"The Israeli intelligence community still thinks Hezbollah is likely to attack first in retaliation for the assassination of its top military commander in Beirut and then Iran could join with a direct attack of its own." axios.com/2024/08/11/ira…

Months of obstruction and the best the Biden administration can do is a milquetoast threat to "publicly blame" Netanyahu. I'm sure he's just terrified at the prospect of being "called out" haaretz.com/israel-news/20…

Good rule of thumb: if you have to put out a defensive statement saying that your economy is strong and functioning well, your economy may not be strong and functioning well

After 240 hours of stories about how an attack will happen in the next 24 hours, it should be clear that no one knows the timing. Including, perhaps, Iran itself, which is nervous about knock-on effects and may prefer to wait for the outcome of Gaza ceasefire talks

There has been broad consensus for months, in Israel and Washington, that Netanyahu is laboring to block a Gaza ceasefire (and lying about it). Now there's documentary evidence that he is. And there's still no one willing to seriously challenge him on it nytimes.com/2024/08/13/wor…

"Random Palestinians have been used by Israeli army units in the Gaza Strip for one purpose: to serve as human shields for soldiers during operations. 'Our lives are more important than their lives,' soldiers were told." haaretz.com/israel-news/20…

The irony of the White House lifting its ban on bomb sales to Saudi Arabia in an effort to "woo Riyadh", at precisely the moment when Riyadh wants nothing to do with the conflict in Yemen or across the region wsj.com/world/middle-e…

"'Since [Shukr's] death, everyone has tried to pass messages to Hizbollah,' said a person involved in the diplomacy, 'but they hardly say anything in return. They've closed ranks.'" ft.com/content/593ba7…

"If the negotiations fail this time... the Israeli defense establishment believes the Biden administration may offer Israel and Hamas a yes-or-no proposition without further bargaining. In such a case, Netanyahu is likely to say no." haaretz.com/israel-news/20…

Trump wouldn't want to inherit the war as president, and he has a real grudge against Netanyahu, so I don't think it's totally implausible that he would tell the Israeli prime minister to take a ceasefire deal (and then try to take some credit if it works) axios.com/2024/08/15/tru…

An honest assessment of Iran's planned retaliation against Israel, from an unnamed American official: "We truly don't know if they will do it, when they will do it, and with what force they will do it. We don't have firm answers for all of that right now." wsj.com/world/middle-e…

"Everyone seems to agree it is time to stop the fighting, except for the two people who will have to sign off on it." wsj.com/world/middle-e…

'Duped' is too charitable, since it keeps happening: fool me once and all that. But the rest is true: "America has levers of power and pressure it chose not to use in the last 10 months. The next few days will indicate whether it is now ready to use them." haaretz.com/us-news/2024-0…

It's almost as if Pezeshkian's presidency is going to be tightly constrained by a supreme leader who wanted him as a fig leaf but has no intention of letting him make any significant reforms amwaj.media/article/exclus…

After some initial bluster, perhaps coming around to the belief that carrying out a direct strike against Israel would be falling into a trap: unlikely to impose deterrence or achieve other goals for Iran, and with a big risk of further escalation nytimes.com/2024/08/20/wor…

The Biden administration has not, in any meaningful way, "tried to use arms sales to pressure Israel". To say that it "didn't work" is like saying exercise doesn't work because you didn't lose ten kilos from a single jog around the block wsj.com/world/middle-e…

Netanyahu gambled that a long war would buy him time to revive his political fortunes, and that is exactly what has happened: for the first time since October 7th, both the Likud party and Netanyahu personally are leading in multiple polls. haaretz.com/israel-news/20…

"A Martian observing the relationship between the US and Israel might conclude that Israel was calling the shots. On the few occasions that Biden has hinted he might use America’s power to restrain Israel, he has felt obliged to climb down." ft.com/content/c430f0…