The most rational and stable country in the middle east at the moment would possibly be Jordan, but:
1 - would they want to be used as someone else’s pawn in that way?
2 - Do they even have any interest in being the regions’ counterweight to Israel. They have had a fairly respectful relationship with Israel since the peace treaty in the 90’s
3 - Israel appears to like having Jordan as one of their go-to peace negotiators with the rest of the region. It seems as if that is one of the stronger more dependable diplomatic relationships that Israel has.
2 Likes
Good call. Jordan is a very small country, although Israel is admittedly also a very small country. There are a lot of Palestinians in Jordan, so that would be interesting.
Otherwise, maybe it should be Turkey. I don’t like Erdogan policies at all, but they are one of the traditional heavyweights in the Middle East anyway. They are in the NATO pact, but also a muslim country.
Turkey would possibly be a good shout under a different leader. But I suspect Erdogan would be the sticking point as Armenia, the Kurds and Syria would reject that possibility with him in charge.
The other issue is how much clout does Turkey have with Iran, Saudi and the gulf states compared to the Mediterainan side of the Midddle East?
Jordan is possibly the weakest country, in all possible ways, in the region.
Their economy is weak. Their king/government is dependent on the Army and the tribal chiefs for survival. It’s their weakness and the resultant dependence on US which made them normalize ties with Israel.
1 Like
I knew their economy wasn’t as strong as a number of other states but was not aware their military and the tribal chiefs held so much sway
1 Like
True, they are weak since they were squarely beaten by Israel in the 1970s. The US have done everything to keep them weak since, so the idea that they could eventually get the atomic bomb is a pipedream of course. I found it still a seducing idea, mind…
Lebanon is even weaker than Jordan though. The poor buggers, they can’t catch a break… 
1 Like
A Muslim country has nukes. Pakistan. It won’t work out.
1 Like
A large scale Israeli Preemtive attack is ongoing. This is large scale.
https://x.com/manniefabian/status/1827534030524576195
Hezbollah firing back. This is not a minor clash, but I will go to bed (I think).
https://x.com/JoeTruzman/status/1827527478380011750
https://x.com/no_itsmyturn/status/1827535721327907143
https://x.com/no_itsmyturn/status/1827540444315537408
https://x.com/academic_la/status/1827537394209583143
https://x.com/no_itsmyturn/status/1827544066231243211
https://x.com/InstaNewsAlerts/status/1827546971319447757
1 Like
1 Like
“We are seeing a catastrophic health crisis unfolding in front of our eyes," said Lama Abdul Samad, a water and sanitation expert at Oxfam.
“Polio is a waterborne disease and it is directly linked to the sanitation situation.”
“The sanitation infrastructure has been damaged severely to the point that it is flooding the streets and the neighbourhoods, and people are basically living adjacent to puddles of sewage," she added.
Aid agencies say doctors in Gaza are also struggling to treat a huge caseload of dysentery, pneumonia, and severe skin diseases because of the collapse of the health sector.
“The reason behind the spread of these bacterial diseases is the complete lack of a sanitation system,” paediatric consultant Dr Ahmed al-Farra explained.
He said the problems included the “mixing of clean ground water and sewage, the severe overpopulation, the extreme heat, the lack of ventilation, the overpopulated tents, [and] the oversharing of toilets”.
The UN estimates the vast majority of Gaza’s 2.3 million people have been internally displaced since last autumn.
Many people are living in shelters with just one toilet for 600 people, a World Health Organization official told reporters in July.
On 7 October, Hamas launched unprecedented assault on Israel, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken back to Gaza as hostages.
Since the attack, the Israeli military operation in Gaza has killed more than 40,200 Palestinians, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.
Reuters
The heat and water crisis has led to an outbreak of skin infections, particularly among children
4 Likes
First case of Polio detected in 44 years 
5 Likes
That’s almost certainly from bad sanitation. TBH, I can barely work out how anyone is still alive.
5 Likes
I read a news on AJ yesterday that UN/UNRAW has managed to bring in 500 portable toilets, after six months.
2 Likes
Those they can’t kill with bombs they will kill by disease. This isn’t accidental , it’s a part of the overall strategy of making the entire Strip uninhabitable.
3 Likes
But you can’t say “genocide”.
2 Likes
is it spelled holocaust ?
1 Like
No, that’s the point. Here:
An eschatological Right-wing cult now holds the majority in cabinet – and wields a vigilante militia ready to attack the military establishment, and the Israeli state. No one was arrested for the attack and take-over of the two bases. They do not dare.
Moshe “Bogie” Ya’alon, former Chief of Staff of the IDF, who also served as Israel’s Defence Minister, had this to say in a video interview on the forces taking over in Israel:
When you talk about Smotrich and Ben Gvir: They have a Rabbi. His name is Dov Lior. He is the Rabbi of the Jewish Underground, who intended to blow up the Dome of the Rock – and before that the buses in Jerusalem. Why? In order to hurry up the ‘Last War’. Do you [not] hear them talking in terms of the Last War; or of Smotrich’s concept of ‘subjugation’? Read the article he published in Shiloh in 2017. First of all, this concept rests on Jewish supremacy: Mein Kampf in reverse”.
My hair stands on end when I say that – as he said it. I learned and grew up in the house of Holocaust survivors and ‘never again’. It is Mein Kampf in reverse: Jewish supremacy: and therefore [Smotrich] says: “My wife won’t go into a room with an Arab”. It is anchored in ideology. And then actually what he aspires to – as soon as possible – is to go to a big war. A war of Gog and Magog. How do you start the flames? A massacre like the [1994] Cave of the Patriarchs? Baruch Goldstein is a student of this Rabbi. Ben Gvir has hung up Goldstein’s picture [in his house]”.
This is what goes into the decision-making process in the Israeli government”.
5 Likes