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<a class="gmail-domain gmail-reader-domain" href="https://www.palestinechronicle.com/us-support-of-israel-fully-fully-fully-or-folly-folly-folly/">palestinechronicle.com</a>
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<h1 class="gmail-reader-title">US Support of Israel - ‘Fully, Fully, Fully’ or Folly, Folly, Folly?</h1>October 5, 2024</div>
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<img src="https://www.palestinechronicle.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/Rockets2_TelAviv_video.png" alt="" title="Rockets2_TelAviv_video" class="gmail-moz-reader-block-img" width="435" height="292" style="margin-right: 25px;">
Iran launched hundreds of ballistic missiles towards Israel. (Photo: video grab)
<p><strong>By <a href="https://www.palestinechronicle.com/writers/jeremy-salt" title="Display all articles for Jeremy Salt">Jeremy Salt</a></strong></p>
<blockquote>
<h3>Netanyahu brought Gaza to Beirut but through mass murder and
destruction in Gaza and Lebanon, he might be bringing it to Israel as
well.</h3>
</blockquote>
<p>The ‘fully’ repeated three times by Joe Biden is how fully the US stands ‘by’ Israel.</p>
<p>Through good times and bad, through genocide, mass murder,
assassinations and occupation, the US has stood by Israel and is
standing by Israel yet again as it threatens to attack Iran.</p>
<p>The US and Israel are claiming that Iran’s second retaliatory missile
attack was a failure because ‘almost all’ missiles were intercepted and
no civilians killed, apart from a Palestinian hit by a falling missile
part on the West Bank.</p>
<p>In fact, as numerous video clips show, the truth is closer to Iran’s claim of an 80 percent success rate.</p>
<p>Military bases were hit. The Nevatim air base was badly damaged and the Mossad headquarters was targeted.</p>
<p>If no civilians apart from this one Palestinian man were killed that
is because, unlike Israel and Hezbollah, Iran was not out to kill
civilians.</p>
<p>This attack was a second warning to Israel.</p>
<p>Iran has warned Israel that if it retaliates there will be a third attack, much stronger than the first two.</p>
<h4>Rifts within US</h4>
<p>Netanyahu brought Gaza to Beirut but through mass murder and
destruction in Gaza and Lebanon, he might be bringing it to Israel as
well.</p>
<p>While standing by to join an attack on Iran, the US is opposed to the bombing of nuclear installations.</p>
<p>This should not be taken as an indication that Israel will not do it, only that the US will not openly be part of it.</p>
<p>The rifts within the US administration are growing. Policy
professionals in the State Department and the Pentagon don’t see the
world in the same way or for the same reasons as the White House.</p>
<p>Shock and horror at the scale of Israeli mass murder has led to
resignations and there are bound to be more as Israel drags the US
further into the morass both have created.</p>
<h4>‘Malevolent Nature’</h4>
<p>Israel wants to seize Iran by the throat and kill it. It wants to
decapitate its leadership, destroy all its nuclear installations and
pulverize the population into submission by another round of mass murder
and destruction.</p>
<p>Iran fully understands its malevolent nature – fully, fully, fully as
Biden might say – and has been preparing to defend itself for decades.</p>
<p>Iran is not Gaza or Lebanon, a small strip of territory and a small
country defended by a guerrilla force. It is a large country with a
population of close to 90 million and a large military.</p>
<p>It has armed allies across the Middle East, already attacking Israel and US bases.</p>
<p>Its nuclear plants are well protected and its missile sites are
buried deeper than can be reached by the biggest bunker bombs, which
naturally raises the question of whether Israel would go as far as using
tactical nuclear weapons.</p>
<p>Needless to say, Iran’s armed forces are modest compared to what the
US has but its hypersonic missiles are capable of reaching anywhere in
Israel as well as US bases in Iraq, Syria and the Gulf.</p>
<h4>The Whale Torpedo</h4>
<p>As for US superiority at sea, Iran has the ‘supercavitating’ (consult the internet for technical details) Hoot (Whale) torpedo.</p>
<p>Adapted from the Russian VIII Shkval, the Hoot travels up to more
than 360 km per hour and is regarded as practically unstoppable.</p>
<p>Iran says the Hoot can destroy the largest surface vessels and
anything beneath the water. Only Russia and Iran have this weapon.</p>
<p>After the second missile attack on Israel Iran issued a short but clear warning to the US: “Don’t attack Iran.”</p>
<p>Professor Mohammad Marandi of the University of Tehran has taken the lead in trying to <a href="https://twitter.com/PalestineChron/status/1841973871282717015">warn</a> the US and its allies of the consequences but Israel has threatened a “significant and swift response.”</p>
<p>Whatever its hesitation, the US will be part of it.</p>
<p>Once released, the dogs of war will run wherever they want and “fully, fully, fully” will turn out to be folly, folly, folly.</p>
<p><em>(The Palestine Chronicle)</em></p>
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<p><span><em>– Jeremy Salt taught at the University of Melbourne, at
Bosporus University in Istanbul and Bilkent University in Ankara for
many years, specializing in the modern history of the Middle East. Among
his recent publications is his 2008 book, The Unmaking of the Middle
East. A History of Western Disorder in Arab Lands (University of
California Press) and The Last Ottoman Wars. The Human Cost 1877-1923
(University of Utah Press, 2019). He contributed this article to The
Palestine Chronicle.</em></span></p></div>
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