Gaza, on the eve of President Biden's Visit
The world awaits in quiet judgement as to how exactly Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prosecutes the inevitable ground operation in Gaza
The world awaits in quiet judgement as to how exactly Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prosecutes the inevitable ground operation in Gaza. Will it be an unmitigated bloodbath? Is eliminating the leadership and infrastructure of Hamas — Netanyahu’s stated endgame — at all even possible? Or, is it just a testosteronal mock-charge, all sound and fury, signifying nothing? Hamas has between thirty and forty thousand armed fighters in Gaza. How does one “eliminate” them in bloody urban house-to-house warfare, with hostages in the mix and, presumably, unimaginable civilian deaths resultant? What will be the public opinion on the Arab street at the rising numbers of such casualties? And how would the International Court of Justice react to further accounts of indiscriminate bombing by the Israeli military against Palestinian civilians?
Further — Whither the Palestinian refugees? Jordan and Egypt have already made it clear that mass refugees in their territory would be a red line crossed. And can President Biden moderate Netanyahu’s more brutalist instincts? Will international law and the rules of war be followed? And, if not, what does that tell the Global South about the behavior of democracies? Because make no mistake about it, the Global South is watching. International humanitarian law limits harm to non-combatants in war. And yet today an Israeli air strike hit a Gaza school and — allegedly — a hospital, killing hundreds, which would be a war crime, if it is actually confirmed. And the invasion has yet to even begin. Such is the nature of the trap into which Benjamin Netanyahu has fallen.
My thoughts go out to the Secretary of State when I think of all the moving parts that he is trying to navigate. He has to leverage the $3.8 billion that the US spends on security assistance to Israel into behavior consonant with the rule of law in Gaza. He has to leverage the $1.3 billion that the US spends on Egyptian foreign military financing into a humanitarian corridor. He has to navigate the swinish behavior of Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who, perversely, kept him waiting for hours recently. And he has to do all of this in the wake of declining US power in the region, a fact that every player in the Middle East is well aware. Of the other Gulf states and the conversations being held there, I cannot even fathom the mechanics.
President Biden’s visit to Israel tomorrow will be a turning point. Absent such a stalwart ally and friend, Israel might already have already tripped headfirst into a high casualty, multi-front war with Hezbollah, Syria and perhaps, ultimately, Iran. Is that the plan? So punch-drunk and bow-legged is Netanyahu with authoritarian hubris. “If Israel goes into Gaza now, it will blow up the Abraham Accords, further destabilize two of America’s most important allies (Egypt and Jordan) and make normalization with Saudi Arabia impossible — huge strategic setbacks,” Tom Friedman, who has a point, wrote. “It will also enable Hamas to really fire up the West Bank and get a shepherd’s war going there between Jewish settlers and Palestinians.” In other words, a trap, with Hamas expecting a Netanyahu overreaction. They understand his personality, his Character — and its limits — quite well.
And so, President Biden, so many miles to go before he rests, makes another warzone visit. We still, apparently, have need for the wisdom of statesmen. Biden’s visit — not for the faint of heart — creates a strategic pause in the horror; it creates some breathing space for Netanyahu to assess his options and get some distance from the initial nightmare of last week’s attack. The Prime Minister has a chance now to reflect, take deep cleansing breaths and formulate a plan for Hamas in Gaza, given this blessed cover by his long-suffering ally and friend, the United States. No doubt Biden will council more of a surgical attack against Hamas in Gaza, the use of the IDF as a scalpel, rather than as a hammer, which would only compound the arguments throughout the Global South that international law does not apply to Jerusalem, so, Whither Democracy.
The Global South — even before the hospital attack — was growing impatient with Israel. Even more impatient, I should add, than usual. Already, South African President has expressed solidarity with the Palestinians. And if the hospital attack is decisively linked to an Israeli air strike (God help us), how many other nations in the Global South will also express a similar solidarity? And what will be the geopolitical consequences to the United States, which unequivocally embraces Israel. Does this not play perfectly into the hands of the rivals of the United States, namely Russia, China and — mirabile dictu! — Iran?
Netanyahu has already recalibrated his rhetoric in the wake of Hamas’ attack, to address the international community. The Prime Minister has, further, recalibrated his relationship to Putin, who, it appears, has finally put a ring on the Supreme Leader Khamenei. Such a pretty couple. But it is probably too little too late.
Will Netanyahu listen to his Generals? He has denied prior warning of last weekend’s sanguinary events. And he didn’t, according to reports, listen to Abbas Kamel, the head of Egyptian intelligence, who warned of a possible attack ten days prior. Netanyahu was distracted with his authoritarian Judicial reform; Netanyahu was distracted with the West Bank; Netanyahu was distracted overseas by the possible normalization of relations with Saudi Arabia. And what has ensued is naught else but the opening of Pandora’s box. From IPS-Journal:
It is a disaster, especially for the usually well-informed Israeli secret service, which did not foresee a major offensive of this kind that had been planned for months. Not only were they completely in the dark with regard to the plans, but they obviously did not think anything like this was politically possible. The belief that Hamas would adhere to certain rules of the game within the framework of controlled hostilities and shy away from a full-scale war was probably too strong. The fact that it did not do so could also mean that Israel no longer feels bound by anything. As a result, both parties are entering new territory in the nature of the dispute — and it is precisely this that exponentially increases the risk of a major escalation, a war possibly beyond Gaza.
What keeps me up at night about this nightmarish situation is the confluence of events that have led us to the present moment. And how well-thought out is the strategy of Hamas as opposed to the thumotic excess of Netanyahu. Hamas not only dealt Israel a humiliating tactical defeat in Gaza, conducted by sea, air and land. In their October 7 attack, days after Netanyahu’s boastful speech at the United Nations, they evaded Israel’s vaunted cybersecurity apparatus. They have consolidated recent technological innovations in war — GoPro cameras, the sophisticated use of social media for recruitment and PR purposes, staging events with Livestream and drones. Hamas, further, has even vowed to release civilian hostages if Israel stops bombing Gaza. By contrast, Israel is bombing civilians where they are fleeing in a humanitarian catastrophe for all the world — especially the Global South — to bear witness.
The tide of condemnation against Israel is growing …
In fine, Israel has lost the first round and now is rapidly losing the optics in the larger, international PR war. Netanyahu’s mistakes appear to be magnifying as the hours pass, compounding upon one another. And this, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, is the dire situation in which President Biden, tomorrow, will find himself.
America is a good friend of Israel. And sometimes, in friendships, difficult conversations must take place, especially if one friend sees the other engaging in repetitive self-destructive behavior. President Biden needs to have such a difficult conversation with Netanyahu tomorrow, warning him about the foolishness of the geopolitical optics of his indiscriminate bombing campaign in densely populated areas, of dehumanizing Palestinians. Senator Chuck Schumer, the highest ranking Jewish leader in Congress in American history, just returned from Israel and has been holding Israel to a higher standard in the Gaza operations. This, from the Senate Majority Leader, is a good start upon which the President can build.
Let’s hope President Biden — leader of the only country with leverage over Israel — has this difficult conversation with Netanyahu tomorrow so that Hamas can pay for their acts of terrorism and so that the two-state peace process can finally begin in earnest.
“Congresswoman Nancy Mace, fresh off shivving Kevin McCarthy, did her best Hester Prynne impression by wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with a scarlet A. This got her a swarm of reporters, and the attention she seems to crave. We also saw a giddy Harriet Hageman—the one who knocked out the very serious Liz Cheney—carrying a lasso rope to a GOP candidate forum. But none of these Republican congresspeople had been able to work the Israel conflict into their costume wearing, until Florida congressman Brian Mast attempted the most ambitious crossover ever, donning his Israel Defence Forces uniform to Congress and somehow blaming a Democrat for it. ‘Tlaib’s got her flag. I got my uniform,’ he wrote on X, referring to Rashida Tlaib, the only Palestinian American member of Congress. Maybe this behavior is inevitable when a political party spends eight years beholden to former reality-TV game show host Donald Trump.” (Molly Jong-Fast/VF)
“NBC News is uniting with a pair of strange bedfellows for the third Republican Party primary debate. The Republican National Committee on Monday formally announced that it will partner with the Peacock network to host the Miami face-off, along with the Salem Radio Network and Rumble, two right-wing media companies that have a history peddling and profiting off extremist rhetoric. It's no surprise that the GOP, which veered sharply to the right during Donald Trump's presidency, would select Salem and Rumble as partners. But it is striking that NBC News would agree to link arms with such organizations.” (Oliver Darcy/Reliable Sources)
“I wrote about the New York Democrats whose fecklessness cost Democrats control of the House of Representatives in 2022. Arguably, the worst offenders were longtime state party chair Jay Jacobs, friend of the wealthy and the mediocre (and especially the mediocre wealthy), and former representative Tom Suozzi, who left his safe House seat on purple Long Island to chase Governor Kathy Hochul’s safe governor’s seat with sexism and GOP-inspired crime paranoia, and turned his seat over to fabulist wing nut George Santos …” (Joan Walsh/The Nation)
“On 23 January 2012, I sat in front of the Japanese Embassy in London, my skin and kimono coated entirely with a thick layer of bronze water-based acrylic paint, and my mouth covered with masking tape. I was a living ‘statue’ of a Japanese ‘comfort woman’ – women and girls forced into sexual slavery by the Imperial Japanese Army before and during World War II – in an attempt to speak about their silencing. ‘Comfort women’ are an example of how prevalent some postcolonial problems in East Asia still are. The Japanese government not only claims that the issue is ‘resolved finally and irreversibly’ with the agreement reached at the 2015 meeting between the Japanese and South Korean foreign ministers, it also upholds that the ‘forceful taking away’ of women by the Japanese military and government authorities cannot be confirmed in any historical documents. The government therefore claims that the expression ‘sex slaves’ contradicts the facts and should not be used. Now, the Japanese government even opposes erecting commemorative statues in various countries – and intervenes when statues or other artworks related to wartime atrocities are shown in exhibitions, as in the case of the exhibition After: Freedom of Expression? at the Aichi Triennale in 2019.” (Yoshiko Shimada /IPS)