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Israel’s geopolitical missteps in Gaza
Ian Bremmer's Quick Take: Back to the Middle East. We are now over a month of war between Israel and Hamas following the October 7th terror attacks. And frankly, it is not going all that well. What I mean by that is, it's an awful lot of carnage. It's an awful lot of political division around the world. And Israel, with the exception of a strong relationship with the United States, feels increasingly isolated. That's certainly in the message I was hearing from the Europeans over the last week, getting more and more uncomfortable as this war goes on. The Americans privately saying that to the Israelis, though publicly, certainly standing very, very strongly with them. And members of the Israeli cabinet increasingly believing that the pressure on them is going to grow significantly over the next few weeks as the war continues.
So is there anything else they could have done, right? Because I mean, if you're saying, well, this is really challenging, the fight and it's leading to enormous backlash and, you know, from the region and from the Global South and even from countries that are quite friendly and well-disposed to Israel, then what might you have suggested they do instead?
And here my view is, when you have enormous support from the West in particular, but also sympathies more broadly, following these horrible terrorist attacks on October 7th. And let's remember, I mean, this was civilians that were targeted, that were brutally murdered. This was not Israeli settlers who were fighting on the right. It certainly wasn't the military, was actually progressives on the left. It was the people that were most oriented to peace, were the ones that were gunned down and tortured and taken hostage by Hamas in Gaza. So if there was ever a time that the Israelis were going to have sympathy, it would be right after this. And my view is use that in the same way the United States did after 9/11. And they built a coalition of the willing with dozens of countries that were prepared to support them to go into Afghanistan, and specifically to take out Al-Qaeda. You build that coalition. There were countries, of course, NATO's allies, no surprise, the UK and France and Canada. But I mean, countries like Georgia were involved in sending people to UAE.
And this, I think, is an opportunity that the Israelis really did have. When French President Macron traveled to Israel, he said that they were prepared to join the fight against Hamas, join the fight on terror with the Israelis. The Americans, of course, immediately sending, you know, sort of troops to the region, as well as troops on the ground to act as advisors, a lot of intelligence support. I think you would have gotten significant support from the Germans in this environment, from the UK, in this environment. And the point here is that in the immediate weeks after the attacks, instead of massive bombing attacks and then a ground war instead, work first and foremost on a coalition, build multilateral support, heck, work with the Saudis. The Gulf states are strongly interested in working with Israel. They hate Hamas. They want the end of Hamas. They find, you know, this would be a dangerous movement that's much more aligned with their enemies. The Iranians. So Israel had a very strong geopolitical position and the ability to use it if their initial response was, “we're going to be stronger, we're going to build on all of this sympathy to have not just us fighting against Hamas, but everybody.”
Now, would that have constrained what Israel would have done? Would it have meant that they would have been more pinpoint in their bombing? It would have taken longer, that there wouldn't have been a ground war? Maybe so. But having said all of that, Israel is massively more capable militarily than Hamas is, and they have vastly better border security and they have incredible missile defense and they would have gotten more technological and military support from allies and friends all over the world following these attacks. I don't believe that there is an existential risk to Israel from Hamas. I don't believe there's an existential risk from anybody in the region in terms of military capabilities.
I remember when I was with Netanyahu once at a conference in Herzliya in Israel, and he came and spoke to some of us, a small group, I think it was 30 or 40 folks. And there were some investors in the room and he was talking. The first half of the meeting was all about how Israel was the best possible place to invest. And of course, had, you know, very high ratings in terms of credit and transparency and rule of law. And as a democracy in the region, all of these things. And, you know, everyone's nodding along. And then the second half of the meeting is how the Iranians need to be contained and how they represent an existential threat to Israel. And I mean, both of these things cannot be true at the same time, right? I mean, if you're saying that it's a fantastic place to invest, then it probably isn't really a place that other people can take out.
Israel, of course, has, though, unstated, a serious nuclear force, and they have massive military capabilities and incredibly well-trained Israeli Defense Force. Now, the point here is that, you know, Netanyahu took his eye off the ball, stopped paying attention to border security, undermined the Israeli defense Force's capacities as they were focused on the West Bank, took his eye off the ball on intelligence. But after October 7th, that was never going to happen again. The entire people, the entire country, with a massive additional number of troops being sent precisely to defend Israel. So I don't think it's credible to say that, if the Israelis didn't strike back massively within days and then engage in a massive ground war, that they were suddenly facing an existential further risk from Hamas. No, the risk came because the Israelis, who have every right to defend their borders, weren't doing so before October 7th and needed to do so after October 7th. There's no question that no one should expect Israel to be living next to a territory that is governed by Hamas. And they were going to need to take that leadership at a very least out and have vastly better security capabilities.
But that could be done at a time of Israel's choosing when they had built up much more multilateral support and when they were engaging not by themselves, but with others. And that was absolutely possible, certainly more possible than what we have today. The fact that the French government is saying that they're calling for a ceasefire, they certainly weren't doing that even a week ago. The Americans are privately, increasingly telling the Israelis that you're going to need to stop this relatively soon or the US will limit the military support that's being provided to Israel, three plus billion dollars a year. The fact that, you know, the Gulf states are having summits in the region, Israel's not a part of it. They're not being invited. They're working together. They're not condemning Hamas directly. This is a problem. And I think that, you know, at the end of the day, as much as everyone out there should have sympathy for the brutality that Israel was experiencing on October 7th and the 200 plus hostages that Hamas is still holding today. I mean, any human being has to have sympathy for Israel and for the Jewish people on the back of that.
It is a horrible, horrible thing. But the steps that they have taken geopolitically, the military steps they've taken on the ground, frankly, in my view, is weak in their position. The only thing that is going to ultimately cause an existential risk to Israel and to the Jewish people in Israel, is if they continue to fall into the trap that Hamas has played for them, has placed for them. And so far that appears to be, unfortunately, where they're going. So anyway, that's my view on all of this. I'm sure that nobody agrees with it 100%. But, you know, I promise to always give you my best sense and tell you what I think can be authentic with everybody. And I certainly hope that this doesn't continue to explode and that at the very least, we can keep the fighting itself contained to Gaza and that the humanitarian damage and devastation that we're seeing on the ground gets more limited going forward as opposed to continuing to expand.
I'm not hopeful. I don't expect it. I expect more violence from the settlers against Palestinians in the West Bank. And I even think that the northern front with Lebanon and Hezbollah appears to be opening up a little bit more. But that is certainly what none of us want. And we will see where we go from there.
That's it for me. I'll talk to you all real soon.
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Beina Lesanjir, a woman who escaped gender based violence, participates in a traditional dance at the Umoja village, Kenya.
Hard Numbers: A Kenyan “No man’s land”, Nicaragua strips critics, Eastern migrations soar, big money Bible
0: The defining feature of Umoja, a village in northeastern Kenya, is that it has precisely zero men. The town, which bans the Y-chromosome entirely (at least among adults), was set up decades ago as a refuge for women fleeing domestic violence, genital mutilation, or child marriage. Some 40 families now live there.
94: The Nicaraguan government of strongman Daniel Ortega has stripped 94 of his critics of their citizenship. The move, which violates international law, is part of a two-year-long crackdown on civil society in which hundreds of Ortega’s critics or opponents have been jailed or forced abroad.
64: The number of migrants undertaking treacherous migrations from East Africa through Yemen and onward to the Gulf countries has increased 64% over the past year. Women and children make up a large part of the rise along the so-called “Eastern Migration Route.”
50 million: The Bible warns against “love of money,” sure, but if you’ve already got $50 million burning a hole in your robes, you could be the owner of a nearly complete Hebrew Bible from a thousand years ago. The book goes on auction at Sotheby’s in May.
Biden's Saudi Arabia visit is more about strategic partnership than oil
I accept that as a reason, but I would be much more direct than that. The fact is that when you have a country that is a strategic partner of yours and has been for a long time, that also matters. And when that country behaves in ways that are more aligned with you strategically, you should recognize that and your behavior should change accordingly. Now, there's no question in my mind that we have had significant differences with the Saudis in the past, and we still do. But Saudi Arabia's also the largest arms purchaser from the United States in the world, and the US is the largest arms exporter in the world. Russia is number two. Won't be for long given their manufacturing and supply chain challenges. So that matters, and that's one of the reasons why the Trump administration had such a good relationship there, as did, frankly, the Obama administration and previous administrations.
And it's not just that. It's also intelligence coordination. It's the Saudis working increasingly closely behind the scenes and at a high level with the Israelis, who are the closest American ally of the United States in the region. Now, on a number of issues over the past couple of years, the Saudis are increasingly, under Mohammed bin Salman, engaging in structural reform. For example, there was a big break in the relationship between Saudi Arabia and the UAE on the one side, and Qatar on the other. The Americans work closely with the Qataris. The Qataris have the most important American military base in the region. Well, that relationship has now improved dramatically. The boycott is over. The Gulf Cooperation Council has been more integrated. That's a positive, not just for the region, but also for the United States and its allies in Europe. That, of course, should be appreciated by the United States. That's positive progress.
So too, the fact that the war in Yemen, which was always a far worse, vastly worse human rights crisis than the slaying of a single journalist, is now in a ceasefire. And that's a positive, and hopefully that ceasefire can stick and we can have less of a humanitarian crisis in what has been an extraordinary proxy war between the Saudis and the Iranians on the ground against the Iran-supported Houthis in Yemen. That's a positive. Also, the social and economic reforms that we're seeing in Saudi Arabia that are getting Saudi citizens to work on diversifying their economy away from fossil fuels and away from petrochemicals, that are getting women into the workplace, that are opening the Saudis culturally from an entertainment perspective, from a sports perspective. These are all things that make it easier to work with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia that would not be happening unless Mohammed bin Salman and an increasingly competent and coherent cabinet around him, less arbitrarily selected, were in place.
So I'm not suggesting that the Americans and the Saudis are suddenly going to have a kumbaya moment and that we think that the Saudis have become the Scandinavians in terms of human rights, though I also recognize that the US needs to focus more on the strategic partnership piece and a little bit less on the holding true to American values piece, since the US is not doing such a great job in holding true to American values in the United States, given red versus blue on pretty much every issue these days, including the legitimacy of American elections, fundamental and critical to a sustainable Republican democracy. So number one, I completely support this trip, and Biden was the one who was personally dragging his feet. His foreign policy advisors, in cabinet and in the White House, all wanted him to go. He was the one that was reluctant.
He's now finally going. I think it's a good thing. And I hope that progressives in the Democratic Party don't beat up on him too much as a consequence of the trip because it is clearly in America's interest long term to have a more stable and sustainable relationship with all of the countries of the GCC and with Israel in the Middle East. I also though think that it's not appropriate for a president to make his first trip as president to Saudi Arabia, as Trump did when he was president. And look, he was close to the Saudis and they treated him like a king when he went there and he liked that and he's close to the Israelis, and Netanyahu when he was prime minister. They have a personal relationship and had for a long time. I get it, but the Middle East is not the top priority for the United States.
Asia, Europe, and of course the Western hemisphere, all more important for the Americans, especially with the United States as the world's largest energy producer, and especially given the increasing transformation to a post-carbon, renewable energy environment. So yeah, I believe that your first trip to the Middle East isn't in the first couple of months. You first go to Canada and Mexico. You first go to Europe and to Asia and you visit the core allies. But then in relatively short order, three, four, six months out, you make a trip to the Middle East, and of course you go to Israel and you go to Saudi Arabia. That makes a lot of sense to me. It's been kicked down the road and it's been pushed in part by the Russian invasion in Ukraine, and now everyone's talking about it as if there's some big breakthrough coming in oil. I think that the oil piece of this is less important than the broader strategic partnership, not least because oil prices have been coming down over the last few weeks. They're likely to continue to.
There is a lot of oil on the market right now. Concern about oil prices was spiking in part because of worries that there'd be a broad European boycott against all shipping and insurance, which would reduce the supply by millions and millions of barrels a day. That is not coming imminently, and will probably be watered down at least a degree by the potential of having some kind of coordination on waivers from the Europeans in the near term. But also, because the world is probably heading towards a global recession, a mild one, but nonetheless a real one, on the back of the pandemic, the supply chain challenges, the Russia-Ukraine challenges, the inflation challenges. And what that means, with China slowing down dramatically with big problems still, even in Shanghai and other cities on zero-COVID, and with the Europeans probably about to experience a contraction in their economy, and the United States maybe there in 2023, that means less demand for energy.
So will the Saudis put some more oil on the market? I think they will. I think they will together with other OPEC countries and I think there'll be some form of headline announcement when Biden is there. But that's not the big news from this trip, and frankly, it shouldn't be the big news from this trip. So again, all in favor of him going, we'll see how it goes. I suspect it's going to end up being less controversial than people think. It's going to be pretty friendly and we can get back to more normalized relations with a bunch of countries. The Americans have been doing business as if there wasn't a big problem anyway.
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De-facto ruler no more — UAE’s new president is ambitious, sophisticated
One of the world’s richest men and arguably the most powerful political player in the Arab world has ascended to the presidency of the Middle East’s most dynamic Islamic state. Crown Prince Mohamed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, 61, was appointed on Saturday as the ruler of the oil-rich United Arab Emirates, after the death Friday of Sheikh Khalifa, his elder half brother.
Known colloquially as MBZ, Crown Prince Mohamed’s rise bolsters his family’s rule over the strategically located Gulf state, where he is expected to continue his ambitious but pragmatic economic and foreign policies for the former British protectorate.
Operationally, not much will change. MBZ has been the de-facto ruler of the UAE since Khalifa, who had taken over in 2004, suffered a stroke and retired from public life in 2014. Until then, Khalifa was overseeing the UAE’s push to diversify away from fossil fuel production and toward becoming a financial and tourism hub.
MBZ’s policies as the proxy ruler, however, have been remarkably more muscular compared to his brother: anti-Islamist, security-focused, even interventionist, but with a strong economic program, propelling the tiny UAE to punch above its weight in regional and global affairs.
“MBZ has been de-facto in charge for many years and will not feel a need to seize the moment and introduce mass change,” says Eurasia Group analyst Ayham Kamel. “He is working deliberately with a vision for the UAE. His powers will expand and he will feel more empowered but the policy direction will not change much.”
Military man. A graduate of the UK Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst, MBZ’s formative years were spent in the Emirati special forces. His career in defense has shaped his politics: with him as the deputy supreme commander, the UAE’s military has transformed into one of the most potent ones in the region, is among the world’s biggest arms buyers, and has adopted an activist security doctrine.
Under MBZ’s watch, Emirati jets have conducted airstrikes in Libya to support his favored factions in the civil war, while Emirati commandos have carried out joint anti-terror missions with the Americans in Somalia, fought alongside Egypt to thwart militants in the Sinai Peninsula, and even participated in the controversial Saudi-led campaign against Houthi rebels in Yemen.
Diplomatically, MBZ has paved the way for the Arab world by normalizing ties with Israel. Indeed, former CIA officer and Brookings Institution fellow Bruce Riedel says “MBZ has been the architect of the relationship with Israel” to create a new, anti-Iran axis in the Middle East. He also pushed for a regional embargo against Qatar (now lifted), bankrolled the al-Sisi regime in Egypt, and supported the rise of his highest-profile protégé, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, aka MBS.
Diplomatic heavyweight. With MBZ in charge, the UAE has become “increasingly independent of the Saudis, who formerly dominated Gulf policies,” says Riedel. Moreover, the Emiratis have also emerged as major players beyond the Gulf region by filling the vacuum left by the decline of traditional Arab powers like Egypt, Iraq, and Syria.
“Under MBZ, the UAE has really expanded its geopolitical sphere of influence,” says Kamran Bokhari, director of analytical development at the Newlines Institute. “From South Asia, where they have a say in Pakistan’s political economy; to North Africa, where they are supporting anti-Islamist factions in Libya and Tunisia; to a recently reestablished relationship with the Assad regime in Syria." They're also turning around a bad relationship with Turkey and taking the lead in the Arab world to forge ties with Israel, he adds.
“We're talking about a real strategic push by the UAE to have this kind of influence,” says Bokhari, noting how incredible that is given the size of the UAE.
True, but the UAE is also very rich — to the tune of some $420 billion in annual GDP, with a population of just under 10 million. Also, the ruling dynasty is especially well-off: by some assessments, MBZ is the richest man in the world because he controls sovereign wealth funds worth over $1.3 trillion, more than any other country, and his family rules over 6% of the world’s proven reserves of crude oil.
This leverage has allowed MBZ to take some rare liberties: Just before the 2016 US elections, he skipped an official lunch at the Obama White House to lobby then-candidate Donald Trump instead. More recently, after the Americans were slow to respond to Houthi drone attacks on the Abu Dhabi port, MBZ responded by refusing to come to the phone a few weeks later when President Joe Biden called for lower oil prices, (after that snub, he got an apology from Secretary of State Antony Blinken for America’s “late reaction”).
Even with the war in Ukraine, the UAE has not jumped on the anti-Russian bandwagon; instead, the Emiratis have abstained multiple times from voting against Russia at the UN, making their neutral position clear.
In the hierarchy of contemporary Arab politics, MBZ ranks higher than MBS. While MBS remains toxic due to his role in the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi as well as the bloody campaign in Yemen, his mentor MBZ has maintained a remarkably well-curated and low profile.
His capital boasts NYU and Sorbonne campuses, and even a branch of the Louvre. Emirati endowments also fund Washington’s finest think tanks. When dignitaries visit the UAE, MBZ impresses them with his accomplishments — like a third of his ministers being women, and the world’s tallest building — while ignoring controversial issues such as stifling dissent or the high-tech surveillance of his own citizens.
But MBZ is as practical as he is ambitious. Though it has shown public displeasure about the resumption of the Iran nuclear deal, the UAE has maintained a backdoor dialogue with Tehran. And when reputational and political costs get high — as they did when a UN panel flagged war crimes in Yemen — MBZ responded by drawing down from the conflict, letting the Saudis bear the brunt of the damage, showing that he’s more statesman than an ideologue.
"Recent shifts in the UAE’s foreign policy outlook are rooted in a fundamental principle: the nation’s economic interests will drive its foreign policy,” said Afshin Molavi, a senior fellow at Johns Hopkins University’s Foreign Policy Institute. “This shift includes an attempt to normalize relations with countries often seen as adversaries, a retreat from robust regional intervention, and an emphasis on a foreign policy that serves the UAE’s economic interests above all else.”
Israeli and Bahraini flags are seen on USS COLE (DDG-67) during Defence Minister Benny Gantz's visit to 5th Fleet Headquarters Navy Base in Juffair, Bahrain.
Prepping for a fight in the Middle East
As the world waits to see whether Russia will invade Ukraine, a different set of military tensions is steadily rising in the Middle East. This week, for the first time ever, naval vessels from Israel and Saudi Arabia operated together as part of a 60-nation, US-led training exercise.
This remarkable political and military milestone suggests that both countries, many of their Arab neighbors, and the US Navy are now actively preparing together for a moment when tensions with Iran, their common enemy, could spill over into open conflict.
This show of well-coordinated strength comes at a time when Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen have again expanded that country’s civil war by firing missiles at targets inside the United Arab Emirates in recent weeks. This happened during a visit by Israeli President Isaac Herzog to the UAE, activating defenses at a base that houses US soldiers.
The backdrop for all this posturing is the international bargaining over Iran’s nuclear program, which has reached a critical period. After lengthy delays and a month of talks, negotiators from Iran, the US, Russia, China, France, Britain, and Germany returned home on January 28 to brief their governments on progress made and unresolved sticking points.
An agreement by all sides to recommit to the 2015 nuclear deal would certainly cool the region’s rising security temperature, but there are two main obstacles.
First, the US can’t guarantee that a future US president won’t decide to abandon the deal as former President Donald Trump did in May 2018. Why, Iran asks, should we commit to a plan the Americans won’t promise to honor?
Second, Iran’s leaders may be confident that their economy can withstand the pressure of continued, even intensified, US sanctions. Oil prices, now at their highest point in years, are bringing new revenue to Tehran’s coffers. Russia and China have agreed to new trade deals with Iran, and its nuclear program is making rapid progress. Moreover, Iran has already endured so much economic pain that its leaders may calculate it can tolerate this misery indefinitely.
The US and Iran might yet reach an agreement, particularly since the deal’s terms will expire in 2026 anyway, and neither side would have to remain committed to the terms for long. Getting to “yes” could postpone a crisis that no one at the table wants.
But if negotiations fall apart, then it will matter much more that Israel, Gulf states led by Saudi Arabia and the UAE, and the US are all working together to up the military pressure on Iran. No one wants a war that could quickly destabilize the entire Middle East, but Israel and the Saudis will not sit on their hands as Iran accumulates enough highly enriched uranium for several bombs, sets more advanced centrifuges spinning, and advances closer than ever before to unveiling a nuclear weapon.
In short, if there’s no deal in the coming weeks, all sides will prepare for real trouble, which may begin with increasingly sophisticated cyber-attacks and sabotage strikes inside Iran. The risk of spillover into broader conflict can’t be ignored.
Increased cooperation between Israel and the Gulf states could also come with one big silver lining for peace in the region. First, the normalization of relations between the Israeli and Arab governments is creating major trade and investment opportunities that boost growth across the entire region. Israel’s government opened formal relations with the UAE and Bahrain in 2020.
Second, at a time when the US is less willing to accept the risks that come with managing conflict in the Middle East, alignment between the Israelis, Saudis, and UAE – with US backing – could still persuade Iran to avoid fights it can’t win.
Israel conducted naval exercises with the UAE and Bahrain in November 2021, and Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz signed a defense cooperation agreement with Bahrain this week. And these historic naval exercises will take cooperation a step further.
For now, however, it’s the fate of the nuclear deal that will determine how high the mercury rises in the Middle East this year.
Why Yemen’s doctors and teachers work without pay
Around 1.2 million government employees, including teachers and doctors, show up to work every day in Yemen with unpaid or partially paid salaries, committed to their fellow Yemenis. UN Coordinator David Gressly emphasizes that if their contributions are lost, the state will collapse.
In his 40 years of experience working as a humanitarian worker, he’s seen that war can often cause destruction of infrastructure and more importantly, a loss of the public sector. Therefore, preserving Yemen’s civil service is a pressing issue that has both short—and long-term consequences, and should be immediately addressed.
Watch the GZERO World episode: Caught in the crossfire: Yemen’s forgotten war
The war in Yemen
Amid the ongoing civil war, the people of Yemen face a multitude of difficulties every day, from food shortages and crumbling infrastructure to COVID and inflation. The UN estimates that the total death toll so far will hit 377,000 by the end of the year.
How did Yemen, a beautiful country on the Red Sea known for its coffee and honey, become a proxy war for regional powers and international actors?
Ian Bremmer explains the complicated history of the conflict in Yemen. Demonstrations during 2011’s Arab Spring led Saudi Arabia and other Gulf nations to meddle with Yemen’s politics, while Iran later threw its support behind the Houthis, a local Shia Muslim movement.
After 7 years of war, both Saudi Arabia and Iran continue to use Yemen as a violent playground with civilians bearing the brunt of their actions.
Watch the GZERO World episode: Caught in the crossfire: Yemen’s forgotten war
Building a post-war economy in Yemen
Will Yemen be able to regenerate its economy if the war ever ends?
Definitely, according to UN Resident Coordinator David Gressly, who says the country has immense human capital because it's full of talented, resilient people eager for peace.
Yemen, he adds, will have a tough time growing enough food for itself in the short term, although it's well-known for its coffee and honey. But it still has active fisheries, and even more importantly untapped oil and gas resources.
Watch the GZERO World episode: Caught in the crossfire: Yemen’s forgotten war