Since the ceasefire started, Iran has said that both it and any peace agreement must include Lebanon. America agreed, Israel didn’t, and the invasion of Lebanon has continued.
Yesterday Iran lost its patience and hit Israel. Israel responded. One set from each side.
For now.
But Iran has said that if Israel keeps attacking Lebanon, Iran will attack again, and much harder.
And more interestingly, Ansar Allah (the Yemeni Houthis) have closed their strait to Israeli traffic. This isn’t a full closure, but it could wind up as one.
I think it’s important to understand a bit of the psychology here: the people in charge before the war didn’t have strong emotional ties to Hezbollah. Old men. But a lot of the people now in charge do, they were personally involved in setting up Hezbollah. They trained Hezbollah. Some of them fought with Hezbollah.
There are strong self-interest reasons for Iran to want to keep Hezbollah strong, which means Israel out of Southern Lebanon. But there are also emotional ties and those matter, because Iran has to be willing to take hits to Iran if it wants to really help Hezbollah.
Of course one attack doesn’t mean much, what will matter is if Iran meant it when they said that if Israel keeps attacking Lebanon (which it will), they will attack again, and next time with much more force.
Threats that aren’t promises don’t mean much. Still, this attack has shown that Iran wasn’t just willing to walk away from Lebanon. They weren’t just spewing words when they said that any peace deal had to include both Lebanon (really, Hezbollah, since the central government is actually willing to let Israel occupy Southern Lebanon, since it’s full of Shi’a Muslims, and the government doesn’t include Muslims), and Iran.
Some people are saying that Trump needs to reign in Israel. That’s… sort of true. But I think what’s happening is simpler: Iran has recognized that America won’t rein in Israel, so Iran must establish deterrence over Israel as well as America. And that means hitting Israel.
Probably they should next send some ranging shots near Israel’s desalination plants, or their big nuclear reactor.
We’ll see how this plays out. Trump’s going to be under increasing pressure. I estimate that some shelves in America are going to be bare in about two to three months, as diesel for shipping to stores runs out in parts of the country. Prices will keep going up. Polling for the mid-terms will keep getting worse, and while Billionaires are so far using this as a profit taking opportunity, the cascade thru the supply chains is going to mean that soon things they care about are going to go up in price, or simply become unavailable: plastics, for example and chips, which require helium.
I don’t know how this will play out, because it depends on the psychology of a few key decision makers; it depends on what the hold Israel has on Trump is; it depends on if lawmakers are more scared of the Israli lobby than polls; and it depends on Iranian leadership’s pain tolerance and how much China is willing to keep supporting their economy.
That’s a lot of variables, and most of them are variable related to leadership decisions among people I don’t know very well.
People in leadership matter. When Israel jerked Kissinger’s chain in the 70s , he convinced Nixon to halt weapon shipments to Israel until they came to heel. But Israel’s lobby was weaker then and Kissinger and Nixon were both hard men: actual “alphas”. Actually dominant. Not pussies. Trump is a classic weak bully who folds under real pressure. They weren’t.
The bottom line, though, is simple. Iran beat America. Now it has to defeat Israel. If it can’t, or won’t, Southern Lebanon and Hezbollah as screwed.
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Joseph Kahn
The expression in English is “rein in” as opposed to “reign in”
Ian Welsh
Yes. Homonyms are my writing kryptonite. I think and write in sound.
Thanks for the catch.
Feral Finster
There is no deal that Iran can make that will satisfy Israel.
Since Israel has complete control over the US government (yes, Virginia, that includes Team D), there can be and will be no deal. The United States and Israel will not hesitate to go nuclear.
I don’t understand why any of this is remotely surprising.
bruce wilder
The U.S. has its own long-standing entanglements in Lebanon. The American embassy there is one of those bizarrely enormous compounds and the U.S. covers a lot of the financing for Lebanon’s official army, including payroll. None of this is much noticed in American news media and I don’t know what it means, beyond indicating how ill-informed the public is about the foreign policy machinations of the goverment.
Purple Library Guy
Israel’s control over team D is strong and longstanding, but it is slipping. Used to be, AIPAC could pick a candidate, allege that their opponent was antisemitic, spread a little money and call it a day. Now in the Democratic party, the allegations aren’t sticking and opponents get a significant boost if they can tie a candidate to AIPAC. The AIPAC money still matters, but they have to use more of it per race and pretend it isn’t them and attack on unrelated issues, which is trickier and if it surfaces the backlash is bigger. Huge majorities of US Democrats have a negative view of Israel. Opposition to Israel is being taken by many as a proxy for general honesty, sort of “If they have the guts to buck Israel, maybe they will have the guts to other big lobbyists too!” kind of sentiment. Because of all this, opponents of Israel are winning primaries more and more. If it keeps up, in time the Democratic establishment just won’t have the numbers in the decision-making bodies any more.
Feral Finster
@Bruce: what it means is the Lebanese government and army are de facto under American control.
Anyway, zero surprise to anyone even sort of paying attention:
https://www.kenklippenstein.com/p/us-secretly-deployed-paratroopers
Michaelmas
Ian: ‘…some shelves in America are going to be bare in about two to three months.’
Sooner.
But as for reining in Israel, Feral Finster is correct: ‘There is no deal that Iran can make that will satisfy Israel.’
I don’t agree with the rest — his assumption that ‘Israel has complete control over the US government’ in perpetuity. But I also don’t think it’ll much matter. It may be that as the global and US economy gurgles down the drain, a clique might take power in DC and — like Kissinger and Nixon in the 1970s and even Reagan in the 1980s — desperately attempt to pull up Israel’s leash.
I don’t believe they’ll be able to do it. Israel isn’t the Israel of the1970s or 1980s, but a blood-maddened rogue state where Netanyahu is a moderate by comparison to a large mass — perhaps the majority — of Israelis who now subscribe to an eschatological belief that Israeli Jews must rule over those lands where Muslims dwelled, if necessary by exterminating them all. They’re as much out of their minds as the German regime from 1933-45, to the extent that they’re already imagining that after they’ve beaten Iran, they’ll go to war with Turkey next. The only thing that’s going to stop Israel at this point is its own Götterdämmerung.
mago
Feral Finster is correct on all counts. I’d hesitate about the nuclear part except neither T nor N care about consequences beyond the personal and both think they’re immune in this case.
That aside, what frosts me among many other things concerning this situation is how Iran is portrayed as the aggressor and poor little Israel and Uncle Sugar had no choice but to respond.
Then, in the short memory department which seems pretty long, it was Trump who tore up the Obama administration’s nuclear agreement with Iran and now this schoolyard bully’s braying about Iran giving up its nuclear program. Yeah, yeah, it’s an Orwellian world and get used to it.
This shit’s not gonna have a good ending Ollie. In fact it’s going to be world war three for a long long time unless somebody drops the big one or environmental catastrophe strikes meteorically. In the meantime suffer little children along the way. You have no say.
Mark Level
bruce wilder, excellent point. feral finster, per multiple sources, about 6 weeks into Trump’s failed War, he was in the Situation Room and demanded the Nuclear Codes from General “Raisin” Kaine. Kaine kicked his fat ass out, didn’t want to go down in a future War Trial with Bibi, Biden, etc.
People think I pick on LAS, I do call him out for absurd statements he makes, it’s not personal, I’ll never meet the man. So some of his prognostications were ridiculous, early on he claimed Putin would send “another 1,000,000 troops to die to take Keev,” well false premise to start, 14 months ago (or whenever he appeared here) there’s no way Russia had lost 1 million troops, any sane person knew that. I noted that if Russia were to face an existential threat to its survival (which was pure absurdity, never gonna happen) it would be logical to lose half a million troops to prevent the deaths of 5 million Russians as occured from 1991-97 or so, premature deaths. Oops!!
He was a little bit right on the claim that the Military would sicken of Trump and do a coup, sometime into the first 4-6 months of Trump’s 2nd term. I’ll grade generously and say that Kaine denying the nuclear codes to him fulfills 6-8% of his prediction. Not great, but it’s something.
Trump is cornered and impotent, will destroy not only the International Economy but the US economy too trying to protect his pwecious little ego, as pathetic as his tiny hands. Unless and until others in the gov’t. stop him. His Cult won’t. If midterms happen he may be impeached, ousted from power and assuming the Dimmies have any spine (they don’t) he could be prosecuted for all the open corruption and looting.
It will end badly in any case. Iran is the Immovable Object, and the US Military is very powerful and now openly commits Genocide like our Zionist Masters have taught us. Be that as it may, as Ian noted, Trump is no Nixon or Kissinger (who I have clear memories of starting in my teens) he is a weakling and coward whose cognitive decline is more noticeable (seen falling asleep in meetings in recent days, using speed at his age “not good, believe me not good”. His 80th birthday is 4 days from now . . .
The good news in the last week is that (a) as Ian noted, Iran escalates every time the US tries another pointless attack, the Houthis are in the game, etc. (b) Even bigger: Jared and Ivanka wanted to “own” an Island off Albania that has been strategically important for centuries, called Sazan, which Ivanka just claimed she had “discovered”, like Daddy she is delusional. J & I were on a luxury ship with their Rothschild pals when they thought up this “real estate deal.” It has been occupied by over a dozen Great Powers (incl. Russia at one point), nobody can exit from the Adriatic Sea to the South & enter the Mediterranean without passing it. Their corrupt, Zio-owned and operated Leader announced the “Luxury Hotel Project” soon. Albanians rose up in massive protests, even riots, like 85% of the populace. Due Dissidence showed clip of an Albanian woman, young, speaking in English, she said there’s no good schools, no good health care, shitty roads, lousy-paying jobs etc. Thus they did what ‘Muricans will seemingly never do. They shut down the country, the Pig Ruler relented, another failed Enterprise like the Gaza Peace (Piece of Land) Board, all $14.6 billion of the Gulf Monarchies, UK and others money disappeared into thin air, Crypto-coin or whatever.
Losers gotta lose, Failures gotta fail. It’ll end badly. He might kill hundreds or thousands of ‘Murican Dipshits to try to stay in power but it’ll end badly. The Dimmies might come in, won’t change nothing, US will be more and more a failed state.
Mark Level
Oops, left off one detail about Sazan. It is covered with Military forts, underground bunkers, as I said very central in battles on the Adriatic entryway for centuries, going back at least to the time of the Ottoman Empire if not far earlier. (Sean P. Kelly likely knows, I could look it up.) Another big Fail for these “Jeniuses”.
GrimJim
In the face of all this, with reserves getting ready to drop to bottom tanks in early to mid-July in the US (let alone elsewhere), oil still keeps a low price, and gasoline keeps dropping.
Sheer madness, I thought.
But…
What if it isn’t madness, but instead, strategy?
Push this war until the whole world is on the verge of economic collapse.
“Something must be done to stop Iran, or the whole world economy collapses!” becomes their rallying cry (overwhelming the fact that it was the US and Israel that started the war).
Now, if the Strait of Hormuz cannot be “opened” the entire world economy will collapse (even though when Iran opens it, it is the US that closes it).
And so, the excuse for the Israeli “Final Solution” to Iran become the only remaining option (coincidentally opening wide their long-sought path to complete conquest and subjugation of the Middle East, in their eyes).
And so, the US nukes Tehran (EMP or otherwise) to try to force the issue. Blanket EMPs the whole country, if they don’t unconditionally surrender after that.
Coming soon… late July early August, most likely.
different clue
If someone is between “liberal” and “left”, what do we call them? ” Leftiberal”?
Here is a podcast from Leftiberal podcaster Jack Cochiarella called ” Barron Trump Gets What He Deserves”. But before Cochiarella gets to Barron Trump, he lets somebody talk about Jared Kushner’s conflict of interest between Jared Kushner co-negotiating the Iran-US ceasefire-and-etc. agreement and Jared Kushner owing a Private Equity Fund which gets almost all its funding from KSA and the Lesser PetroGulfie Emirates. This talking-head person says that “reports indicate” that the KSA government wants US-Israel to keep fighting Iran and that the KSA government wants US troops to invade Iran physically. Since Jared Kushner’s private equity fund relies on continued money input from KSA and the Lesser Gulfies, is he bendable to their will if their will be that talks fail and America overtly invades Iran with American soldiers?
That certainly seems like support for the War from a different direction than Israel.
Two things can be separately true at the same time. If this is true, that would make the likelihood of American soldiers in Iran kind of ‘over-determined’.
That part of the video lasts from 1: 07 to 3: 10. I feel confident that podcaster Cochiarella told us who the talking head is before airing the talking head’s segment, but I didn’t take the time to watch that part. ( On the rare occasions that I watch these Liberal and Leftiberal and Liberadical podcaster, I tend to slider-bar right past their own presence and get to the footage they air a little bit of.)
And he promised to get around to Barron Trump later in the podcast, so I will watch it to wallow in the shchadenfreudelicious schadenfreudelight of young Barron being negatively discussed.
Anyway, here is the link.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lh8NzpdZZHA
Carborundum
Thinking about how the decimation of both Iran and Hezbollah’s command leadership may have affected the relationship and the strategic calculus on both sides is very good idea. To truly accomplish this would require a lot more insight into the internals than I think anyone on the outside has, but I agree it is a reasonable assumption that there are more people with shared, operational experiences at higher echelons than 24 months ago in both groups.
I think my dominant interpretative lens from this distant remove would be that Hezbollah is somewhat weaker (or at least devoting considerable energy and resources to recovering capacity) and even more independent than it was previously. I don’t think this is quite something where the older Iranian generation wasn’t as emotionally invested – a lot of the senior personalities that have been killed (both in the current conflict and over the previous decade or so) were actually involved in the establishment of Hezbollah and had significant ties to the part of Hezbollah that action-armed Iranian strategic interests. I could actually see the new generations being less ideological about the relationship than the older one.
Right now, if I were in Hezbollah’s shoes, I would be a bit skeptical that Iran has my best interests at heart over their own – they’ve sat on their hands for weeks while the Israelis have run what is clearly a depopulation strategy in Southern Lebanon, which I’m sworn to defend. The op which is said to have sparked this response looks to me to have been point attack on a reasonably senior level of Hezbollah leadership. We may be looking at a situation where Iran really had to do something to keep their credibility with Hezbollah leadership (if this entered Iranian thinking at all – I could easily see them doing this simply to increase the daylight between the Israelis and Americans and make the areas of strategic misalignment more obvious).
I think at least some of this could come down to what the exact nature of the shared experiences between the new generations of personalities has tended to be. Were they bravely fighting shoulder to shoulder in support of a shared goal or was it cold exchange calculations? No idea, but I think we can assume that there’s more stress in the relationship, with both parties being forced to prioritize their individual interests than there was.
Feral Finster
@PLG:
Plattner will be made to lose and AIPAC will make this point very publicly. Team D also has a variety of methods of funneling money to Team D candidates who publicly pledge not to take AIPAC money.*
https://www.dropsitenews.com/p/aipac-connie-chan-san-francisco-primary
@Mark Level:
I suspect that the Trump nuclear story was intended to throw a scare into Iran. We have seen no evidence of the Pentagon brass refusing orders in what is obviously a war of aggression.
@ Mago
It’s not just T and N, it’s the entire political class. Trump and Netanyahu are simply more brazen in their sociopathy, because they can be.
*tax title and license not included. Some assembly required. Batteries not included. Your parents put it together.
Mark Level
Feral Finster, a correction to your correction. We have seen many, many firings, these are Deep State Assets who want to draw inside the lines, and not outside them for the Trump Cult. When Hegseth started the first targeted killings from the skies in the Caribbean, the Naval Chief, with 25 years experience, resigned proactively, didn’t want to face future justice. The story could be a plant, I’ll admit, one never knows ‘coz 99% or more of everything from the Elite Class is lies, obviously.
Mark Kelley, who I don’t greatly admire, with others cautioned service members that per Military Law they do not have to obey orders to, e.g., commit War Crimes. (I admire that single act, but not Kelley.) TrumpCo went after him hard for that, tried to cut his retirement pay and classification, but stymied by the higher-ups, too illegal to do.
Our disagreement may be a moot point now anyway. 4-5 days back it came out Iran has warned US it has Nuke(s), likely purchased from N. Korea or Pakistan. These people aren’t gonna bare their populace’s necks for mass Nuking or genocide, the Zionists have Gaza, Southern Lebanon, the West Bank, etc. for that. They’re not going there, Khamenai is gone, stronger leadership now.
different clue
Here is a conditional if/then prediction. And the “if” is a very unlikely “if”, but if the unlikely “if” actually happens, then the “then” is almost certain to occur.
So I predict that ” IF!” Election 2026 and then Election 2028 bring into overwhelming power the sort of Democrats who will use government to charge and try the plausibly prosecutable bad actors like Hegseth for War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity, ” THEN!” the good people at Naked Capitalism will accuse those Democrats in power of “weaponization” ” Lawfare” and “TDS”. I feel sure of it.
Feral Finster
@Mark: even if we take the firings and their rationale as granted- it works. Any military resistance has been neutered.
Iran doesn’t have The Bomb, unfortunately. The ultimate source of those rumors is Pepe Escobar, a serial fantasist. The alt-media Luke Harding.
Remember the breathy rumors of oreshniks in Venezuela, Chinese aid, Russian subs, etc.? All wishful thinking and fantasy.
Mark Level
I disagree with you viz Escobar, Feral, but time will tell which of us is right. He’s far from the only journalist or pundit to share this. At this point the Iranian Leadership would be insane NOT to take such a basic precaution. Some days back Nima had a guest on, last name is Allen, a Southern white guy, gotta be in his 70s and looks a lot like a bigger, healthier Jimmy Carter, has a very mordant laugh at the world’s follies, (mordant from Latin and Spanish, “biting”, v. is morder, “la mordida” a bribe the poor forced to pay when I was younger in Mexico). Name Something Paul Allen?
In any case, he was agreeing with you, he said it seems like Putin “doesn’t want to win the War,” too much the lawyerly gentleman (a point Gilbert Doctorow has been making for some time), he said the Iranians were stupid to have pussied out (my term) and NOT gone all in when the Chinese pressured them for a Cease Fire, Destroy the Zionist Entity, Bomb it to the subsoil, would Bibi and the other monsters do anything les? I had to 100% agree with him, viz both points. Putin has gone “soft” in his old age, it happens to many. Wants to reintegrate with Europe?!! To what potential benefit?
Anyway, had to answer Finster but main reason for additional comment today was this thorough reveal of how after 1914, JP Morgan called in the Brits’ fantastical War Debts (which never got fully settled), Perfidious Albion played their typical dishonest game, gave promises of their Conquered Land to 4 different parties, biggest lie was to T.E. Lawrence’s Arab Allies, he’d let Palestine stay Arab and Muslim. Promise kept only to the Khazar Zionist Ashkenazis, now literal Nazis, and thus years of Nakba, genocide, land theft etc.
Very good scholarship, he is, they are dispassionate and includes all the facts. I will be looking at this podcast in the future, well worth watching: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35SygAiylHw
Uncover History; indeed what’s under the topsoil (corpses) or the sheets? Don’t be afraid to look.