Special Edition: October 7 - One Year Later

A year ago on October 8 I wrote about the Hamas attack on Israel that had occurred the previous day. When I was writing, the full scale of the horror that Hamas had visited upon Israel was not yet known. Had I written that post a week later, I probably would have taken a different approach. In particular, I would have paid more attention to the brutality of the attack and the murder of many innocent and undeserving Israelis. In addition, I probably wasn't clear enough that I hold Hamas solely responsible for the attack. However, Hamas didn't act in a vacuum and what I was writing about were the conditions that made the Hamas attack possible. That continues to be an interest of mine. Re-reading the post today, I continue to feel that its analysis was solid. More importantly, I think the the main point of my writing — that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, due to personal interests, was responsible for creating an opening that Hamas exploited — remains true today. Netanyahu was pursuing a personal agenda that led to a national disaster. Netanyahu's motivation has not changed, which explains his willingness to sacrifice the remaining hostages held by Hamas and to expand Israel's wars rather than seeking a ceasefire.

For almost as long as he has been Prime Minister, Netanyahu has either been under investigation or on trial for bribery, fraud, and breach of trust charges. His response has been to attack Israel's justice system in an attempt to neuter it and put in place officials who won't pursue the charges. As a result of Netanyahu's preoccupation with escaping legal consequences, he was forced into a governing coalition with extremist, far-right supporters of Jewish terrorism. These officials, in turn, leaned on Netanyahu to help them fulfill their dreams of an Israeli takeover of the West Bank. A year ago, due to violence in the West Bank that was almost entirely provoked by Netanyahu's coalition partners, nearly all active Israeli battalions were deployed to the West Bank. This meant that once Hamas broke through weak border installations, the Negev Desert was wide open and undefended. Hamas was able to storm kibbutzim virtually unopposed. The political dynamics that led to Netanyahu's deference to his extremist coalition partners and the deployment of Israel's military assets to serve expansionist goals continue to this day.

Today Gaza has been almost completely destroyed. Israel has initiated bombings and missile attacks on the West Bank and Israeli settlers routinely attack West Bank villages. The Houthis in Yemen have virtually blockaded the Red Sea, turning the Israeli port of Eilat into a ghost town. Missiles have been fired into Israel from Yemen and Israel has repeatedly bombed targets in that country. Israel has bombed Syria throughout the past year. Israel has also attacked Iranian targets both inside Iran and out, provoking retaliatory attacks by Iran on Israel. Also throughout the year, Israel has battled with the Lebanese organization Hezbollah. This culminated in Israel killing Hezbollah's leader and most of its top leadership, bombing civilian areas of Beirut and its southern suburbs, and launching an invasion of southern Lebanon. Hezbollah, the Houthis, and Iran have all been clear that their actions have been in support of Hamas and that they would end their attacks on Israel if a ceasefire were implemented in Gaza. But Netanyahu has sabotaged all attempts to reach a ceasefire agreement and, instead, continued expansionist aggression.

Netanyahu and his extreme right-wing partners hold each other in an existential embrace. If either side abandons the other, it will be the end of both of them. For his part, Netanyahu would likely end up in prison. The terrorist-supporting extremists in his coalition would almost certainly never hold political power again and would see their interests severely marginalized. Netanyahu has two choices: 1) he can engage in endless war, using the excuse of a national emergency to avoid facing justice, or 2) he can completely defeat Israel's enemies, heralding a period of peace and prosperity and, hence, be celebrated as Israel's savior. He is clearly pursuing the first in hopes of achieving the second. Israel appears determined to make every last inch of Gaza uninhabitable, with all its residents either killed or displaced. Netanyahu may be hoping to do the same to southern Lebanon. It is one of the West's greatest failures that it has stood by and allowed Israel to perpetrate genocide in Gaza and may further allow something similar in Lebanon. Journalist Peter Arnett famously quoted an American military officer in Vietnam as saying, "It became necessary to destroy the town to save it." Netanyahu appears to believe that it may be necessary to destroy the entire region in order to save himself from prison.

According to recent reporting, some Biden administration officials have apparently been won over by Netanyahu's vision of total victory. They believe the region can be remade, resulting in peace between Israel and its neighbors. I am extremely doubtful that Netanyahu can achieve anything close to his idea of victory. Violence begets violence and even killing every resident of Gaza and southern Lebanon will leave plenty of enemies for Israel while creating new ones along the way. At some point, U.S. officials need to realize where Netanyahu's strategy is leading and decide whether or not they really want to continue being part of it. Right now, those officials appear to be quite content to supply arms and money to Netanyahu while he engages in an ever expanding circle of warfare. U.S. officials have fooled themselves into believing that they are supporting Israel's strategic interests. In reality, they are supporting Netanyahu's personal goals. Netanyahu's prioritization of his own interests led to a disaster for Israel a year ago. His continued fixation on his personal concerns may well lead to an even greater disaster, and one that involves the United States. Within days we will probably see Israel's retaliation against Iran, an attack that appears to be very closely coordinated with U.S. officials. The scale of that attack may offer some clues as to how close the Biden administration plans to continue tying itself to Netanyahu and his "stay out of jail at any cost" strategy.

An Israeli Arab professor once told me that Americans focus too much on personalities and ignore societal trends. I am clearly guilty of that in this analysis. In deference to my old friend, I should also concede that if Netanyahu and his government of extremists were replaced, there is a good chance that not much would change as far as the wars are concerned. While Netanyahu is clearly driven by personal motives, Israeli society at large appears to support the complete devastation of Gaza and probably Lebanon as well. If or when U.S. officials divorce themselves from Netanyahu, a second step will be needed to separate U.S. interests from Israeli interests. Israel, as an independent country, has the right, indeed the duty, to pursue its own national goals. However, the U.S. has no obligation to fund and support those goals if they are contrary to its own interests. Whether U.S. officials will ever come to see daylight between U.S. and Israeli interests is a question for another day.