Before this conflict, Tel Aviv had largely bent the region to its will, amid false claims of its own vulnerability in a 'tough neighbourhood'

Following the start of the Gaza genocide in October 2023, Israel’s political and military leaders greedily seized on what they saw as an opportunity to reshape the Middle East based on their own interests, regardless of international law and whatever suffering this campaign might cause.

Devastating assaults on the Gaza Strip and Lebanon reduced the capacity of resistance groups to a point that Israeli leaders found tolerable, but which also allowed them to continue to use these groups as boogeymen to motivate the Israeli public for war.