Do you think that this conflict is sufficiently similar to the Ukraine war that it can also be considered a proxy war that indicates/reveals the relative power/assertiveness of different geopolitical poles (e.g. the US and Russia/China)? e.g. to what extent Russia and possibly China provided military technology and logistical support via Iran that ended up being relevant to the conflict, even if they didn’t start this conflict itself?
Also, a more distant question I’ve had for a while, did Russia or China provide any kind of technological or logistical support to the major opposing parties of the War on Terror during the 2000s (e.g. the primary Iraq and Afghanistan insurgencies)? Also, before or after the conflict started is relevant.
It’s an Iranian proxy war, and Iran is allied with Russia, but Russia likely isn’t interested in this other than to the extent that it’s an international distraction from Ukraine.
And Russia provided military hardware to groups it supported in Syria, and many of those groups were adjacent to terrorist groups—but not materially more so than the US’s support of groups in Iraq and Afghanistan.
I slightly disagree with David here: Hamas representatives did thank some unnamed countries in addition to Iran in the last couple of days, which might hint to some Russian involvement and supply. However they don’t want to be publicly associated with all this, so I imagine it’s not too substantial.
I don’t know about the war on terror more than what David said, sorry. It’s a bit far from home, and I was young at the time and didn’t follow it closely.
What interests do you imagine Russia having here? Israel was pretty shy at supporting Ukraine, so from the Russian perspective, Israeli policy in the last years shouldn’t be seen as too bad.
There are many other countries that have motives.
There was a deal with the Egyptian military that in return for the US paying them off, they won’t support the Palestinians. It seems like the US stopped some of the payments in the last years “because of the country’s repressive policies”. It would be surprising if some in the Egyptian military think they don’t need to uphold their end of the deal in response.
The Israel/Saudi deals are hated by many Muslims in the region. There might be people in various Muslim countries including Saudi Arabia who would like that alliance to break up.
The Russian are now close Iranian allies, so it might have been some form of payment.
Could you point me to the exact deal? I’m not sure what you’re talking about. Also, Egypt had three different regimes since 2010, which all had different interests. We have reasonably good relations with the current one.
Sure. Qatar is one other obvious candidate, and there are probably other possibilities.
The Camp David Accords accords back in 1979 where Egypt and Israel signed a peace deal. They are the reason U.S. aid to Egypt was the second-largest recipient of U.S. aid after Israel.
The governments of Egypt changed three times since 2010 but military leadership didn’t.
First, the military allowed the government to fall and be replaced by a democratic one partly because the government didn’t do what the military wanted. Then, there was the Democratic government which also didn’t do what the military wanted and finally, the military took over.
When the military took over various groups pressured the US to reduce aid to Egypt. From the perspective of the Egyptian military that’s likely walking back on the agreements on which the peace between Egypt and Israel rests.
Oh, I see. I find it very unlikely. Such actions would border on casus beli, and it just doesn’t seem important enough to risk an actual war with Israel. The US sent ~$80B over the years, which is a bit less than $2B a year, which is 2% of Egypt’s government budget.
The peace with Israel is mainly based on mutual deterrence since the 1973 war, military aid from Israel and more. The US is not a major actor within it.
I would expect very public, very ulikely to escalate actions in order to increase US aid. Not something like this.
The entity that I’m talking about is the Egyptian military and not the Egyptian government.
It’s worth noting here that the Egyptian military is a bit different than a lot of other militaries and does things like olive oil production.
Oh, I see. I find it very unlikely. Such actions would border on casus beli, and it just doesn’t seem important enough to risk an actual war with Israel.
Directly funding Hamas would be a casus beli. On the other hand, there are actions like saying “because you cut the funding we unfortunately can’t afford border patrol at that point where there might be weapons going into Gaza, it’s too bad that we are stripped of cash...”
Do you think that this conflict is sufficiently similar to the Ukraine war that it can also be considered a proxy war that indicates/reveals the relative power/assertiveness of different geopolitical poles (e.g. the US and Russia/China)? e.g. to what extent Russia and possibly China provided military technology and logistical support via Iran that ended up being relevant to the conflict, even if they didn’t start this conflict itself?
Also, a more distant question I’ve had for a while, did Russia or China provide any kind of technological or logistical support to the major opposing parties of the War on Terror during the 2000s (e.g. the primary Iraq and Afghanistan insurgencies)? Also, before or after the conflict started is relevant.
It’s an Iranian proxy war, and Iran is allied with Russia, but Russia likely isn’t interested in this other than to the extent that it’s an international distraction from Ukraine.
And Russia provided military hardware to groups it supported in Syria, and many of those groups were adjacent to terrorist groups—but not materially more so than the US’s support of groups in Iraq and Afghanistan.
I slightly disagree with David here: Hamas representatives did thank some unnamed countries in addition to Iran in the last couple of days, which might hint to some Russian involvement and supply. However they don’t want to be publicly associated with all this, so I imagine it’s not too substantial.
I don’t know about the war on terror more than what David said, sorry. It’s a bit far from home, and I was young at the time and didn’t follow it closely.
What interests do you imagine Russia having here? Israel was pretty shy at supporting Ukraine, so from the Russian perspective, Israeli policy in the last years shouldn’t be seen as too bad.
There are many other countries that have motives.
There was a deal with the Egyptian military that in return for the US paying them off, they won’t support the Palestinians. It seems like the US stopped some of the payments in the last years “because of the country’s repressive policies”. It would be surprising if some in the Egyptian military think they don’t need to uphold their end of the deal in response.
The Israel/Saudi deals are hated by many Muslims in the region. There might be people in various Muslim countries including Saudi Arabia who would like that alliance to break up.
The Russian are now close Iranian allies, so it might have been some form of payment.
Could you point me to the exact deal? I’m not sure what you’re talking about. Also, Egypt had three different regimes since 2010, which all had different interests. We have reasonably good relations with the current one.
Sure. Qatar is one other obvious candidate, and there are probably other possibilities.
The Camp David Accords accords back in 1979 where Egypt and Israel signed a peace deal. They are the reason U.S. aid to Egypt was the second-largest recipient of U.S. aid after Israel.
The governments of Egypt changed three times since 2010 but military leadership didn’t.
First, the military allowed the government to fall and be replaced by a democratic one partly because the government didn’t do what the military wanted. Then, there was the Democratic government which also didn’t do what the military wanted and finally, the military took over.
When the military took over various groups pressured the US to reduce aid to Egypt. From the perspective of the Egyptian military that’s likely walking back on the agreements on which the peace between Egypt and Israel rests.
Oh, I see. I find it very unlikely. Such actions would border on casus beli, and it just doesn’t seem important enough to risk an actual war with Israel. The US sent ~$80B over the years, which is a bit less than $2B a year, which is 2% of Egypt’s government budget.
The peace with Israel is mainly based on mutual deterrence since the 1973 war, military aid from Israel and more. The US is not a major actor within it.
I would expect very public, very ulikely to escalate actions in order to increase US aid. Not something like this.
The entity that I’m talking about is the Egyptian military and not the Egyptian government.
It’s worth noting here that the Egyptian military is a bit different than a lot of other militaries and does things like olive oil production.
Directly funding Hamas would be a casus beli. On the other hand, there are actions like saying “because you cut the funding we unfortunately can’t afford border patrol at that point where there might be weapons going into Gaza, it’s too bad that we are stripped of cash...”
We are in agreement, then