5 Aug 2024 - A regional war in the Middle East?

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G’day… Claire Kimball here. 

If you participated in last week’s poll about whether this newsletter is useful and enjoyable, thank you. Overwhelmingly, the response was positive, but there were a few comments about the volume of content we produce each week, and I reckon that’s something worth addressing.  

We’ve talked a lot recently about the challenges the news media publishing industry is facing - a potential news ban on Meta’s platforms, strains on advertising budgets, and Aussies’ reluctance to pay for news all feature in that. 

We’re in a good place - we do not rely on social media audiences, and we’re not a web-based publisher that needs a constant/growing stream of traffic to generate revenue. As you know, we’re focused on newsletters and podcasts and they are direct-to-audience channels supported by advertising - most publishers are now trying to build those out... 

It goes without saying that we want Squiz to grow and flourish - and we know you want that too.

For us, it means doing more/different content to attract new Squizers. And for you, we promise to keep you informed of what’s on offer, whether that’s a Kate Watson Newsmakers interview with Nine’s Kerri Elstub on leading the nation’s biggest news website (out on Wednesday) or a Squiz Shortcut on JD Vance (out on Thursday), along with new offers in the future. 

We know that as our output increases, you probably won’t get through everything we produce every week, but we appreciate the feedback that communicating more clearly would help you out. That sounds entirely reasonable to me. 

Now onto helping you out with one of the biggest stories that isn’t the Olympics…

“Escalating tensions in the Middle East” has been a frequent flyer phrase after attacks by Israel on Hamas and Hezbollah leaders triggered threats of retaliation, notably from Iran. So for this week’s News Club picks: 

1. Is there going to be a broader war in the Middle East? This piece from the Observer’s foreign affairs commentator Simon Tisdale cemented for us Iran’s central role. It’s an opinion piece, and Tisdale makes it clear he is no fan of Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu… But he reckons the region is “traumatised and inflamed by Gaza, transfixed and entrapped by the Iran-Israel confrontation and lacking effective American leadership”, which means it’s “moving inexorably closer to the full-scale war they all claim not to want.” 

2. Israel v terror group Hezbollah in Lebanon has been simmering for decades, and on the boil since the 7 October Hamas attacks on Israel. There have been escalating tit-for-tat airstrikes and last week, Israel claimed it had killed their top military leader Fuad Shukr. This podcast episode from US publisher The Free Press on that part of the conflict is worth a listen for some deep background. 

3. Our government has issued warnings to the up to 30,000 Aussies currently in Lebanon to get out ASAP. They’re worried it’ll be a rerun of the Lebanon War in 2006 between Hezbollah and Israel when we had to hustle to evacuate 5,200 Australians, mainly by sea after the airport was bombed by Israel. This interview with Ian Parmeter, a former Aussie Ambassador to Lebanon, covers it from the perspective of someone who’s been there/done that. 

I have a feeling we’ll be talking about this some more… 

Your friend in news

Claire Kimball

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