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Regime change is what the US and Israel has been doing for the last 40 years in the middle east.

That is literally the ultimate ambition of this war.

There's a long list of middle eastern countries where we've installed our stooges.



They don’t care about the regime, they only want it to be aligned with the US and Israel. The Saudi absolute monarchy regime (something that is way worst than the Iranian one) that is directly coming from middle ages, doesn’t get the same journalistic treatment in the US. Women rights in Iran are lightyears ahead of what is happening in Saudi Arabia. But who cares? Talking about Iran regime change only is pure hypocrisy when your best friend in the region can kill anyone by just deciding it.


Actually, Saudi Arabia doesn't beat woman to death for not wearing a hijab (although they're not great either). Saudi is ranked 56 on the Gender Inequality Index, whereas Iran is 113. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_Inequality_Index


No but talking badly of the royal family will get you executed: https://cpj.org/2025/06/saudi-arabia-executes-journalist-tur...


You claimed "women's rights in Iran are lightyears ahead of Saudi Arabia."

And Iran executes plenty of journalists too.


3 years ago Saudi Arabia set into its law (on the international women’s day) that a male relative always have control on a woman. A few years ago only, women were allowed to drive but as of today they are very few female drivers. But that’s not the point, the point is the hypocrisy to point at a political regime because he his not aligned with your views while having as a best friend the worst absolute monarchy.


> A few years ago only, women were allowed to drive but as of today they are very few female drivers.

Maybe. But overall Saudi Arabia has been undergoing pretty dramatic changes in recent years: Women can now drive, are no longer required to wear a hijab, are allowed to work, can meet with male friends/non-relatives without the police stopping them, etc. Yes, it's still a far cry from what women are allowed to do in western countries, and absolute change is still slow, but relatively speaking it's still quite impressive and gives me (and apparently people there) hope.

Source: I was in Saudi and talked to people.


Did you talk to any Saudi women about this?


Yes, quite a few actually. I do have to mention, though, that the women I talked to were from the cities, usually very well educated (studied abroad, spoke English / grew up with Netflix, etc.), and/or used to tourists. I didn't dare talking to women in the smaller, more rural towns as I wasn't sure about repercussions (for them). Plus there would have been the language barrier, anyway.

Overall, there seemed to be a rather pronounced divide between the cities and the country side: In the cities you did see the occasional woman without hijab, some women working (particularly in the hospitality industry), and a few women driving (though still not many). Meanwhile, in more rural areas tradition strongly prevailed. So none of the things I mentioned are really commonplace yet (not even in the cities) – it's just that at the very least they're legal now and people (women) are making their first baby steps towards enjoying their newfound freedom.


#56 vs #113. They're both bad, but one is worse, and famously murders women for showing their hair. And that's Iran.


You can find many videos of people walking around cities in Iran - not only are plenty of women not covering their hair, there's plenty of dyed hair too. Dress is a bit more conservative than western countries, but not by much, and women are obviously free - and feel safe - to leave the house unescorted. Iran has liberalized a lot compared to the post-revolutionary period.


Mahsa Amini was famously beaten to death by Iran's morality police in 2022 for the crime of not wearing a hijab. Even modern-day Iran is incredibly oppressive to women, and is currently ranked #113 on the Gender Inequality Index.


In Saudi Arabia they just disappear or are even executed in total secrecy. They even execute women that were raped… https://reprieve.org/uk/2023/01/31/saudi-arabia-and-the-deat... And please have a look at your index, if there a broken one it is this one https://hdr.undp.org/data-center/thematic-composite-indices/... In 2013 Saudi Arabia went from almost last to ahead of countries like Cuba… Cuba may not be a great country but female don’t need a perpetual male tutor to do anything.


Saudi Arabia has killed and dismembered a journalist in their own embassy in Istambul, Jamal Khashoggi.


> They don’t care about the regime, they only want it to be aligned with the US and Israel.

So they want to either change the regime or change the regime, and don't much care which one?


Israel hasn't really engaged in regime change. If anything the opposite. There was a single failed attempt to get the Christians into power in Lebanon. But mostly sort of the devil I know. We have Hussein in Jordan. We had Assad in Syria. Egypt had its own turmoils but not much Israeli involvement. The PA and Hamas were also viewed as a stabler alternative to chaos. Saudi and the emirates pretty stable. Turkey (not quite middle east but whatever) also have their internal turmoil. Iran has been stable as well.


Israel helped strengthen Hamas to make Palestine Authority ( who came close to negotiating peace ) weak. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_support_for_Hamas


This is true but that happened mostly after Hamas already took Gaza. Israel would have greatly preferred for the PA to control Gaza. The regime change in this case was done by the Palestinians themselves. The Israeli right wing did to some extent strengthen the division once it was in place. The Wikipedia article reads like a propaganda piece and I would not trust it at all. I've lived in Israel through this period so I have a pretty good first hand knowledge/experience of the events.

The PA didn't really come close to negotiating peace and given Hamas were not able to. See Hamas' suicide bombing campaign during the Oslo peace process. The PA, somewhat as a response to Israeli policy, decided to pursue trying to force Israel to yield via a combination of armed and political struggle and not negotiate with it. Strangely enough security cooperation did continue throughout (and the PA is basically supported by the IDF otherwise it would likely have been toppled). This all happened after the Oslo peace process collpased due to Hamas.


Bush pushed for an election as he wanted to have solved the middle east situation before his presidency was over, against both Israel and PAs wishes. Then Hamas won and Bush again pushed PA to do a coup which failed and PA was kicked out of Gaza.


Interesting. I don't remember the Bush involvement but it's quite possibly true.

The Wikipedia article does not mention this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Palestinian_general_elect... but that doesn't mean anything given the current sorry state of that site, and this article supports this idea: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2023/10/was-hamas-electe...

This is relevant to the coup: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/mar/04/usa.israelandt...

Thanks for the extra colour here.


I'm sure if we keep trying we'll get it right eventually.


Bombings will continue until morale improves?


The plan is working as intended I think. They are not optimising for humanity.




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