by James M Dorsey
Gaza is gearing up to be a war on President-elect Donald J. Trump’s watch that he doesn’t want but may be unable to end.
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Mr. Trump will likely discover that assembling a Middle East team closely aligned with Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and his ultra-nationalist coalition partners will not solve the problem.
It’s a lesson Mr. Trump failed to learn during his first term as president when Palestinians from all political walks rejected his “deal of the century” that, at best, offered them a semblance of an independent state.
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Mr. Trump’s failure was magnified by the Biden administration allowing the Palestinian-Israeli conflict to fester instead of proactively pushing for the two-state solution it repeatedly touted.
To be sure, Messrs. Trump and Biden were in good company, walking in the footsteps of their predecessors who for decades favoured Israeli rights and aspirations at the expense of the Palestinians rather than recognising both had equally valid demands.
It all came to a head with last year’s brutal October 7 Hamas attack on Israel, Israel’s disproportionate response and the Biden administration taking support for Israel to new heights by giving it diplomatic and political cover and refusing to put its money where its mouth is by suspending arms sales.
As a result, the unspeakable traumas suffered by Israelis and Palestinians, Israel’s indefensible killing of tens of thousands of innocent civilians and wounding of many more, and the devastation of Gaza likely set the scene for another generation of violence.
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“When the current Israeli prime minister Netanyahu talks about finishing off Hamas, I wonder about what the one million children in Gaza will be doing in 20 years’ time. The conflict in Gaza is an Israeli terrorism creation factory, and there is no sign of it finishing,” said Chris Sidoti, former Australian human rights commissioner and one of three authors of a just-released United Nations report on Israeli violations of international law in Gaza.
Mr. Sidoti’s dire prediction and the lessons of the last eight years and beyond will likely be lost on Mr. Trump and his Middle East-focused administration nominees.
Even if they weren’t, the administration will have to decide whether hardline Israel supporters or American Firsters have the upper hand in formulating Middle East policy if it wants to bring the Gaza war to an end.
So far, Mr. Netanyahu can likely count on the unconditional support of Secretary of State-designate Marco Rubio, national security advisor Michael Waltz, and the president-elect’s nominees as ambassadors to the United Nations and Israel, Elise Stefanik and Michael Huckabee.
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Mr. Netanyahu will find America Firsters like Vice President-elect J.D. Vance and potential candidates for office such as talk show host Tucker Carlson and former Pentagon official Elbridge Colby more problematic because they do not see US and Israeli interests as aligned by definition.
Mr. Trump could put wind in the sails of the America Firsters if he sees an opportunity to achieve personal success, particularly one he believes could earn him a Nobel Peace Prize.
“Trump may push aggressively to end the fighting in Gaza and Lebanon, with little consideration for Israeli interests, to reduce the risks of regional instability and of the US being drawn in” or “should he conclude that there are realistic prospects for a personal success – his only real consideration,” said Yair Golan, a former Israeli deputy military chief of staff and opposition leader, and Chuck Freilich, a former deputy national security advisor.
Mr. Trump’s personality quirks and potential policy differences within the administration are just some hurdles his Middle East team will have to manage.
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Messrs. Rubio and Waltz are the probable adults in a team with key members who are political and/or diplomatic neophytes, including Steven Witkoff, a real estate magnate and long-time Trump megadonor whom the president-elect has identified as his Middle East envoy.
A 1999 Observer profile portrayed Mr. Witkoff as a Harlem landlord who kept on his desk a copy of Tough Jews, a book about Jewish gangsters, and packed a gun when he collected rents.
Even if the new administration gets its ducks in line, to negotiate a permanent ceasefire, it will need to bridge the yawning gap between Mr. Netanyahu, who has a vested interest in continuing the war and blocking the emergence of a credible Palestinian representation, and a deeply divided Palestinian polity that may not be able to deliver.
Mr. Netanyahu fears that ending the Gaza war would allow Hamas to regroup and open the door to a political reckoning engineered by his long-standing critics and those who hold him responsible for Hamas’ October 7 attack.
Recent public opinion polls are likely to stiffen Mr. Netanyahu’s intransigence. The polls suggest that a surge in the prime minister’s popularity, fueled by the killing of Hamas and Hezbollah leaders, may have been a blip on the radar.
Channel 12 reported this week that its polling showed that a large majority of Israelis supported ending the Gaza war to achieve the release of 100 Hamas-held hostages, while a slim majority blamed politics, i.e. Mr. Netanyahu, for the failure to reach a deal.
Even so, there is little reason to believe that Mr. Netanyahu, who ignored public opinion for the past year, will suddenly switch gears and take heed of the public’s quest for an end to the Gaza war, provided it leads to the release of the hostages.
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While not suggesting so publicly, Palestinians probably hope that America Firsters will shape the Trump administration’s efforts to manage the Middle East’s multiple crises.
This week, Hamas political bureau member Bassam Naim reiterated the group’s willingness to entertain “any proposal submitted to it that would lead to a definitive ceasefire and military withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, allowing the return of displaced people, a serious deal for a prisoner exchange, the entry of humanitarian aid and reconstruction.”
Even so, Hamas’s favouring a proposal and its ability to follow through could prove to be two different things.
While there is no doubt that Palestinians desperately want an end to the war, it is unclear what authority Hamas’ exile figures exert on the ground in Gaza after Israel killed the group’s senior Gaza-based leaders, including Yahya Sinwar and Mohammed Deif.
Moreover, Hamas and President Mahmoud Abbas’ largely discredited West Bank-based, internationally recognised Palestine Authority (PA) have yet to abandon their deep-seated differences that have allowed Mr. Netanyahu to exploit the Palestinian polity’s paralysis for the better part of two decades.
“Even if Trump is serious…the chances of ending Israel’s war with Hamas in Gaza are low… Peace would require acquiescence by Hamas, effective mediators, and an Israel eager to end the war, all of which are lacking. A new administration, no matter how ambitious, will find it difficult to create peace in these conditions,” said international relations scholar Daniel Byman.
Dr. James M. Dorsey is an Adjunct Senior Fellow at Nanyang Technological University’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, and the author of the syndicated column and podcast, The Turbulent World with James M. Dorsey.