Israel-Gaza war

[Meclazine for Israel]

The ratio of cost between what Iran threw out there and what Israel and the USA had to throw up there to stop them must be very heavy in favor of Iran from a military hardware ROI point of view.   Iran basically made Israel and the USA burn a lot of cash yesterday. 

The USA is backing down when it comes to Houthis, offering to take them off the terrorist list if Red Sea attacks cease, mostly for that reason, military hardware ROI and cash burn.

It seems this is a good place for Israel and Iran to stop but I suspect for political reasons Israel cannot let this slide and there will be more escalation.  Iran's strategy should be similar to the  Houthis: make Israel and the USA burn more cash at a much higher rate it will burn cash.

I would have thought that the US gets free training in 2024 warfare (drones, small multi-missile attacks).

Most of the Israeli systems in place would be monitored by the US as well.

Just the price you pay for living in the Middle East surrounded by enthusiastic neighbours.

If the cost gets too great, Israel and the US will change the defensive team out and swap in the offense.

[Oregon Eagle Politics]

Most moral army in action.

Israeli drones 'luring people with sounds of babies crying before opening fire'

[Alben Barkley]

Confirmed it was Israel now.

Goddamn it. Why?

Netanyahu’s about to lose virtually all his international support, probably including Biden’s.

And for what?

Jesus Christ, man. You had a win!

You killed Iranian officials and all they did was thump their chests in response. It could have been over right then and there.

I was with you all the way to this point but I just can’t do it anymore. This is senseless and stupid.

[MR DARK BRANDON]

Confirmed it was Israel now.

Goddamn it. Why?

Netanyahu’s about to lose virtually all his international support, probably including Biden’s.

And for what?

Jesus Christ, man. You had a win!

You killed Iranian officials and all they did was thump their chests in response. It could have been over right then and there.

I was with you all the way to this point but I just can’t do it anymore. This is senseless and stupid.

Bibi has got to go.

[Open Source Intelligence]

Confirmed it was Israel now.

Goddamn it. Why?

Netanyahu’s about to lose virtually all his international support, probably including Biden’s.

And for what?

The current Israeli government are the kid in school that feels like they have to start a fight with every kid that shoves him.

"We have 2 military fronts going on, let's go for 3."

CNN reporting based on their U.S. official source is the administration appears to have known ahead of time about a "limited in scope" retaliation and they weren't to go after nuclear or civilian targets.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Jesus Christ, man. You had a win!

Take a moment to consider why Israel might not consider it a win (and why they might be quite reasonable not to do so).

Iran is very close to getting nuclear weapons, as they have been for some time. It appears that they have been stepping right up to the edge of getting nukes, but have not (at least as far as we know) crossed the nuclear rubicon.

Now consider that Iran just shot ballistic missiles at Israel.

If Iran were to get nukes, then this means that they could put them in the ballistic missiles and fire them at Israel.

For that reason, it is very much in Israel's interest to not allow a precedent to be set that Iran can fire ballistic missiles at Israel and get away with it.

In the future, if Iran fires ballistic missiles at Israel, how is Israel supposed to know if it is a nuclear attack or if it is just a regular explosive warhead?

Israel will never know with complete certainty whether Iran has finally crossed the line and made nukes. All they will have is intelligence analysis. But intelligence can be flawed.

So if shooting ballistic missiles at Israel is something that becomes normalized, then Israel may have to assume that those ballistic missiles may contain nuclear warheads - and respond accordingly.

This makes the situation very dangerous, and there is room for miscalculations to be made that could lead to something disastrous.

[Tekken_Guy]

Jesus Christ, man. You had a win!

Take a moment to consider why Israel might not consider it a win (and why they might be quite reasonable not to do so).

Iran is very close to getting nuclear weapons, as they have been for some time. It appears that they have been stepping right up to the edge of getting nukes, but have not (at least as far as we know) crossed the nuclear rubicon.

Now consider that Iran just shot ballistic missiles at Israel.

If Iran were to get nukes, then this means that they could put them in the ballistic missiles and fire them at Israel.

For that reason, it is very much in Israel's interest to not allow a precedent to be set that Iran can fire ballistic missiles at Israel and get away with it.

In the future, if Iran fires ballistic missiles at Israel, how is Israel supposed to know if it is a nuclear attack or if it is just a regular explosive warhead?

Israel will never know with complete certainty whether Iran has finally crossed the line and made nukes. All they will have is intelligence analysis. But intelligence can be flawed.

So if shooting ballistic missiles at Israel is something that becomes normalized, then Israel may have to assume that those ballistic missiles may contain nuclear warheads - and respond accordingly.

This makes the situation very dangerous, and there is room for miscalculations to be made that could lead to something disastrous.

As long as these missiles are getting intercepted it shouldn’t be a problem.

[7,052,770]

Confirmed it was Israel now.

Goddamn it. Why?

Netanyahu’s about to lose virtually all his international support, probably including Biden’s.

And for what?

Jesus Christ, man. You had a win!

You killed Iranian officials and all they did was thump their chests in response. It could have been over right then and there.

I was with you all the way to this point but I just can’t do it anymore. This is senseless and stupid.

Israel had the support of the whole Western world 6 months ago, and has now even lost Alben. Let that sink in.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

As long as these missiles are getting intercepted it shouldn’t be a problem.

Um. They're not.

Many of them were shot down, but not all. 10 ballistic missiles from Iran hit targets in Israel.

The problem is with nukes, if Iran ever secretly gets them and manages to prevent Israeli/US intelligence from finding out about it, you only need a single one to do unacceptable damage.

Israel is also a very small country, it would not take many nukes (depending on yield) to destroy the country in general.

Israel also has to consider that any ballistic missile fired at all near airbases/missile silos where they store nuclear weapons could potentially be a nuclear first strike to try to eliminate the Israeli ability to retaliate with nukes.

Israel does have some nuclear second strike capability, but obviously it is much less than what e.g. the USA has.

(I am assuming of course that the conventional wisdom rumors about some of the specifics of Israeli nuclear capability is true, since it is not officially acknowledged).

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

The State of Israel is widely believed to possess nuclear weapons. Estimates of Israel's stockpile range between 90 and 400 nuclear warheads,[2][5][6][7][8][9][19] and the country is believed to possess the ability to deliver them in several methods, including by aircraft, as submarine-launched cruise missiles, and via the Jericho series of intermediate to intercontinental range ballistic missiles.[20][21] Its first deliverable nuclear weapon is thought to have been completed in late 1966 or early 1967; which would make it the sixth country in the world to have developed them.[2][22][23]

Israel maintains a policy of deliberate ambiguity, never officially denying nor admitting to having nuclear weapons, instead repeating over the years that "Israel will not be the first country to introduce nuclear weapons to the Middle East".[24][25][26] However in Nov 2023 amid Israel-Hamas war Israel minister of Heritage who was a member of the war cabinet[27] publicly stated that dropping a nuclear bomb over Gaza is an option.[28][29]

[Tekken_Guy]

As long as these missiles are getting intercepted it shouldn’t be a problem.

Um. They're not.

Many of them were shot down, but not all. 10 ballistic missiles from Iran hit targets in Israel.

The problem is with nukes, if Iran ever secretly gets them and manages to prevent Israeli/US intelligence from finding out about it, you only need a single one to do unacceptable damage.

Israel is also a very small country, it would not take many nukes (depending on yield) to destroy the country in general.

Israel also has to consider that any ballistic missile fired at all near airbases/missile silos where they store nuclear weapons could potentially be a nuclear first strike to try to eliminate the Israeli ability to retaliate with nukes.

Israel does have some nuclear second strike capability, but obviously it is much less than what e.g. the USA has.

(I am assuming of course that the conventional wisdom rumors about some of the specifics of Israeli nuclear capability is true, since it is not officially acknowledged).

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

The State of Israel is widely believed to possess nuclear weapons. Estimates of Israel's stockpile range between 90 and 400 nuclear warheads,[2][5][6][7][8][9][19] and the country is believed to possess the ability to deliver them in several methods, including by aircraft, as submarine-launched cruise missiles, and via the Jericho series of intermediate to intercontinental range ballistic missiles.[20][21] Its first deliverable nuclear weapon is thought to have been completed in late 1966 or early 1967; which would make it the sixth country in the world to have developed them.[2][22][23]

Israel maintains a policy of deliberate ambiguity, never officially denying nor admitting to having nuclear weapons, instead repeating over the years that "Israel will not be the first country to introduce nuclear weapons to the Middle East".[24][25][26] However in Nov 2023 amid Israel-Hamas war Israel minister of Heritage who was a member of the war cabinet[27] publicly stated that dropping a nuclear bomb over Gaza is an option.[28][29]

Does Israel have the ability to intercept anything that could be a nuclear weapon? Or a nearby ally like Saudi?

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Does Israel have the ability to intercept anything that could be a nuclear weapon? Or a nearby ally like Saudi?

Israeli missile defense is pretty clearly the best in the world, but they cannot intercept with a 100% guaranteed success rate currently - if ever.

And even if they thought they could intercept with 100% success rate, a single error could mean that a hypothetical nuke could get through. 0 errors, ever, is a tall ask.

An additional thing to consider is that the missiles Iran fired at Israel a week or so ago were shorter range/intermediate range ballistic missiles. Those have relatively low flight trajectories (not going as far into space) and fly relatively slowly compared to intercontinental ballistic missiles, or hypersonic missiles, so that also means they are easier to intercept. If Iran had the same ICBMs that the USA or Russia have for example, and fired those at Israel, the interception rate would have been lower.

Also, if Iran were to fire a large enough number of missiles, they could simply overwhelm the missile defense in numerical terms. This is the main problem with missile defense in general.

And again, remember that 10 of the relatively worse missiles that Iran did fire at Israel did not in fact get intercepted.

[Tekken_Guy]

Does Israel have the ability to intercept anything that could be a nuclear weapon? Or a nearby ally like Saudi?

Israeli missile defense is pretty clearly the best in the world, but they cannot intercept with a 100% guaranteed success rate currently - if ever.

And even if they thought they could intercept with 100% success rate, a single error could mean that a hypothetical nuke could get through. 0 errors, ever, is a tall ask.

An additional thing to consider is that the missiles Iran fired at Israel a week or so ago were shorter range/intermediate range ballistic missiles. Those have relatively low flight trajectories (not going as far into space) and fly relatively slowly compared to intercontinental ballistic missiles, or hypersonic missiles, so that also means they are easier to intercept. If Iran had the same ICBMs that the USA or Russia have for example, and fired those at Israel, the interception rate would have been lower.

Also, if Iran were to fire a large enough number of missiles, they could simply overwhelm the missile defense in numerical terms. This is the main problem with missile defense in general.

And again, remember that 10 of the relatively worse missiles that Iran did fire at Israel did not in fact get intercepted.

I’m at very least hopeful that Iran cares enough about self-preservation to not use nuclear weapons. If they do that then they’re just inviting a nuclear attack on them whether from Israel or another ally.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

I’m at very least hopeful that Iran cares enough about self-preservation to not use nuclear weapons. If they do that then they’re just inviting a nuclear attack on them whether from Israel or another ally.

Personally I agree it is relatively unlikely Iran would do a nuclear first strike, particularly in the short term.

Even if that's true though, there is still abundant room for miscalculation. It could be the case that neither the Prime Minister of Israel or the Supreme Leader of Iran wants to go to war (nuclear or not), but it could nevertheless happen. Not necessarily dissimilarly to how WW1 started, or how the Cuban Missile Crisis brought the world all too close to the edge.

3 years ago, I would have told you that I could not imagine Vladimir Putin would possibly be so crazy to start an actual bona fide full scale conventional war against Ukraine.

I had hoped that it was true that we really did live in a world where humans had sufficiently learned the lessons of history (WW1 and WW2 in particular) to avoid destroying ourselves.

The other thing to consider is even if it is true that the current leaders are fully rational and sane and would never make a first use of nukes, who is to say who the leaders will be 50 years from now?

I think, instead of thinking we live in a new era, at this point, having seen the events of the past few years, we really have to look back further in history to the mistakes that most people hoped/assumed were behind us after the end of the cold war, and consider that there can be very bad leaders who do very bad (or stupid) things.

Similarly, I think we have to recognize that the possibility of China genuinely and actually trying to invade Taiwan at some point (maybe in the 2030s or 2040s?) is a lot more real than we would really like to think. Unfortunately, it seems we do not live in the end of history.

[GoTfan]

Israel already has nukes. it does seem like they're falling into the US way of thinking that we're the only ones allowed to have these things and that anyone else is automatically an enemy.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Right or wrong , I will stand with Israel . We are not the French or Germans who made us out to be the villains after 9/11 and we should not forget how that made us feel .

[GoTfan]

Right or wrong , I will stand with Israel . We are not the French or Germans who made us out to be the villains after 9/11 and we should not forget how that made us feel .

Dogma is very comfortable after all; it saves on critical thinking.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Right or wrong , I will stand with Israel . We are not the French or Germans who made us out to be the villains after 9/11 and we should not forget how that made us feel .

Dogma is very comfortable after all; it saves on critical thinking.

No that’s what being an ally is . The fact is Iran is an enemy and is the main cause for Middle East instability and funds Islamist extremism everywhere. I may disagree with the way Israel decided to handle the situation but Iran is an enemy and we must stand with our ally against Iran .

Islamists hold the third most evil ideology in the modern world after nazism and communism so yes there is no nuance , we must stand firm against the Iranians and that means standing with our Allies

[DaleCooper]

Israel should not receive any support (including humanitarian aid) until Netanyahu is gone.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Israel should not receive any support (including humanitarian aid) until Netanyahu is gone.

It is up to Iran if they respond to this with full scale war or not. They escalated with their missile launch and Israel just responded with a tit for tat style of a response.

If Iran escalates then yes we should help Israel by destroying all of Iran's offensive capabilities through an air attack

[DaleCooper]

Israel should not receive any support (including humanitarian aid) until Netanyahu is gone.

It is up to Iran if they respond to this with full scale war or not. They escalated with their missile launch and Israel just responded with a tit for tat style of a response.

If Iran escalates then yes we should help Israel by destroying all of Iran's offensive capabilities through an air attack

No, absolutely not. If Israel wants free money and resources then they need to stop treating this like a game. Get rid of these morons currently in charge and maybe we can work with them again, but until then, nope.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Israel should not receive any support (including humanitarian aid) until Netanyahu is gone.

It is up to Iran if they respond to this with full scale war or not. They escalated with their missile launch and Israel just responded with a tit for tat style of a response.

If Iran escalates then yes we should help Israel by destroying all of Iran's offensive capabilities through an air attack

No, absolutely not. If Israel wants free money and resources then they need to stop treating this like a game. Get rid of these morons currently in charge and maybe we can work with them again, but until then, nope.

Netnayahu>>>>>>>Ayatollah.


This is like saying our allies should have treated George W Bush if he was just as bad as Saddam which would have been insane. Iraq unlike Iran did not have the ability to destroy us as well so them staying out was not as consequential

[Horus]

Confirmed it was Israel now.

Goddamn it. Why?

Netanyahu’s about to lose virtually all his international support, probably including Biden’s.

And for what?

Jesus Christ, man. You had a win!

You killed Iranian officials and all they did was thump their chests in response. It could have been over right then and there.

I was with you all the way to this point but I just can’t do it anymore. This is senseless and stupid.

I mean, I'm glad you're seeing the light, but I predicted something like this on 10/8. I told you guys Israel was a foul excuse for an ally. I told you guys Bibi was insane. Why are you just now seeing the obvious, Alben?

[DaleCooper]

Israel should not receive any support (including humanitarian aid) until Netanyahu is gone.

It is up to Iran if they respond to this with full scale war or not. They escalated with their missile launch and Israel just responded with a tit for tat style of a response.

If Iran escalates then yes we should help Israel by destroying all of Iran's offensive capabilities through an air attack

No, absolutely not. If Israel wants free money and resources then they need to stop treating this like a game. Get rid of these morons currently in charge and maybe we can work with them again, but until then, nope.

Netnayahu>>>>>>>Ayatollah.


This is like saying our allies should have treated George W Bush if he was just as bad as Saddam which would have been insane. Iraq unlike Iran did not have the ability to destroy us as well so them staying out was not as consequential

America under Bush should not have gotten any help from the rest of the civilized world, lol.

[Alben Barkley]

Right or wrong , I will stand with Israel . We are not the French or Germans who made us out to be the villains after 9/11 and we should not forget how that made us feel .

Sorry OSR but “My ally, right or wrong” thinking is f—ked up and is how we got things like Reagan siding with the apartheid regime in South Africa for far too long for example.

As the world’s preeminent superpower, we absolutely CAN swing our d—k around. And we can and should do so when it is a net benefit to mankind. BUT we also should never even dream of doing so when it is NOT a good thing for mankind. I hate to literally quote a comic book but the fact remains: With great power comes great responsibility.

Point is, Israel is absolutely our ally, yes. But in this situation, they had already won. They got everything they wanted and then some. Our government begged and pleaded with them to just take the W and not escalate things farther, yet they refused. Some “ally” that is!

I don’t think the people of Israel should be punished for having a megalomaniac for a leader any more than us Americans should have been for Trump. But fact remains their leader right now is a narcissistic asshole and an impediment to world peace. The whole international community needs to put pressure on him to back off and stop swinging his d—k around. Period.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Right or wrong , I will stand with Israel . We are not the French or Germans who made us out to be the villains after 9/11 and we should not forget how that made us feel .

Sorry OSR but “My ally, right or wrong” thinking is f—ked up and is how we got things like Reagan siding with the apartheid regime in South Africa for far too long for example.

As the world’s preeminent superpower, we absolutely CAN swing our d—k around. And we can and should do so when it is a net benefit to mankind. BUT we also should never even dream of doing so when it is NOT a good thing for mankind. I hate to literally quote a comic book but the fact remains: With great power comes great responsibility.

Point is, Israel is absolutely our ally, yes. But in this situation, they had already won. They got everything they wanted and then some. Our government begged and pleaded with them to just take the W and not escalate things farther, yet they refused. Some “ally” that is!

I don’t think the people of Israel should be punished for having a megalomaniac for a leader any more than us Americans should have been for Trump. But fact remains their leader right now is a narcissistic asshole and an impediment to world peace. The whole international community needs to put pressure on him to back off and stop swinging his d—k around. Period.

Israel did not launch a full scale attack so at most this is just a tit for tat response. Israel was always gonna respond in some response so no doing this does not start a full scale war anymore than Iran firing the missiles did and them funding Hamas and Hezbollah did.

Like Israel has more justifiable reasons to do this then we did in Iraq