John J. Mearsheimer

John Mearsheimer, political scientist at the University of Chicago specialising in international relations, talked about the ongoing Gaza war and the fighting between Israel and Iran between 1 April and 19 April 2024.
M. speaks clearly and concisely. Unlike politicians who practically all have a - mostly hidden - agenda he argues rationally and realistically.

About the Gaza war:
Todays 'Greater Israel' includes all "land between the River and the Sea": Israel before the 1967 war plus the West Bank plus Gaza inhabited by ca. 7.3M Palestinians and 7.3M Israeli Jews. In principle Israeli governments has/had four options to deal with this situation:

1. a democratic Greater Israel with equal rights for all: with ethnic populations now equal in size, Israel would no longer be a "Jewish-state"; this would be totally unacceptable for Israeli Jews;
2. a two-state solution: successive Israeli governments were adamantly opposed to a two-state solution. This option was systematically destroyed by encouraging colonisation of the West Bank; it had been dead for years. The US is fantasising when still advocating it.
3. an apartheid state: this is the present state of Israel with Gaza as an 'open prison';
4. ethnic cleansing of Gaza: killing and expulsions of the Palestinians and destroying the infra-structure and housing to make Gaza unliveable in; Israels assault on Gaza with the support of the US now constitutes genocide: https://www.un.org/unispal/document/anatomy-of-a-genocide-report-of-the-special-...

According to Mearsheimer and many others, Israel will not achieve its objective in destroying Hamas (which in fact Israel had supported so as to weaken the PLO) and has not so far been able to ethnically clean Gaza. They are stuck and in trouble.
M. does not mention that the IDF ignored ample warnings of an imminent Hamas attack and why and by whom the decision was taken not to act on the information. A convincing answer may never be established, so the suspicion remains that the Netanyahu government decided not to act so as to get the US backing for a major Gaza assault and ethnic cleansing of Gaza.

As to Iran versus Israel and the US:
Unlike Israel neither the US nor Iran wanted the up to then shadow war to escalate after the Israeli attack against the Iranian consulate in Damascus on 1st April 24. So the US and Iran worked together through intermediators to make sure that the Iranian reprisal on the 14th caused limited damage with the defence coordinated by the US and Israeli allies.
Consequences: Israelis are stuck in Gaza without solution, Israels deterrence weakened, surrounded by adversaries with increasing military capabilities; finally Israel has become a pariah-state in the eyes of an increasing number of people in the US and Europe.
Conclusion: the situation in the near East has fundamentally changed before and after October 7th . (V-24)… (más)