An article in The Guardian suggests potential flashpoints in 2023, including Iran and Israel.
"Iran is near boiling point, too, owing to sweeping anti-government protests – and because nuclear talks with the west face imminent collapse. Even if Iran makes dramatic concessions, it is hard to see the US president, Joe Biden, cutting a deal with a regime that actively murders and tortures its young women.
Head-on (as opposed to covert) Israel-Iran military confrontation could be one result of a final western rupture with Tehran. That in turn could draw in Iraq and Syria – more unfinished US business – as well as Russia."
Close date updated to 2024-01-01 12:00 am
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I think that this should resolve N/A if the creator doesn’t return, given the ambiguity of the targeted assassination and the cyber counterattack counting as “open conflict”. It doesn’t say ground war in the description, but the past week was certainly an escalation. I can see the arguments against, but the Israeli official including Iran in their “multiple arena” war quote makes me think it’s just unclear now, even if you ignore the BTE market. Note that I am in a few controversial markets right now and this is the only one I am saying this in.
@Panfilo The cyberattack (which I haven't seen a source for?) can't count because there was a bigger one earlier this year when Thomas was still here.
@Shump It being retaliatory would count for openness and for the assassination being seen as an escalation. Also we don’t know what Thomas knew about the previous one.
@Panfilo I still have no idea what cyberattack you are talking about. I didn't see anything on Israeli media or google.
I'm talking about the cyberattack that disabled the technion. Iran also claimed that it was retaliatory, they always do.
@Shump There was one on the 25th but a good back and forth summary that emphasizes Israel’s fuel center attack earlier this month can be found here: https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/security-aviation/2023-12-26/ty-article-magazine/.premium/when-predatory-sparrow-strikes-israel-iran-shadow-war-awakens/0000018c-a524-df1f-a7bf-b7e59ba00000
@Panfilo It wasn't done by Israel. At the very least, Israel concealed their involvement, which would mean covert
I'm surprised that folks have kept this as surpressed as it is. Anyway, here's a (historically pro-Israel) source noting a translation that Iran seems to have acknowledged that the assassination target was probably involved in October 7th. Bayesian evidence up as a retaliatory strike is more of an open back and forth than the general proxy war in Syria.
@Panfilo My prior on Iran following up on threats is low. Their track record is not good.
One related thing to note is that recently Iran said that 10/7 was a retaliation for another Iranian general that was killed in 2017 (which Hamas of course denied, Hamas is not Iran's puppet). Like, that's their idea of retaliation. The Houthis will probably sink some ship, or maybe Hezbollah will pull some shenanigans, and Iran will proclaim it as their "revenge"
@Panfilo I don't follow middle-east news much, but I would expect that the top traders on the relevant leaderboard do so I trust their opinion. I'm not saying this market will resolve based on Shump, just speaking as a trader and not a mod.
@Shump The qualitative difference is the significance of the target, which is why Semiotic's most recent comparable example was from 2022. Why doesn't this market use the very common word "war" if it's looking for a conventional war? Why is the almost identically named market so high?
If I asked someone decently informed a year from now, "were Israel and Iran openly involved in a military conflict when Israel blew up that famous general last year?" they'd say "Sure, not like a ground war, but a military conflict I guess so." and they'd wonder why you were asking a finnicky geopolitics question but they'd be right.
@Panfilo Wait you might still win your bet. We are still holding our breath, waiting for Iran's retaliation. I think the spirit of this market is direct confrontation, rather than the proxy conflict and covert operations that have been happening so far. That would also correspond to head-on.
@Panfilo "Openly" is the keyword here. Israel is only striking in Syria, and Iran is only punishing through their proxies. If what you are saying is true, there would not be a point to this entire market, since bombings of Iranian targets in Syria were ongoing for years.
@Joshua https://x.com/aryjeay/status/1739414176991199671?s=46&t=ysuToRHdvIMAo_KadMtpHA An Iranian hacker group may have gotten the green light, but it’s very difficult to confirm. Power/internet outage is real and all over twitter though.
@Panfilo I'm really skeptical. The description says
Head-on (as opposed to covert) Israel-Iran military confrontation could be one result of a final western rupture with Tehran.
I don't think any of this fits that, even if it were all confirmed. Which it hasn't been.
OP is inactive, criteria is unclear. This may come down to a mod resolve. I'm not sure it will resolve the same as BTE's market.
Israel does a lot of strikes in Syria. We don't know if this was an assassination, Israel hasn't said anything yet.
Even if it were an assassination, was the US openly in military conflict with Iran after killing Qassem Soleimani? I'm not sure.
@Joshua I think you are sure, the answer is no, the US isn't in open military conflict with Iran. Even if it was an assassination by Israel, that's not open military conflict. I'm not sure what BTE market you're talking about because I blocked him a long time ago, but this market should resolve no.
@colorednoise The oldest comment here is someone reading the two markets as having the same question. Not all military conflicts are wars/invasions. Their military launched the strike, it hit a military target, and it wasn’t covert. If it was intentional, this should resolve yes.
@Panfilo I'm much less confident than you on how this market should resolve. I think what makes this market different is "openly". Maybe the other market resolves YES, but this one NO if Israel never takes credit or makes any statements about being in a conflic
@GCS My read of “openly” is “not just special ops Mosad/cyber warfare” which is ongoing at any given time. An air/drone strike is “going loud,” in my view.
@Joshua Israel kills irgc personnel all the time in Syria. This is not close to open war.
@SemioticRivalry “Military conflict” is a superset of war. The description also uses “military confrontation”.
@Panfilo Israel has been shooting at the irgc in Syria like once a week for literal years. This market should have resolved yes 1 second after it was created if this suffices.
@SemioticRivalry Not unless there was a significant Iranian target hit previously.
they do hundreds of strikes killing personnel , air defenses, radar systems, military bases, airports, but now one of them hit someone who makes the news so we switch from no military conflict to military conflict. Simply ridiculous.
In this example did they quickly go from no military conflict to military conflict for one day and then back out again?
@SemioticRivalry In 2022? Yes, I’d say that was a usually simmering conflict heating up temporarily.
@SemioticRivalry Was there an example of a major Iranian target being hit on that day? Your example was from last year, I’m confused.
@Panfilo there have been plenty of strikes on Iranian targets in 2023, but I find it extremely hard to believe this market creator intended to have a question "will iran and Israel return to their November 2022 level of military conflict".