Ian Garner
“Europe has spent more time discussing, making statements, and making calls than actually putting its money where its mouth is and stepping up to give concrete support to Ukraine or to pursue any other policy of its own choosing. Everybody is technically on the same page. The problem is when you actually look at finer details of the plans, everybody disagrees. All these European leaders are still trapped in potential maybes. Nobody has come up with a cohesive, comprehensive, and collaborative plan to say, 'Here's what we would actually be willing to definitely do.' And so, of course, Trump, Putin, and even Zelenskyy don't take Europe seriously.”
16 hours ago
Majda Ruge
“There seems to be a group of EU countries who are clear that they are not going to be part of a poorly designed and hasty Trump deal, and who are focused on continuing their support to Ukraine.”
16 hours ago
Abdulaziz Alghashian
“Many people are preparing themselves for something very negative on the horizon in regards to the ongoing yet fragile Gaza ceasefire. I think they sense that Netanyahu is someone who's really confident, especially after leaving Washington [and] getting a great deal of support from the White House for his dream of pushing people out of Palestine. The emboldened Israeli prime minister might, at some point, try to draw the United States into attacking Iranian nuclear facilities. Netanyahu is trying to create a great deal of instability so he could prolong his political career.”
16 hours ago
Ian Garner
“Europe has spent more time discussing, making statements, and making calls than actually putting its money where its mouth is and stepping up to give concrete support to Ukraine or to pursue any other policy of its own choosing. Everybody is technically on the same page. The problem is when you actually look at finer details of the plans, everybody disagrees. All these European leaders are still trapped in potential maybes. Nobody has come up with a cohesive, comprehensive, and collaborative plan to say, 'Here's what we would actually be willing to definitely do.' And so, of course, Trump, Putin, and even Zelenskyy don't take Europe seriously.”
16 hours ago
Majda Ruge
“There seems to be a group of EU countries who are clear that they are not going to be part of a poorly designed and hasty Trump deal, and who are focused on continuing their support to Ukraine.”
16 hours ago
Abdulaziz Alghashian
“Many people are preparing themselves for something very negative on the horizon in regards to the ongoing yet fragile Gaza ceasefire. I think they sense that Netanyahu is someone who's really confident, especially after leaving Washington [and] getting a great deal of support from the White House for his dream of pushing people out of Palestine. The emboldened Israeli prime minister might, at some point, try to draw the United States into attacking Iranian nuclear facilities. Netanyahu is trying to create a great deal of instability so he could prolong his political career.”
16 hours ago
“Rebuilding Syria is going to be impossible without the participation and help of regional and international donors and stakeholders: not just the economy, but also the Syrian military, because there is no country with sovereignty that does not have security. But for that to happen, the new transitional government must open up quickly to the other parts of the opposition and the other parts of Syrian society and must build bridges. Take the example of Turkiye - we all know that Turkiye came out more influential in Syria and Iran came out weaker. But Turkiye could play a major role as a neighbour, not as a dominant power. That's why I think the next government in Syria will have to deploy its security forces up to the Turkish border, there's no doubt about that. There should be no Turks, no Americans, no Israelis - no one - bombing or taking control of territory in Syria.”
“Israel believes that it can get away with the assaults it is carrying out in the region. Many of the Israeli ministers in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government perceive parts of Syria, Jordan and Lebanon as being parts of the 'greater Israel' that they were promised. They take advantage of each and every pretext, of each and every opportunity in order to expand that territory. It is something that they have their eye on, and they will continually expand, and take advantage of weaknesses around them.”
“After 60 years, more than six decades of dictatorship and repression, it's certainly earth-shattering the way everything fell apart in a dozen days. This has been long in the making. The regime, while maintaining the appearances of bravado and an attempt at confidence, turned out to be so empty - such an empty shell, it's beyond belief. If you want a bit of honesty, none of us, no one, no one that I know, expected the regime to fall so fast that the contagion would be within days and the breakdown within hours - that the fall of Damascus would come after those two decades of horrors and fears that the al-Assad regime instilled in people.”
“The war in Lebanon is becoming more costly to Israel, which may be looking to draw the conflict to a close by obtaining security guarantees in southern Lebanon. Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said earlier that there had been certain progress” in talks about a ceasefire in Lebanon, but Hezbollah said it hadn't received any peace proposal yet. What they mean is that in the talks with the United States and others, perhaps the Lebanese government, there were some steps forward but nothing that can yet be presented to Hezbollah. In the process of dividing and occupying the Gaza Strip, the big prize for Israel is not Gaza. It's the West Bank. The appointment of Yechiel Leiter, who lives in the Gush Etzion settlement, as the next Israeli ambassador to the US signals the Netanyahu government intends to work with President-elect Donald Trump to expand Israeli settlements. Netanyahu is dreaming of the West Bank, and he could even barter some sort of agreement in Gaza in exchange.”
“I think it's going to be unprecedented in American electoral history, in American presidency. I think we are at a turning point that we haven't seen except a few times in American history. There is a newly changed America, an America that has decided that it wants to break with the past, break with the liberal past. Because if you notice, Trump ran on an agenda that is both nationalistic, ultra-nationalistic, and anti-liberal, in every possible way anti-liberal. We really need to address the fact that Americans in general and independents in particular are no longer happy with liberal Democrats of the East Coast and West Coast. That California and New York will no longer be the dominant political establishment in the United States. That the heart of America, as it were, if you see it in the map, all that red part of America, the hinterland, the America profound, as it were, this is going to rule and govern through Trump. And this America is illiberal to a large degree, it is somewhat conservative, and it's certainly very resistant and very resentful of the liberal elites in New York and California.”
“With the US, Egypt and Qatar involved in the negotiations, there is a chance for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to get something more today than what he would have gotten back in June. It is unclear if negotiations would result in a deal this time. The continuation of the war is important to Netanyahu politically and personally.”
“Netanyahu and his government's appetite for violence grows with war. … They don't get enough of it. In the wake of the successful assassinations carried out by Israel in recent months - Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah - the war has expanded. And now with the killing of Sinwar, the war will continue to expand and deepen and become even more violent.”
“If you observe the correlation between what is happening in Palestine and what's happening with the cause of Palestine around the world, you will notice that the better it gets for the cause in terms of popular movements, and government recognition, the worse it gets for Palestine. Israeli aggression, bolstered by the United States, has been so severe that the rise in popular support and official recognition has yet to yield significant improvements. And that's a horrific fact in international relations. The fact that the entire international community, the United Nations, recognise the Palestinian right to self-determination in their own homeland, while Israel and the United States continue to deny them that.”
“Hezbollah losing contact with its leader Hashem Safieddine shows that Israel is able to deliver one blow after another to the group. It is also significant that it proves there is an intelligence breach when it comes to Hezbollah, allowing Israel to locate and attack one leader after another. From the rigging and detonating of communication devices and the assassination of one Hezbollah leader to another, all the way to Hassan Nasrallah and now apparently his successor, underlines that either Israel is getting help or it has infiltrated Hezbollah in various ways digitally, electronically or perhaps with human resources.”
“The fascists and the fanatics of the Israeli government that have been carrying out the genocide in Gaza this past year, and that are responsible for expanding that war against the people in Gaza and later on against the people of the West Bank, are the ones who are expanding the war against Lebanon and beyond. Instead of finishing up with one war, accepting a ceasefire, they decided that they're going to start another war. The world, the so-called international community, including the 'Western world' community, is seeing more and more that this Israeli government is simply mad. It's actually going crazy. It's totally apocalyptical.”
“While his speech centred around Israel's right to defend itself, the UNGA resolution, backed by an advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), made it clear that Palestinians have the right to resist their occupiers. Israel has no right to defend its occupation and dispossession of a majority of Palestinians that continue to live in refugee camps for eight decades. Israel claims to be defending itself when in fact it is defending its racism and its system of apartheid. The US administration gave Israel the green light to use self-defence as a rationale by drawing a parallel between Hamas's October 7 attack and Russia's invasion of Ukraine. It then went on to shield it, to arm it, to finance it and to defend it at the United Nations and that's why we need to remember that Netanyahu has the arrogance to come to the UN and lecture the world, because the US supports him, a war criminal.”
“The first half of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's speech at the UN General Assembly was quite argumentative, calling out the US for refusing a permanent ceasefire earlier in the war on Gaza, refusing to recognise the state of Palestine, and turning a blind eye to Israeli aggression. However, overall Abbas seems to me like a statesman who never changed. For the past 50 years, he's been repeating the same arguments, making the same points - again and again. Over the past year, as Israel was carrying out its genocide in Gaza and its war crimes in the occupied West Bank, Abbas has been missing in action. With the exception of a few appearances here and there and international forums, Abbas is nowhere to be seen in Palestine, speaking on behalf of or defending the people of Gaza. While Abbas offers strong arguments against occupation and apartheid, he is still making the same gestures towards Israel, speaking about peace and security.”
“One of the top goals of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government in its attacks on Lebanon is to make people forget about Israel's failures in Gaza. Although it destroyed most of Gaza and killed thousands of children, destroyed families, destroyed schools and hospitals, it is yet to be able to bring back its captives from Gaza nor destroy Hamas - two of its main objectives. The Israeli government has failed to fulfill its promise about allowing its northern residents to go back to their homes because of the clashes in the northern front. The attacks on Lebanon have something to do with October 7 and the failures of Netanyahu's government to prevent the Hamas-led attacks. To make people forget about that. I think he's launching another war.”
“The main obstacle to reaching a ceasefire deal is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's latest insistence of keeping the military in Gaza after the ceasefire. The Palestinians and even the mediators are not going to accept Israel directly reoccupying Gaza by having troops deployed in various parts. We are at a fateful crossroads. Either we turn towards a ceasefire in the next few days … or we can have a wider regional war. We will have more escalation of violence in Gaza, in Lebanon and potentially throughout the region because Israel does not have an alternative strategy. Israel has no exit plan.”
“The United States's bridging proposal has turned out to be a betrayal of their own role as mediators. It's not like they have been honest brokers but they had to maintain some form of appearance of objectivity so that the process would be credible and they could get away with whatever they could. Hamas once again finds itself being cornered. It's once again being trapped, and it's mostly because of the US, because we know where Israel has been throughout this process. They're against a permanent ceasefire. Every time Hamas made concessions and accepted another American diktat, the Israelis added new conditions, forcing the Palestinians to accept more concessions. But at this point in time, after so many concessions have been made, the whole point of a ceasefire is no longer there. What we're really talking about now is a pause, whereby Israel's captives are released and Israel resumes the war whenever it wishes.”
“Where there is a will there is a way, but there is no will on the part of the European governments to go far from what the American position is. Most European powers since the war in Ukraine have been playing the role of a client of the United States than independent powers of their own, and the same goes with the situation in Gaza. There is some meagre change from the British government like resuming funding to UNRWA that is welcome, but that is nothing compared to continuingwar on Gaza. The first step new UK Foreign Minister David Lammy took was to go to Israel and have a photo-op with the criminal prime minister there. Apparently, a British foreign minister needs to get the blessing of the prime minister of a country that is basically on trial for genocide and a prime minister that is being prosecuted by the top prosecutor of the International Criminal Court for war crimes. But the UK and other European countries have been quick to warn their citizens to evacuate Lebanon and other countries as Iran and its axis of forces are preparing to launch retaliatory attacks on Israel. Whenever they make a serious move, it's when there's a security issue threatening their own nationals.”
“The assassination of Hamas's Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran and Hezbollah's Fuad Shukr in Beirut underscores Israel's impressive intelligence-gathering efforts in those countries. Israel has achieved a major intelligence and tactical victory against Iran and against Hezbollah. The intelligence gathering necessary for such an operation is a testimony to Israel's capacity for strategic strikes.”
“He [Blinken] said the two proposals are virtually the same. But I will name you two important differences: One is that the Hamas proposal calls for the end of Israel's siege; the proposal outlined by the US does not. What's the point of this war or the past 20 years of four wars against Gaza if we're going to go back to square one where Israel imposes a siege on Gaza? So the Hamas proposal suggested ending the Israeli siege on Gaza. This new proposal does not. Two, there's the key difference between a permanent and temporary ceasefire. This proposal speaks of a temporary ceasefire. Hamas presented a permanent ceasefire. The difference lies in phase two, which says that Israel will withdraw from the Gaza Strip upon the agreement of the parties - which means Israel will have to agree. And there's every proof and demonstration that Israel does not want to end the war, and it keeps saying that this resolution will allow it to achieve its war objectives.”
“Something incredibly important is happening in the world today. Israel is getting a beating around the world, while Palestine is getting a beating in the Middle East. Palestine the cause - whether it's at the United Nations or Western capitals or university campuses - is certainly gaining ground.”
“Once again, the US's veto demonstrated a policy of it's my way or the highway. Palestine could only be a country the way the United States sees it, or Israel sees it, only at the time that it's suitable to the United States and within the geopolitics and the global interest of the United States. The US is sacrificing the freedom of Palestinian people for egotistical and narrow interests of the United States and Israel.”