They don't really have much to gain from trying to grab parts of Syria - they already have just the right amount of territory in the area to have very defensible borders. Taking more would give them territory much more vulnerable to attack, pretty much nothing in the way of natural resources, and most likely a population somewhere between neutral and hostile to manage. Not to mention that it would surely play rather poorly in the Arab world and the greater diplomatic community. Israel has done relatively well to conspicuously have no involvement in any of the Arab Spring rebellions.

And yes, Israel has some extremely good technology. But they also have some pretty fierce enemies. See their incursion into Southern Lebanon a few years back for instance. They also don't have that large of a population. It probably is in their best interest they aren't seen as expansionist.... for the moment at least.

Given the history short (modern) history of Israel and the religious animosity of the neighbors etc. it would be certain to inflame more hostility internationally than Rawanda taking a piece of Burndi for instance. But I'm sure you are already aware of all this. I went back and read your previous posts. It seems you may be looking for an anti-Semite under every rock. Well... next rock. I'm just pointing out practical reality. I don't have an axe to grind with Israel existing.

What made me raise an eyebrow was the bit about how if things changed, it might be in Israel's interests to be expansionist. That's obviously true, one could say that about any country, of course, but... well, in the end that's probably on me being oversensitive, and it was uncalled for to go after it.

Certainly Israel has been very formidable against weak armies such as those of Egypt. However, I don't think Israel's brief 2006 war against Hezbollah went all that well. Very little achieved at considerable cost. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_Lebanon_War

My impression was that the average Israeli soldier involved was like: "fuck this, what the fuck am I fighting for?" Shades of Vietnam!

The Israeli army of 2016 is not at all the same as the armies that fought in 1967 and 1973. But I'm not very knowledgeable about this stuff, so I'd welcome corrections.

It's worth noting that Hezbollah is quite terrible at counter-insurgency too, and they know it, which is why they've never made any attempt to take control of the rest of Lebanon outside the Shia area they control in the south.

  I was and still surprised they didn't grab a bit of Syria.

If Israel was "hell bent on using nuclear weapons" why haven't they used their nuclear weapons? You are so choked with hatred you can't even assemble a consistent argument. You need to step back and think about things for a while. Ask yourself why you hate so much, and who put this poison in your head, and why they did it.

Eh, there's no reason to be surprised. There is no strategic benefit to Israel in "grabbing" arbitrary chunks of Syria just because they happen to be undefended at the moment. It is in an excellent position right now to not just defend itself against any attacks from Syria but indeed deter them, and military overextension would weaken that.

I think Israel's history and geo-political position makes them much more skiddish than other countries. A significant portion of their society was formed from holocaust survivors. And then it fought a series of wars against it's neighbors. A significance loss could be disastrous for them.

There is some reason for them to be suspicious of America. During The 1973 war, the US told them not to preemptively attack, which may have cost them dearly (it's not clear if Americas advice was the reason they didn't). The US considered not re-arming the Israeli's during that war when they needed supplies and weapons.

But they also have little to offer the United States. If a Warsaw/NATO war happened in the 1950-80s it would have been Europeans dying by the millions too. Israel is never going to a key ally to the US.

The editor of Al-Ahram in Cairo, who was very close to the government, once wrote on that subject back in the Cold War days. He said that the USSR had a quite explicit three-tier system, and it was very hard for a country to change tiers. Tier I countries got the Bolshoi ballet on tour, and when mid-level ministers called Moscow, the call back was from a higher level minister. Tier II countries got the Leningrad ballet, and callbacks from an equal level minister. Tier III countries didn't get tours and got callbacks from some low-level staffer.

On Israel as an ally of the US: The US and Israel do not have a mutual defense treaty. The US has a treaty obligation to defend NATO countries, most of South America, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand, and the Philippines.[2] But not Israel. The NATO connection is particularly strong; the NATO commander (a job which rotates amongst the NATO countries) can deploy troops from the member nations. Israel has a "security cooperation" treaty, but it doesn't obligate the US to support Israel militarily if they get into a war. A few years ago, Israel was pushing for war with Iran, but the US made it clear that Israel was on their own if they started a war with Iran.[3]

[1] http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/the-monitors-view/2012/0... [2] http://www.state.gov/s/l/treaty/collectivedefense/ [3] http://blogs.reuters.com/great-debate/2015/07/20/the-real-cr...

As long as the US continues to gain more from its alliance with Israel than it loses, the alliance will endure. No matter how much individual leaders may loathe each other.

It's an empire-cock-blocking hate we have with Iran.

This also begs the question what is Iran's main problem with Israel then? Israel wasn't involved in operation Ajax. Why is it the little Satan to America's great Satan?

Given their conduct in Syria, I find the "sympathy with the Palestinians" slightly hard to believe.

Creating a throwaway account so you can break HN's rules with impunity in a politically inflammatory thread is not ok.

Please post civilly and substantively, or not at all, regardless of how strongly you feel about an issue.

If only we acted that way. Our levels of support to Israel are disproportionate to the benefits we receive. For better or for worse we would in no way tolerate the Israeli level of diplomatic and political sabotage without such a strong pro-Israeli lobby. If it's a moral imperative, then fine, but I've never heard a convincing description of what we're actually getting from the Israelis to justify the rest of the relationship. Just "having a democracy in the Middle East" is not itself useful, especially when literally everyone in the neighborhood wants to kill them. If it weren't for the pro-Israeli lobby they'd be getting the Ukraine treatment, strong words of support, but otherwise they'd be on their own.

I think you can probably trace such realpolitik and statecraft back to Mesopotamia and beyond.

"But Israelis have bought our corruptible political system to the point where all our politicians fight each other to prove who is more of a "friend" to Israel. If the US where acting in its real best interest it would keep Israel at much more of an arm's length. In a way Israel is much more of a dangerous enemy to American democracy than Iran, Russia, China or any other country."

That's a lot more serious than dispassionately noting how one nation among many that has an influential lobby in the United States.

But one other point that is worth considering: American public opinion of Israel is generally around 60% positive, 30% neutral, and 10% negative (source: http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/US-Israel/poally...). Is it particularly shocking that politicians go where the votes are? No conspiracy theory required.

"Stepped-up NSA eavesdropping revealed to the White House how Mr. Netanyahu and his advisers had leaked details of the U.S.-Iran negotiations—learned through Israeli spying operations—to undermine the talks; coordinated talking points with Jewish-American groups against the deal; and asked undecided lawmakers what it would take to win their votes, according to current and former officials familiar with the intercepts."

What a laugh. A Palestinian in Hebron whose family has been there for thousands of years gets no vote, whereas a Jew from Brooklyn who just got off a plane and steals his land does get a vote in the Knesset. This is a democracy? How deluded do you think we all are?

The US is not threatened by Iran. At all.

Israel is threatened by Iran and Iran's leaders have said they would wipe Israel off the map.

For Israel, there was probably a greater sense of urgency than the level of patience that we were willing to use.

This was not said, it's just Zionist propaganda. Even the Washington Post says so ( https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/did-a... ).

The fact that this lie is repeated over and over shows you how thoroughly Zionist propaganda has propagated through the US media.

> But the story doesn’t end there. Karim Sadjadpour, an Iranian specialist at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, notes that Iranian government entities began to erect billboards and signs with the “wipe off” phrase in English. Joshua Teitelbaum of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs compiled an interesting collection of photographs of these banners, such as one on the building that houses reserve military forces of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. “Israel should be wiped out of the face of the world,” the sign reads in English."

That's like saying having a hamster is an unfair relationship because the hamster gets a lot more out of it than you do.

The word you're looking for is aid. People die of aids.