's capability, but it's quite possible Hezbollah won't bother taking Israeli territory. What would they do with it other than to move some of their missile batteries forward to better target the rest of Israel? But if they do that, they don't have the same degree of pre-made bunkers like they've built in southern Lebanon. And as I suggested, it would be much better not to try and thus avoid getting exposed to the US Air Force.
The real problem, as Nasrallah is painfully aware, is that if the US Air Force gets involved along with the Israeli Air Force, the population of Beirut (from the Israelis) and southern Lebanon (from the US) will be killed in the thousands. Nasrallah definitely wants to avoid that for political reasons in Lebanon. But he may not have a choice - especially if Israel starts it, which looks increasingly likely, as Crooke says.
I think what the Israelis are doing by threatening a Lebanese invasion or air campaign is to trade on that concern and try to convince Nasrallah to ratchet down his operation in the north. But Hezbollah has to keep that operation going to tie down Israeli forces that would otherwise be in Gaza. So both Israel and Hezbollah are stuck between a rock and a hard place. The Israelis really don't want to engage Hezbollah and Hezbollah doesn't want Lebanon bombed but also not see Hamas lose, so both are waving hands.
If Crooke is right, we'll see in January or February. Supposedly Biden has told Netanyahu to wrap it up by end of year - which I don't believe for an instant, that's just CYA on Biden's part - but Netanyahu I'm pretty sure will not. So if it's still on in the next two months, it will widen.
Most bomber sortie, U.S. and IDF will generate from IDF airfields. Two U.S. carriers are maybe 40 attack sorties per day.
Ford has been deployed a long time, has to home port soon.
Eisenhower has month left on deployment clock but may not return via Suez. As in 1990 and 2003 carrier launches make movies, airfields make air campaigns.
What carriers?
Otherwise, TAC bombing won’t soften S. Lebanon that much.
You're assuming Hezbollah will leave any IDF airfields functional. I know it's not easy to disable an airfield - look at the US bumbling in Syria - but Hezbollah has a LOT of missiles.
And we still don't know whether Hezbollah has missiles that can hit US ships in the Med. I did a lookup on that and I think if the CBG stays over 150+ miles from Lebanon, they're probably in the clear.
As for the deployments, as I said, they are running on financial fumes now. However, Congress is likely to authorize more money if things get hot - and the US can always deploy one or two more of its carriers, at least the ones not in drydock for maintenance. Out of 11, you'd think they could find at least 3, maybe 4.
It all depends on how much the neocons and Congress want to destroy Hezbollah. I think they'd love to try, but as you say, they're not likely to succeed. But when has likely failure ever stopped either of them? Do you remember Ukraine? This is one reason they want a new war in the Middle East - to distract from the dismal failure in Ukraine.
I am skeptical of the effect of bombing, including anti ship missiles on carriers. I doubt Hezbollah would be damaged by just bombs. IDF boots are not doing it either.
The minority view (casualties and opportunity cost not justified by results) on the WW II strategic bombing study has been ignored.
I remember Ukraine. NYTimes says 300,000 Russians are KIA (I let that one alone on another blog conversation)! Declare victory, blame the republicans for not destroying Putin and shutter it!
Neocon and MIC would have war always, lots of fiat to hoard.
Incredibly solid strategy.
Let the countries in the area work it out and for Russia and China to avoid being drawn in.
This fits Russian and BRICS strategy of sovereignty, self determination and cooperation
The genocide of Gaza showcases the vestiges of colonialism which the RoW understands
And, Russia and China continue to press the superpower gently to avoid crazy outbursts
Too bad so few are able to grasp the reality you articulated.
thanks karl.. it seems israels fate is inextricably linked to the usa's fate. if the usa goes down - israel goes down.. i guess this is the beauty of a small host, attaching itself to the large host... now, i am not expecting the usa to get its head out of its ass, so, i think we are in a long haul here until the usa is no longer able to sustain all its rubber stamping of israels disregard to others - specifically palestinians.. the world sees this concept of a 2 class system as not only not working, but wrong.. can we move into the 21st century please? can we get leadership that has the foresight to bring it about? i am certainly not holding my breathe with regard to the future leadership of either the usa or israel here..
Congress going into its Holiday Recess not only failed to provide more monies to Ukraine, but also failed to provide more monies to Occupied Palestine, thus begging the question: which of the two will be hurt more?
don't worry, the money will be coming soon enough! the dems and repubs know who they have to swear fealty to!! give it a bit of time... this ship is headed for an iceberg, but predicting exactly when is a fools game..
I was initially disappointed by Russia's response, & the 2-state solution. But I'm beginning to realize that regardless, Israel is doomed. And not just because they are destroying their economy.
Demographically, it will cease to exist, hopefully sooner rather than later...
The US won't be able to carry this burden forever & nobody will pick up the slack when we falter. How many will continue their personal exodus to greener, safer pastures. Not to mention that they slow-holocausted themselves when they elbowed their way to front of the line for the clot shots. After at least 5 rounds of mandatory jabs they are certain to fall to failing hearts, auto-immune diseases, cancers, permanently sterilized young women, etc. I remember reading that by '22, something like 1/3 the population had some degree of functional disability.
IMO, many fail to understand the initial policy commitment USSR/Russia made at the outset in 1948 by being the first nation to recognize the state of Israel--without--an accompanying Palestinian State as the original Mandates both stipulated. And the rest of the International Community tragically as it has become decided to follow that same path. Furthermore, Russia has Constitutional responsibilities to protect its diaspora, which further constrains its ability to act with force in this instance. However, the utterly stark difference in Russia's approach to dealing with civilians in combat zones beginning with Syria and now in Ukraine has solidified the Global Majority's decision to decline to further the West's propaganda against Russia and to more actively side with Russia against a clearly immoral West whose "values" are far from what's touted.
"IMO, many fail to understand the initial policy commitment USSR/Russia made at the outset in 1948"
I was oblivious to it until one of your moa posts. I still forget about it until reminded. 🤔.
In that case they should at least be returned to their 1948 borders..
But regardless of what happens politically, their trajectory is such that sooner or later Israel will go the way of 404.
Yes, it's an artificial entity as I've said of Ukraine. Eventually Humanity will evolve to the point where national borders will no longer exist, but that won't happen for several hundred more years. Given the nature of living on a finite planet with a mostly closed system, Humanity will eventually need to become a universal commonwealth that sees itself as one community, one family, which it is in reality.
Thanks for another enlightening post, Karl. It's great to see these three countries collaborating. I appreciate the far-sightedness of China.
At least ten years ago, Russia proposed a collective security arrangement for the Persian Gulf Region based on the UN Charter and its concept of Indivisible Security. It lurked and languished in the background while the Outlaw US Empire went on its Obama Era rampage through the region that began with the Arab Spring. Then at the 2019 UNGA, Iran proposed its HOPE plan that's essentially a copy of Russia's previous proposal. If you compare HOPE with China's Global Security Initiative, you'll see many similarities, the key being the ability of the leading regional states to accomplish what the emphasized text says must be done--exclude negative external influence that harms regional interests. Ironically, Al-Aqsa Flood has given more impetus to that than what was happening the day prior.
Impressive blog and comments!
A friend, born and raised in Lebanon, Christian tribe, lives in the US but calls his dad every day who lives in southern Lebanon. What I get from him is that Hezbollah has gained support among all factions over the years, people are scared but resolute, no more game playing. Seems that Hezbollah is the spine that the whole of Lebanon forms around. Everyone knows that Beruit will be obliterated along with most of the country if Israel and US go all out while Hezbollah destroys Israel. Nasrallah and Iranian leaders know this and are charting a "go slow" path while Israel is tied to Nutty who has Biden in a death grip and both are staring at the end of their "careers".
Looks like war to me.
There are some adults near or in the room, trying hard not to touch the tar baby cooked up by Netanyahu with the US.
Yes, Understanding that parable is very important. Products stamped Made in Israel will become radioactive and the already dying Zionist economy will slowly atrophy as its residents leave for better places.
"Many readers will react negatively to the continued pursuit of the Two State Solution."
That would be me.
" Like it or not, that’s the established International Law track on the issue that provides the main point of leverage for the Global Majority."
As usual, Crooke is on the right track. He concludes that Israel will attack Hezbollah, and Hezballah will defeat Israel along with Hamas.
What he fails to mention is what happens when the US attacks Hezbollah. He acknowledges - correctly - that the US will. But he doesn't discuss what happens next. He apparently assumes that the regional actors, including Hezbollah, expect Hezbollah and Hamas to beat Israel without the euphemistic "wider war."
I am not prepared to see it going that easily. It will be nice if it does, if the US decides to bow to internal US pressure, say, from the Pentagon, or its global geopolitical isolation. But we know the neocons will not, and we know Congress will not. So a US military engagement, however lame, is to be expected.
The US may be unable to put many boots on the ground and will be loath to do so, remembering Lebanon in earlier days. But it can still send one or two more carrier battle groups to the region once it sees that the one group it has in place able to attack Lebanon is insufficient. And three CBGs in the area, along with long-range Air Force support from US bases all over the Med and as far out as Diego Garcia can do one hell of a lot of damage to Lebanon, if not Hezbollah per se.
Yes, I've heard that the US doesn't have the money to support such a deployment. It remains to be seen if that continue to be the case if Congress decides to approve some sort of "emergency disbursement". In fact, that may have been why that process was undertaken this past week to send another $100 million worth of bombs to Israel, as Judge Napolitano was so enraged over - to set the precedent. Nothing stopped that one, nothing will stop the next one.
Scott Ritter believes Hezbollah can take Galilee. Perhaps. But it will be a lot harder with the US and Israeli Air Force bombing them continuously 24x7.
And that may force the other regional actors to intervene - or perhaps to withdraw from supporting the Resistance even more. And what consequences would either of those actions have?
We just don't know. What we can expect, as Crooke rightly does, is that everyone involved, at least on the US/Israeli side, will make fatal mistakes. It's what they do. It's what people do when their fundamental connection to reality has been broken.
Crooke has said Hezbollah's response to Outlaw US Empire attacking it will be total destruction of Occupied Palestine's cities and critical infrastructure as it has the missiles to do that and has spent more than enough time determining the targets. There's also the matter of the other resistance groups in Iraq and Syria massively escalating their attacks on all US regional bases. All of that Crooke's talked about since 7 October. There's a very good reason why the Empire tried to buyoff Lebanon and Jordan's leaders but failed. Hezbollah doesn't need to take any territory, nor does Hamas.
Agree with all that, last sentence in particular. I think Ritter may be correct as to Hezbollah's capability, but it's quite possible Hezbollah won't bother taking Israeli territory. What would they do with it other than to move some of their missile batteries forward to better target the rest of Israel? But if they do that, they don't have the same degree of pre-made bunkers like they've built in southern Lebanon. And as I suggested, it would be much better not to try and thus avoid getting exposed to the US Air Force.
The real problem, as Nasrallah is painfully aware, is that if the US Air Force gets involved along with the Israeli Air Force, the population of Beirut (from the Israelis) and southern Lebanon (from the US) will be killed in the thousands. Nasrallah definitely wants to avoid that for political reasons in Lebanon. But he may not have a choice - especially if Israel starts it, which looks increasingly likely, as Crooke says.
I think what the Israelis are doing by threatening a Lebanese invasion or air campaign is to trade on that concern and try to convince Nasrallah to ratchet down his operation in the north. But Hezbollah has to keep that operation going to tie down Israeli forces that would otherwise be in Gaza. So both Israel and Hezbollah are stuck between a rock and a hard place. The Israelis really don't want to engage Hezbollah and Hezbollah doesn't want Lebanon bombed but also not see Hamas lose, so both are waving hands.
If Crooke is right, we'll see in January or February. Supposedly Biden has told Netanyahu to wrap it up by end of year - which I don't believe for an instant, that's just CYA on Biden's part - but Netanyahu I'm pretty sure will not. So if it's still on in the next two months, it will widen.
Most bomber sortie, U.S. and IDF will generate from IDF airfields. Two U.S. carriers are maybe 40 attack sorties per day.
Ford has been deployed a long time, has to home port soon.
Eisenhower has month left on deployment clock but may not return via Suez. As in 1990 and 2003 carrier launches make movies, airfields make air campaigns.
What carriers?
Otherwise, TAC bombing won’t soften S. Lebanon that much.
You're assuming Hezbollah will leave any IDF airfields functional. I know it's not easy to disable an airfield - look at the US bumbling in Syria - but Hezbollah has a LOT of missiles.
And we still don't know whether Hezbollah has missiles that can hit US ships in the Med. I did a lookup on that and I think if the CBG stays over 150+ miles from Lebanon, they're probably in the clear.
As for the deployments, as I said, they are running on financial fumes now. However, Congress is likely to authorize more money if things get hot - and the US can always deploy one or two more of its carriers, at least the ones not in drydock for maintenance. Out of 11, you'd think they could find at least 3, maybe 4.
It all depends on how much the neocons and Congress want to destroy Hezbollah. I think they'd love to try, but as you say, they're not likely to succeed. But when has likely failure ever stopped either of them? Do you remember Ukraine? This is one reason they want a new war in the Middle East - to distract from the dismal failure in Ukraine.
I am skeptical of the effect of bombing, including anti ship missiles on carriers. I doubt Hezbollah would be damaged by just bombs. IDF boots are not doing it either.
The minority view (casualties and opportunity cost not justified by results) on the WW II strategic bombing study has been ignored.
I remember Ukraine. NYTimes says 300,000 Russians are KIA (I let that one alone on another blog conversation)! Declare victory, blame the republicans for not destroying Putin and shutter it!
Neocon and MIC would have war always, lots of fiat to hoard.