The risk of Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza expanding is rising – piling the pressure on the US to intervene

Published

2 years ago

January 7, 2024

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Antony Blinken, the US secretary of state, arrived in Turkey on Friday for his fourth visit to the region since Hamas launched its attacks on Israel last year.

This flurry of visits reflects the growing international concern that the war in Gaza risks escalating into a wider regional conflict.

The US vetoed the most recent UN Security Council resolutions to bring the conflict to an end to provide time for Israel to achieve its political objectives.

The international community overwhelmingly believes that a two-state solution is the only way to bring peace to the region, but it has become increasingly apparent that such an end-state is not supported by Israel.

Although Israel’s defence minister Yoav Gallant has started to elaborate on what the “day after” the war ends might look like, it is very vague, lacks detail, and appears to be an Israeli solution rather than an international, including Palestinian, collaboration.

And, although the US had hoped that the conflict might be drawing to an end by Christmas last year, Israel has reiterated the war will only end once Hamas has been destroyed.

The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) believes it has killed or captured 9,000 Hamas fighters out of a pre-war total thought to be around 30,000.

This leaves well over two-thirds of Hamas fighters still at large, which probably explains why Israel believes the conflict could go on for at least another year.

Israel says there are still around 130 Israeli hostages being held captive in Gaza, who were seized in the 7 October raids by Hamas, in which around 1,200 people were killed and 240 taken hostage.

Since then, more than 22,400 people have been killed by the Israeli response, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry.

Risks of escalation in Lebanon, Yemen and the Red Sea

Hamas is no match for the IDF militarily, but if the conflict did escalate into a regional war, pressure would increase on the US to bring their influence to bear to bring the war to an end.

Iran funds Hamas, Lebanon’s Hezbollah and the Houthi rebels in Yemen, and it is this influence that is being exploited to ratchet up pressure on the US.

The Israeli border with Lebanon has seen regular exchanges of fire between the IDF and Hezbollah.

However, following the claimed assassination of Hamas deputy military leader Saleh al Arouri on 2 January in southern Beirut, the Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah vowed to avenge the attack.

Earlier on Saturday, Hezbollah fired 62 rockets at an Israeli observation point, prompting an Israeli fighter jet to respond with an attack on what the IDF claims was a Hezbollah command post.

In the Red Sea, Iranian-backed Houthis have been disrupting global shipping.

On Friday, huge crowds gathered in the Yemen capital Sana’a to mark the deaths of 10 Houthi fighters who were attacking a Maersk merchant ship when a US military helicopter intervened.

US forces stationed in the Middle East to prevent the resurgence of Islamic State have also come under more frequent attack – the US has 900 based in Syria and 2,500 in Iraq.

The conflict in Gaza has also distracted world attention, and support, for Ukraine in its war with Russia.

All this increases pressure on the US to find a way to bring the Israel-Hamas war to an end to stop the steady escalation in the region.

Blinken faces struggle to find a solution for all sides

The longer the war in Gaza continues, the greater the risk of a wider conflict.

But, it is not clear what the desired end-state is for Israel.

Rumours abound that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s cabinet cannot agree on a future governance model for the region, and if not a two-state solution, then what is the solution?

An Israeli-imposed model would be unlikely to secure international support, and thus lack credibility.

Nobody expects negotiations to be simple, but any agreement has to be mindful of Palestinian concerns, involve the international community, enable peaceful co-existence (eventually) for both Israelis and Palestinians, and create prosperity for Palestinians to replace decades of despair with hope.

This will not be simple to resolve, but failure means perpetuating the endless cycle of violence and devastation that has defined the region over the past eight decades.

A huge weight of responsibility lies on the shoulders of US Secretary of State Blinken.

World

What’s it like with the National Guard on the streets of DC?

Published

10 hours ago

August 22, 2025

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What's it like with the National Guard on the streets of DC?

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What’s it like on the streets of DC right now, as thousands of federal police patrol the streets?

Who is Steve Witkoff, the US envoy regularly meeting Vladimir Putin and Benjamin Netanyahu to broker peace in Ukraine and Gaza?

And why is Californian Governor Gavin Newsom now tweeting like Donald Trump?

Martha Kelner and Mark Stone answer your questions.

If you’ve also got a question you’d like the Trump100 team to answer, you can email it to trump100@sky.uk.

You can also watch all episodes on our YouTube channel.

World

It’s been a confusing week – and Trump’s been made to look weak

Published

10 hours ago

August 22, 2025

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It’s been a confusing week.

The Monday gathering of European leaders and Ukraine’s president with Donald Trump at the White House was highly significant.

Ukraine latest: Trump changes tack

The leaders went home buoyed by the knowledge that they’d finally convinced the American president not to abandon Europe. He had committed to provide American “security guarantees” to Ukraine.

The details were sketchy, and sketched out only a little more through the week (we got some noise about American air cover), but regardless, the presidential commitment represented a clear shift from months of isolationist rhetoric on Ukraine – “it’s Europe’s problem” and all the rest of it.

Yet it was always the case that, beyond that clear achievement for the Europeans, Russia would have a problem with it.

Trump’s envoy’s language last weekend – claiming that Putin had agreed to Europe providing “Article 5-like” guarantees for Ukraine, essentially providing it with a NATO-like collective security blanket – was baffling.

Russia gives two fingers to the president

And throughout this week, Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov has repeatedly and predictably undermined the whole thing, pointing out that Russia would never accept any peace plan that involved any European or NATO troops in Ukraine.

“The presence of foreign troops in Ukraine is completely unacceptable for Russia,” he said yesterday, echoing similar statements stretching back years.

Remember that NATO’s “eastern encroachment” was the justification for Russia’s “special military operation” – the invasion of Ukraine – in the first place. All this makes Trump look rather weak.

It’s two fingers to the president, though interestingly, the Russian language has been carefully calibrated not to poke Trump but to mock European leaders instead. That’s telling.

The bilateral meeting (between Putin and Zelenskyy) hailed by Trump on Monday as agreed and close – “within two weeks” – looks decidedly doubtful.

Maybe that’s why he went along with Putin’s suggestion that there be a bilateral, not including Trump, first.

It’s easier for the American president to blame someone else if it’s not his meeting, and it doesn’t happen.

NATO defence chiefs met on Wednesday to discuss the details of how the security guarantees – the ones Russia won’t accept – will work.

European sources at the meeting have told me it was all a great success. And to the comments by Lavrov, a source said: “It’s not up to Lavrov to decide on security guarantees. Not up to the one doing the threatening to decide how to deter that threat!”

The argument goes that it’s not realistic for Russia to say from which countries Ukraine can and cannot host troops.

Would Trump threaten force?

The problem is that if Europe and the White House want Russia to sign up to some sort of peace deal, then it would require agreement from all sides on the security arrangements.

The other way to get Russia to heel would be with an overwhelming threat of force. Something from Trump, like: “Vladimir – look what I did to Iran…”. But, of course, Iran isn’t a nuclear power.

Something else bothers me about all this. The core concept of a “security guarantee” is an ironclad obligation to defend Ukraine into the future.

Future guarantees would require treaties, not just a loose promise. I don’t see Trump’s America truly signing up to anything that obliges them to do anything.

A layered security guarantee which builds over time is an option, but from a Kremlin perspective, would probably only end up being a repeat of history and allow them another “justification” to push back.

Image and reality don’t seem to match

Among Trump’s stream of social media posts this week was an image of him waving his finger at Putin in Alaska. It was one of the few non-effusive images from the summit.

He posted it next to an image of former president Richard Nixon confronting Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev – an image that came to reflect American dominance over the Soviet Union.

That may be the image Trump wants to portray. But the events of the past week suggest image and reality just don’t match.

The past 24 hours in Ukraine have been among the most violent to date.

World

At least 17 dead in Colombia after car bombing and helicopter attack

Published

10 hours ago

August 22, 2025

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At least 17 dead in Colombia after car bombing and helicopter attack

At least 17 people were killed after a car bombing and an attack on a police helicopter in Colombia, officials have said.

Authorities in the southwest city of Cali said a vehicle loaded with explosives detonated near a military aviation school, killing five people and injuring more than 30.

Authorities said at least 12 died in the attack on a helicopter transporting personnel to an area in Antioquia in northern Colombia, where they were to destroy coca leaf crops – the raw material used in the production of cocaine.

Antioquia governor Andres Julian said a drone attacked the helicopter as it flew over coca leaf crops.

Colombian President Gustavo Petro attributed both incidents to dissidents of the defunct Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).

He said the aircraft was targeted in retaliation for a cocaine seizure that allegedly belonged to the Gulf Clan.

Who are FARC, and are they still active?

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, a Marxist guerrilla organisation, was the largest of the country’s rebel groups, and grew out of peasant self-defence forces.

It was formed in 1964 as the military wing of the Colombian Communist Party, carrying out a series of attacks against political and economic targets.

In 2016, after more than 50 years of civil war, FARC rebels and the Colombian government signed a peace deal.

It officially ceased to be an armed group the following year – but some small dissident groups rejected the agreement and refused to disarm.

According to a report by Colombia’s Truth Commission in 2022, fighting between government forces, FARC, and the militant group National Liberation Army had killed around 450,000 people between 1985 and 2018.

Both FARC dissidents and members of the Gulf Clan operate in Antioquia.

It comes as a report from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime found that coca leaf cultivation is on the rise in Colombia.

The area under cultivation reached a record 253,000 hectares in 2023, according to the UN’s latest available report.