Thread by @sfrantzman

There should be a kind of "alternate history" article(s) on how Iran and its proxies were empowered to grow exponentially in the region and it should include Israel's policies, which were ostensibly against Iran and the proxies...but explain how this ended up with Iran in an unprecedented and strong position on Israel's borders.

What I mean is the aphorism, when everyone is thinking the same thing, someone isn't thinking. It requires a critical reading of the history to explain the policies that enabled Hamas to become exponentially more powerful than it was 20 years ago.

And it requires some explanation why Israel's conception of strategy decided that having an increasingly powerful Hezbollah on the northern border, especially after the challenges of 2006...became "this is fine." Even as it became clear that Hezbollah was not deterred, but rather Israel was becoming deterred.

And then it requires a critical look at the Campaign Between the Wars...a campaign that was supposed to use the freedom of action enabled by the Syrian civil war to try to reduce Iran's entrenchment and Iran's exploitation of the power vacuum in Israel. Ten years of the campaign have not brought the success that might have been imagined.

The recent Iran-Israel tensions is evidence of this. Iran continued to entrench and Iran was NOT deterred in Syria, rather the whack-a-mole approach and "managing" and "precision" strikes...led Iran to assume it could just keep moving, like a slow moving freight train.

And then let's look at how Iran's militias in Iraq were openly empowered...and they increased threats on Israel with impunity. And the Houthis...a group that at one time was supposedly just fighting in Yemen...was put on steroids by Iran until it was openly threatening Israel and shipping with impunity.

And then it needs to look at Hamas, which was empowered and strengthened exponentially....going from being a murderous terror group to a terror army with 24 "battalions"...with officials admitting it "cannot be defeated" or that it will take "years to defeat"...YEARS...when Israel back in 1967 was defeating countries...but allowed a terror group that might take "years" to defeat to grow up a terror empire in Gaza.

This requires a more critical reading of the history of the 2012, 2014 and 2021 conflicts...questioning whether most of the assumptions about setting back Hamas "metro" were accurate at all.

It requires a big question about a policy or strategy or just slouching and sleep walking that thought "this is fine" to have two powerful Iranian-backed groups on two fronts of Israel...groups that apparently people now think will take years to be defeated or cannot be defeated...

We talk a lot about QME...Qualitative military edge...but how does that stack up...if quietly people know "well, Hamas can't be defeated fully"...or "it will take years"...when a 5th generation militiary takes six months of fighting in Gaza and still Hamas controls most of Gaza...then one must ask about the last 20 years.

And then this requires shedding light on the Palestinian Authority and the West Bank and the enabling of PIJ...let's go back and look at "Break the Wave" which began in 2022...did the wave break or grow? Isn't PIJ as powerful or more powerful today? Hasn't there been a flood of thousands of M-4/AR rifles to armed groups in the West Bank.

A few years ago when the IDF did raids in the West Bank it was a big deal if they found "Carlo" improvised weapons...now the terrorists are always caught with an arsenal of modern rifles, modern sights, and it's all obviously stolen...it's so obvious...but if anyone dared to say "let's track these rifles"...they got a shrug...like they got a shrug regarding Hamas and Hezbollah threats...and the Houthis and PMU...

Considering these facts...it's worth looking back at how this happened. I think we know part of the story. Part of it is a story of these groups acquiring more weapons and their capabilities being dismissed as not important...this was hubris.

But there is another story here. It's the story of how Iran exploited the regional chaos and Syrian civil war and war on ISIS and even exploited "maximum pressure" to grow its power massively since 2015, and especially since 2018.

This is a story also about how Ankara and Doha and others backed and hosted Hamas. How two western allies backed this terror group and everyone thought "this is fine" even as countries like Egypt, Saudi, the UAE and others turned against the MB...the fact is that Hamas became massively more powerful.

How did the Hamas power begin? It began with the international community shrugging when it took over Gaza...and then partnering with it. It got a huge boost when it moved to Doha in 2012 and basically was indirectly backed by the West...remember 2012 when the MB came to power in Egypt also...this was a trend not an accident.

There is a narrative that sees Israel's position as strengthened greatly over the last two decades, with growing ties to countries like India and the Abraham Accords...and all of that is true...but I think one thing that was overlooked is that while Israel was focusing on "third circle" threats...the first circle became exponentially a larger threat...and this wasn't well understood.

I think the concept of "managing" the conflict has become incredibly problematic. When you think you're managing something but it grows much stronger...then it's not being managed. Israel's decision to "manage" isn't unique, a lot of countries try to manage things unsuccessfully, it's a product of some of the tendencies of the neo-liberal world order that dismissed threats like Russia and thought "this is fine" about everything.

A critical understanding of this is necessary if the next 20 years are going to be different in the region. So far Iran has been on the march