Political interference is inappropriate. But so is much of what goes on these days
In a more genteel era, it would have been inconceivable for Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to accuse Benjamin Netanyahu of losing his way and call for new elections in Israel, and for President Biden to praise the “good speech” and declare that Netanyahu is “hurting Israel more than he’s helping.”
Wow (and I never write “wow”)! US leaders are basically telling Israelis that they want Netanyahu gone. That type of thing does not happen every day between the US and an ally. Or, more precisely, it never happened. So an anonymous Israeli “very senior official” – code for the PM himself – complained to Israeli media that the US was trying to oust Netanyahu. Truer words Netanyahu has never spoken.
All this is quite dangerous.
It’s dangerous for Israel, because this path the US might withhold spare-parts shipments (without which Israel would find it hard to continue the Gaza war) or withdraw its diplomatic umbrella (without which Israel could find itself very quickly facing not just condemnations but sanctions at the UN Security Council). Moreover, an Israel that is at loggerheads with its main protector is more likely to be attacked by its enemies, who will sense vulnerability and weakness.
It’s also dangerous for Biden. If he is seen as turning his back on Israel, he will lose the votes of many Jews and moderates, which could be devastating in certain swing states like Pennsylvania. Certainly he’d lose all hope for Florida. On the other hand, perceived blind support for Israel will hurt him especially in Michigan, because of the large Muslim population there. Basically, Biden needs the war to end.
That’s why he has engineered a pretty great deal for Israel: Agree to restore the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority to Gaza (as Israel itself has been demanding since Hamas violently took over in 2007); restart negotiations on a two-state solution (as Netanyahu himself agreed under Donald Trump in 2020); and receive peace with Saudi Arabia and possible other countries. It may involve exile for Hamas leaders, which Israel almost certainly would agree to in exchange for all the hostages.
The Israeli security establishment loves this deal. Netanyahu won’t hear of it, because the Israeli far right controls his political fortunes and would rather occupy Gaza forever. Anyone who thinks Netanyahu will choose anything over his political survival has not been paying attention.
Are Schumer and Biden wrong to be violating norms so egregiously? Well, two things.
First, we no longer live in an era of gentility (it may actually never quite have existed). Rather, we live in an era where a man who faces 91 felony counts, was twice impeached by the US house of representatives and tried to overturn the 2020 election (and that is somehow not the worst of it) might be returned to the White House in November, because many voters do not care that much that he’s a miscreant.
We live in an era where Russian’s Vladimir Putin threatens the use of nuclear weapons. And we live in an era where Netanyahu himself clings to power while being on trial for bribery. And indeed it was this same Netanyahu who some years ago flew to Washington to deliver an impassioned speech to the US Congress against the policy of the American president (on the Iran-nuclear deal, whose eventual cancellation by Trump was a disaster for the world). So coming from Netanyahu, the protestations are a bit rich.
Second, niceties aside, Schumer and Biden are right: Saying that Netanyahu is doing more harm than good is if anything a comical understatement. In Israel itself, polls show most people think he’s acting out of political reasons in the war – basically, stalling and playing for time – and the vast majority want him gone.
Let’s take a look at where things stand in the war.
- After five months of fierce fighting, Israel claims to have pacified most of Gaza, except for its southern city of Rafah, which abuts the border with Egypt. These few square miles were home to about 200,000 people before the war but are now crowded with most of Gaza’s 2.2 million residents, who are living in terrible conditions amid fears of starvation.
- Israel says it has rendered non-functional 18 of the 24 Hamas battalions, and killed more than 10,000 of an estimated 30,000 trained combatants; many others are surely grievously wounded. Hamas is by any definition severely degraded, with its remaining fighters mostly in Rafah.
- The Israel Defense Forces has also wiped out much Hamas infrastructure: operations rooms, underground quarters, weapons depots, rocket launchers and the like.
- In the process, Gaza has been devastated. Satellite-image analysis suggests more than half its buildings have been damaged or destroyed, and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi recently estimated the cost of reconstruction at $90 billion. That’s about two-thirds of the current value of the Marshall Plan.
Despite all this, Israeli strategists believe that Hamas is still poised to retake control of the Gaza Strip should the IDF withdraw. This is in part due to the military’s apparent failure to find much of the estimated 300-mile network of tunnels Hamas uses for all manner of nefarious activity. Even now, aid distribution in northern Gaza is frequently hijacked by Hamas operatives emerging from undiscovered openings.
It’s tempting to declare that if Palestinians were rational, Hamas should have been weakened politically as well as militarily. You’d think that given the cataclysm Hamas caused, the Palestinian public would be trying to rip its representatives limb from limb. Instead, there is no revolt in Gaza and Hamas seems to enjoy growing support in the West Bank. Rationality is in scarce supply these days — in many places, to be fair.
Hamas is banking on Israel eventually having to leave Gaza due to both international pressure and domestic distress over an eternal war of attrition and the costs of maintaining a full occupation, as displaced persons in Rafah start to return to areas they evacuated. And the group’s leaders are almost certainly pleasantly surprised by Israel’s refusal to contemplate reinstalling their rivals in the Palestinian Authority to the “liberated” parts of Gaza. That Israel is walking away from Biden’s proposal framework is a staggering strategic failure and a gift to global jihad.
Netanyahu could put his coalition scheming aside and accept the proposals as a basis for a ceasefire agreement. Put off the invasion of Rafah, which risks a bloodbath in which more hostages are killed along with many more Palestinians, and Israel’s international standing is battered further still. Instead offer the Hamas leadership exile in Qatar, or wherever will have them.
Israel should be projecting to the world that it does not want the war to last another minute, and all Hamas has to do is agree to the above terms. The window of legitimacy would reopen, at least a little. If Hamas refuses, allow the population out and only then attack, with some international legitimacy restored.
You cannot win a war of narratives without a narrative.
All of this is excruciating and heartbreaking and complicated. But I have an assertion to make. Biden is Israel’s friend, and also a politician with calculations. Netanyahu is a politician with calculations.
