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We kindly invite you to the upcoming Bayreuth Peace Talks event:

"Exit Wounds: Aftershocks of the Gaza Conflict in Levantine Middle East"

Lecture by Kingshuk Chatterjee (Professor of History, Calcutta University)

The outrage of 7th October 2023 committed by Hamas, followed by Israeli reprisals, had at one stage raised the prospect of a wider regional war involving satellites propped up by the Islamic Republic of Iran. Having an ambivalent USA underwriting the military security of Israel, Tel Aviv went about dismantling any military apparatus it considered a potential threat. With Hamas and Hizballah pummelled badly and even Iranian air defences compromised by direct attacks in October 2024, Israel was on a roll by the time Donald Trump was sworn in for his second term. There is a very gentle hint of optimism in some sections of the US media with respect to the geopolitical landscape of the Middle East that is becoming increasingly difficult to miss – nowhere more so than with respect to recently-resumed negotiations on Iran’s nuclear programme. A casual observer could be forgiven for thinking that the Middle East is on the verge of being reshaped to a point there would be little prospect of future conflict.

The proposed talk suggests a tempering of the enthusiasm as being in order. It argues that the ongoing Gaza conflict has accidentally opened up a number of exit-wounds, which have the potential of ushering in an even bigger period of instability than the region has witnessed since 9/11. It evaluates the risk of rebuilding Syria from the ruins of the civil war, stopping the unravelling of Lebanon, letting Gaza smoulder and fixing the Iranian nuclear issue – all at the same time.

Moderator Paula Schrode (Professor for the Study of Religion, University of Bayreuth)

Free, no registration required | Bayreuth Peace Talks