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Notes -
Operation Poseidon Archer
Reported by CNN:
I have mixed feelings about this. It is clearly the responsibility of the imperial hegemon to protect global shipping lanes. But by that same logic, it's time for the imperial hegemon to force a settlement onto the Israelis due to their never-ending destabilization of the region. That would entail the EU forcing a peace onto Israel, performing a Special Military Operation within Israel if necessary.
Bring back the 117 AD borders, with EU administration of Jerusalem. Jews may live in Jerusalem, wail at their wall and study Torah in peace, but it is utterly nonsensical for the West to continue to bear the burden of Israeli destabilization of the region.
This washy middle ground of appealing to imperial obligations when it comes to Middle Eastern intervention, without control of the "vassal" state destabilizing the region, is a never-ending pattern that has to stop. The US and EU has more than enough leverage to force a settlement onto Israel.
Let's say Israel agrees to a two-state solution but Palestine just keeps attacking Israel over and over. What is Israel entitled to do in response? Do they just keep retaliating tit-for-tat? Are they allowed to invade, depose the government, but then must leave just to return when the new government does the same thing? Do they just have to improve their defences?
Let them do whatever they like, with their own capabilities and let them deal with the consequences. We, the West, shouldn't be standing behind the Israeli military, supplying the bombs and shells they're using, bankrolling their operation, threatening anyone who attacks them. Once they start taking our aid, we become a participant.
Azerbaijan has a spat with Armenia? Not my problem, let them handle it.
But the Palestinians are far more dependent on US and EU aid than the Israelis are. We are much more funding the terror campaigns against Israel than the military operation in Gaza.
No you're not - Biden sent $14 billion in military aid to Israel for this conflict alone, plus the baseline $3 billion in military aid annually. Palestinians don't get any military aid from the West, only a few hundred million annually in humanitarian aid.
Over 6 years, the entire UN gave about 1.5 years of annual US military aid. The US sent about 1.7 years of Israeli military aid and tries hard to avoid it going to Palestinian war effort. If anything the aid serves more as a bribe to keep them from electing Hamas, they cut funding when that happened.
I propose complete non-interference, to cut aid to both sides.
Without which the entire economy would collapse and they wouldn't be able to afford a single scrap of metal, let alone a bomb or weapon. Plus the international orgs that aid and abet Iranian resupplies. Its not magnitude alone that matters, its percentage. If we left Palestine 100% on a branch, they would have nothing.
Look, if you provide 14 billion in military aid to one side and a few hundreds of millions in civilian aid to the other side (openly talking about how you try to prevent it going to their military wing), you clearly support the former over the latter. This is absolutely basic logic. Every US politician will tell you that they love Israel and hate Hamas.
Who cares if Palestine has nothing? Who cares if the Israelis have to pay for their own bombs? Not my problem!
Who cares?
Probably because the US has a need for Israel in the Middle East as basically the best army in the region. Perhaps not 100% capable of paying for their own bombs but extremely capable at using those bombs to modern military standards.
Also, America is a Democracy and I would like to remind you American Jews pay a hugely disproportionate amount of US taxes and are almost certainly net payers to the US treasury far above whatever aid we give to Israel.
This seems like a bit of circular reasoning. The US support Israel because it has the best army in the region. Why does US need to support Israel? Because the Arabs (generally) hate the US and the US need geopolitical support in the region. Why do the Arabs hate the US? Because the US supports Israel.
Additionally, the US actually gets very little from Israel. Israel fragrantly acts against US interests and ignores US calls all the time. Even the most milquetoast request from the US to Israel to maybe tone it down just a bit is just blatantly ignored. Israel demands the US intervene on its behalf all the time but rarely reciprocates. Prior to post-WW2, the Americans were actually seen very favorably by the Arabs.
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