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no bull and the aftermath.

Well in the past there was always I think there was a regional balance of power at least

that was able to constrain things or at least limit it in time and scope on some level.

We saw that certainly two years ago in November 2012 when the conflict was basically nipped

in the bud fairly early on it was eight or nine days because you had essentially a credible

interlocutor in Egypt who could talk very credibly to both the Israelis and to Hamas.

Now you don't have that obviously Ham and Mercy and the brotherhood are not in the picture

and Hamas is actually not just facing Israel so to speak on the battlefield but it's also

confronting in many ways an attack by Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

So it is you know this is a joint effort really directed against Hamas politically, militarily

and otherwise.

That wasn't the case in the past.

I'm Benjamin Wittes and this is the LawFair podcast August 2nd 2014.

What is the voice of my Brookings colleague Khalid El-Gindi who joined us today along

with Natan Saks also of Brookings and a Brookings colleague of a special note to LawFair

readers Tamara Kaufman-Wittes who yes is also my wife.

We got together to talk about Gaza, about Israel and about the regional politics surrounding

the conflict that continues to go on despite the ceasefire that was supposed to go into effect

...