The Arab Gulf states may provide some aid money and political support, but they will continue to focus on Iran and not take any serious military action or risk a major political confrontation with Israel or split with the United States. This threat forces them to focus on Iran and limit any support of Hamas and the Palestinians. More importantly, and despite some recent diplomatic contacts, Iran does present a serious military, political, and sectarian threat to the Arab Gulf states. But Iran cannot project meaningful military power other than long-range missile strikes to challenge Israel and faces the threat of far higher levels of Israel retaliation. It might carry out limited raids against some Israeli targets. Iran can threaten and provoke Israel and provide money and limited arms supplies to Palestinian fighters. In an odd way, Iran may actually add to Israel’s regional security. The Arab Gulf states are not a meaningful military threat. Syria’s Assad regime and its military forces are still caught up in its own civil war, and an unstable Iraq lacks the capability to project meaningful forces into the Levant. Jordan now has only limited military forces, is not organized to fight Israel, and has its own internal economic and political challenges. Egypt is strong in military terms but is no longer organized and prepared to fight Israel and is caught up in its own economic crisis and political problems. Hezbollah can raise the ante in terms of missile attacks and cross-border infiltration but is vulnerable to far superior Israel air and missile attacks. In practice, Israel will be able to create almost any security structure in Gaza that it wants to limit Palestinian action in Israel and the West Bank to demonstrations and small acts of violence or terrorism.Īs for the rest of the Arab world, Israel does not seem to face any major direct military threat from its Arab neighbors. It does face limited threat from attacks by Palestinians in Israel and in the West Bank, but they are unlikely to rise above sporadic incidents of violence. Israel is so strong relative to Hamas that it can both defeat Hamas and establish almost any new security structure in Gaza that Israel wants. The outcome of the war in Gaza is already clear.
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