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THE US DIPLOMATIC STRATEGY ON ISRAEL AND GAZA IS NOT WORKING
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Daniel Levy
August 27, 2024
The Guardian
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_ US policies strengthen Benjamin Netanyahu – whose political
preference in the short term is an open-ended war, not a deal.
Netanyahu is a loose cannon, which Kamala Harris should have no
interest in reloading 10 weeks out from an election. _
‘Netanyahu is a loose cannon that Kamala Harris should have no
interest in reloading 10 weeks out from an election.’ , Photograph:
Haim Zach/Israel Gpo/Zuma Press Wire/Rex/Shutterstock // The Guardian
The Biden administration
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an intense phase of Middle East diplomatic activity working to avoid a
regional war while optimistically spinning the prospects for a Gaza
breakthrough deal.
Following the latest round of provocative Israeli extrajudicial
killings in Tehran and Beirut and the intensified exchange of fire
between Israel [[link removed]] and
Hezbollah over the weekend, the region appeared to lurch further in
the direction of all-out war. Preventing that is a worthy cause in
itself.
With a US election looming and policy on Gaza
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unpopular with the Democrats’ own constituency and a potential
ballot box liability in key states, there are also pressing political
reasons for a Democratic administration to avoid more war and to
pursue a diplomatic breakthrough. Countering domestic political
criticism with hope for a deal was a useful device to deploy at the
Democratic convention in Chicago and will be needed through to 5
November.
Team Biden is attempting a difficult trifecta. First, the Biden
administration is trying to deter the Iranian axis from further
responses to Israel’s recent targeted killings in Tehran and
Beirut. Joe Biden [[link removed]] no
doubt has wanted to hold out the prospect of a ceasefire, which Iran
would prefer not to upend, while he simultaneously bought time for the
US to beef up its military presence in the region as leverage and a
threat against Iran.
The US is also trying to help a key regional ally, Israel, reclaim its
deterrence posture and freedom of military operation after the balance
of forces shifted against it during the current conflict.
Second, the Biden administration is trying to reach election day on a
positive note, by bringing an end to a divisive conflict – or, as a
fallback, to at least avoid further escalation and a potentially
debilitating regional explosion into which Israel could pull the US.
Third, and more speculatively, the Biden administration might want to
bring an end to the brutal devastation and killing of Palestinian
civilians in Gaza, the humanitarian crisis there, and the hellish
ordeal of the Israelis held in Gaza and their families. A ceasefire
would also have the benefit of avoiding further damage to US interests
and reputation as a consequence of Biden running political cover for
and arming Israel throughout this war.
Ordinarily, delivering on those first two goals – and merely scoring
two out of three – might constitute an acceptable achievement. It is
made more attainable by the Iranian-led axis of resistance not wanting
to fall into the trap of all-out war. However, failure to achieve a
ceasefire in Gaza risks everything else unravelling and keeps the
region at boiling point. Regional de-escalation and domestic political
quiet will be that much more difficult to sustain if the Gaza talks
again collapse, especially against the backdrop of raised
expectations.
Sadly, that is the direction in which things are headed, exacerbated
by the current US diplomatic push being exposed as clumsy or
fraudulent or both.
It should go without saying that putting an end to the unprecedented
daily suffering of Palestinians in Gaza, as well as bringing the
Israelis who are held there home, is reason enough to throw everything
at achieving a ceasefire. But the Biden administration has been
singularly incapable of treating Palestinians as equals with the
humanity and dignity accorded to Jewish Israelis – one of the
reasons this has played so badly with the Democratic voting base.
The staggering shortcomings in the Biden administration’s approach,
exacerbated in secretary of state Antony Blinken’s latest mission,
are highly consequential and worth unpacking. Alarm bells should have
been set off when Blinken at his recent press conference
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Jerusalem announced that Benjamin Netanyahu had accepted the US
“bridging proposal” – when the Israeli prime minister himself
declared no such thing. Within hours, it became clear that Israel’s
chief negotiator, Nitzan Alon, would not participate in the talks as a
way of protesting against Netanyahu’s undermining of the deal.
That was followed by senior US and Israeli security officials
anonymously briefing the press that Netanyahu was preventing a deal.
Similar conclusions were also reached and made public by the main
forums
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the Israeli hostage families. On his ninth visit to Israel since the 7
October attack, Blinken again failed – not just at mediating between
Israel and Hamas, but even in closing the gaps between the competing
camps inside the Israeli system. The US refusal to take seriously that
there are Hamas negotiating positions which are legitimate, and which
will need to be part of a deal (and with which the US ostensibly
agrees to in substance – such as a full Israeli withdrawal and a
sustainable ceasefire), has condemned US-led talks to repeated
failure.
Repackaging Israeli proposals and presenting them as a US position may
have a retro feel to it, but that does not make it cool. And it
won’t deliver progress (it can’t even sustain Israeli endorsement
given Netanyahu’s constant shifting of the goalposts to avoid a
deal). That the US has zero credibility as a mediator is a problem.
That it has conspired to make its contributions not only ineffective
but counterproductive is devastating. Even Itamar Eichner, a
diplomatic correspondent for the Israeli Yedioth
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describes Blinken’s visit as having displayed “naivete and
amateurishness … effectively sabotaging the deal by aligning with
Netanyahu”.
This is a US government modus operandi with which Netanyahu is
extremely familiar, and which falls very squarely inside his comfort
zone. Netanyahu knows that he has won once the US mediator –
whatever the actual facts – is willing to blame the Palestinian side
(Arafat during Oslo, Hamas now). Despite having the US having changed
its own proposal to accommodate Netanyahu, and Netanyahu still
distancing himself from the terms and being called on it by his own
defence establishment, Biden and senior US officials continue their
public disinformation campaign of claiming that only Hamas is the
problem and should be pressured.
Even if US governments hold personal frustrations with Netanyahu,
their policies serve to strengthen Bibi at home.
From early in this war, Netanyahu’s bottom line has been that while
internal pressures exist to secure a deal (and therefore get the
hostages back and cease the military operation), the opposite side of
that ledger is more foreboding: a deal would upend Netanyahu’s
extremist governing coalition and bring an end to the most important
shield Netanyahu has created for himself politically: his claimed
mantle as Israel’s indispensable wartime leader.
Netanyahu’s ideological preference is for displacing Palestinians
and eviscerating their rights, alongside pulling the US more actively
into a regional clash with Iran; his short-term political goal is to
maintain an open-ended war which can accommodate varying degrees of
intensity, but not a deal.
So where might change ultimately come from? Given current tensions,
something approximating an all-out regional war might yet unfold.
Alongside the dangers and losses this would entail, a broader
conflagration might belatedly produce a more serious external push for
a comprehensive ceasefire.
Israeli coalition politics could also throw a spanner in the works for
Netanyahu, given tensions among his governing allies, and particularly
with the ultra-Orthodox parties over the issue of military enlistment.
But the surest way to de-escalate in the region and to bring the
horrors of Gaza to an end continues to be via challenging the Israeli
incentive structure in meaningful ways – through legal, political
and economic pressure and sanctions, and especially by the withholding
of weapons.
Netanyahu is a loose cannon, which Kamala Harris
[[link removed]] should have no
interest in reloading 10 weeks out from an election.
_[DANIEL LEVY is the president of the US/Middle East Project and a
former Israeli peace negotiator.]_
* Israel-Gaza War
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* Benjamin Netanyahu
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* U.S. foreign policy
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* Joe Biden
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* Biden Administration
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* Kamala Harris
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* 2024 Elections
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* Gaza
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* Israel
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* Palestine
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* Israel-Palestine
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* war crimes
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* apartheid
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* Occupied Territories
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* West Bank
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