Part of statesmanship is not escalating tensions into a full on war with Iran if possible. Iran is trying to poke the US and Israel as much as possible from Lebanon, Yemen, Syria, Gaza, and Iraq without bringing on the full wrath of our military might. It probably is about time to show the Houthis who has the big guns.
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Israel/Hamas conflict
- Thread starter Buckminster
- Start date
The Houthis are essentially an insurgency force. Conventional forces, no matter how large and how capable are weak against insurgencies. Especially if the insurgency is getting outside help, which they always are these days. There are two types of insurgencies: those against an outside force and those against their own government.
Insurgencies against their own government can and have been put down because a government has legitimacy within the population they are trying to control. The insurgents can always be betrayed by the people who they are hiding among who side with the government.
Outside forces almost always lose to the insurgents. It's why the US tucked tail and ran from Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan. It's why the Soviets lost in Afghanistan and why the European colonial powers lost their empires. The only post WW II external army trying to put down an insurgency that worked was the British in Malaysia in the late 1940s and they left soon after anyway.
We've entered a new era where insurgents can strike out further from home than ever before with cheap drones.
The only way to really kill off an insurgency is to win over the hearts and minds of the population generating the insurgents. That usually means giving in to the demands of the insurgents which usually is unacceptable to the powers opposing them.
Bet TSLA
Active Member
This seems to be a pretty good primer on the situation in Yemen.
engelsbergideas.com
Things seem to be escalating.
The Houthis’ forgotten war goes global
The Houthis emerged in Yemen as an Islamist movement in the late 1980s. Following the war in Gaza, their significance has grown as they disrupt trade through the Red Sea, with dangerous potential for escalation
engelsbergideas.com
Things seem to be escalating.
The Palestinians are screwed. There is no safe place to evacuate to, and if there was Hamas would threaten to kill them. Electing religious lunatics has its price. When Israel is done hunting down most of these terrorists they will leave. Hopefully the next international aid funding for Gaza isn't used to build tunnels and weapons.
Thought of something else today, with all the tunnels underground, why isn't Hamas sheltering as many of these people as possible there? Why is no one concerned about Hamas using these civilians as human shields?
High civilian casualties play into Hamas' hands. They want high civilian casualties so they can sell the Palestinian cause better overseas. A lot of people in other countries see the ratio of dead to be 23K Palestinian and about 1200 Israelis and it helps sell the idea that Israel is the bully in this situation.
Someone should be educating the public outside Israel that this is the game Hamas is playing, but Hamas has been very effective in selling their cause on social media and this further sells the ideas they already planted. To those too young to remember the Arab-Israeli wars of the past Israel is a colonial occupier who keeps Palestine as second class citizens in their own country. Hamas and others have been cultivating this idea in the minds of younger people in the west.
For those who buy in to the talking point of human shields... This has never been proved. It is just the Israeli narrative. (moderator note: This is not just the Israeli narrative: Westpoint, NATO, The Guardian, etc. ) But on the other hand, Israel found guilty of using Palestinians as human shields: HRW, B'Tselem
Why would Palestinians evacuate their land? Wouldn't that be ethnic cleansing?
People evacuate Florida when a hurricane approaches. That doesn't mean that they don't come back home when it's safe. They who sow the wind shall reap the whirlwind. If Gazans continue to rape, murder, and kidnap Israeli civilians..... it won't be their land for long.
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When was the last time Palestianians who were forced to leave their lands allowed to return back? Why does right-to-return law only apply to Jewish people?
First of you mean Hamas, not Gazans. Second, we heard about rape, but have not seen any proof yet. But of course, if it happened, it is wrong.
As to murders... that is of course condemned when it comes to civilians, but let's not make a general statement. Not everyone killed that day were civilians and not all of them were killed by Hamas.
Regarding kidnappings. This is also not right, no doubt. Though, one wonders, do you feel the same about 1000s of Palestinians, including children, kidnapped by Israeli army?
Of course, you can also ask yourself, why would group of people resort to such acts? Maybe because they have been oppressed and dehumanized without any possibility of any future? What would you do if you were born in Gaza? And lost half your family in regular "mowing the grass" operations?
Huh? Palestinians are the only group of "refugees" in the world who argue their kids and grandkids born elsewhere are allowed right to return.
Good lord! People are still denying that Hamas raped scores of women on 10/7?
Before 10/7, Gaza was one of the nicest places to live in the Muslim/Arab world. Gaza had a higher GDP and life expectancy than many of their Muslim and Arab neighbors - and better than most of Africa.
It is an absolute myth that living in Gaza was so terrible to create (let alone justify) the barbaric attacks on 10/7.
Gaza was no garden of Eden prior to 10/7. But that was largely due to their Hamas leadership. It could be a wonderful place to live if Gazans at some point decide that it is better to live peacefully with their Israeli neighbors than to live in squalor and violence.
Sometimes it does. But that's beside the point. Israel isn't claiming any of Gaza. The Gazans will be free to either rebuild it into a prosperous, thriving enclave, or another dingy hellhole. It's their choice. Peace or violence.
Phony maps of a nation that never existed don't mean much. The Gaza strip has the same borders today as it did in 1948 when Egypt occupied it. Israel gained control in 1967 after defeating it's Arab neighbors in the Six Day War.
