The New Dynamics of Mideast Geopolitics

The ongoing conflict between Hamas and Israel threatens to destabilize the Middle East — and the world. The war has elevated the issue of Palestinian statehood to the diplomatic forefront as an essential element of any conflict resolution strategy. How this is addressed will determine the future of Middle Eastern geopolitics.

On the morning of Oct. 7, Hamas militants breached the border wall installed by Israel that separated the Gaza Strip from Israel, and carried out attacks on military installations and settlements in what’s known as the “Gaza Belt.” These attacks killed more than 1,300 people on the day — rising to more than 1,400 since — including hundreds of civilians. The Israeli response — an incessant aerial bombardment of Gaza which has, to date, killed more than 7,000 people — has provoked international alarm, even as the world condemns the actions of Hamas that precipitated the Israeli assault.

This dynamic has manifested itself in a mindset among those who will be taking the lead in resolving this crisis that any conflict resolution plan must transcend the Israeli revenge-motivated formula, and instead search for a lasting solution inclusive of Palestinian statehood. “There can be no return to the status quo,” US President Joe Biden said in recent remarks about the Israel-Hamas conflict. Biden expressed hope that work toward integrating Israel in the region, halted by the fighting, would resume, but noted that this could only be possible if “the aspirations of the Palestinian people will be part of that future as well.”

Escalation Potential

While the issue of Palestinian statehood has been identified as an essential element of any conflict resolution effort, the immediate threat facing the world is the danger of the conflict escalating by drawing in Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia and Iran, and thereby forcing the US to intervene on the side of Israel. The US has deployed significant military forces into the region in support of Israel, and US bases in Iraq and Syria have already come under attack by pro-Iranian militias. Any broader Middle East conflict would risk destabilizing the entire region and, given the expected impact on energy markets, the world.

Both Hezbollah and Iran have stated that if Israel were to conduct a large-scale ground assault on Gaza, they would have no choice but to intervene. Israeli politicians and generals alike have stated that the only option available to Israel to defeat Hamas to the extent necessary to secure Israeli security is a massive invasion of Gaza by hundreds of thousands of Israeli forces. The Biden administration has quietly encouraged Israel to forego such an incursion, dispatching a high-level military team to advise the Israeli leadership on the difficulties associated with large-scale urban warfare.

Israel has, in the past two years, carried out large-scale military exercises, together with the US, that simulated a simultaneous war on multiple fronts in Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon (against Hezbollah), the Golan Heights (against Syria) and Iran. While the results of these exercises remain secret, military analysts assess that, at a minimum, the Israeli military was stressed to the maximum extent possible by such a scenario, and that any conflict involving Iran could only be conducted with the participation of significant US support.

It is the uncertainty attached to Israel’s ability to prevail in a multifront conflict, and the consequences of an Israeli strategic defeat (up to and including the possible use of Israeli nuclear weapons), that has prompted the US to quietly push Israel away from launching a full-scale ground invasion of Gaza. From the US perspective, the disruption of US Middle Eastern policy that has occurred due to the outbreak of fighting between Hamas and Israel pales in comparison to that if a regional war broke out. Managing the escalation potential of the Hamas-Israeli conflict has become a leading US diplomatic objective.

A New Political Landscape

Whichever way the military situation in Gaza unfolds, the fact is that, in the aftermath of Oct. 7, there is a new political landscape in Middle Eastern geopolitics. Prior to the Hamas attack, the Middle East appeared to be on a path toward a modicum of regional stability, buttressed on one side by a Chinese-brokered rapprochement between Iran and Saudi Arabia, and on the other by the prospects of a US-sponsored normalization of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia. The issue of Palestine, to the extent it was raised at all, was relegated to the diplomatic backburner, shackled by the constraints imposed under the Abrahams Accords. These sought the normalization of Arab-Israeli relations independent of a Palestinian state. Moreover, the conditions for Palestinian statehood set out by Israel in the accords were so constraining as to make any nation that emerged politically and economically unviable.

Today, the Middle East is lurching toward catastrophe. Much to the irritation of Israel and its supporters, it is the plight of the Palestinian people, not Hamas terrorism, that has taken center stage for the global community. UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, in a statement before the Security Council, declared that the “appalling attacks” by Hamas against Israel “cannot justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people,” noting that “it is important to also recognize the attacks by Hamas did not happen in a vacuum.”

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan, in a recent speech before Turkish lawmakers, declared that “Hamas is not a terrorist organization, it is a liberation group, ‘mujahideen,’ waging a battle to protect its lands and people.” Unlike the US, its Nato allies and the European Union, Turkey has never considered Hamas a terrorist organization and regularly hosts members of the group on its territory. But such an open endorsement of Hamas so soon after Oct. 7 underscores the difficult situation Israel finds itself in as it struggles to respond to the deadliest day in its history.

Tectonic Shift

The most significant indicator of the tectonic shift taking place because of the Oct. 7 attack can be found in a recent statement by former US President Barack Obama, who declared that “how Israel prosecutes this fight against Hamas matters.” Any Israeli action “that ignores the human costs could ultimately backfire,” Obama stated, by hardening Palestinian attitudes “for generations,” eroding global support for Israel, and ultimately playing “into the hands of Israel’s enemies” by undermining “long term efforts to achieve peace and stability in the region.”

Israel has set an impossible standard for the current conflict: the total elimination of Hamas as a military power. Any failure to achieve this oft-stated objective could be portrayed as a Hamas victory by default (Hamas wins simply by surviving.) But for any post-conflict peace process to stand a chance of success, firstly, Hamas will need to be involved — the group is a political reality that cannot be ignored — and secondly, the issue of Palestinian statehood will have to be reimagined in a manner that rejects the formula of the Abrahams Accords, and tilts back to the two-state solution envisioned under the Oslo Accords.

Palestinian statehood will, again, color virtually every major Middle Eastern issue going forward. As things stand, the proposed India-Middle East Economic Corridor, which had emerged from the recent G20 Summit as a centerpiece of US regional policy, is effectively dead in the water. So, too, is the notion of normalized relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel. While Riyadh has not slammed the door shut on such a possibility, its leadership has made it clear that there cannot be any movement in that direction until the issue of a Palestinian homeland is resolved.

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