Situation in the Middle East. An Expert Discussion
On October 2, the Valdai Club hosted an expert discussion dedicated to the situation in the Middle East. For decades, the Middle East has remained a region with numerous hotbeds of tension. Over the past several years, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict has entered another active phase, and Israel's relations with its Arab neighbours are in crisis, despite attempts to normalise them in 2020. The Hamas invasion of Israel on October 7, 2023, and the subsequent Israeli strikes on the Iranian consulate in Syria led to a new round of escalation. On September 17 and 18, 2024, thousands of pagers and radios belonging to Hezbollah members exploded in Lebanon, after allegedly being boobytrapped with explosives and equipped with remote-controlled detonators. The explosions were followed by Israeli strikes on targets in southern Lebanon and the Bekaa Valley on the border with Syria. According to Israeli Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi, the goal of the military operation was to "create conditions for the return of residents of northern Israel to their homes" and to destroy Hezbollah's military infrastructure. At the same time, some experts note that neither Hezbollah nor the United States, which supports Israel, want a large-scale war to start in the region, but against the backdrop of Israeli activity, it is becoming increasingly difficult to avoid one. How far will Israel go in the fight against Hamas and Hezbollah? Will Arab states unite to counter the threat? Will Iran continue to follow the policy of “strategic patience”? The participants in the discussion tried to answer these and other questions. Speakers: Amal Abou Zeid, Advisor to the President of Lebanon; Member of the Lebanese Parliament from the Free Patriotic Movement (2016–2018) (Lebanon) Ruslan Mamedov, Research Director of The Evgeny Primakov Center for International Cooperation; Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Oriental Studies, RAS Adlan Margoev, Research Fellow, Institute of International Studies, MGIMO Alexander Rudakov, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Russian Federation to Lebanon Moderator: Andrey Sushentsov, Programme Director of the Valdai Discussion Club
On October 2, the Valdai Club hosted an expert discussion dedicated to the situation in the Middle East. For decades, the Middle East has remained a region with numerous hotbeds of tension. Over the past several years, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict has entered another active phase, and Israel's relations with its Arab neighbours are in crisis, despite attempts to normalise them in 2020. The Hamas invasion of Israel on October 7, 2023, and the subsequent Israeli strikes on the Iranian consulate in Syria led to a new round of escalation. On September 17 and 18, 2024, thousands of pagers and radios belonging to Hezbollah members exploded in Lebanon, after allegedly being boobytrapped with explosives and equipped with remote-controlled detonators. The explosions were followed by Israeli strikes on targets in southern Lebanon and the Bekaa Valley on the border with Syria. According to Israeli Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi, the goal of the military operation was to "create conditions for the return of residents of northern Israel to their homes" and to destroy Hezbollah's military infrastructure. At the same time, some experts note that neither Hezbollah nor the United States, which supports Israel, want a large-scale war to start in the region, but against the backdrop of Israeli activity, it is becoming increasingly difficult to avoid one. How far will Israel go in the fight against Hamas and Hezbollah? Will Arab states unite to counter the threat? Will Iran continue to follow the policy of “strategic patience”? The participants in the discussion tried to answer these and other questions. Speakers: Amal Abou Zeid, Advisor to the President of Lebanon; Member of the Lebanese Parliament from the Free Patriotic Movement (2016–2018) (Lebanon) Ruslan Mamedov, Research Director of The Evgeny Primakov Center for International Cooperation; Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Oriental Studies, RAS Adlan Margoev, Research Fellow, Institute of International Studies, MGIMO Alexander Rudakov, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Russian Federation to Lebanon Moderator: Andrey Sushentsov, Programme Director of the Valdai Discussion Club