Iran - Israel - Gaza Conflict

[SharperDingaan]

The hard reality is that Israel f****d up badly when they struck the Iranian consulate in Damascus; senior officials rolled the dice, and almost pulled the US and UK into Gulf War III. There are a lot of bills to pay for last nights bail-out, and there will be consequences.

 

The only reason we don't have Gulf War III this morning is because Iran also has very smart generals, who managed to launch a face-saving sovereign-on-sovereign strike that was designed to reliably fail. Now it's purely a personal matter between families; the perpetrators will be known, and its old world 'eye-for-an-eye'. One day ... they will be suddenly gone, the matter closed, and we will all be the safer for it.

 

 https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/4/4/why-does-israel-keep-launching-attacks-in-syria

 

Lot of very smart people acted last night; we owe them all an enormous favour.

 

SD

Edited April 14 by SharperDingaan

[ourkid8]

42 minutes ago, SharperDingaan said:

The hard reality is that Israel f****d up badly when they struck the Iranian consulate  in Damascus; senior officials rolled the dice, and almost pulled the US and UK into Gulf War III. There are a lot of bills to pay for last nights bail-out, and there will be consequences.

Bingo! This is something no one talks about as Israel has been playing US and UK. like a fiddle.  What do you think would be some of these consequences for Israel’s actions in trying to cause a gulf war 3? 

[crs223]

10 hours ago, changegonnacome said:

It’s embarrassing for Iran how little by way of damage they were able to inflict

 

true, but i’m not sure they were really trying to inflict damage.  normally you don’t telegraph your intentions a week in advance.

 

Iran did the same thing to US bases after Solemani.

 

If there was any damage inflicted yesterday it was Israel exposing more of their air defense capabilities, which presumably they want to keep secret.

Edited April 14 by crs223

[blakehampton]

Just out of curiosity, is there a way to bet on oil volatility?

Edited April 14 by blakehampton

[SharperDingaan]

1 hour ago, ourkid8 said:

Bingo! This is something no one talks about as Israel has been playing US and UK. like a fiddle.  What do you think would be some of these consequences for Israel’s actions in trying to cause a gulf war 3? 

 

The best outcome would be peace breaking out; Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, unrestricted aid flows across Gaza, Gulf state funded field hospitals on the Egyptian side of the Rafah crossing, Houthis give Red Sea shipping a break. Oil prices fall like a brick, partial diversion of Israeli weapons flow to Ukraine, and Israel prepares for a new round of elections. Not in many peoples interests, but the calculus changed last night. 

 

Longer term; all that destruction in Gaza has to be rebuilt. Most would expect a change in Gaza's status, gulf state money combined with Gaza labour, and Israel excluded as much as possible. Without the war spending and cheap labour, Israel goes into recession.

 

SD   

Edited April 14 by SharperDingaan

[Xerxes]

 

The best outcome would the sudden death of Khamenei. Not that flowers will blossom after his fall, but rather that next generation (most likely the IRGC) will have different view, as they control Iran's assets, borders and have an interest for a quid pro quo. This view would (that IRGC would be better) be counterintuitive for Westerners. But then again, Westerners are not exactly up-to-date with everything in the real world. 

 

The second best outcome, would be for Netanyahu to depart. Surely, the Israeli people deserve a better leader than this clown. Sadly, Netanyahu as hateful as he is, he is actually somewhat of a balancing moderate in his cabinet when compared to some (not all) crazy extremist in his cabinet. So he is unlikely to go.

 

Folks (Westerners of course), like to point out to no end how Gaza voted for Hamas in 2006. Yet, they look the other way, when it comes to Israeli government and it current extremist profile.     

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Xerxes]

15 minutes ago, SharperDingaan said:

 

The best outcome would be peace breaking out; Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, unrestricted aid flows across Gaza, Gulf state funded field hospitals on the Egyptian side of the Rafa gate, Houthis give Red Sea shipping a break. Oil prices fall like a brick, partial diversion of Israeli weapons flow to Ukraine, and Israel prepares for a new round of elections. Not in many peoples interests, but the calculus changed last night. 

 

Longer term; all that destruction in Gaza has to be rebuilt. Most would expect a change in Gaza's status, gulf state money combined with Gaza labour, and Israel excluded as much as possible.

 

SD   

 

 

There will be no Gulf money for Gaza, until they are sure there is a credible path forward with all parties involved.

No one is going to pay a dime, only for Israeli to blow stuff with their 2,000 Ib bombs, two months later.

 

 

[ourkid8]

8 minutes ago, SharperDingaan said:

 

The best outcome would be peace breaking out; Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, unrestricted aid flows across Gaza, Gulf state funded field hospitals on the Egyptian side of the Rafa gate, Houthis give Red Sea shipping a break. Oil prices fall like a brick, partial diversion of Israeli weapons flow to Ukraine, and Israel prepares for a new round of elections. Not in many peoples interests, but the calculus changed last night. 

 

Longer term; all that destruction in Gaza has to be rebuilt. Most would expect a change in Gaza's status, gulf state money combined with Gaza labour, and Israel excluded as much as possible.

 

SD   

I think Israel will also start to be excluded from the world based on their heinous actions and how they tried to start a larger war across the region. Short term however they will get a Nobel peace prize for not escalating the Iranian attacks and show to the world how good human beings they are. Go figure…

[Xerxes]

16 hours ago, Dinar said:

Israel is not the occupier, Jews have lived in Israel, Gaza, West Bank (Judea and Samaria) for three thousand years continuosly.  Arabs came in 1600 years later.   Do you also believe that Armenians and Greeks have the right to rape and murder every Turk in Turkey since Turks murdered two million of them in the 1910s-1920s and kicked the rest out?   If you live in North America, or Australia, do you believe that Indians/Aborigines have the right to murder you in cold blood?   If not, why not?  

 

I have a different take. It doesn't matter that much who was there 1,000 years ago. or even 500 years ago. We as humans may have personal bias and attachment to a particular culture and religion. So this kind of debate is pointless and will never stop. Should black South African put all the white people to sword because Black people were there first. In this analogy black people are like Jews "who were there first" and white people are like Arabs "that came later".

 

What matter is (in my view) is what I call the "conqueror' law". Israel has won wars against Arab state in '73, '67 and others before. Government fight wars because they cannot agree diplomatically. The two sides could not agree diplomatically, therefore they entered into a contest. And the Gods of War have decided the matter for them. 

 

Israel prevailed. And it deserve recognition. And the fact that it is historical link to its ancestral homeland is a nice touch.

Palestine (IIRC) was part of the kingdom of Jordan pre-1967, so they changed their masters from the Hashemite dynasty to Tel Aviv, but they remain subjects.

 

Israel had signed peace treaties with most of the Arab countries that it was fighting against, but subjugated people (that swap one master for another) don't factor into peace treaties between sovereign powers.

 

Now how Israeli treat their subjugated population is really for them. We, however, as outside observers and as human beings have every right to question when we see injustice. Wether it is from the subjugated people toward their overlord (terrorism) or vice versa (state-sponsered terrorism).

 

So that there is no confusion, subjugation is not solely about annexation and direct rule, you could have de facto control over a population in every sense, and not annex it and just choke them for decades. In its heyday, the British ruled Egypt, yet formally it was governed by the office of the viceroy who formally answered to the Sublime Port and its Grand Vizier. It was de facto control.

 

Gaza and West Bank be it before 2006 or after has always been under de facto control of Israel. So that makes them responsible. It is a shitty job, but that comes with victory.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[SharperDingaan]

40 minutes ago, Xerxes said:

 

 

There will be no Gulf money for Gaza, until they are sure there is a credible path forward with all parties involved.

No one is going to pay a dime, only for Israeli to blow stuff with their 2,000 Ib bombs, two months later.

 

 

 

If there is going to be a lasting peace, there is going to have to be a 2 state solution; as/when there are 2 states, this will be a non-issue. After last night's fiasco, one has to think the current coalition government is done; it has now been 6 months+ since the Oct 09 attack, and the blood-lust has to be pretty much over.

 

SD

Edited April 14 by SharperDingaan

[Xerxes]

2 minutes ago, SharperDingaan said:

 

If there is going to be a lasting peace, there is going to have to be a 2 state solution; as/when there are 2 states, this will be a non-issue. After last night's fiasco, one has to think the current coalition government is done; it has now been 6 months+ since the Oct 09 attack, and the blood-lust has to be pretty much done.

 

SD

 

Disagree, the moment war stops Netanyahu is out of the job.

That was the whole point of the embassy strike. War has to continue and take a new form.

 

It is about Netanyahu' "right to keep his job", everybody else is acting their role as puppets, with clueless North Americans cheering on

 

[SharperDingaan]

5 minutes ago, Xerxes said:

 

Disagree, the moment war stops Netanyahu is out of the job.

That was the whole point of the embassy strike. War has to continue and take a new form.

 

It is about Netanyahu' "right to keep his job", everybody else is acting their role as puppets, with clueless North Americans cheering on

 

 

Nobody is indispensable -  even Julius Caesar.   

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Julius_Caesar

 

SD

[ourkid8]

27 minutes ago, Xerxes said:

 

Disagree, the moment war stops Netanyahu is out of the job.

That was the whole point of the embassy strike. War has to continue and take a new form.

 

It is about Netanyahu' "right to keep his job", everybody else is acting their role as puppets, with clueless North Americans cheering on

 

 

Agreed - I wonder how much additional land will be stolen from the Palestinians once the Israeli government's blood lust is over? US has significant concerns with Israeli governments extremist tone in this area.  

 

Israel’s far-right wants to move Palestinians out of Gaza. Its ideas are gaining attention | CNN

 

"Into that void has stepped a group – once fringe, but now in the governing coalition –that hopes for full Israeli control, to resettle Gaza and even expel Palestinians. And its ideas are permeating mainstream debate."

 

 

Edited April 14 by ourkid8

[Xerxes]

1 hour ago, ourkid8 said:

 

Agreed - I wonder how much additional land will be stolen from the Palestinians once the Israeli government's blood lust is over? US has significant concerns with Israeli governments extremist tone in this area.  

 

Israel’s far-right wants to move Palestinians out of Gaza. Its ideas are gaining attention | CNN

 

"Into that void has stepped a group – once fringe, but now in the governing coalition –that hopes for full Israeli control, to resettle Gaza and even expel Palestinians. And its ideas are permeating mainstream debate."

 

 

 

 

It has been said (i don't know where I read that many years ago) one bad outcome of the otherwise great Israeli decisive victory in the Six Days War was that they suddenly came into possession of the West Bank and its entire population.

 

Typically, when you gain land over many years, inch by inch, you can de-populate by attrition, forcing people out slowly. It is much more difficult when suddenly you gain and land with people in it. That needs some long term commitment to make life miserable and brings about all kinds of problem, one of which is that from Jordan point of view, Israel has now the West Bank and the people in it. Not their problem anymore. You see, you cannot just conquer the land but deciding not be responsible to the people in it.

 

But like I said in my post to Dinar, in my opinion Conqueror's Rule prevails. Israel won the West Bank. Fair and square.

How they deal with their subjected population (And thus far, I ain't impressed) is what we can opine on, but not their right to the territory. 

 

My history of Gaza is a bit fuzzy.

Not exactly an interesting topic for me to read about. 

 

 

 

 

[Xerxes]

Do we have Israeli, or Palestinian, or Jewish people with folks/contacts back home or Arabs from neighbouring countries in the ME that can chime in this thread ?

 

Or are they all hiding and just lurking.

I think they should be commenting more than us North Americans and Europeans

 

 

[cubsfan]

The Palestinians elected a terrorist organization to run their country. Hamas, their elected choice, proceeds to murder all the moderates that oppose them. Then Hamas steal all the billions of dollars given to them by the UN, US & others - over $500M/yr.  Hamas uses the money for rockets, arms and tunnels - ignoring the needs of the Palestinians.  Yet, Hamas is backed for almost 20 years or perhaps they just murdered all their opponents?

 

But somehow, Israel is responsible - while Egypt, Jordan and neighboring Arab countries want no Palestinians in their countries since they actively work to overthrow the host government, like they did in Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon.  The Palestinians are trouble makers & harbor terrorists - and the result is the destruction of their own country. 

 

You will not see peace until Hamas is 100% destroyed.

[lnofeisone]

7 hours ago, blakehampton said:

Just out of curiosity, is there a way to bet on oil volatility?

If you think Vol is underpriced here, you can buy straddles. You can adjust your strategy to backspreads if you have a directional bias. 

[lnofeisone]

On 4/13/2024 at 4:57 PM, ourkid8 said:

 

Israel attacked a sovereign country's embassy which is an act of war, can you at least admit that much?  Second, if you need to even ask what genocide/theft Israel has commited, I have nothing more to say as this is blind ignorance.  Iran has not officially released any statement as such besides organizations that may or may not be affiliated with the government.   Let's do a simple exercise, please perform back of the envelope math on what the population would be if Israel did not commit genocide since 1948.  let's look at how many lives were lost.  Its shocking when you do this exercise. 

This is factually incorrect. 

1) Israel didn't attack a sovereign country's embassy. They attacked an annex. Notice how everyone killed was IRGC and the ambassador and embassy staff were safe. A lot of news sources got this wrong, and this has become one of those nuances that got lost for those who aren't reading and tracking this carefully.

2) Let us not forget that Iran set this precedent long ago with this - https://www.reuters.com/world/argentina-court-blames-iran-deadly-1994-bombing-jewish-center-2024-04-12/

 

Can we agree on this much?

 

3) Your take on Gaza is also weird and incongruent. Let's do a simple exercise. You claim Israel is an occupier. As an occupier, Israel is obligated to provide food, water, and shelter to the occupied territories, which it did before Hamas and MANY Gazan civilians went on their adventure into israel.

 

However, as an occupier, Israel has some flexibilities, which include setting up checkpoints, restricting population movement, and really anything for the purpose of security. Palestinians have shown time and time again that they are a true security threat. So if Israel is really an occupier, their behavior in Gaza and WB is really justified. Think another way. If there was a terror group that actively lobbed missiles from Puerto Rico and Guam into the continental US, you can bet your portfolio US would not hesitate to deal harshly and there are many existing laws that could be applied to punish those responsible. This is why I think the talking point of "Israel is an occupier" is a really bad one so whoever is giving you your talking points, should take that into account. 

 

4) You want to see real Genocide? Look at how Hamas went into Kibutzes and systemically targetted and killed every family they could find. That's what genocide looks like. If Israel had no ability to stop Hamas, they would go as far as they could. That's Genocide. What Israel is doing is combat. Terrible collateral damage (still well below many comparable urban warfare situations) but it's legal combat. I'll concede that not everything Israel is doing is perfect and by the book but it's much closer to what International laws were designed for. 

 

 

[Sweet]

Oil lower - hard to believe.

[Ulti]

https://apnews.com/article/iran-israel-gaza-analysis-mideast-95a0861c8b51cda375d31a806686c23a

[Vish_ram]

18 hours ago, cubsfan said:

The Palestinians elected a terrorist organization to run their country. Hamas, their elected choice, proceeds to murder all the moderates that oppose them. Then Hamas steal all the billions of dollars given to them by the UN, US & others - over $500M/yr.  Hamas uses the money for rockets, arms and tunnels - ignoring the needs of the Palestinians.  Yet, Hamas is backed for almost 20 years or perhaps they just murdered all their opponents?

 

But somehow, Israel is responsible - while Egypt, Jordan and neighboring Arab countries want no Palestinians in their countries since they actively work to overthrow the host government, like they did in Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon.  The Palestinians are trouble makers & harbor terrorists - and the result is the destruction of their own country. 

 

You will not see peace until Hamas is 100% destroyed.

 

An interesting parallel. Sri Lanka (majority Sinhalese) was treating Tamils as 2nd class citizens. This spawned quite a few political org in the north and it got support from Indian state of Tamilnadu (yours truly is from this place). Most of these groups were moderates and had widespread support of the people. There was no improvement in the plight of Tamils.

 

Soon the frustration created a ruthlessly violent group called LTTE run by Prabakaran. First thing he did was to kill all opposition moderate leaders. He took total control of the movement. He basically killed more Tamils than Sinhalese. Soon India came in with peace keeping mission and this pissed off Prabakaran. He killed Rajiv Gandhi. Eventually Prabakaran got killed after a decade of civil war and LTTE is basically dead. 

 

In any conflict, the most ruthless group has to either gain power and maybe turn moderate or should get killed. Even in WW2, the most violent folks in power (Axis powers) got eliminated and we got peace. In USSR, the violent Stalin consolidated power and there was some relative peace. 

 

Only a total war can eliminate the violent group. There is no easy way out. 

[Vish_ram]

The only logical/rational outcome to Israel conflict is that we need Israel & Palestine to exist as independent countries with peace. Every single person/entity/country that is opposing this outcome (it may take a while for Palestine to get that independence) has to be neutralized. 

 

[Spekulatius]

On 4/14/2024 at 12:49 AM, changegonnacome said:

Wow much kudos to Israel….best I can tell from reports their missile defense systems pretty much bested these attacks .

 

It’s embarrassing for Iran how little by way of damage they were able to inflict here…..and quite foolish in a way to reveal how weak they are relative to Israel’s military capability….hopefully this reality seeps through to the Iranian people so that they might constrain their leaders….it would be insane for that countries leadership to pursue a straight out conflict with Israel….but these sectarian regimes don’t live in anything approximating the real world…they hear god whispering in their ear.

 

 

My guess is that Iran really didn’t want to do that much damage. They were just forced to “do something” to save face after Israel bombed their assets and are probably glad if this does not escalate.

 

Not that Iran government are great guys, but I think they want to stay out of the Gaza conflict. They are more rational than many in the west think, but they are also bound by constraints that can force them into a Zugzwang situation.

 

 

[Parsad]

23 hours ago, lnofeisone said:

This is factually incorrect. 

1) Israel didn't attack a sovereign country's embassy. They attacked an annex. Notice how everyone killed was IRGC and the ambassador and embassy staff were safe. A lot of news sources got this wrong, and this has become one of those nuances that got lost for those who aren't reading and tracking this carefully.

2) Let us not forget that Iran set this precedent long ago with this - https://www.reuters.com/world/argentina-court-blames-iran-deadly-1994-bombing-jewish-center-2024-04-12/

 

Can we agree on this much?

 

3) Your take on Gaza is also weird and incongruent. Let's do a simple exercise. You claim Israel is an occupier. As an occupier, Israel is obligated to provide food, water, and shelter to the occupied territories, which it did before Hamas and MANY Gazan civilians went on their adventure into israel.

 

However, as an occupier, Israel has some flexibilities, which include setting up checkpoints, restricting population movement, and really anything for the purpose of security. Palestinians have shown time and time again that they are a true security threat. So if Israel is really an occupier, their behavior in Gaza and WB is really justified. Think another way. If there was a terror group that actively lobbed missiles from Puerto Rico and Guam into the continental US, you can bet your portfolio US would not hesitate to deal harshly and there are many existing laws that could be applied to punish those responsible. This is why I think the talking point of "Israel is an occupier" is a really bad one so whoever is giving you your talking points, should take that into account. 

 

4) You want to see real Genocide? Look at how Hamas went into Kibutzes and systemically targetted and killed every family they could find. That's what genocide looks like. If Israel had no ability to stop Hamas, they would go as far as they could. That's Genocide. What Israel is doing is combat. Terrible collateral damage (still well below many comparable urban warfare situations) but it's legal combat. I'll concede that not everything Israel is doing is perfect and by the book but it's much closer to what International laws were designed for. 

 

 

 

+1!  Cheers!

[Dinar]

59 minutes ago, Spekulatius said:

My guess is that Iran really didn’t want to do that much damage. They were just forced to “do something” to save face after Israel bombed their assets and are probably glad if this does not escalate.

 

Not that Iran government are great guys, but I think they want to stay out of the Gaza conflict. They are more rational than many in the west think, but they are also bound by constraints that can force them into a Zugzwang situation.

 

 

I don't know what Iran wanted or wants, but according to his obituary published by the Iranian press, the Iranian general who was killed planned the October 7th massacre.  So if that is true, it is clear that Iran wanted a war with Israel or at least was fine with it.