It seems clear that Israel is taking this opportunity to eliminate any potential opposition and with the backing of the USA it can pretty well do what it likes. Unfortunately what it will achieve is a vacuum and, politically (and more generally), vacuums are notoriously unstable and at some point Israel will face a backdraft.

Israel’s empire is expanding far too rapidly and easily to have any longevity. HTS can now clearly be seen as the lapdog of the West. Syria is just going to be a hot mess for some time to come. I just hope the Arab states will wake up to the truth that they have been played for fools.