More than two months after the outbreak of Operation “Roaring Lion,” the Islamic Republic stands with significant vulnerabilities and a new leadership, yet it also has certain achievements to its credit. These include surviving a joint American-Israeli attack and exploiting levers of pressure created during the fighting, including attacks against the Gulf states and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. While it is premature to assess the full implications of the war, the conclusion of which remains uncertain, prominent...
Bias against Israel on English Wikipedia is a known and documented phenomenon, yet its internal mechanisms often remain hidden from the broader public. This article examines the underlying mechanisms of this phenomenon through a focused analysis of the behavioral patterns of Iskandar323, a senior and experienced editor who operated on the platform for nearly twelve years before being permanently banned in early 2026 for violating prior restrictions on editing articles on the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. The study is based on mapping...
Introduction
Donald Trump’s return to the U.S. presidency has consolidated a shift in American foreign policy toward unilateralism, economic coercion, and transactional diplomacy. At the core of Trump’s “America First” policy is the belief that the international order long led by the United States has been turned against it, driven by deindustrialization and the disruptive effects of globalization. Instead, Trump seeks to restore American economic primacy, which he views as having been exploited by economic rivals such as China,...
Assuming that Operation Roaring Lion does not end in the complete defeat of Hezbollah, the issue of disarming Hezbollah will remain on the agenda at its conclusion—an interest shared by both Israel and the Lebanese state. This article proposes adopting the DDR model—Disarmament, Demobilization, and Reintegration—and advancing an L(ebanon)DDR process as an orderly framework for disarming Hezbollah and integrating it into Lebanon, alongside repairing, rebuilding, and strengthening the Lebanese state.
This framework offers an...
Every strategy proposes a plan of action for changing the situation. In his book on strategy, Prof. Lawrence Freedman defines strategy as “the art of building power.” It is the ability “to get more out of a situation than the starting balance of power would permit.” At the same time, alongside strategies of “what to do” are prohibitions of “what not to do”: the Ten Commandments, the Code of Hammurabi in Mesopotamia, Islamic prohibitions on consuming alcohol and charging interest, and the imperative to prevent harm to noncombatants in...
Over the past decade, the amount of natural gas in electricity generation in Israel increased significantly, while the use of coal and diesel declined. Alongside the economic and environmental advantages, the use of natural gas raises new issues of electricity security and systemic robustness, because it is supplied through only two pipelines from the offshore reservoirs to the coast, without any storage capacity within Israel. Moreover, gas-based production is concentrated at a small number of production sites, and the transmission...
Despite being subjected to one of the harshest sanctions regimes in the world, Iran has succeeded in building a sophisticated, law-evading mechanism to support its aviation industry, which reflects the broader principles of the shadow economy it has developed. This article maps the operational architecture of that mechanism, based on using front and shell companies in countries with little transparency, layered ownership registries, bursts of activity designed to complete transfers within short timeframes, and flight-path planning...
The main foreign policy issue that has preoccupied Egypt recently has been the war in the Gaza Strip. Egypt’s policy toward the war in particular, and toward Israel in general, should be assessed in light of two central factors: first, the prolonged war and its severe consequences in the Gaza Strip—an area that directly borders Egypt; and second, the war’s contribution to the growing prominence of the Palestinian issue on Egypt’s national agenda, which resonates deeply within Egyptian public opinion. In this sense, this current...
The concept of victory has become increasingly politicized, particularly the notion of an “absolute victory.” At the same time, the term “decisive defeat” is widely used but rarely defined with precision. This article examines the concept of victory through a professional, military-strategic lens, differentiating it from decisive defeat. The distinction is essential for understanding Israel’s achievements in the war against Hamas and for framing public expectations, especially regarding scenarios in which Hamas may continue to exist...
China’s relations with Iran were recently tested during the twelve-day Israel–Iran war and the US strike on Iran’s nuclear sites. While China’s diplomatic statements supported Iran verbally, they did little else. Chinese media reports covered the Iranian minister of defense’s visit to Beijing in June and mentioned the possible supply of air defense systems and fighter jets to Tehran, although China denied the former. As Beijing is typically cautious in its security, defense, and military cooperation with Iran, most public attention...
According to the German philosopher Hegel, history is written by universal reason, which reveals itself only when the future becomes reality and visible to the eye. This universal reason deceives the actors of history while they are preoccupied with the pursuit of political power, military conquests, glory, or wealth. Thus, the Israeli victory in 1967 brought down the barriers that had separated the various parts of the Palestinian people. At the end of the Six-Day War, the vast majority of the Palestinian nation found itself within...
In recent weeks, voices in the Israeli political arena, particularly from the settler lobby beyond the Green Line, have intensified their call for annexing territories in Judea and Samaria, as well as in the Gaza Strip—namely, the application of Israeli sovereignty to these areas—in response to the growing wave of declarations by many states to recognize a Palestinian state. Annexation, which is by no means a new phenomenon, is intended to block any path toward Israeli disengagement from the West Bank, either from it or within it,...
