TIMES OF ISRAEL
Catastrophe in Afghanistan — for Afghans, Israel, the region… and for America
by David Horovitz
August 19, 2021

…We should note that Israel has twice in recent decades carried out its own hasty military withdrawals on our very own doorstep, under circumstances and with consequences it has to some extent lived to regret. We left southern Lebanon unilaterally in 2000, under public pressure amid the relentless loss of soldiers’ lives in the Security Zone, and were plunged into the Second Lebanon War six years later. Now we face a full-fledged Hezbollah army on that front. We left Gaza unilaterally in 2005, choosing neither to negotiate the pullout with the Palestinian Authority nor to heed the warnings that emboldened terror groups, claiming vindication, would fill the vacuum. Now we face endless friction and intermittent bloody conflict with Hamas. READ MORE

TIMES OF ISRAEL Michael Oren: The Taliban win forces the question: What’s next for the US? Will America bounce back from this debacle by reclaiming its role of peacemaker or will it continue isolationist policies, and pave a path for Iranian hegemony?