Israel’s list of nearby enemies in the Middle East includes Iran, Hezbollah and the Houthis, in addition to its most obvious current enemy, Hamas. While some peace negotiators expressed guarded optimism regarding a deal that sets up Palestine as a sovereign nation using terms and borders agreed to back in 2002, it remains highly questionable whether either Israel or Hamas would accept such a deal in 2024. Both Israeli and Hamas officials expressed a conviction to continue fighting regardless of whatever offer is on the table.
Watch the video above as Straight Arrow News contributor Newt Gingrich walks through the various threats that Israel faces and how he thinks the United States should respond.
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The following is an excerpt of the above video:
The Middle East is in a very dangerous crossroads. On the one hand, there’s enormous pressure on Israel to accept the survival of Hamas, to look for some kind of “solution,” and I put that in quotes, for Gaza, and who recognize that Israel is surrounded by nearby enemies, the Houthi down in Yemen, Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, the forces of the Syrian dictatorship, and of course, the distant enemy around. And some would say that stopping the war against Hamas will somehow improve Israel’s position, that there will be some magic coalition come together, probably led by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates and they will police Gaza and make it safe for Israel.
On the other hand, none of the core problems of the region are being solved. Hezbollah is still in southern Lebanon, being funded, armed, trained by Iran. The Syrian dictatorship continues to be a puppet of the Iranians. The Houthis have cheerfully taken on the Saudis, the United Arab Emirates, and now the Americans and the British. They’ve been bombed over 23,000 times, and it’s had no real effect on them, so they continue to threaten the Red Sea, and they pose the threat of missiles coming from the south toward Israel. All of these things are still there, nothing has been changed.
What’s been added to it is a worldwide propaganda campaign, by the elements of Iran, and by the forces that favor Hamas, leading to huge demonstrations in the United States, in Great Britain and elsewhere, and leading to a desire, a desperation by Western politicians, whether in Germany, France, Britain, or the United States, to somehow get Israel to stop, to accept a truce, as though that truce would somehow be in the long run successful.
