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Hisham Awartani, Kinnan Abdel Hamid and Tahseen Ahmed
Hard numbers: Palestinians shot in Vermont, undocumented Chinese migration to the US soars, Beijing tries to erase Islam, Black Sea storm batters Russia and Ukraine
24,000: Over the past year, 24,000 Chinese migrants have been apprehended while crossing into the US from Mexico, more than were detained in the entire preceding decade. Many say they’re fleeing Communist Party political repression and have braved perilous journeys through Latin America, including the deadly Darién Gap, to get to the US border.
1,714: Meanwhile, back in China itself, the government has disfigured or torn down at least 1,714 mosques over the past five years, as part of a nationwide campaign by the Communist Party to suppress Islamic religious symbols and iconography. Satellite data gathered in an exclusive FT interactive shows how authorities have replaced traditional Islamic architectural features with more “Chinese” looking ones. The campaign of erasure reaches well beyond Xinjiang, the northwestern region where human rights abuses against the local Muslim population have been widely documented for years.
2 million: An unusually severe storm in the Black Sea has knocked out power to nearly 2 million people in Southern Russia and parts of Ukraine that are occupied by Russia. The storm, which slung 25-foot waves at the Black Sea coastline, killed at least four people and forced authorities to stop loading oil tankers at the Novorossiysk port, one of Russia’s busiest oil export hubs.
Israel-Hamas war: Hostage release doesn't mean the end is near
Ian Bremmer's Quick Take: Hi, everybody. Ian Bremmer here and a Quick Take to kick off your week. And yes, we are back to the Israel-Gaza war and it is at least a little bit of good news with some hostages finally being released over a month and a half from when they were originally taken. That has gotten us some Palestinian prisoners released, some humanitarian aid allowed into Gaza and a ceasefire for a few days. And indeed, looks like it will now plausibly be extended for another day or two as more hostages are being let go.
Got to give Qatar a lot of credit here for playing a role in negotiating between Israel and Hamas. Not an easy thing to do. Qatar, an ally of the United States, the biggest military base on the ground, but also a government that has allowed the political leadership of Hamas to live inside their territory in peace and security as they have Taliban leadership for years. And that proves to be useful for both the Americans and the Israelis, more on that later. But is this potentially the beginning of the end of the war? And on that front, I think we have to say absolutely not for a few reasons.
First of all, because there are still well over 100 hostages and they're going to be much harder to get released because here you're not talking about women and children. You're talking about men of fighting age, and in some cases you're talking about soldiers. And Hamas is going to demand a lot more in return. And the Israelis are going to be very reluctant to provide it. So first, I don't expect that's going to happen. And as long as there are hostages on the ground, there's still going to be an awful lot of fighting from the Israeli side.
Secondly, we still have a Hamas leadership, a military leadership active in the north of Gaza. Their ability to continue to fire rockets and their ability to continue to have command and control infrastructure, that's not been destroyed. And the Israeli military saying that it's probably another two months of fighting that they need in the war. By the way, this is about a month after they told the Americans privately that there would be 4 to 6 weeks required.
Now, part of that is, hey, just say the absolute minimum so you get support from the US. You can always extend it later. It's a tactic, but also because it's proving to be more challenging on the ground than the Israeli Defense Forces had anticipated. Not to mention the fact they haven't started fighting in the south, where they told all the Palestinian civilians to evacuate to, but there are also Hamas militants operating in the south. And so Israel intends to try to take them out as well. In other words, we're still talking about weeks, maybe months of active fighting.
The other thing I will say, though, is that the level of pressure on Israel internationally to stop that fighting is going to grow a lot. You've seen the Chinese, the Gulf states, the Egyptians, the Jordanians and Europeans, many Europeans, though not all, and increasingly many inside the United States as well, now actively calling for a ceasefire. And Biden even saying, President Biden, something he had been saying privately, but is now saying publicly that he might be willing to condition further military and financial support to Israel on the basis of Israeli behavior on the ground in the war. And he's very concerned, certainly as everyone is, about the level of civilian casualties that we've all seen in Gaza. Now, does that mean that Israel is no longer America's top ally? No. Under no circumstances can I see that. And Biden would not move in that direction, not personally and not politically. But I could see, for example, some high tech offensive weaponry being held back by the Americans for example, becoming more controversial.
And I also see that happening from Democrats in the House and in the Senate. Again, this is no longer a matter of just a small number of hard-line progressives on the squad in the House. This is much broader. I think we are at the point where Israel has probably lost some degree of support from the United States permanently. The demographics in the United States and how they feel about Israel and what that means politically for the country longer term has shifted. And certainly you can now see things in mainstream media that never would have been printed sort of even three months ago, never mind ten years ago, about their feeling of how Israel does and doesn't run a democracy, nature of the occupation in the West Bank, nature of detentions of those that are accused of, but not yet convicted of crimes, and on and on and on. That level of attention, which only grows, that level of scrutiny that only grows, the longer this war goes on. And of course, the longer we see massive civilian casualties on the ground, that's going to be more challenging for Israel.
There also remains what is the plausible long-term impact of all of this. And for now, it just looks like misery and it's very hard to imagine how the Palestinians could ever come to peace in the region until they have an option that looks attractive. And right now, if you're a Palestinian in Gaza, the option is run away and find someplace to not get blown up. And they're not going to leave Gaza and they're not allowed to leave Gaza, even if they did want to leave Gaza and they don't want to. And then you have Palestinians in the West Bank who are living on smaller and smaller pieces of territory and their lives have become more and more challenging. So, I mean, clearly, at some point, the Israeli government, with a lot of international support and pressure, are going to need to provide meaningful opportunities for the Palestinian people.
And we are not close to that. We are still talking about more war, not less, and less opportunities for building peace, not more. I hope that that will turn in the coming weeks and months. Certainly the international pressure is turning, but not yet the situation on the ground. From that perspective, we're still going to be talking about this quite a bit.
That's it for me. I'll talk to you all real soon.
- Israel-Hamas war: "Just bring them back," says brother of 9-year-old Israeli hostage ›
- Why Israel’s war aims may “break Israeli society”: a conversation with Israeli hostage negotiator Gershon Baskin ›
- Third hostage and prisoner exchange goes ahead, but will there be ... ›
- Dealing with Hamas: What a former hostage negotiator learned ›
- The debate over a “cease-fire” for Gaza ›
Why the Israel-Hamas war is so divisive
Ian Bremmer's Quick Take: Ian Bremmer here and a Quick Take to kick off your week. And more from the Middle East, the story that continues to dominate the headlines.The story that continues to dominate the headlines. And right now, foreign ministers from across the Middle East and the Muslim world, including the Palestinian foreign minister in Beijing and soon to be in Moscow and soon after that, to be in London and Paris to talk about efforts to contain and end the war in the Middle East. The Chinese foreign minister calling for an immediate ceasefire, also calling for a two-state solution, agreeing with the Americans on the latter, not agreeing with the Americans on the former. This is an environment where pretty much everybody involved is trying to get an end to the fighting except the United States, which is the most important ally, the critical ally of Israel.
And the Israelis intend to continue their military strikes until they feel like they have destroyed Hamas on the ground. And that means not just in Gaza City, but also it means in the south of Gaza. This is causing difficulties inside the United States with stronger opposition inside the Democratic Party, especially among young people where Biden is under water wanting a much more balanced, much less pro-Israel policy. And Republicans who on balance think that Biden has been too soft in his support for Israel. This means that Biden's at 40% approval right now, the lowest of his administration to date. And it's hard to see this getting any better any time soon. I think that the Israelis are clearly having military successes on the ground in Gaza. And when you talk to the generals, they feel like they're on the timeline they want to be. They are finding the tunnels, finding the militant leaders, able to go after with impunity, those that are there. Of course, the very fact that Hamas is fighting inside a civilian area, that they have tunnels underneath schools and hospitals, and that's where they're putting the hostages. And we've seen those videos now that are confirmed and where they're putting their military equipment makes Hamas responsible for a lot of the civilians that are getting killed, but also makes the Israelis responsible in the global environment for not being able to take out Hamas unless they put massive numbers of civilians at risk.
And so what you have is the Israelis winning, at least tactically, the military battles on the ground, whether one can destroy Hamas or extremist militarism against Israel through bombing and a ground war is another longer question. But losing the information war where around the world and including in the United States, there is just a lot more sympathy increasingly for the Palestinians. Only six weeks after the worst terrorist attacks, the worst violence against Jews anywhere in the world since the Holocaust. That is the reality.
And, you know, it's very different in this regard than covering the Russia-Ukraine invasion, where, first of all, the Ukrainians were winning the information war and also it was very clearly a black versus white struggle. I mean, these were, you know, not that the Ukrainians are Democrats and didn't have problems with corruption, but they were minding their own business. They wanted to join NATO. True. That's a decision that is made by a sovereign country. But they weren't threatening Russia. They weren't invading Russia. They were doing nothing to Russians in the Federation. And that was even true despite years of annexation illegally by the Russians of Ukrainian territory. So it was very clear when the Russians invaded Ukraine that the Russians were at fault and that the question is how can you respond to that? It was black and white.
In the case of Israel and Palestine, it is very clear that Hamas is responsible for October 7th. That's clear. But it's also clear that the Israelis have engaged in a lot of illegal actions in taking Palestinian territory on the ground in the West Bank and continue to occupy territory that is not theirs that nobody thinks is theirs and not prepared to do anything about it. It's also clear that the Israeli government had been supporting Hamas in undermining the Palestinian Authority and in refuse thing to consider a two-state solution under Netanyahu and his far right coalition. So, I mean, it's not black and white. There are different shades of gray. There are you know, it's very easy to say that Hamas is a terrorist organization and that means they should be destroyed and Netanyahu is a bad leader and that means he should be voted out. But there's no equivalence between these two leaders. But saying there's no equivalence doesn't mean that one is good and the other's bad. Here we are talking about different shades of illegal activity and we're also talking about different shades of behavior that is causing immense amounts of responsibility for human suffering.
And you can't simply say that Hamas is only responsible for all the people that are getting killed. You can't say that. You can say they're mostly responsible because they're the ones that have the hostages. They're the ones targeting the civilians. They're the ones putting civilians in harm's way. But certainly the Israeli Defense Forces deserve some culpability for their willingness to, you know, have a siege and not allow in humanitarian aid. And their willingness to engage in attacks that are going to take out some militants, but are going to risk the lives of far more civilians. And, you know, how do you balance that? Is it 90:10 Hamas responsible? Is it 70:30? Is it 80:20? I'm not sure I care, you know, doing a percentage as I am in recognizing that we have to describe the nuance. We have to be reasonable in not trying to play one side off as purely responsible and guilty and bad, that the only way this is going to lead to peace is if Hamas is removed, if they are destroyed as a terrorist organization. Number one. If there are prospects for peace for Palestinians to have livelihoods in Gaza and the West Bank going forward, and if Netanyahu and his far right coalition are removed from office, those things are all necessary antecedent conditions before we can have stability in the region.
That's where we are. So it's not an easy conversation. It's a nuanced conversation. It's one that makes almost nobody satisfied and happy in a way that on Russia and Ukraine, it was very easy to be on team Ukraine, even though they frequently lied about stuff in terms of propaganda and support of the war. And their government wasn't 100% clean and isn't 100% clean. But it's still very easy to say the Ukrainians deserve their territory back. It's much harder in this environment on Israel-Palestine to put your thumb on one side of the scale, you have to have a broader conversation if you want to be accurate and if you want to have peace. And that's where we are, and that's part of the reason why it's been so damn difficult to get peace in the Middle East for decades and decades, why the Americans, like many others, have kind of given up on it in favor of just trying to create stability with everybody else. And that worked to a degree. But now we see it wasn't enough. And so we're going to have to go back yet again in one of the most challenging geopolitical missions that we face in the world today.
So that's it for me, but I'm sure we'll be back to this real soon.
- The debate over a “cease-fire” for Gaza ›
- US compared to Russia after tanking UN resolution on Gaza ›
- Biden seeks urgent aid package for Israel, Ukraine ›
- Israel-Hamas war: Biden's second foreign policy crisis ›
- How Netanyahu used Hamas to avoid talks of a two-state solution ›
- Is an Israel-Palestine two-state solution possible? ›
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.
FILE PHOTO: A Canadian dollar coin, commonly known as the “Loonie”, is pictured in this illustration picture taken in Toronto, January 23, 2015.
Israel-Hamas war echoes at home in Canada
As the Gaza fighting entered a new and likely bloodier phase with Israel's ground force surrounding Gaza City, Muslim and Jewish Canadians are feeling the shockwaves of the conflict at home.
In late October, Canada confirmed a seventh dead Canadian in the territory with two others missing. Three Canadians are being held hostage by Hamas. So far, 75 Canadians have left Gaza via the Rafah Crossing into Egypt, and dozens more are set to go, though an unexpected closing of the border on Wednesday has delayed plans to get them out.
Justin Trudeau, like other world leaders including President Joe Biden and all G7 nations, has called for a “humanitarian pause” to get people out and aid in. The Canadian premier appeared to make this point in a convo with Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu earlier this week, but Israel has rebuffed all of these calls.
Meanwhile, in Canada, observers report a staggering rise in antisemitic and Islamophobic hate crimes in recent weeks. A Jewish center near Montreal recently suffered a Molotov cocktail attack, while earlier this month a yearlong Senate investigation concluded that discrimination and violence against Canadian Muslims is already an “acute threat.”
Trudeau said the violence and hate has Canadians “scared in our own streets,” as he called for an end to racist attacks. Muslims comprise about 5% of Canada’s population, and Jews about 1%, according to the 2021 census.
Protest for Palestine in Dearborn, Michigan, home to the largest Arab-American community in the US.
Biden’s Arab-American exodus
US President Joe Biden’s policy towards Israel has cost him support among a community that could decide his fate in several swing states next year. A new poll by the Arab-American Institute shows just 17% of Arab-American voters now support him – a staggering drop from nearly 60% back in 2020. In addition, barely a quarter of Arab-Americans said they identify as Democrats now, the first time in a quarter century of polling that the number has fallen below 50%.
The reason? Two-thirds of Arab Americans disapprove of Biden’s handling of the Israel-Hamas conflict, in which he has given “rock solid” financial, military, and moral support to Israel. And while Biden has recently urged Israel to minimize civilian deaths, he’s also downplayed the importance – and even the credibility – of Palestinian casualty figures.
This view diverges from the broader US feeling. Polling shows 52% of Americans say Biden’s level of support for Israel is just right, with another 20% saying Washington should do more for Israel. Small wonder that two-thirds of Arab Americans said they don’t feel comfortable expressing concerns about Palestinians publicly.
Who’s picking up Arab-American allegiances? Support for Trump, one of the most pro-Israel US presidents in memory, surged past Biden to about 40%, while nearly one in five Arab-Americans are considering third-party candidates. As one Arab-American leader told Time, “the policies are basically the same. Except when Trump does it, you get some pushback from the Democratic Party.”
Could this affect the 2024 election? Arab Americans account for about 5% of the vote in up-for-grabs Michigan, which Biden won by 2.8 points in 2020. They also represent as much as 2% of the electorate in Pennsylvania, which Biden won by 1.2 points.Israel-Hamas war set to expand & directly involve US
Ian Bremmer's Quick Take: It is, of course, an expansion of the war in the Middle East. Israeli troops and tanks now inside Gaza. The ground invasion, the second phase, as they've said, is well underway. Netanyahu, the prime minister of Israel, his advisor saying that payback has begun.
It is, of course, retribution for Hamas terrorist attacks, killing 1400 Israelis, mostly civilians, on October 7th. And since then, the number keeps going up. Over 250, it looks like total hostages having been taken and still mostly being held by Hamas in Gaza. This is a horrible tragedy on every count and the deaths that we will see, both the ability of the Israeli Defense Forces to take out Hamas military leadership and also the Palestinian civilians who are caught up in this fight.
Those numbers, those death numbers are going to go way, way up over the coming weeks. And I now believe we can no longer contain this war in Gaza. That was perhaps mostly possible in the past couple of weeks. It is so no longer, I think, the level of radicalization and violence that you will see on the West Bank from the Palestinians and in return from the IDF and the settlers, also from Hezbollah in the north and from Iranian proxies like the Houthis in Yemen and elsewhere, Iraq, Syria. That is going to be a reality in very short order.
And the United States will be involved in that war. In that regard, very different from the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which almost two years in now, and a massive amount of military support and expense from the United States and allies to support the Ukrainians. But no fighting, no direct fighting of American soldiers. Already, we have over 20 US servicemen and women that have been casualties of Shia-Iranian proxy strikes in the region. Those numbers expected to go way, way up. Also, anti-Semitism attacks across the region. Terrorism against the United States in the region and more broadly. I expect that we're going to see so much more of that in the coming weeks and months. And that means that this is not just Israel's war against Hamas. It is also a US war in the Middle East.
And the Americans will resist saying that. But increasingly that will be a reality. And in that regard, I do think that Biden has some vulnerabilities here in 2024. Trump is going to say no new war started under him. And now you've got two wars, Russia invading Ukraine and now you've got this Middle East crisis under Biden. And most Americans, even though they support Israel, though certainly not all, and a majority of Gen Z in the US does not, but a majority overall do. A majority in the US does not want to be involved in a new war in the Middle East, and that I think especially a war the Americans have sort of like found themselves engaged in, as opposed to, actively said, we're fighting and here's why. That I think, is going to go over badly for Biden in 2024.
Still a very, very close race, of course, and you see that. But for the near term, we're focused on the impact in the region, the reality that relations in the Gulf for Israel have been, at best, frozen for the foreseeable future and at worst degraded substantially. Turkey in particular, you saw President Erdogan using the 100th Republic Day as an opportunity to bring out massive numbers of supporters for Palestine. And those were the statements he was making, referred to Hamas as a liberation movement, refused to condemn them, condemned Israel, and the Israelis withdrew their diplomats. We're going to see a lot a lot more of that kind of behavior going forward as well. I wish we had good news here. War in the Middle East rarely brings it, and I fear that escalation is about to get much, much worse.
That's it for me. And I'll talk to you all real soon.
- As crisis deepens in Israel-Hamas conflict, cracks emerge for Biden and Trudeau ›
- Is Biden's embrace of Israel a political liability for him? ›
- Israel-Hamas War: Can the US count on its Arab allies? ›
- Podcast: What's the US role in the Israel-Hamas war? Views from Sen. Chris Murphy & Rep. Mike Waltz ›
- America's tightrope walk with the Israel-Hamas war ›
Israel-Hamas war: Biden's second foreign policy crisis
Ian Bremmer's Quick Take: We are now two weeks into an Israel war in Gaza against Hamas. I guess if there's good news that it hasn't expanded beyond that, But aside from that, not very much good news to take away. Maybe the big picture for me is that this is the second serious global foreign policy crisis that we have seen during the Biden administration. And there are some very interesting comparisons and contrasts with them.
I mean, maybe the first thing to say is it's, you know, the last what is it been, almost 20 months? This is the first time that the Russia Ukraine crisis has been completely kicked off the headlines. No one asking me about Russia, Ukraine, over the last couple of weeks, even though that war continues apace. Plenty of civilians continue to get killed by Russian rockets and drones and lots of fighting on the front lines between the two militaries. But that is not the focus. The focus, of course, is what's happening in Gaza and just how much worse this can all get.
I guess one interesting comparison is that in both cases, President Biden is providing an enormous amount of public support and alignment with a leader that he does not really like or trust. In the case of Ukraine, not an ally, though a country that the United States has been aligned with, hasn't paid a lot of attention to it. And Zelensky himself, someone that Biden really did not feel had experienced to run the country, was presumptuous about, you know, sort of his need to be in to NATO and the Americans not doing enough for him and not listening to US intelligence in the run up to the war. Suddenly the Russians invade and Biden feels no choice, along with American allies, to be out there publicly and strongly supporting him, supporting democracy against an illegal and unprecedented Russian invasion.
In the case of Netanyahu, this is of course, the most important ally of the United States in the Middle East, has been for a very long time. But Biden does not support or like Netanyahu personally much at all. The farthest right wing coalition that Israel has had since independence, expanding their illegal settlements in the West Bank. Biden didn't want to even meet with him in person for a while. It was challenging to get a meeting set up on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly for example. Even though Biden wants to have a very strong, committed relationship with Israel, very different from the present government.
A big difference is, of course, in the case of Israel, it is the ally that the Americans are both actively supporting, but also trying to contain and constrain, as opposed to, in the case of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, it was trying to stop the Russians, the adversary, from a broad invasion into Ukraine. A very big difference, of course, is once the Russians invaded Ukraine, the United States did everything it could to support the Ukrainians. But absolutely wanted to stay out of the war no matter what. And so did American allies. And the US was very aligned with pretty much all of NATO in doing everything they could to stay out of the war, to avoid any possible escalation that could get the Americans fighting directly against the Russians. Hence, no no-fly zone. Hence, you know, concerns about what kind of significant offensive, advanced military equipment that would be provided to the Ukrainians, especially in the early months of the war. This was going to be a proxy fight, not a direct fight.
In the case of the Israel invasion of Gaza, there is a very strong feeling that the Americans will get involved in the war if the war expands. In other words, sending carrier groups directly to the Eastern Med, telling Iran, putting them on notice that if there's an expansive fight involving Hezbollah, involving Iranian proxies around the region, that the Americans will directly fire back. And so the likelihood that this war, if it expands, is going to involve the Americans directly is actually very high. That's one of the reasons why Biden has been so concerned about the potential of significant escalation. Now, there are clearly very strong efforts by Biden and by the Europeans to try to convince Netanyahu not to go ahead with a ground assault. And at least delay one significantly.
Lots of reasons for that. One is because you don't have sufficient humanitarian aid in place. And so where are those that million plus of Palestinians living in northern Gaza, the densely populated urban area that has more infrastructure? Where do they go? They go to the south. What if there's no food and supplies for them? There are no tent encampments set up. Where are they supposed to live? All of those are questions that have not yet been resolved, but can be resolved if you take more time. Can you get more citizens, civilians out of that areas of consequence, limit the civilian casualties? There's also the matter of 220 civilians that are still being held hostage, most of whom are still believed to be alive. You start a ground war, you're probably not getting many, if any, of them out alive. You wait, you can possibly get a lot more of them. Secure them if you had already had worked with the Qataris to get two American citizens that have been released by Hamas over the weekend. And finally, the widespread belief on the part of pretty much everyone in NATO that if Israel engages in a ground war, it's going to be very long, very bloody, and will lead to more radicalization of Palestinians, not just in Gaza but across the region in the West Bank.
Also, all those places where there are large numbers of refugees like Lebanon, like Syria, and on and on. So that is very different from where the Israelis are right now. And this is not just Netanyahu. It's not just his very far right-wing government. It's also the war cabinet. It's also experienced Israelis across the political spectrum. A majority of Israeli citizens support a ground offensive. About half of them think it should be a long lasting, very substantial one, but half think it should be shorter and sharper. And we'll see where that goes. But certainly I don't have any confidence that they're going to be able to forestall the Americans and allies this invasion for much longer. Couple more points here. Unlike in the Russian invasion of Ukraine, where the United States was aligned with everyone among the advanced industrial democracies to support the Ukrainians, and those policies were formulated together, here the Americans are basically by themselves.
The Europeans are all over the map in terms of how they feel about Israel, how they feel about the Palestinians, what should be next, no military support in the region, how do you feel about humanitarian support. It's a mess. And so as this war continues and likely expands, the Americans will be acting much more unilaterally, which is challenging both because it's a distraction from the Russian invasion of Ukraine and likely means that the United States will provide less support for the Ukrainians, undermining the strong trans-Atlantic ties that have been increasingly built over the last 20 months, but also because America's role in supporting Israel and supporting the Netanyahu government will be seen as misaligned with that policy of many of the core Europeans. So for both of those reasons, this really does play out more broadly. Anyway. An awful lot to think about. A very fast moving and very tragic set of events all set off on October 7th and all only getting worse over the last couple of weeks.
That's it for me and I'll talk to you all real soon.
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