The Deep File: The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
Few conflicts present less tasteful tradeoffs and conundrums for American diplomacy than the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I break down the historical context alongside event's of the last month.
This week, I’m coming to you a little late and in a slightly different format. Typically, at the end of the month, I like to do a deep dive on a topic in addition to the weekly newspaper, but this week’s podcast topic dovetailed nicely with the monthly topic: the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It also dovetails nicely with me being sick with a head cold, which explains why this week is one email instead of two. All that to say, I hope you enjoy this deeper look at an extremely critical component of American foreign policy and diplomacy.
May 7: Mid East power politics shifts again
For the last couple of years, it really seemed as Turkey was the Mid East country making power moves in the region, but lately the would-be hegemon has run into some serious trouble (see last week’s newsletter).
More trouble came Turkey’s way this week as Saudi Arabia continues an unofficial boycott of Turkish goods and Iraq upbraiding Ankara for its incursions into Kurdish territories.
With Turkey in disarray, Netanyahu struggling to form a government in Israel, Saudi Arabia looking for the exits in Yemen, Iran is seeking a rapprochement with its regional adversaries. This may be part of a broader diplomatic effort linked to the American-led initiative to restart the JCPOA. Indeed, Iran seems confident sanction relief is around the corner, and Israel’s Mossad doesn’t seem to be feeling good after a meeting in Washington.
Bottom line: We’re watching a power realignment in the Middle East. With America drawing back from its traditional regional allies (Israel and Saudi Arabia), and Egypt and Turkey being distracted elsewhere, Iran has an opportunity to make some diplomatic hay.
May 14: The Rockets of Ramadan: Israeli-Palestinian violence
Widespread violence in Jerusalem was sparked by a series of terror attacks and reprisals between Palestinian and Israeli groups, culminating last Friday in a clash between police and Palestinians at the Al-Aqsa mosque… on Friday… during Ramadan. Historically, that’s a recipe for disaster, and this time was no different.
A week later, Ramadan is over, and the violence continues compounded by an opportunistic Hamas volleying thousands of rockets at Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, and other towns, and now the IDF is saying rockets are coming in from Lebanon as well (Hezbollah).
This is the first major test of the Abraham Accords to see how Israel’s newly publicly friendly Arab neighbors will respond. Egypt works closely with Israel to monitor the Gaza border, but the Jordanian government is under immense pressure internally, which will limit its response options on the West Bank. American diplomats are similarly limited, and are generally being ignored at best or being told to stay out of it at worst.
Israel, for its part, has called up reserves and activated ground forces to address the Hamas attacks, which has most observers concerned about a ground war. Politically, for the moment, opposition to Benjamin Netanyahu’s leadership has suddenly ended in the face of the external threat.
Despite increasing party pressure to rejoin the Iran nuclear deal, Joe Biden will find it difficult to make any move on that front so long as this violence keeps up.
May 21: Ceasefire in Gaza, splitting the difference in DC
After 11 days of incessant rocket fire and aerial bombardment, Hamas and Israel appear to have stepped back from the brink of a broader conflict that had threatened to draw in other actors like Syria and Hezbollah in Lebanon, and led some to call for a repudiation of the Abraham Accords (for it’s part, Sudan, notably, defended the Accords).
Both sides, as is usual, claimed victory. Israel’s Iron Dome was able to intercept most rockets and the IDF killed multiple militant commanders in the course of the fighting. Hamas, for its part, could claim a measure of international support that it had recently not had, but I fail to see how solidifying Netanyahu’s government, losing multiple commanders, and putting a two-state solution on ice gains you much. Unless, of course, those weren’t your objectives and your objectives were deepening ties with Iran, undermining Mahmoud Abbas, and getting American aid. If those were Hamas’ primary objectives, then yes, there was success.
In Washington, the conflict exposed (again) the growing divide in the Democratic Party over supporting Israel with Democrats in Congress calling for a halt to arms sales to Israel. In the face of such Congressional opposition and criticism, the Biden administration kept its head down, only publicly calling for a ceasefire early this week as the matter came up for the UN Security Council. Israel, for its part, publicly rejected calls for a ceasefire only to announce one yesterday.
Why the sudden change of heart? Israel was sending a message to America and the UN that it will act on its own timeline, and not at the behest of others. Likely, this was also a little bit of clap back from Tel Aviv at Biden’s early waffling on publicly supporting Israel when the rocket attacks first began (incidentally, the Biden administration has yet to appoint an ambassador to Israel, indicating a general lack of priority with this relationship).
For its part, the Biden administration’s contribution to the ceasefire is essentially a “split the difference” approach where the US will provide aid to the Palestinians and replenish Israeli munitions for Iron Dome. That’s where we’ll leave it for now, but Biden’s foreign policy troubles, of which this conflict is so emblematic, are not over yet.
May 28: Israel in America: Antisemitism and the Democrats’ Catch-22
With the ceasefire in Gaza holding this week despite some scattered violence, the Biden administration turned its attention to damage control at home where a spate of antisemitic attacks in response to the conflict occurred across the country.
The ongoing problem of antisemitism and its complicated relationship to anti-Zionism creates a particularly thorny Catch-22 for Biden and the Democrats, riven as they are between full-throated support for Israel and support for Palestinian rights . It’s not an impossible needle to thread, but it’s a difficult one and the Democrats have struggle to strike the balance between denouncing antisemitism and maintaining a position critical of Israel’s handling of Palestinian issues even as allies in the Muslim world loudly praise Hamas.
It’s a messy, messy conflict. So, to help us understand the deeper history of this conflict beyond the drama of the month outlined here, I interviewed my friend and Mid East expert Judith Mendelsohn Rood on the podcast this week. Enjoy!