Thoughts on events in the Middle East
I’m not going to lie, this is something I’ve been trying hard to not write about. In case anyone was wondering why I haven’t written about it yet, the choice has been deliberate. It’s a depressing subject that has very few positive things going for it. Still, I feel that by not writing about it I’m doing readers a disservice. It’s a big story that has dominated the news for the last month and will continue to be a big story going forward. I can’t ignore it forever so here we are.
There are many things on my mind regarding what has been going on since the Hamas attacks on October 7 and I probably will write another piece on it. I figure I should start off with the lowest hanging fruit and get out of the way the most obvious things before proceeding to the more disputed aspects of it. This piece will be about what are, at least to me, the most obvious points even if not everyone agrees.
To state what should be blindingly obvious, and something everyone should agree on, what happened on October 7 was beyond horrific. Forget for a minute which group was the victim of what happened that day. As a human being, anyone with any ounce of decency should react to what happened that day with horror and anger. If someone doesn’t react to such an event that way, there is something fundamentally wrong with them.[i] There is no justification for what Hamas did. I don’t care what a group’s cause is, if they do what Hamas did they lose all legitimacy and forfeit their right to exist.
Hamas is an evil organization that should be eliminated. That has to happen not only for Israel’s security, but for Palestinians’ security, too. If any kind of peace is ever going to be attained, it can’t happen with Hamas still being a force. There have been many pieces written on why Hamas has to go, but I think this one from Hillary Clinton makes the case very well and I encourage everyone to read it.
After the attacks on October 7, it should be obvious that the current situation with respect to Israel-Palestine isn’t going to work. It’s very much in the interest of both sides to work out some kind of two-state solution (or maybe even a three-state solution). Such efforts has been made unsuccessfully for decades and leaders on both sides have made plenty of bad decisions at different points. I’m not going to argue that one side is more/less at fault. Even if one side is more at fault, it doesn’t change the fact that the current situation is bad and both sides will have to agree to fix things for it to happen in a meaningful way.
Another obvious point is that it’s in virtually everyone’s interest that the conflict with Hamas not expand to include other countries and/or groups. The Biden Administration has strongly advised Israel against attacking Hezbollah. Some in the Israeli government want to do that, but have lost out for now. Let’s all hope it stays that way. A war against Iran is an even worse idea and would almost certainly involve the US.
As far as how Israel should respond to the October 7 attacks, they obviously should respond forcefully. It would be insane if they didn’t do that. As far as which kinds of tactics and strategies they should use to defeat Hamas, I have no idea. There are people who are authorities on urban warfare, but I’m not one of them. If the experience against ISIS in Mosul is any indication, an urban warfare fight can be won, but it’s hard and takes a long time.
However Israel chooses to conduct the war against Hamas, there is at least one thing beyond the war that I think they should keep in mind. Prior to the October 7 attacks, Israel was seemingly close to forging a partnership with Saudi Arabia. It is part of what has been called the Abraham Accords. That phrase refers to a series of deals Israel has made or is in the process of making with some of its previously hostile neighbors. Countries like the UAE and Bahrain have made deals already, but Saudi Arabia would be the biggest one by far.
Part of the deal with Saudi Arabia was that they would recognize Israel as a legitimate country. It would be an earth shattering event since Saudi Arabia is the region’s biggest economy. The US has been involved in facilitating the negotiations. I think the Abraham Accords are a very good thing and the best thing to come from Trump’s foreign policy. To his credit, Biden has continued and expanded on it.
Hamas doesn’t want Israel and Saudi Arabia to become partners as Saudi Arabia has funded Hamas in the past. Undoubtedly, if Israel formed a partnership with Saudi Arabia, one of the requests they would make is that they never fund Hamas again. If Hamas lost Saudi funding, then they would become almost entirely dependent on Iran for government support. A driving force behind the Israel-Saudi Arabia deal was countering Iran as both countries have a mutual interest in that. If Iran became isolated by Israel and Saudi Arabia becoming partners, Hamas would also become isolated.
I don’t know that stopping the Israel-Saudi Arabia deal was the number one reason why Hamas launched their attacks, but it was definitely on their minds. I’m sure their hope was for Israel to overreact and cause mass casualties in Gaza. If that happened, it would likely create a backlash throughout the Middle East that might cause Saudi Arabia to back away from the deal.
It’s very much in Israel’s interest to finalize the deal with Saudi Arabia. However they go about fighting Hamas, that should be something they take into account when deciding which actions to take. In the end, it may not be possible to respond adequately to Hamas’ attacks and keep the deal alive. Time will tell whether that’s the case, but we should all hope it’s not. If the deal falls apart it will be a big loss for Israel even if they get rid of Hamas entirely.
Netanyahu has to go
While not entirely without controversy, I think that is obvious and it looks like, as of now, a large majority of Israelis agree. One silver lining to come out of all the awfulness over the last month may be that his nine political lives finally come to an end. The internal damage he has done to Israel is worse than any previous leader by a long shot.
He has spent the last few years ripping the country apart. He has done everything possible to polarize people based on their views of him. He has spent the last year trying to gut the judiciary and put Israel on a path to becoming a dictatorship just so he can stay out of prison.
In trying to stay in power at all costs, he has aligned himself with the most right-wing parties, including parties representing settlers in the West Bank[ii] and ultranationalists. His current governing coalition is the most right-wing in Israel’s history. To get an idea of what that coalition would look like in the US, picture Attorney General Ben Shapiro, Speaker of the House Marjorie Taylor Greene, Senate Majority Leader Tucker Carlson and President Sean Hannity. During his tenure, he has encouraged the expansion of settlements in the West Bank. In the 2015 elections, he campaigned on bigotry against Israeli-Arabs.
He has aligned Israel with right-wing authoritarians around the world. That includes a bromance with Putin, which has aged very poorly in light of his recent hanging out with the leaders of Hamas. Orban has also been a favorite BFF of his. Trump, of course, is his good buddy, too. In Trumpy fashion, he has refused to accept any responsibility for what happened on October 7 and has tried blame everything and everyone else.
With respect to US politics, he has done everything he can to align Israel with the Republican Party. In 2012, for example, he all but campaigned for Mitt Romney and did everything he could to undermine Obama. In 2015, he spoke to a joint session of Congress where he railed against the deal the Obama Administration was trying to pursue with Iran. He telegraphed clearly in 2016 that he wanted Trump to win.
What makes support for Israel so strong in the US is that it’s bipartisan. It has always been that way and still is today. After the attacks on October 7, the House and Senate passed resolutions affirming US support for Israel. In the Senate, the vote was 97-0 and in the House it was 412-10. While a handful of far-left Democrats grab a lot of attention for their opposition to Israel, they are a small minority. Democratic leaders like Joe Biden, Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries are very vocal Israel supporters, as are many other Democrats in Congress.
Intentionally or not, Netanyahu has done everything he can to undermine that bipartisan consensus. His actions have all been very shortsighted. Whatever immediate gain he might get from aligning Israel with Republicans will be to Israel’s long-term detriment. If support for Israel becomes just another partisan issue, the loser from that won’t be the US or Democrats. It will be Israel.
While the US and Israel are long-time allies, it has been much more beneficial for Israel. There are plenty of legitimate arguments for why it’s in the US’ interest to support Israel, but Israel needs the US far more than the US needs Israel. The US has plenty of allies and is a major player on the world stage. Israel is a small country with few dependable allies and can’t afford to lose the US.
There is no danger today of partisanship ending the US alliance with Israel, but that’s not guaranteed to last forever. Things can change very fast. It was only a short while ago that nearly all Republicans in Congress were criticizing Obama for being soft on Putin. Now, it’s Republicans in Congress who oppose aid to Ukraine in their fight against Putin and who are most likely to sing his praises.
Israel not only needs the US, but also needs to be unified domestically. It’s one thing to argue over various domestic policy issues like taxes and spending. Being divided over the basic direction of the country, i.e., whether it remains a democracy, isn’t something Israel can afford.
As dysfunctional as things can be in the US and as polarized as things are, because the US is a major player on the world stage and has the world’s biggest economy, that is manageable. The US is also lucky to be surrounded by neighbors who are allies. Israel doesn’t have those luxuries. A country that is physically small, has a small population and is surrounded by hostile neighbors can’t afford to be divided on the most fundamental issues. Netanyahu has spent the better part of a decade doing everything in his power to make that happen.
I can’t stand many of Israel’s critics in the US. That is especially true for those who make bashing Israel part of their identity and don’t actually care about Palestinians. The only thing I can say to their defense is that Netanyahu has been Israel’s leader mostly uninterrupted since 2009. For those who have come of political age during that time, he has been the face of Israel. Yes, those who are truly interested in the subject should know about its history before then, but the present matters, too. For more than a decade, Israel has been associated in many peoples’ eyes not with being an underdog surrounded by hostile neighbors, but with right-wing politics.
A tough moral dilemma
What makes Hamas evil is not just their actions against civilians. It’s that they purposefully place their fighters and operations near civilians so as to maximize their casualties when Israel attacks. In particular, Hamas has used the Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza as a command center and as a platform to launch attacks from. They deny doing that, but the evidence is overwhelming that they do exactly that.
Eliminating Hamas is a legitimate goal, but so is minimizing harm to civilians in Gaza. Those are likely to be in tension with each other. It’s a very difficult, if not impossible, situation for Israel to be in. On the one hand, they have every right to eliminate Hamas, whose ultimate goal is to get rid of Israel. On the other hand, as a democratic country that holds itself out as a beacon in a region full of dictatorships, they have obligations towards Palestinians and should be held to a higher standard than Hamas.[iii]
Crushing Hamas will inevitably mean attacking places where civilians are present. That includes the Al-Shifa hospital where patients, doctors and nurses will be in danger. Inevitably, there will be civilian casualties no matter how careful Israel tries to be.
I wish I had an answer for how to resolve that tradeoff, but I don’t. It really is a damned if you do, damned if you don’t situation. If Israel decided they were going to prioritize avoiding civilian casualties above all else, it would give Hamas a big advantage. By putting their fighters and operations near civilians, they would effectively be safe from any Israeli offensive. They could launch attacks at will and not have to worry about retaliation as long as they were among civilians.
Israel could respond by being more surgical in how they attack Hamas, but that’s not foolproof. It also has downsides. For example, by bombing less and using more ground troops, their troops would be involved in much more combat and would inevitably see lots of casualties.
Conversely, Israel could decide to prioritize eliminating Hamas above all else, but that has serious problems, too. Maintaining international support is critical for the campaign against Hamas to succeed. Israel already faces enough international hatred as it is, but casually wiping out civilians would be a great way to make that much worse and give ammo to bad faith critics. If Hamas could convince Palestinians that Israel doesn’t care about their lives that would be great for their efforts. It would probably be a recruiting boost, too, more than enough to make up for losses.
While the US will remain a staunch supporter of Israel in the war against Hamas, that support is not absolute nor should it be. The Biden Administration has, rightfully, emphasized the need to protect civilians in Gaza and Israel can’t just blow that off. Since Israel will likely be getting a large amount of aid from the US, the US will have a say in how that aid is used and will make requests of how Israel conducts their operations.
The conundrum of the moral dilemma being faced notwithstanding, there is something that I think is an obvious truth, but seems to have been lost in some of the discourse during the last few weeks. It’s worth clarifying that point and making sure it’s not forgotten. Everyone should remember that all of the actors involved have agency. The Israeli government and Hamas are both made up of adults with minds of their own who are capable of making decisions.
What Hamas did on October 7 was a choice. Nobody forced them to do that. They could have launched attacks against Israeli soldiers in a way that minimized civilian casualties. That would not make their cause just, but it would have been a much more defensible way of going about pursuing it. That they chose to attack civilians in the most horrific way imaginable is on them and no excuses should be made for it. No amount of wrongdoing by Israel absolves them of responsibility for what they did.
By the same token, Hamas’ atrocities don’t let Israel off the hook for decisions they make. If Israel were to make a huge mistake that killed civilians or commit war crimes, what happened on October 7 would not excuse it. Many factors go into decisions that are made, but ultimately those decisions are made by choice. They may be right or wrong, but they are made by actors with agency who have minds of their own.
[i] Anyone with any ounce of decency should have the same reaction to what is happening in Gaza, too. No matter which side someone favors, everyone should be able to sympathize with the people in Gaza suffering now who have nothing to do with Hamas and are not at fault for the conflict.
[ii] Many of the settlers in the West Bank have a worldview that’s not very different from the worldview of Hamas. See this interview for an example of that.
[iii] I hate it when I hear people complain about Israel being held to a higher standard than their neighbors. Those who say that aren’t doing Israel any favors. A democratic country should be held to a higher standard than a dictatorship. That’s why I hold the US to a higher standard than countries like China and Russia.