The platonic ideal European politician

I'd guess the main target of this operation is still Lebanon. They're going to have another go at Hezbollah once they've consolidated their positions in Syria. Trying to take over Damascus at this time is pointless, they already seem to have the compliance of HTS.

The resistance knows better than us what is at stake and what an all-out war would look like. Although it almost certainly wouldn't entail less Palestinians dying.

i don't believe Iran has avoided getting weapons out of a faith in the west or flawed understanding of what they would do to protect them, but because other priorities have been more pressing in recent years

In that regard being close to having nukes already gives you much of the leverage of having them. Countries don't build nukes because they plan on actually using them. It's about the threat, which still exists to a large extent if you are close to getting the bomb. But without the cost of maintaining nukes.

Investing in missile and nuclear technology is worth it because that tech can be used for other applications. Actual nukes just sit in a warehouse until they have to be replaced.

If you have a blender, you can also throw a ton of oats + a bunch of peanut butter and a banana with some soy drink or whatever in there. It's all pretty affordable and easy to adjust to taste and caloric content.

The question has to be what Hezbollah going 'all in' would achieve. Will it stop the genocide of Palestinians? Or will it intensify if there's an all-out war?

At the end of the day, Israel is a nuclear state with full ideological support from the US. There is no scenario where the US stays on the sidelines if actual war breaks out. Yes, the axis of resistance could inflict massive damage to the US and Israel but the same can be said the other way around.

Imo the only way to end the genocide without spelling disaster for the whole region, is for Israeli society to become politically untenable. For the Zionist project to collapse in on itself. Atm, that goal is best pursued through anything up to, but not including, all-out war.

Let me save you the disappointment: they're not going to be coming up with any substantial plan for de-dollarization. Even if they did, it would take decades to negotiate the terms between their members.

A lot of these settlements have either contracters or the IDF directly providing security. So the idea that Hamas could have broken out of Gaza and just found all the soldiers neatly in their bases seems unbelievable. The IDF is an occupying force, not a European military where it's just some dudes with their thumbs up their asses in a barracks near some nature reserve.

Ultimately we can't know how Hamas leadership told their soldiers to behave. But they do have a clear incentives not to condone the killing of civilians: they want to capture hostages and use them as leverage. They need to create the expectation that these hostages are treated fairly and can be returned safely so that it is entirely up to Israel whether it wants those civilians to die.

Tragically, civilians always die in wars. Both sides always propagandise this to claim that it is the other side that is just killing civilians as policy. The facts however, are abundantly clear when it comes to the question of which side shows the greater disregard for civilian casualties.

I think this ignores the fact that Israel has nukes. Them actually using nukes would be disastrous for all sides of course. But it does create a situation where it is unlikely that Israel will back down due to threats of invasion by arab countries.

At this point I am becoming more skeptical of the idea that other countries will get involved directly. Hezbollah is the most likely candidate to act, but their relationships with Syria and Iran would force those countries into the conflict. I don't think either of those countries want to be in a situation where they are dragged in rather than make the active choice to (not) intervene. Likely there is pressure back and forth between those parties to be very careful in how they respond.

The fact that Israel has nukes all but insures that the US will be forced to act no matter what. If Israel would look to be anywhere near collapse, the US would want to prevent at any cost a scenario where Israeli nukes fall into the 'wrong hands'.

I'll have you know that the 'Two Megathreads One Community'-policy has been recognised by almost the entire world.

I was listening to a podcast and they mentioned Russia hit a 'hotel that is no longer in use'. Oh you mean exactly the type of building that you would use to house your personnel in a war?

I mean, if Ukraine didn't put pressure on Kherson the Russians would have happily stayed. Russia made mistakes and Ukraine capitalised on them. 'You only won because I wasn't really trying' is a weak excuse. It takes two to tango.

Not that I don't agree with your analysis overall. But I don't think you have to be completely blinded by ideology to come to see that you have made gains when you were able to stretch Russia's resources (which are highly constrained politically), and to try to recreate that in the future. Even if you know the chances of succes are low, are you not going to try given that you have just received a bunch of weapons and training?