Slogan
Director of Conflicts Forum; Former Senior British Diplomat; Author.
The stark reality is that even if Ukraine gets this quarterly tranche, ‘the ask’ for the next will almost certainly be even more problematic.
What is clear is that the ruling strata in Washington are settled on the primacy of containing China.
An image of the White House lecturing, and facing off versus Netanyahu’s policies, might look ‘tough’ … but will any of this elaborate ‘dance’ -- whether Biden and Netanyahu meet or not -- make a jot of difference?
The security anxieties amongst "Israel’s" professional military caste are very real. There is tension in the north with Lebanon, rising tensions with the Palestinians, and Syria is edging towards major ruption.
The BRICS 11 now represents 37% of the global GDP (in PPP terms) and 46% of the global population. The G7 GDP is 29.9% (PPP terms), by comparison.
Change is ineluctable. If "Israel" intervenes -- imagining it to be helping America -- it is likely to prove to be a strategic mistake.
Steven Simon, a former White House official, has written a book on US influence in the Middle East, which offers quite the take on the dynamics of the relationship between the US and "Israel".
This is the crux: Biden is desperate to have Riyadh buy Treasuries and to keep buying them.
To which sphere would Netanyahu think to hitch the Israeli ‘wagon’? To remain as the isolated Western outlier, protruding into a consolidated Eurasian mega economic and security bloc, or try to go with the Russia axis?
Hezbollah had taken the trouble to ‘deep-study’ their enemy; to know their strengths and weaknesses, and therefore know how to mount the feints to deceive them.
