There’s no denying Iran’s proxy forces are great value for money. The regime’s support for its allied militias, including the Lebanese Hizbollah, Hamas and the Houthis, probably doesn’t exceed a few billion dollars per annum — perhaps even less, given …
Meet the Iranians supporting Israel
Lily Moo is used to death threats: in the past 14 months, 19 against her have been reported to the police. An Iranian in London, she has been leading Woman, Life, Freedom marches in her adopted home — calling for …
Israel is turning into Lebanon
Beirut, in the mid-20th century, was a synonym for Middle Eastern glamour, its Rue de la Phénicie a nocturnal haunt for Hollywood movie stars and Arab oil barons. In the early Fifties, when the city was in the Western press, …
Israel’s war is about to escalate
As I look out over Lebanon from high up on Israel’s northern border, I see undulating hills dappled with hedgerows and green brush that glows golden in the winter sun. But this is far from an idyll. Lebanese Hezbollah have …
Hamas is playing for time
Hamas leaders know that once the Israeli counter-offensive starts, they will lose their greatest asset: their inter-connected tunnels. This vast warren conceals the vital operations for the manufacture, storage and launch of their rockets, and shieldsheadquarters and rest areas from …
What Israel will face in Gaza
When conventional armies take on enemies who have neither uniforms nor overt bases, and who impolitely refuse to assemble in conveniently targetable mass formations, the inevitable problem is how to find them. Indeed, such a task is often impossible, a …