People have just been told leave by any means possible. There are just over two million people in the Gaza strip. It is broken up into roughly too heavily populated areas, the north with Gaza City, and then in the south. And what Israel has done at han unis in the south, and what Israel has said, everyone should leave the north, evacuate Gaza City, evacuate an entire city of a million people,
and get in their cars, get in donkey carts. And there are still donkey carts in use in Gaza, and move south, moved below the Wadi Gaza Valley.
That's the biggest news overnight, Israel saying, hey, you in the north, move south. And I assume that means the ground war is about to start.
Major Mike Clons served the United States military in a number of capacities around the world. He has now respected military analysts for CNN, among others. Mike's always a pleasure.
How are you take one of guys great to be with you?
So I think it goes without saying that the fighting in Gaza, when it does commence, is going to be difficult to watch and difficult to execute. What should we expect.
Let's hope there's not a lot of video coming from it. Frankly, if they've shut down the Internet and everything coming, because it's going to be exactly that, you know, a concrete jungle. I'm still not quite sure this is as imminent as people think home because these defensive positions have been prepared. You know, this has been a wrong plan that they've had here, and I think Israel's going to still look to protect their force. That's going to be very important
for them. So I don't know. You know, the thing is, you do you run all the traps on all the different courses of action that happen here, and is this the time that we're going to kind of change this cycle of what happens of war in the Middle East,
And that is it's just gonna win. They're going to go in there and they're going to flatten things and level things, are gonna kill thousands of civilians, and at some point the West says enough's enough and Israel's forced to stop and Hamasco's you know, back to their holes, and then in the next three or four years they regroup and they do the same thing all over and over again. So I personally think though Israel's had enough, and I think you heard their chief of staff say
it's time for war. So I think I don't think they're going to stop this time. I think there's a lot more things to go, and I think we're at the beginning of the beginning, so to speak.
So in other words, you think Israel, even with lots of collateral damage, you said earlier this week, it's going to be the worst we've seen this century, probably with lots of collateral damage, they're just going to keep going until they've wiped out Homas. Yeah.
Yeah, And they're gonna they're gonna take over. Likely they're going to cut the Gods Strip in half and they're going to occupy the northern portion of it, and they'll set up another border between north and the northern port of Gaza and the southern portion. And I mean, look, we're the Arab nations helping these Palestinian refugees. Where are the Egypt has closed their border. They're pretty smart. We
should be that smart close our border, right. They're not letting these people into their country, why because they know they would come in and disrupt what's going on there. No other Arab countries are taking these refugees. Israel needs an ally. They don't have anybody on the Arab side to do this. And here's the United States now, and
I still look to the north. There's a Washington Post as an article that says the United States intelligence agencies thinks that are war and the North is unlikely, which is called for it's likely, right. I mean, those guys have not been very good at predicting what's actually going to happen. And if you're Hesbla, you're looking at Israel saying, you know, you guys are over stretched right now. If you're going to commit all these forces to the south, I got to think they're not going to put thre
hundred forces to twe undred thousand soldiers down there. That just doesn't make any sense. But now now the time, Israel is vulnerable. So if it's time for war, HEAs block to say, you know what, let's go. Here we go. So they're marched to Tel Aviv from the north, and now it's Juel's got this two front war. So and then what's the US doing? Did the US then go after are we in? And now too are we going to start attacking from there? So there's so many tipping points still to happen here.
Well, I have a quick observation, then a question on that tech I saw comparing contrast the gates. The security apparatus of the gate out of Gaza into Egypt contrasted with that into Israel, and the one into Egypt is much more secure and fortifying. The Egyptians are serious about not let adding hamask guys into their country, no matter what it takes. So as usual, the Arab world yells and beats their chest, then does nothing for the Palestinians.
But I was going to observe that the Biden administration, Well, the United States military is moving various hardware from ships to planes much closer in the region. Is that merre gesturing Mike, or might we use that hardware?
Well, the hardware is right now. It's going to be air support. We won't put troops on the ground. But you know we've got that Navy, the carrier group that's there. There's a lot of combat power that's there. I think that's what we would do if something does come from the north to protect Israel, and then does it open up an avenue to attack into Iran. I think you know, Israel is not going to let Iran get away with
this anymore. I think they're going to go after their capability to manufacture oil and petroleum and drill, and then as well as they're going after those, their nuclear capabilities just a matter of time. They did it in the Rock, they hit it in Syria, and the second we think we've talked about, the second they know that they have that capability, they're going to go after it. I mean, and all these everything has been done in the past to kick the can down the road. I think the
can is here now. I think this might happen. I think is right. I think we're ready to go.
So given all that and where this is likely headed, why wouldn't now be the best time for China to move on Taiwan that's ever gonna come with us as involved as we are with supplying Ukraine, and we might actually be involved in this situation in the Middle least, and a senile old president my words, not yours.
Yeah, it could be. It could be that as well. It depends on what they're looking at. I mean, they still want shipping lanes open, you know, they're they're they've got their own internal problems themselves, and all these countries now that are aggressive. Countries are making these calculated risks as to what they should do. I mean, like I said, Lebanon has blown the north of Chinese into i Wan. Russia already made their commitment last year. They thought it
would be over by now. They thought they'd be you know, having coffee in Kiev by now. But that's just as it happened. So you know, these are the decisions that countries make when they go to war as an extension of foreign posts, right, because that's really what this is. When when Israel said we're going to war, everything's changed that you know, that means that that there's an extension of foreign policy. They can use their military or accomplish what they what they want to do. And then the
Second World I think we talked about a siege. The word siege means pretty clear things. To a military guy, it means everything's going.
Mike Lyon's military analyst on the line. Mike, back to the Middle East. What should we know about the capability of the hesbalav forces or Lebanon. Is the Lebanese government in bed with Hewela? Are they frenemies? How does that all work?
Yes, they they've got more capability than Hamastas, more anti tank, more fighters, more experienced fighters. I think it potentially draws the Syrian military, whatever's left of that into this. I think the mask becomes a target. I think Asad is going to be targeted then too. It's back. It's literally nineteen seventy three, it's just fifty years later. Can't gets kicked down the road. I think that they've got more
capability and that's why Israel cannot sleep. And I know there's somebody in the room there saying that to bebing Net and Yahoo. Is that if we're going to put one hundred thousand, if we're going to put one hundred thousand troops or two hundredousand troops in the south, we've got to put another couple of hundred thousand up north because that really could go fast and it would be the same, literally, the same thing that happened back in
seventy three. They'd get to the goal and heights and then just because of poor military operations on the other side, they won. That wouldn't happen now. Hamas has got much better a military fighters, much more capability than was in nineteen seventy three.
Do we have the ability to continue to supply Ukraine the way we are and promise Israel that their iron dome won't run short and all these different things. Can we do all that?
Yeah, it's funny said two different weapons systems. Rather, the Ukraine military needs one five to five ammunition, which we've pretty much in the last year now increased our capacity to manufacture. That's still nuts to where they need it. We still aren't getting it from a lot of different places, but that's what they need. One five to five rounds. Israel is going to need small arms fire seven point sixty two rounds as well as the Tamiir rockets. Those
are made by Raythion. Here they still have about thirty to thirty five thousand rockets inside of the Gaza Strip someplace. So that's what the military is going after right now. But they still have capacity. And here it is day six and Hamas is still firing rockets into Israel. It shows you they have capability and that so what Israel needs is those Tamio rockets.
Mike Lyons. I think the quote of the interview Mike is we're at the beginning of the beginning, so we sure appreciate the thoughts and the perspective. Good to talk to you.
Thanks guys, thanks for me every weekend. Armstrong and Getty