What Trump got wrong about Iran, what the IDF got wrong about Hezbollah: Amos Harel on wars with no exit strategy

About this episode

Amos Harel discusses the ongoing conflicts with Iran and Hezbollah, highlighting the challenges faced by Israel and the miscalculations of U.S. President Donald Trump.

As the war with Iran drags on and the conflict with Hezbollah intensifies, a growing number of Israelis are “losing faith” in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s promises of a decisive victory, Haaretz senior defense analyst Amos Harel said on the Haaretz Podcast.  IDF senior officers admitted this week that Israel underestimated Hezbollah’s remaining capabilities following the November 2024 cease-fire, Harel said. At the moment, he said, “It's clear to anybody watching this carefully that it's hard to reach a final victory again against Hezbollah. Hezbollah may no longer be the army of terror that it was in 2023, but it is capable of launching 100 rockets a day,” while coordinating their attacks with their Iranian sponsors, in a conflict that has now surpassed the length of the second Lebanon war.  In his conversation on the podcast, Harel noted that Israel’s enemies – Iran, Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon – now share a common war philosophy: “You win by not losing.”  “At one point, Hamas assumed that it could defeat Israel. So did Iran. Now, after getting knocked so hard by Israel and…

People in this episode

Host: Haaretz

Guest: Amos Harel

Topics covered

• Iran conflict
• Hezbollah
• Israeli politics
• military strategy
• U.S. foreign policy
• Middle East tensions

Keywords

• Iran
• Hezbollah
• IDF
• Netanyahu
• Trump
• military strategy
• Middle East
• Hamas
• conflict
• victory

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: IDF, Hamas, Iran, Hezbollah

Places: Gaza, Lebanon

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