I posted this not in October 2023 but in August 2024.
In my August 2024 post What I think Israel is trying to do, I included a capture of a bracing Twitter thread by İyad el-Baghdadi | إياد البغدادي from 13 November 2023, about understanding Israel’s attack on Gaza as genocidal and what that does and does not imply. That thread became the anchor for a Twitter thread in which I accumulated resources I found clarifying, which eventually developed into that “What” post.
Baghdadi was originally prompted to write that thread when a commenter on a previous Twitter thread of his from 23 October 2023 objected to him calling Israel’s attack genocidal. That previous thread provides an instructive time capsule of the state of what was happening and what we knew in the very earliest days of Israel’s attack on Gaza. It holds up astonishingly well (though a handful of his predictions did not come true in interesting ways). I have various quibbles and a few sharp disagreements, but I don’t want to examine those here, not least because in most places where I disagree I admit that I may well be wrong.
If you benefit from his commentary half as much as I did and have a buck or three to spare, I encourage making a one-time or recurring donation to Baghdadi’s Kawaakibi Foundation. I just did.
Past this point, this post is not my writing; it is a capture of Baghdadi’s earlier long original thread and its sequel responding to questions, which I have created for readability, convenience, and in case Twitter implodes:
23 October 2023 intro
Here’s a thread outlining the geopolitical situation around the Israel-Gaza war its possibilities, impossibilities, and possible outcomes. Heads up, it’s my longest thread yet. It’s also raw, unedited, and unevenly paced. Sorry, none of us are well but at least we’re trying.
A note that this thread rhetorically departs from my usual tone because it’s about geopolitics. I’m analyzing the actions of many actors the majority of whom are awful. I’m trying to do that from a position of objectivity, which is hard when you actually value all human life.
Hamas & 10/7
Hamas’s stated objectives for their Oct 7 operation were:
- Release Palestinians in Israeli prisons
- Stop normalization pacts between Israel & Saudi
- Punish Israel for violations / attacks on Palestinian holy sites
- (there was a fourth objective I can’t find right now)
Most coverage of Hamas’s attacks in Western media have focused on the atrocity factor (the mass killings & kidnapping of civilians). Virtually none have actually covered it from a military strategy standpoint. But it’s important to look at that to get a full picture.
Hamas’s attack was very well coordinated and meticulously planned. They first used drones to take down surveillance systems on the border fence, rendering them “blind”, then moved bulldozers to knock down sections of the fence. Other fighters used tunnels. Others used paragliders.
Israel had relied upon high tech surveillance including tunnel detection systems for the security of the Gaza border fence. Hamas seems to have dug deeper than these systems can detect. The tunnels they dig across the border seem to be one-use only and are abandoned afterwards. Their first targets were intelligence posts, police stations, and IDF points. They knew exactly where to hit and how long it’ll take them to encounter a response. Their fighters were able to operate within enemy territory for [more than] 24 hours, meaning they were well supplied.
Why is this important? Because we want to understand what Hamas was expecting as an Israeli response. Was it expecting or planning on a ground invasion? Or did they think this will be a kidnap operation that will be followed by bombing and then negotiations and a prisoner swap?
There are indications & early statements suggesting that Hamas’s attack was more successful than they had expected. In one statement I came across: “The army collapsed as we attacked, what do we do in this situation? So we just pressed forward as far as we could”. Other statements suggested that the wanton massacres and atrocities that followed as being the result of them running out of targets and trying to just gain as many hostages as possible. Basically a coordinated military operation descended into an unimaginably bloody massacre.
But even if we assume Hamas planned this as a complex hostage-taking op, I find it hard to believe that they did not anticipate a ground assault in response. Whoever planned an attack this sophisticated couldn’t have not planned for an unprecedented Israeli response.
In the early days after Oct 7 there were messages (originating on Telegram channels, copied into group whatsapp chats etc) that say that Hamas has “8 months of supplies”, and that in addition to their homemade weapons they also have Iranian, North Korean, etc weapons. About the tunnel network — some say it runs ~500 kms in total. For comparison Oslo’s metro is 85 kms (and a lot of it is overground). It’s multilayered and was built over many years. Also there’s thousands of tunnels across the Egyptian border, plus temp tunnels into Israel
So, did Hamas at least anticipate, if not actually plan, on a ground invasion? I think they did. Now for question 2 — did Hamas coordinate this with its allies (Hezbollah & Iranian regime)? I also think they did:
There are strong indications that Hezbollah at least knew, if not coordinated the attack. If we go by the report on this link, then Hamas’s attack wasn’t a one-off hostage operation, it was part of a much broader strategy.
Some people familiar with the operation said that a tight circle of leaders from Iran, Hezbollah, and Hamas helped plan the attack starting over a year ago, trained militants and had advanced knowledge of it. That account is based on interviews with three Iranians affiliated with the Revolutionary Guards, one Iranian connected to senior leadership, and a Syrian affiliated with Hezbollah.
New York Times | Hamas Attack on Israel Brings New Scrutiny of Group’s Ties to Iran
If this is a coordinated broad plan, and if the Hamas attack planned on an Israeli ground invasion, then it would make sense for Hezbollah to wait until Israel is bogged in Gaza before they open a major new front to Israel’s north. But I’ll come back to this. I’m thinking aloud.
Israel
But let’s look at Israel now. When discussing state actors and their decision-making, there’s a kind of hierarchy that serves me well: The most fundamental imperatives are geopolitical; then the political; then the ideological. Keep in mind when analyzing Netanyahu’s response.
What I mean is that what you see isn’t just Israel acting for its own security (its geopolitical imperatives) but also Netanyahu acting for his own political career. And there’s also his electoral allies acting out their ideology. The Oct 7 attacks are a huge repudiation of much of Netanyahu’s career. It’s almost like everything he built for decades crashed in a matter of hours. Netanyahu presented himself as a master statesman who can do the impossible for Israel. His project was to liquidate Palestinian national project:
- Normalize with Arab regimes to break the “land for peace” paradigm
- Strengthen Hamas to weaken the Palestinian Authority
- Annex the West Bank to make 2SS [a two-state solution] impossible
- Treat Palestinians as a security problem to be managed indefinitely
Btw, the point about how Netanyahu’s policy was to strengthen Hamas, a lot more can be said about this failure but here’s a good place to start:
This is solidly documented. Between 2021 and 2018, Netanyahu gave Qatar approval to transfer a cumulative sum of about a billion dollars to Gaza, at least half of which reached Hamas, including its military wing. According to the Jerusalem Psot, in a private meeting with members of his Likud party on March 11, 2019, Netanyahu explained the reckless step as follow: The money transfer is part of the strategy to divide the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. Anyone who opposes the establishment of a Palestinian state needs to support the transfer of the money from Qatar to Hamas. In that way, we will foil the establishment of a palestinian state (as reported in former cabinet member Haim Ramon’s Hebrew-language book Neged Haruach, p. 417).
[⋯]
In an interview with the Ynet news website on May 5, 2019, Netanyahu associate Gershon Hacohen, a major general in reserves, said, “We need to tell the truth. Netanyahu’s strategy is to prevent the option of two state, so he is turning Hamas into his closest partner. Openly Hamas is an enemy. Covertly, it’s an ally.”
In a tweet on May 20, 2019, Channel 13 quoted Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak saying: “Netanyahu isn’t interest in the two-state solution. Rather, he wants to separate Gaza from the West Bank, as he told me at the end of 2010.” Mubarak said that during an interview with the Kuwaiti daily Al-Anba.
[emphasis Baghdadi’s]
Ha’Aretz | Opinion | Why Did Netanyahu Want to Strengthen Hamas?
It was also under Netanyahu that Israel expanded its disinfo capacities and leaned hard into relying upon cyber capabilities and high-tech occupation. Also a reminder, Netanyahu is one of the first pioneers of the “war on terror” paradigm: the US War on Terror doctrine was influence by Israeli doctrine, and particularly by a certain Benjamin Netanyahu who had been arguing that the US should adopt it since the early 1980s. “The Bush doctrine in NSS-2002 was taken from the Shultz doctrine, and … the Shulz doctrine in NSDD-138 was taken from Israeli doctrine.”
So after Oct 7 Bibi had one of two options —
- Gesign & admit that this is the result of a series of failures most of which lead back to him
- Go all out and try to accomplish a “victory” his allies always wanted but couldn’t do. Ethnically cleanse 2 million Palestinians.
So my analysis is that Israel’s response so far reflects primarily not Israel’s security imperatives but Netanyahu’s political calculations. His first statement was “We’re going to change the Middle East”, which if you follow Netanyahu you know is a very Netanyahu thing to say. Netanyahu even seems willing to sacrifice the hostages for that. He’s not even meeting with hostage families, and pro-Netanyahu mobs are calling hostage families “traitors” for calling for a cease fire to allow for hostage negotiations before a ground invasion.
I understand when people ask "What else could he have done in response to such a brazen attack". Ami Dar and others have written good posts about this.
Some people have asked, “What would you do if you were in Netanyahu’s place?” After thinking about this, here’s what I would have done last week: Nothing. Nothing at all. Not one bullet — at least not for a while. I would have said, “We will secure our borders immediately. We will bury and grieve for our dead. We will sit shiva together. And we will think before acting. I promise you this won’t happen again. But we will do this methodically, surgically, politically, economically. With most of the world behind us, and while keeping an eye on the future we want to build here. I understand the desire for action now. But we have to be strong and smart. And Hamas is in Gaza. They can’t leave. They, and we, can wait a bit. We will win. But we will do this right.”
This would have been hard-to-impossible to pull off politically, but that's what leaders are for.
But while such a response would have been good for Israel it would have been bad for Bibi’s career.
(Btw, Israel will come out of this a much more polarized and right-wing country. You’d expect people to rally to their leader and to unite versus a common threat after such horrors, but Bibi is placing his political career above everyone’s security in Israel and regionally / globally.)
And so the Israeli (Netanyahu & co) response to a humiliating failure is to “achieve the impossible” and ethnically cleanse Gaza. I’ll come back to the actual Gaza op and the stated objective of “destroying Hamas”. But now let’s look at Egypt in all of this.
Egypt
According to multiple Israeli commentators (and even think tanks), the Israeli demand is to transfer Gaza’s population into the wilderness of the Sinai desert. It’s even clear that the US, and perhaps other Western countries, tried to pressure Egypt’s Sisi into accepting this.
Here’s the thing — Egypt would never accept this, as a matter of geopolitical imperative. If 2 million Palestinians are displaced into Sinai, it could be fatal to Sisi’s regime (not exaggerating when I say the regime could fall). And it won’t even stop Hamas. Hamas already has ~2500 smuggling tunnels across the Gaza-Egypt border + ties with smugglers in Sinai. If Sinai becomes the new Gaza, Hamas will just start to rebuild on the Egyptian side where they’d also have the advantage of a recruiting pool of millions of angry Egyptians.
Not to mention that Egypt was already getting screwed over with Biden’s India-Middle East-Europe Corridor that bypasses Egypt and devalues the heavy investments they’ve made in modernizing their own infrastructure. So they were getting screwed even before these events.
Reminder that a significant part of the modern Egyptian national identity was forged in conflict with Israel. The current Egyptian regime itself was founded by army officers who overthrew the previous regime (the monarchy) after blaming it for the 1948 defeat vs Israel.
So not Sisi nor anyone else who wants to stay in power in Egypt would allow Gaza population transfer into Egypt. I am not exaggerating when I say that Egypt would sooner break the Camp David accords or even start covertly supply Hamas with weapons than accept such an outcome.
It is within this context that I read today’s (?) call between Egypt’s Minister Of Foreign Affairs and Iran’s Minister Of Foreign Affairs. Sisi is feeling the heat and is looking for options in case of an escalation. He wants to be in contact with all sides. I can’t imagine he’s been sleeping easy these days.
Jordan too would never allow it. In Jordan the fear is that if population transfer happens in Gaza then the West Bank is next. Historical note: Jordan saw a 10-month civil war in the 1970s when Palestinian militants stationed themselves there to fight Israel.
Egypt and Jordan have the longest lasting peace treaties with Israel. That even those are being tested tells you something. Biden adopting Bibi’s position shows he’d rather coddle Bibi than appreciate Egypt & Jordan’s vital national security concerns.
It’s insane that the US actually adopted the Israeli position and wanted Egypt to accept population transfer. This has far-reaching implications for how regional leaders will see the US going forward. You can get your allies to do many things, but not slit their own throats. Those in charge of US policy on this seem insane, incompetent, senile, or a combination of the three.
Strained relations with both the US and Israel prompt the Egyptian president to snub President Biden and dismiss plans for Egypt to offer a temporary refuge for Gazans fleeing the Israel-Hamas conflict
The Medialine | El-Sisi Rejects US-Israeli Proposal for North Sinai Refuge for Gazans
Alliance means mutual interest / benefit. When you ask someone to slit their throat for you, the alliance is over. It means these countries no longer can trust the US to make their interests a priority. It also means they can start looking for an ally who’d respect their interests.
Basically if he gets his way the Bibi & co plan is to expel Gaza Palestinians into Egypt, and probably later expel West Bank Palestinians into Jordan, so Israel can have all the land without any of the Palestinians. And so for Palestinians to no longer exist as a national group.
(Also, I swear if I get another comment from a clueless person who seems to think Arab countries should accept refugees because “refugees should be welcome”. This isn’t a humanitarian operation you fucking morons, this is ethnic cleansing and the liquidation of a nation.)
Saudi Arabia
Ok. Now let’s talk about Saudi Arabia, which was in the process of negotiating a normalization deal with Israel which included US security guarantees. Summary: MBS [Crown Prince Muḥammad bin Salmān Āl Su‘ūd] is annoyed that this war spoiled one of his main strategic aims, but has no choice but to take a hardline on Israel. MBS has a project and it’s to secure the Saudi regime’s future. He wanted Israeli tech & investment in his pet project in Neom. He wanted US security guarantees. He wanted the prestige of being a hero for “making peace in the Middle East” etc. And he knows how to play hardball.
For over a year before the war MBS dangled public Israel normalization before both Bibi and Biden to get a long list of concessions and he kept asking for more. But he’s aware that his people can’t stand by with Gaza being slaughtered. He has no choice but to take a hardline. Because MBS has a project, he doesn’t want war. He really, really doesn’t want war. The Iranian regime knows this of course, and for years had presented a simple formula: If they go to war against Israel/USA, they’ll consider US/Israel’s Gulf allies to be targets as well.
In 2019 when there was an escalation with Iran MBS immediately deescalated and engaged them. Now again and shortly after Oct 7, MBS called Iranian president Raisi (first time ever!) and shortly after Iran’s foreign minister visited Saudi. Basically “hey if this escalates I’m not part of this.”
So it’s not only that MBS thinks his people (including his own family) won’t tolerate witnessing the massacre / ethnic cleansing of 2 million people nearby. He also has to send a clear signal to the Iranians that he’s not on Israel’s side in this
That said, MBS would be hoping that this dies down and he can get back to the Israel normalization project in due time, but he knows that if this escalates it may be many years (if at all) that this can happen. He’ll continue to engage Israel in private. (probably already is).
(Weirdly enough MBS now prefers Biden to Trump because while Biden seems ready to entertain a US security guarantee Trump won’t. Biden’s agenda is securing the US empire in the world. Trump’s is securing white supremacy within America. Choose your poison.)
Iran
Back to the Iran axis. Iran has assets in Yemen, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon. The relationship between the Iranian regime and much of this militant network is complex. Calling them “proxies” reduces their agency. Calling them “allies” makes it seem they’re totally independent.
Anyway. I don’t think Iran wants a regional war at this point. The question is whether in case of an escalation, they’ll go all in, or whether they’ll stand by and sacrifice Hamas. Some think they’ll sit it out and allow Hamas to be destroyed. I think they won’t, here’s why.
Btw Iran's proxy network isn’t just about ideology but geopolitics. Look at this map of the Sassanid empire (6th century AD), note how Persia at the time extended its influence into the Levant and the Gulf, and also … Yemen. It just makes geopolitical sense on this chessboard.
If Iran sacrifices Hamas it’ll:
- Lose a critical asset
- Suffer a serious ideological & political setback
- Send a signal to its other proxies that it doesn’t stand by its allies
The third point is critical and other analysts haven’t considered it fully. Iran’s network is built over decades and based on long-term relationships. The regime really stands by its allies (look at Bashar in Syria). They don’t waffle like others. To allow one of its allies to be destroyed while it stands by will really damage its network.
A similar calculus applies to Hezbollah. If Hamas is gone, and Israel no longer has a military threat to its south, then it can then focus all of its efforts on the enemy to the north. Hezbollah cannot allow Hamas to fall because it’ll be next.
Btw Iran’s assets have already been activated. Houthis fired missiles & drones towards Israel that US navy intercepted. US assets in Iraq & Syria were also targeted. US still has a lot of assets in the region. Iran’s m.o. is to attack using proxies. The Houthi missiles / drones were really a shock, Yemen is 1700 kms away from Israel. The fact that they have missiles and drones of this range is astounding. But it’s also likely the Houthi attack isn’t meant to actually threaten Israel but to tie up US navy assets in the Red Sea.
But there’s another side to Iran’s calculus — opportunity. If this becomes a major war, it would be a chance to use the chaos to attack US presence across the region. At best keeps the US distracted among multiple fronts; at best force US withdrawal that would be hard to reverse. This is amplified by the fact that unlike other US wars in the Middle East this isn’t coming after significant pre and in line with overriding strategy. For years US geopolitical thinkers have focused on the China threat. Nobody serious has said “let’s get involved in another war in the Middle East.” So in this particular case the US is caught flatfooted, it hasn’t prepared for this, it’s not in line with its long-term geopolitical aims, it’s just reacting, and from everything we’ve seen so far there’s a lot of incompetence in their response. Even the messaging is confused.
What about the IRGC, Iran’s real army? They won’t get directly involved unless the US gets significantly involved. Keep in mind the US moved assets to “deter nonstate actors from exploiting the situation”. I don’t know if that means the US would act directly vs Hezbollah. Is the US prepared to get directly involved alongside Israel? Put boots on the ground? Attack Hezbollah positions? Bibi clearly wants the US to be involved directly. Some even suggesting the IDF can’t win this on its own. Some of Biden’s messaging too can be interpreted this way.
If the IRGC acts its likely target would be to block off the Straits of Hormuz where 30% of world energy passes. Send oil prices skyrocketing, hurt the West in its pockets.
They’ll do it cheaply too using drones, mines, etc. They won’t even claim responsibility. China sent navy assets to the region. It’s extremely sensitive to oil shocks and its main interest in preventing escalation is to ensure the oil flows. It’s also a friend of Iran, perhaps it’ll want to make sure shipments headed to itself can still pass. There’s also a non-zero chance that if this escalates to a significant degree and drags in the US, China will see this as a golden opportunity to move on Taiwan. But let’s not even go there, this is already apocalyptic without another major war in the world. But non-zero chance.
Here’s the thing about an oil shock. Russia will benefit twice (hurts West, more profit on oil sales). But you know who else greatly profits from oil shocks? MBS. Recall he was a pariah pre-Ukraine war. After the Ukraine war he was a darling of the West again.
IDF (Israel’s military)
Back to Gaza. Some have blind faith that the IDF will absolutely win and eliminate Hamas. I don’t share that view. Bibi painted himself into a corner with “destroy Hamas” as [his] objective. He clearly doesn’t have a well thought out plan.
Israel has not won a land war since 1967, and even then, it relied on a preemptive strike. It is quite experienced in military occupation and dropping bombs from the sky on civilians, but fighting face to face or urban combat and guerrilla warfare is something it fears.
This is true. Many seem to have blind faith in Israel’s military dominance. But the IDF hasn’t operated in a real urban warfare situation for a generation. Its army is not well trained for the battle for Gaza and isn’t prepared for the mass casualties they’ll see during it. And this isn’t just me saying it. Here’s an article from Israel Today giving the full assessment of a retired IDF general. “We have lost the ability to field an effective army and have become a one dimensional aerial power that can’t win a war on its own.” Today’s IDF is really effective at sniping unarmed journalists, raiding undefended Palestinian towns, and helping extremist settlers harass and beat up Palestinian farmers. But fighting a war in a potential urban meat grinder? I don’t think so.
To really “destroy Hamas”, [Netanyahu will] have to wage a bloody, prolonged urban war to dislodge a well trained, highly motivated, well supplied army that has spent over a decade digging in and preparing for such a day. The IDF has never fought such a battle. He’ll have to take all of Gaza and hold it, and either push out its inhabitants or fight among them. A partial invasion will only relocate Hamas. An occupation will make IDF a target for a prolonged and bloody attrition war.
The deeper he gets into Gaza, the higher the risk of a second front opening to his north, plus multiple fronts vs the US, and a regional conflagration erupting. The regional escalatory potential will be almost infinite. Also the deeper he gets into Gaza and the more desperate the situation gets for civilians there, the more likely it is that even his long-term partners Egypt and Jordan will turn on him, despite their hatred of Hamas, because they can't afford not to. And even if he actually wins, all he'd have done is relocated Palestinian militancy from a besieged and blockaded Gaza to a slightly further but much deeper (and suddenly much less stable) Egypt.
Right now in Israel a major shitstorm has erupted between Bibi and IDF. He wants them to take the blame for Oct 7. IDF [are] also suspicious of the military aims he’s set up and think some are unrealistic. Meanwhile the hostage families who want to see negotiations are being ignored.
The most likely outcome is he’ll go in as far as he can but as the risks rise for everyone he’ll have to stop, declare victory and pull out. The report card will be:
- Israel isn’t safer
- Relations with long-term partners (Egypt & Jordan) damaged
- Impossible for Saudi to normalize for a while
- Real damage to US standing in the region
- Hamas can claim victory because it wasn’t destroyed
In the words of Noam Shuster Eliassi:
There’s so much coverage about the Israelis who are kept hostage by Hamas and so little coverage of Israelis who are kept hostage by Netanyahu.
Many Israelis and their future & security are also captives of Netanyahu. De-escalation is in everyone's benefit. Except Netanyahu.
Biden
- He has his own domestic political calculus
- He’s coddling Bibi (they don’t get along)
- He revealed his cards to Iran by making it clear he doesn’t want escalation
- His whole “diplomacy” amounts to ensuring Israel can attack Hamas without a spillover happening
Answering questions a few days later
I want to start by thanking everyone for their engagement & their questions. I’m particularly grateful that the thread did change some minds. I try not to preach to the choir and to write so that everyone, pro-Palestinian or not, will read. I hope others take note, this isn’t a popularity contest where you try to say whatever is most extreme in order to get followers. You speak in order to be heard.
Several asked for sources (they didn’t doubt the info but wanted sources for additional research). There are some in the thread, but I’m afraid going back and sourcing every single claim is prohibitive. The amount of info we have to consume daily is immense and esp under these circumstances it’s very hard to keep track. I’m not saying I’m 100% sure of every fact I cite and I’m happy to be corrected.
Several asked about US posture and whether the carrier strike group will sufficiently deter Hezbollah & Iranian allies. Umm, difficult concept for some — the US isn’t as intimidating as it used to be 20 years ago. The US simply doesn’t have as much leverage in the region as it used to have. Militarily everyone knows that whatever the US does, it’ll eventually leave. Even regional countries (other than Israel) that used to be closely allied don’t trust the US as before. This isn’t 2003.
Some asked about Hezbollah’s capabilities. Well they’re estimated to have 100k fighters, and they have the strategic depth (via Syria, Iraq, and Iran) to bring in more soldiers & supplies. They’ve spent the last 17 years rebuilding & stacking up weapons, many of them pretty advanced and accurate missiles. I believe their capabilities to be significant. But I’m happy to defer on this to experts watching the group more closely.
There were questions about Netanyahu and his ideology. Reminder, in politics, consistency is a liability. There are certain ideas Netanyahu always held — prevention of a Palestinian state a main one — but otherwise he’s less an ideologue and more a slimy, populist, but also skilled politician. He’s very good at building coalitions and he’s often the most secular & liberal member of the coalitions he builds (which are mostly people further to the right than him).
Questions about Netanyahu strengthening Hamas etc because some people were shocked. Well Ha’aretz did this job for everyone because now they have a pretty detailed article, A Brief History of the Netanyahu-Hamas Alliance. Yup you read that right, the Netanyahu-Hamas alliance.
There were people casting doubt about the “genocide” claim (that Israel’s actions amount to the crime of genocide under international law). On this me and many others are relying upon actual genocide scholars (such as Arnesa Buljušmić-Kustura & others). Maybe someone can post a thread about all the genocide scholars who took this position. Also a reminder that ethnic cleansing and genocide aren’t always separate things; they’re a continuum of each other.
Someone asked about Russian involvement alongside Hamas. The question shows a lack of understanding of the Russia-Israel relationship and what Israel means for the modern Russian psyche. Many of the founders of Israel were born in the Russian empire or the USSR. The USSR was the very first country to recognize the state of Israel. And “defeating Nazism” is almost a moral foundation of the modern Russian national identity. About ⅙th of Israelis today are Russian speakers.
Russia may get pissed with Israel now & then but it’ll always maintain friendly relations. This also explains why Israel was rather slow / reluctant to take Ukraine’s side or supply it with weapons vs Russia. Russia may use this crisis to attack / criticize the West but it will not back Hamas.
An update / correction regarding Russia’s involvement. Many have responded and made me realize I’ve made a mistake. You can read their responses under the tweet. While the facts in my tweet are correct, I made the mistake of confusing the ideological / cultural with the geopolitical. Geopolitically yes, in case of an escalation it makes sense for Russia to stand against the collective “West”, that is against the pro Israel alliance. Putin’s relations with Israel have been worsening. He has relations with Hamas and has criticized the West for its response so far but there’s no indication he’s giving any sort of material support to Hamas and I don’t think he will, even in case of an escalation.But I do think in case of a regional escalation, Russia would give material support to the Iranian axis.
There was a question about whether Palestinians would rather “leave” than get bombed and whether they’ll leave Gaza if it’s damaged beyond repair. How do I explain the Palestinian concept of “sumud صمود” (staying put)? Like I said elsewhere Palestinians are survivors of erasure. After the Nakba, Palestinians adopted a popular attitude of “staying put” (sumud), this is ingrained in our psyche. Perhaps this song can explain?
I’m staying put
In my land, I’m staying put
They can take my livelihood, I’m staying put
They can kill my children, I’m staying put
They can blow up my house, and in its ruins, I’m staying put
A few asked about the Biden-Netanyahu relationship. A lot of my insight came from this reporting from Axios. Basically, Biden and Netanyahu don’t get along, and while Biden declares strong support in public, in private he’s been trying to rein him in.
There were questions about my conclusion that we’re more likely to see a limited incursion that doesn’t go as far as everyone initially thought. I think since I posted the thread, more people are seeing it this way. There’s also this thread [from Dimi Reider] that talks about how the US keeps asking for delays to the ground invasion, but also how the IDF is now walking back the imminence of the invasion.
This is one of those threads that might age very badly, very fast, but I’ll risk it: I don’t think there’s going to be a ground incursion, or a regional war, yet. ֿֿIn fact, barring another hospital hit or something similarly ghastly, we’re going to de-escalation, of sorts:
- The IDF not only wasn’t prepared on the defensive on October 7th; it was also massively underprepared to launch a successful counter-attack. It didn’t have the intel (as evidenced by Hamas attack itself), the plans to suppress Gaza (having subcontracted Hamas for that) or the gear, hardware or supplies. This impression is partly anecdotal, but it bears out through the sheer number of public fundraisers big and small for various bits of gear, from vests to rations.
- This scramble, alone, created a delay which you think would have been surmounted by now. Buf if anything, the signalling from Netanyahu and his circles AGAINST a ground assault is becoming ever more urgent, even as he himself is promising to destroy Hamas, rewrite history, find the Holy Grail and mine the Moon and/or other patently achievable objectives. Signals since Sunday include: IDF saying it won’t be dictated timings by Biden but launch the assault “at a time of their choosing”, which is literally what Hezbollah says when it decides against ever reacting to an IDF bombing raid; a flurry of press statements and leaks about Netanyahu holding “meetings” and “consultations”, which is diplospeak for dawdling; an interview by key coalition partner Aryeh Deri, who candidly said the army simply didn’t have the plans in place to retake the Strip and would need time to prepare them;the quiet demobbing of some of the urgently mobilised reserves; and, hilariously / grimly, a transparently astroturfed campaign urging Netanyahu not to invade, led by a former Netnayahu staffer (grimly, because the campaign says just keep bombing Gaza).
- The delay has been filled by Israel’s brutal but overwhelmingly aimless bombardment of the Strip, which not only killed an astonishing 5,000 or so people (a third of them children), but has cashed in most of cart blanche offered up to Israel by Europe, the US, Saudi and Egypt. You can track for yourself the increase in caveats in support announcements from the West, and the increasingly assertive setting of boundaries closer to home, esp by Egypt. Israel had a chance to radically and brutally reshape the post-Oslo landscape. Thankfully, that’s gone.
- Although word is being put about Israel thinks Hamas sufficiently cowed to whip round and attack Hezbollah — the stronger adversary — first, it would seem this window has been missed as well — and there is no evidence (publicly at least) of army being redeployed northwards.
- And this would also go against the priorities of world powers, starting with both US and China. It’s hard to see what US can gain from regional war, whether or not it participates; its assertion its sending significant forces to avert rather than fight a war seem plausible.
- So what can we expect? Two scenarios: An increase in speed and volume of hostage release culminating in a ceasefire; or a very overhyped but limited incursion aiming to slice off the northernmost tip of the Strip — either just to show we can or to create the buffer zone touted by Galant, which is such a jaw-droppingly stupid idea — even for Galant — that I personally refuse to believe even he takes it seriously (ask me why). Then it’s back to scenario one — release of hostages, ceasefire.
And then?
This deserves a separate thread on a separate day, assuming THIS thread doesn’t collapse in the face of events overnight. Which can happen in any number of ways, beginning with the obvious — Israel actually embarking on a giant offensive contrary to all public evidence. Also, the current status quo is fluid, and the possibilities for unplanned escalations are endless (e.g. Israel bombs a hospital, a Palestinan rocket backfires on a hospital or hits an Israeli schoolbus, etc). And obviously, the RIGHT thing to do is an unconditional ceasefire NOW. Which is not going to happen. But as of 11pm GMT, it seems the current round is petering out. It might only be in anticipation of a more definitive round to come. But it does give the actors working against relentless bloodshed to regroup — both domestically and internationally.
The next day
Update, of sorts.
Breaking: In special statement, Netanyahu says Israel still “preparing” for ground incursion, and emphatically declines to say “when, how, how many.” Says timing of incursion will be determined by war cabinet “unanimously”. Has no update to make about hostages, does not take responsibility for any of the fuckups. “Everyone will have to answer questions, even me — but only after the war.” The rest of the speech is sloganeering.
Israel’s national TV: We have to say we were expecting some dramatic announcement from Netanyahu, and, yet again, we got the opposite … he’s once again evading the issue of accountability … the prime minister is basically saying, I’ll see you at 6 o’clock after the war.
There were questions about whether Hamas political leadership would have known about the attack. On this I generally deferred to this interview by a respected researcher who thinks the political leadership did not know and were only informed shortly before:
My debut on BBC Newsnight explaining Hamas’ internal leadership & power dynamics. The brutal violence unleashed by Hamas against Israeli civilians represents a take-over by hardliners in the military wing, sidelining political moderates who argued for engament & compromise.
There was also this illuminating additional context [on the interview above] by a Palestinian commentator who talks about how the military wing of Hamas has really been the one in charge since 2006.
This isn’t the case; I’m sorry. Hamas, the political movement, became entirely a follower of its military wing in 2003 (Yassin & Rantisi’s Assasi.,). Al Qassam brought Hamas to power in 2005 and saved them in 2007 against the Palestinian Authority. There was a chord that syncs the political and military actions, and it faded away. Hamas was excluded from the operational level that is meant to serve a political aim, and the timing, tactics and red lines of the attack on the 7th of October were drawn by Al Qassam. Now, Hamas leaders in the diaspora need to find solutions.“Every discussion about the day after or the presence of Hamas in Gaza will be decided in Gaza and nowhere else,” Arab diplomats say.
Arab diplomats who recently met with Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh and other senior officials in Qatar say that every proposal or discussion about the future of the group or the hostage deal was met with the answer, ‘We’ll see what they say in Gaza’
Ha’Aretz | Hamas Officials Abroad See Power Wane as Gazan Leaders Take Control
There were questions about Qatar’s role — well, Qatar is in a mediation role because Hamas political bureau members live there. But also, would be remiss not to mention that Netanyahu wanted Qatar to be an in-between long ago, and convinced it to continue to send money to Hamas. In fact, in 2019, Qatar considered walking away from this deal, so Netanyahu sent his Mossad chief + an IDF officer to convince them to continue to send money to Hamas.
There was a question about Hamas and the hostages. Well, it seems that Hamas is playing an interesting game with the hostages, releasing a few every few days to forestall a ground invasion and to increase political pressure on Netanyahu and the pro-Israel coalition. You can’t start a ground invasion when hostages are being released every few days. In fact there’s reporting that Netanyahu and the IDF have been very frustrated by this. There was also reporting that when Hamas said it would release some hostages, Israel initially ignored them.
Several questions about the atrocities committed on Oct 7. I’m preparing another thread on this but there are now many reports by credible journalists that make it impossible to deny that horrific atrocities were committed on that day. Israel says Hamas planned every single atrocity from the start. Hamas says some of the worst atrocities were done by other opportunistic parties from Gaza that used the border fence breach to go on a rampage. They also say that at least some of the civilian deaths were due to a disorganized and heavy-handed IDF response. Like I said I have another thread coming on this but at this point I don’t think anybody who’s objective can doubt that Hamas committed serious war crimes that day.
Questions about Turkey’s role. Funny, this reminded me of this article (published a week before Oct 7) in Israeli media talking about a “Turkey-Azerbaijan-Israel coalition” (really). Turkey won’t get involved in the conflict directly or diplomatically and has lost leverage over Hamas when it agreed to expel its members in order to re-normalize relations with Israel last year. There’s another report that says more Hamas members were asked to leave Turkey after Oct 7. Erdogan is a geopolitical opportunist and will use any chaos to secure Turkey’s southern border; he’s also a domestic populist who’ll praise Hamas as Palestinian resistance but acts opposite to this.
Someone asked whether Israel’s electorate want Gaza ethnically cleansed. The answer is actually no, the Israeli electorate were largely satisfied with the pre-Oct 7 status quo and thought it was manageable (Palestinians of course were not, it was just relentless and escalating violence and pain). Did they change their minds after Oct 7? We don’t know, but I don’t think so. The ethnic cleansing push is coming from certain people in Israel but I don’t think it’s a mainstream opinion, not yet at least.
Someone asked, how should Israel defend itself if not with a ground invasion? Reminder that the pre-Oct 7 status quo was supposed to be “the solution”. Hamas was caged & blockaded, but Netanyahu kept sending them money (via Qatar) and they eventually broke out of the cage in a dramatic and devastating way. But really, the problem is the assumption that this is a security-only problem with a security-only solution. This is the kind of thinking that failed explosively on Oct 7. Without a long-term political solution, there will be Palestinian militancy in some form or another.
Someone asked if this is an existential threat to Israel. Well, a regional war which drags in the full force of Iran’s proxies, with Egypt and Jordan staying neutral (or secretly hoping Israel doesn’t win), and Saudi Arabia remaining neutral, and with the US kinda iffy — well that can be catastrophic for Israel’s security. But I don’t think it’s an existential threat. I do think however that the stance of Western powers is bad for Israel long term. They need to be pushing Israel towards a political solution, not coddling the worst of its right-wing impulses in a way that makes a solution impossible.
Question about whether the Palestinian Authority can take over Gaza’s administration after / if Israel “dismantles Hamas”. Well given the mass murder and potential ethnic cleansing, it would be a poisoned chalice, and any Palestinian faction that agrees to “take over Gaza” after will be seen as collaborators in their own people’s genocide. But also, remember that Bibi strengthened Hamas explicitly in order to weaken the PA. Not to just hand them over Gaza and allow them to administer all territories under Palestinian control for the first time since 2006.
Someone asked about Iran and its nuclear program. Some experts believe that Iran has developed its program to the point where it can, if it wanted, develop a nuclear weapon within weeks or months, but it will hold that off until a time of serious crisis. I do think that if there is a serious escalation that becomes an open war, Iran could take that step. Noting also that Iran has put its entire army on alert and started military drills.
Iran is mobilizing its ground forces and conducting widespread military exercises. Everything is pointing to a massive regional escalation at the moment that would have absolutely devastating consequences. The lunatics in Washington prefer this over telling Israel to stop murdering thousands of Palestinian families.
People also asked about the two-state solution (2SS) and whether if we have a de-escalation we can see a return to that. The short answer is no. There is no path to a 2SS under current conditions and there hasn’t been for at least a decade. I posted about this here …
Since the phrase “two state solution” is in the news a lot, I thought I’d re-share this thread from 2021. “Two state solution” is what people say about Palestine-Israel when they don’t know what to say and want to sound like they’re saying something when in fact they’re clueless.
The US must immediately work with our partners to stop Hamas’s rocket attacks and Israel’s airstrikes, then get to work on ending the illegal settlement expansion and impending forced removal of Palestinian families from E. Jerusalem and bringing about a two-state solution.
— Elizabeth WarrenAs a Palestinian I find this statement hostile. There will never be a two-state solution and white liberals need to accept that and stop deceiving themselves and gaslighting us Palestinians. There is a one-state reality and it’s called apartheid. Wake up and smell the apartheid.
Speaking as a Palestinian who was a child when the Oslo Accords were signed: Those who supported a two-state solution owe us an apology. Meanwhile those who still think a two-state solution is possible are out of touch with reality and no longer deserve to be taken seriously. The 2SS framework has for decades allowed Israel to extend the status quo and escape accountability, thereby extending Palestinian suffering, all towards an unworkable goal. It was smoke & mirrors pulled upon us while they annex more of our land and establish apartheid
White liberals yammering about a 2SS should never be interpreted as being about Palestinians, it’s not about us and does not center us, it’s about their white guilt as they try to find an in-between position that salvages Liberal Zionism from its tragic incoherence. Speaking of a 2SS in 2021 belongs in the realm of fantasy, a lie used to lull Palestinians into passivity and help Liberal Zionists and their mostly white allies to pretend that their worldview continues to be coherent. At this point it’s cruel and outright violent.
The perfect situation for Israel is to maintain the status quo and be free to annex the West Bank piecemeal and further enshrine Jewish supremacy and kill us at will, all while maintaining the ghost of a 2SS. White liberals yammering about a 2SS help them do exactly that.
A 2SS is the necessary fantasy that liberal Zionists believe in to reconcile their emotional desire for a Jewish ethno-state with their moral pangs about Palestinian suffering. My job isn’t to help you deceive yourselves further. My job is to center my people and tell the truth.
Also: What often goes unsaid in the whole 1SS / 2SS debate is that
- Israel will never allow Palestinians to have a truly sovereign state anywhere in historical Palestine
- Israel’s settlement expansion was never about “natural population growth” but preempting a Palestine state.
Pro-Israel folk want to have their cake and eat it too, they want to live in a fantasy world in which Israel actually accepts to coexist with a truly sovereign Palestinian state and wants to gaslight Palestinians by forcing us to live in their fantasy world too.
Bottom line, in the short to medium term, neither a 1SS nor a 2SS is possible. A huge reason is unqualified, unconditional, uncritical historical Western support for Israel. We can have a 1SS in 20-30 years if we work hard. Meanwhile we can have a 2SS when hell freezes over.
I actually get triggered when someone fucking marches into my mentions to tell me a 2SS is still possible or “you’re deluding yourself”. I’m not deluding myself, you’re deluding yourself and trying to gaslight us. We’re living in a 1SS reality and that reality is called apartheid.
Also this must be said: The existence of an ethnic nation state anywhere in historical Palestine is incompatible with any path towards peace, stability, coexistence, democracy, or human rights. Nobody can exist with a state that sees his kind a “demographic threat”.
Ultimately, 1-state, 2-state, 233-state, 3252-state is not the correct argument to have, it’s not the number of states that’s the root problem but the type of state. Two peoples can coexist in a narrow strip of land. Two ethnic nationalisms can’t. لا يجمع السيفان في غمد
… but I think I’ll post more about it in the coming days. The fact that after this carnage we’ll just return to the same/worse impasse is depressing, but we have to face the truth. Bibi could be gone but his project to make sure the 2SS is impossible has succeeded.
Someone pointed to additional reasons why Iran will likely stick by Hamas: Among their network of allies, Hamas is the only major Sunni force. This allows Iran to project itself not as a “Shia” power but as a pan-Islamic power. To lose Hamas is to retreat back into being a sectarian network of extremist organizations, which would deal a heavy ideological & soft power setback.
Also “supporting Palestine” will give them a huge popularity boost across the region that they can leverage politically. They had lost an enormous amount of soft power for their stance on Syria/Bashar since 2011.
Someone asked if Hamas is good for Gaza or for the Palestinian cause. I have another thread coming on this but Hamas does not really see itself as an administrative but as a resistance movement, and through its 16 years running Gaza never took steps to mitigate or reduce Palestinian civilian casualties. Also since 2017 they never really put forth any political proposal or initiative. I kinda talked about this earlier:
Historically [Hamas’] decisions have had a catastrophic impact on the Palestinian cause. But many Palestinians look at the West Bank vs Gaza and know that if there was no armed movement in Gaza, it would be ethnically cleansed piecemeal as well. I mean, there’s no Hamas in the West Bank but there’s settlements, settler attacks, land theft, erasure, and violence. But all of this applies to before Oct 7. I’m terrified to consider what Oct 7 and its aftermath mean for everyone.
Some people got miffed at my Biden vs Trump comment. Here’s the thing, Trump isn’t a fascist. He has no ideology. He’s a populist kleptocrat who’s out for himself. But he’s a battering ram for a movement of explicit white supremacism to take over. Meanwhile Biden’s foreign policy represents a continuation of the same old — ensuring US strategic & geopolitical supremacy. That is, the preservation of the US empire.
Someone asked about Biden’s political calculations. Well, taking a very strong position on Israel will ensure that he can’t get criticized by the GOP for being insufficiently invested in Israel’s security. In fact right-wingers went nuts over this. (Can you believe Tucker Carlson actually called for de-escalation?) But it’s really more likely Biden is acting on political impulse/instinct. He’s a Zionist through & through, he said so himself.
A few people triggered me by cheering for this side or that or talking about “winning” or “losing”. Do you see anyone winning? These are human beings being killed and human lives being shattered, destroyed.
I hate geopolitical-centric thinking even though I have to engage in it (and as you see I’m pretty good at it). It trains you to look at the world as a game of chess and almost ignore the human lives. Reminder of my comment “A note that this thread rhetorically departs from my usual tone because it's about geopolitics. I'm analyzing the actions of many actors the majority of whom are awful. I'm trying to do that from a position of objectivity, which is hard when you actually value all human life.” I’m sorry but cheering for war either way is disgusting.
People asking how representative I am of Palestinians. I am extremely Palestinian and I represent only myself. Palestinians are a diverse people with diverse opinions. My comment (from 2021) stands:
Palestinians are a very diverse group of people. We were already diverse pre 1948, but since then we were also forced to live under very different realities from each other. Please do not assume that one Palestinian represents everyone. Follow a whole bunch of people for balance.
For this exact same reason, there needs to be a flurry of initiatives for intra-Palestinian conversation after these events. Including difficult ones. We need to get to know each other, not only in terms of our ideas but where they come from, and what realities we lived under.
Also if you’re Palestinian you need in this moment to prioritize your identity over your ideology. Those Palestinians you disagree with were also uprooted, crushed, and traumatized. They lived different lives and came to value different things. Don’t hate them, get to know them.
Another important update. Overnight it seems that Israeli projectiles fell into Egyptian territory injuring several people. Unlike the Israeli strikes that injured several Egyptian workers near the Gaza border, these projectiles were in a whole different area (to the south).
This is coming a few days after USS Carney operating in the northern Red Sea (second image) shot down missiles & drones supposedly fired from Yemen towards Israel. Egyptian commentators [are] very pissed with Sisi and seeing this as an attack/provocation by Israel. The attacks near the Gaza border are probably deliberate but those projectiles likely interceptors. Again the fact that Houthis in Yemen (see map) have this range & sophistication of drones is astounding.
Some people were complaining about inaccuracies here & there. Guys, it’s a thread. I gave you more info in a single thread for free than you’ll find by reading 100 Western op-eds so give me a break?
But seriously most people were grateful and I’m grateful for them too.
