IMRA Middle East News Updates

Weekly Commentary: In our neighborhood you talk with your hands

Thu, 17 Jul 2025 08:35:02 -0400

Weekly Commentary: In our neighborhood you talk with your hands
Dr. Aaron Lerner 17 July 2025

I read the following line and rolled over laughing:

"...U.S. President Donald Trump is working to advance coordination
agreements between Israel and Syria and seeks normalization between them. An
Israeli war against Al-Sharaa's regime, even if aimed at protecting the
Druze minority in Syria, does not align with those ambitions."
Zvi Barel (Middle East affairs analyst) - No Plan - Haaretz front page
print edition 17 July 2025

This is the Middle East.

We talk with our hands.

Ahmed al-Sharaa didn't tell his troops to stop participating in the
slaughter of Druze because of a friendly telephone call from someone in the
Trump team.

He did it because we started to bomb key locations in Damascus - including
some broadcast live on Syrian TV.

He heard us when we talked with our hands.

We are also talking all the time in Lebanon.

I daresay that if our "conversation" with Hamas had not been handicapped by
a curious morality that makes the hostages more important than the lives of
many hundreds of soldiers and possibly thousands of civilian lives in the
future, that the Gaza challenge would already be behind us.

And that's really the point.

If we succumb to talking western style when we face a security challenge in
our neighborhood, we will fail.

Our relationship with former and possibly current and future terrorist Ahmed
al-Sharaa isn't hurt by our talking with our hands. Its enhanced.

I don't know if one day President Trump's dream that Syria joins the
Abraham Accords will come true. But if such an event is to be more than a
photo op for a presidential scrapbook, it is critical that the leader of
Syria is convinced that we are not Westerners who can be impressed by nice
clothing and remarks crafted by high priced PR firms.

Ehud Barak was right. Our neighborhood is a jungle. And in a jungle you
need, when needed, to talk with your hands.

________________________________________
IMRA - Independent Media Review and Analysis

Since 1992 providing news and analysis on the Middle East with a focus on
Arab-Israeli relations

Website: www.imra.org.il

Weekly Commentary: Cut The Cr*p - Hamas Never Agreed & Never Will Agree To Disarm

Fri, 11 Jul 2025 12:32:06 -0400

Weekly Commentary: Cut The Cr*p - Hamas Never Agreed & Never Will Agree To
Disarm
Dr. Aaron Lerner 11 July 2025

New Flash! Formal COS Gadi Eisenkot was just featured on the 18:00 news
bulletin of Kan Radio for this posting on his Facebook page (original in
Hebrew)

Netanyahu - stop the total blurring.
On 27/5/24 you brought to the war cabinet an agreement that was approved
unanimously and in it were four principles: exchange of hostages for
prisoners, permanent ceasefire, withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, and
rehabilitation of the Strip in exchange for demilitarization.
Since then, a series of excuses led to the blurring of deals that cost the
blood of hostages and fighters.
Two chiefs of staff informed you in a long series of cabinet meetings that
the conditions for returning the hostages had been met.
Political and personal considerations prevented the deal; the Hamas
organization, which defines as its vision the destruction of Israel, will be
defeated in every way.
A government that is afraid to make a necessary decision is not worthy to
lead this people.

Oops!

"in exchange for demilitarization"

A flying pig condition.

Hamas has never agreed to lay down their arms.

Demilitarization of the Gaza Strip by agreement was a dead letter from day
one.

And yet the Israeli public is continually bombarded with this cr*p that
political considerations are keeping 20 live and 30 dead hostages stuck in
the Gaza Strip.

Its anything but a political consideration that Hamas can't remain an armed
force in the Gaza Strip.

Yesterday Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu met with some of the hostage
families in Washington and had both the guts and the decency to tell them
the truth: that if Hamas won't agree to a demilitarized Gaza Strip that we
will use our full military power to demilitarize the Gaza Strip ourselves.

Shame on Eisenkot for posting this BS.

Shame on Reshet Bet for featuring it.

Sure, it would be fantastic if there was a real "deal" out there which
provided for the demilitarization of the Gaza Strip by peaceful means.

But like many other fantasies presented to us over the years since the start
of the Oslo debacle, this pig also will never fly.

________________________________________
IMRA - Independent Media Review and Analysis

Since 1992 providing news and analysis on the Middle East with a focus on
Arab-Israeli relations

Website: www.imra.org.il

Weekly Commentary: Temple Mount Movement Thwarted The Boiling Frog Plot

Thu, 03 Jul 2025 17:12:45 -0400

Weekly Commentary: Temple Mount Movement Thwarted The Boiling Frog Plot
Dr. Aaron Lerner 3 July 2025

#1 If not for Jewish activity on the Temple Mount, Sinwar would have followed the recommendation of Hamas intelligence and the Hamas invasion would have taken place under dramatically more devastating circumstances in coordination with Hezbollah and Iran.

#2. If not for the developments which followed in Lebanon, Iran's pace of weaponization would have remained at a level which would not have drawn an Israeli response.

It is said that If you put a frog into a pot of boiling water, it will immediately leap out. But if you put a frog into cold water and gradually raise the temperature, it will stay there until it is boiled alive.

That aptly describes our situation before 7 October 7 2024.

Iran was progressing at a pace in its nuclear weapons program as well as ballistic missiles production program which, in the view of decision makers, did not justify radical action.

While we were aware that Hezbollah continued to build up its massive stores of guided missiles and rockets as well as preparations to invade, those guided missiles and rockets effectively deterred us from confronting these challenges. We frequently bombed inside Syria but the moment weapons crossed into Lebanon they safe.

As for the Gaza Strip, we found it convenient to ignore the ongoing, large scale, preparations of Hamas.

So what went wrong with what was essentially a boiling frog plot?

Haniyah and the Temple Mount.

The Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center recently published details of the July 2023 Hamas intelligence report whose main recommendation was not to initiate a military confrontation but rather to wait for the crisis inside Israel to worsen.

Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar was intimately familiar with Israel

The intelligence report didn't tell him something he wasn't aware of.

But Sinwar was also a religious fanatic.

And as a fanatic, the ever-increasing Jewish activity on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem blew his fuses.

So instead of following the recommendations of Hamas intelligence, Hamas, without proper coordination with either Iran or Hezbollah, invaded Israel.

Hezbollah, instead of invading with full force at the same moment, engaged in a prolonged and ever-increasing series of tit for tat.

And Iran basically remained at the sidelines.

As a message to an intransigent Hamas leadership, Israel assassinated Ismail Haniyeh on 31 July 2024 in Teheran.

Iran didn't budge.

And most of both the Israeli defense establishment and political leadership wanted to remain in the pot, hoping that the tit for tat would resolve itself.

So much so that in early September 2024, most of the Israeli defense establishment and political leadership advocated forfeiting the exploding beeper/walkie talkie project when Hamas began to detect the devices.

On 17 September 2024 Prime Minister Netanyahu opted to support the Mossad's minority recommendation and the thousands of pagers detonated simultaneously.

This turning point ultimately led to killing Hezbollah’s Secretary‑General Hassan Nasrallah in a major airstrike on 27 September 2024.

It was only at this point that Iran directly entered the fray with a major missile attack against the Jewish State on 1 October 2024.

While Israel's 26 October 2024 on Iran showed impressive abilities this was by no means part of some master plan to remove the Iranian nuclear threat.

As Treasury Minister Smotrich, who participated in the secret planning of the war against Iran, explained in an interview in the 26 June 2025 edition of Makor Rishon:

###
"...somewhere in last November-December we begin to gather again for intensive discussions regarding Iran.

This happens because reliable intelligence arrives regarding two dimensions

- also in the nuclear (program), that Iran is approaching the bomb and begins to engage in weaponization, something that did not happen for many years.

Also in missiles - we understand very quickly that no less dangerous than the nuclear is Iran’s striving, which planned to triple its missile production rate from 100 per month to 300. That means 3,600 per year.

The meaning is that if we started the campaign now when Iran has about 2,500 missiles capable of reaching the State of Israel, in another two years it will have ten thousand. This would create a balance of terror and give it a protective umbrella to pursue the nuclear, because who can attack it when it has such a quantity of missiles.

After we saw what one such missile can cause, it is clear what the meaning could be of ten thousand missiles.

Within a year, it was clarified in those confidential discussions, Iran would already have 6,000 missiles, and an attack would be almost impossible.

Therefore, the time to act was pressing.

In November Trump won, and we understand that there is here a window of opportunity and begin to work in a very intensive way with the army."
###

Jewish activity on the Temple Mount didn't endanger Israel - it saved it.

________________________________________
IMRA - Independent Media Review and Analysis

Since 1992 providing news and analysis on the Middle East with a focus on Arab-Israeli relations

Website: www.imra.org.il

COS Zamir wrong to cite hostages to thwart victory

Tue, 01 Jul 2025 02:26:08 -0400

COS wrong to cite hostages to thwart victory
Dr. Aaron Lerner 1 July 2025

Chief of Staff Zamir warned the cabinet that deepening the ground maneuver and continuing the fighting in Gaza would endanger the hostages.

With all due respect, the mistake from the very first day of the war was that we tied the IDF’s hands by restricting operations in order to avoid harming the hostages.

What’s strange to me is that, as a nation, we long ago internalized that sometimes difficult, even cruel decisions must be made - that we are mature enough to understand that the fate of the nation takes precedence over the fate of specific individuals.

Moreover, the cabinet approved a war against Iran when it was expected that there could be hundreds, if not thousands, of Israeli civilian casualties, along with air crews that would not return.

So I truly wonder, after all that, how the Chief of Staff recites talking points as if it is legitimate to sacrifice the entire state for the sake of the hostages.
________________________________________
IMRA - Independent Media Review and Analysis

Since 1992 providing news and analysis on the Middle East with a focus on Arab-Israeli relations

Website: http://www.imra.org.il

Hamas insists remain in power and armed - Lapid complains why no deal

Mon, 30 Jun 2025 05:34:16 -0400

Reality check: Hamas insists remain in power and armed - Lapid complains why
no deal
Dr. Aaron Lerner 30 June 2025

Reshet Bet 09:00 news bulletin features Mk Lapid attacking the government
for not making a deal with Hamas to end the war and release the hostages
followed by report of Hamas leader who states that Hamas insists that Hamas
remain in power in Gaza with their weapons.

https://youtu.be/cupg1VIcRjo

________________________________________
IMRA - Independent Media Review and Analysis

Since 1992 providing news and analysis on the Middle East with a focus on
Arab-Israeli relations

Website: www.imra.org.il

Weekly Commentary: Mr. Netanyahu - No Time For Games About Palestinian

Fri, 27 Jun 2025 12:50:48 -0400

Weekly Commentary: Mr. Netanyahu - No Time For Games About Palestinian State
Dr. Aaron Lerner 27 June 2025

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu knows that a sovereign Palestinian state
of any size would be a disaster.

He knows that once a sovereign state exists that it remains a sovereign
state even if it renounces whatever commitments it made to receive that
status.

And he knows that sovereignty can be exploited in terrible ways.

But I fear that Netanyahu may play poker with the sovereignty card.

Betting that he can make sure that it never happens.

But there are too many things which can go wrong.

Mr. Trump may press us in ways we were never pressed before if he believes
that creating a sovereign state is a necessary condition for reaching some
goal which he seeks in his term.

And there is no telling who the president will be after him.

Look at the surprise this week in New York.

Add to that: an Israeli leader after Netanyahu may have to deal with
pressure to come through with the promises Netanyahu made.

And let's be clear: any list of conditions we set will be met.

If we require that the sky is purple, we could have a world proclaiming it
is purple.

After all, the CIA continually signed off the PA was complying during the
early years of Oslo so that they could get USA funds.

And even if Mr. Netanyahu is certain he could always handle the challenge,
considering the disdain he has for the caliber of the other politicians
here, he most certainly doesn't think that anyone else could succeed.

So Mr. Netanyahu, please don't play games about Palestinian sovereignty.

Let's keep this card out of the game.

________________________________________
IMRA - Independent Media Review and Analysis

Since 1992 providing news and analysis on the Middle East with a focus on
Arab-Israeli relations

Website: www.imra.org.il