By Michael Snyder

Did you see what just happened in the Middle East? We live at a time when the entire world is going crazy, and I am entirely convinced that it won’t be too long before the war in the Middle East takes an apocalyptic turn. Even CNN is admitting that we are dangerously close to witnessing an all-out war between Israel and Hezbollah, and in such a war both sides would not hold anything back. Of course once Israel and Hezbollah start pummeling one another with everything that they have got, other interested parties are likely to join the fighting. Could that potentially include the nation of Turkey? On Sunday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan made headlines all over the world when he suggested that his forces could actually enter the land of Israel at some point…

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Sunday appeared to threaten to invade Israel in support of the Palestinians, and to put an end to the nearly 10-month-old war Israel is fighting against Hamas in Gaza.

Turkey must be “very strong so that Israel can’t do these things to the Palestinians,” the Turkish leader said of the war. “Just as we entered [Nagorno-]Karabakh, just as we entered Libya, we might do the same to them. There is nothing we can’t do. We must only be strong.”

That is nuts.

But I think that he was quite serious.

In response to these remarks, Israel’s foreign minister is calling on NATO to expel Turkey from the alliance…

Israel’s foreign minister urged NATO to expel Turkey on Monday after its President Tayyip Erdogan threatened his country might enter Israel as it had entered Libya and Nagorno-Karabakh in the past.

“In light of Turkish President Erdogan’s threats to invade Israel and his dangerous rhetoric, Foreign Minister Israel Katz instructed diplomats … to urgently engage with all NATO members, calling for the condemnation of Turkey and demanding its expulsion from the regional alliance,” the ministry said.

I don’t think that there is an imminent threat that Turkey will take military action against Israel.

But without a doubt, Erdogan is very dangerous, and he is not particularly stable. During one recent event, Erdogan actually slapped the face of a small boy that hesitated to kiss his hand at an important public event…

During the event, where the leader was seen handing keys to the new homeowners of houses rebuilt as part of an urbanisation project, two young boys appeared on stage to greet the president after he delivered a short speech.

In viral footage, Erdogan was seen extending his hand to the two children so they could kiss it but one hesitated for just a moment while staring up at the president.

Viewers were then left in shock when Erdogan quickly flicked his wrist and slapped the small boy across the face, before resuming his position and waiting for his kiss.

If I was that little boy, I wouldn’t have wanted to kiss his hand either.

Let’s keep a very close eye on Turkey and all of Israel’s neighbors during the months ahead, because things will soon get very “interesting” in the region.

In fact, many are concerned that the spiral of escalation that we are currently witnessing could be difficult to stop.

On Saturday, a rocket that was fired by Hezbollah killed 12 children when it slammed into a soccer field in northern Israel…

A new close-up video emerged Tuesday showing the moment the football pitch was struck. It shows children playing in a small park next to the pitch as sirens start to blare. The youngsters appear anxious but do not initially seek shelter.

Then the sound of the incoming rocket can be heard, quickly becoming deafening, before it smashes into the ground just meters from the camera and appearing to knock the girl holding the phone to the ground. For a split second, the camera captures a huge fireball triggered by the blast.

Children are heard screaming before they run to shelter behind a wall, along with others. “Mom! Mom!” she screams as she runs to safety, as an alarm, perhaps set off by the blast, can be heard. The video ends about 30 seconds after the rocket struck.

In response, Israel stuck Beirut on Tuesday. The goal was to kill a key Hezbollah military commander that was responsible for the attack on the soccer field…

A massive Israeli strike rocked southern Lebanon targeting a top Hezbollah military commander as fears of a wider war exploded.

Massive plumes of smoke were seen over the Lebanese capital Beirut today (Tuesday) as Israel’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant declared the militant group Hezbollah had “crossed the red line”.

The Israeli military said it had struck targeting the militant commander allegedly behind the deaths of 12 children and teens.

Just before I started writing this article, the IDF announced that the target of the attack had indeed been killed.

His name was Fuad Shukr, and he had been conducting terror attacks in the region for a very long time…

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced the death of Fuad Shukr, the Hezbollah commander who was behind a drone strike that killed 12 children and teens over the weekend.

Shukr, who was also known as Hajj Mohsin, joined Hezbollah in 1985. He was also sought by the U.S. government over his connection to the 1983 Beirut barracks bombing, which targeted U.S. Marines.

Shukr served as a senior adviser to Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah at the time of his death. He died in an IDF strike on Tuesday in southern Beirut, Lebanon.

Now we shall see what Hezbollah chooses to do in response.

Prior to the Israeli attack, the head of Hezbollah had pledged that any attack on Beirut would mean that Tel Aviv would be targeted in return…

On Monday, Lebanon’s foreign minister told CNN that an Israeli attack in the southern suburbs of Beirut, or the international airport, “would surely lead to war.” Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah has repeatedly said that any Israeli strike on the Lebanese capital would prompt a Hezbollah attack on Tel Aviv.

I am sure that Hezbollah will do something in response.

But I don’t think that all-out war will erupt quite yet.

I still think that we are at least a couple of months away.

But a day of reckoning is definitely approaching. The Israelis are absolutely determined to move Hezbollah north of the Litani River, and Hezbollah has warned that the moment IDF troops enter southern Lebanon all-out war will begin.

So let’s see what happens. I think that both sides would like to avoid all-out war, but throughout history major wars have erupted “even when leaders didn’t want them”…

Israel wants to remove the Hezbollah threat entirely, moving it back to the Litani River, in accordance with the UN Security Council Resolution that ended the last major war between the two in 2006. “If the world doesn’t get Hezbollah away from the border, Israel will do it,” said former Israeli war cabinet member Benny Gantz in December.

And so despite the bombast, domestic pressures, the fears and the escalations, the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah continues to simmer rather than boil over. No one seems to want this war. But as Hochstein warned in that same webinar: “Wars have started historically around the world even when leaders didn’t want them, because they had no choice.”

I have written extensively about “the three wars of the apocalypse”, and this end times war in the Middle East is one of them.

Ever since last October, this war has been simmering at a relatively low level as Israel and Hamas have been going at it.

But eventually this thing is going to spiral out of control, and the death and destruction we will witness will shock the entire globe.