UWGB professor discusses history of conflict in the Middle East | WBAY

GREEN BAY, Wis. (WBAY) – This recent attack from Iran doesn’t come as a surprise to Professor David Coury at the University of Wisconsin Green Bay, but he says this is a disturbing escalation of tensions in the Middle East.

Coury is the co-director of the UWGB’s Center for Middle East Studies. He says while both Hamas and Hezbollah, the Palestinian and Lebanese terrorist organizations, have been supported by Iran, but Iran has been cautious to not get directly involved in the conflict.

That is until Tuesday. Coury says there have been protests in Tehran of people pressuring the government to do something. He says the tensions in this region are deeply rooted in territorial claims and historical claims, including religion.

“It has to do with land, but also with religious claims and biblical claims, so devout and Orthodox Jews will refer to the territory as Judea and Samaria, which are the historical lands of the Bible that were the lands of the Jewish people, the Palestinians who lived in this area, then refer to it and want to see the establishment of this state of Palestinian state,” explains Coury. “So I’m hesitant to say that it’s a religious dispute. I think in many ways, it is developed into one. I think that there’s a simplistic way of looking at it as a conflict between Jews and Muslims. But there’s much more larger historical context to it. The dates back to the founding of the State of Israel, as proclaimed by Britain and France in the early part of the 20th century.”

Coury says it’s important that these tensions don’t escalate any further.

We know Israel has unwavering support from the U.S. and its military support, which is an advantage over Lebanon, Palestine, and even the Iranians, but he says it is in nobody’s best interest for this to escalate any further.

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GRB: UWGB professor discusses history of conflict in the Middle East