I suspect most RNS readers are familiar with the term “proxy war” from living through the Cold War, but for any of the Gen-Y/Z crowd out there who don’t know it, follow this link to find out what it means.
Anyway, Michael Ledeen’s article at NRO has this intriguing tidbit:
The Lebanese Tourism Ministry’s Research Center announced an amazing statistic in early July: in the first six months of the year, 60,888 Iranian tourists visited Lebanon. No other Asian country came close (the Philippines ranked second, with a bit over 12,000). I don’t think that there’s enough disposable income in mullahland to cover the expenses of more than ten thousand people a month headed for the Beirut beaches. Do you think, as I do, that a goodly number of those “tourists†were up to no good?
I think this does quite a bit to explain some of Israel’s actions. Seems to me we’re already fighting a war with Iran, it’s just a proxy war at this point.
Verrrrrry interrrrresting.
Could be a case of pre-emptive strike against a large Iranian force now in Lebanon.
Would explain why the IDF knocked out both sizeable airpatches in Lebanon, they are trying to prevent resupply of said force, or augmentation of it.
I’m waiting to see what Syria does now. If Syria gets into it with Israel, we might see an Alpha strike or two from US carriers to blunt the tip of their spear.
Good catch, David!
Why does this not surprise me? And why will it not surprise me whent he left denies all of it?
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