In the perception of most Americans, Israel has become Goliath. It's no longer David and it no longer gets the benefit of the doubt.
Hello and welcome to GZERO World. I'm Ian Bremmer. This week marks three years since the October 7th Hamas attacks in Israel. And in those three years since, Israel and the Middle East have changed dramatically. Israel remains today the region's dominant military power. But diplomatically, it is increasingly isolated. Longtime allies have grown more critical of the Israeli government's actions in Gaza. Settlement expansion in the West Bank has hurt relations with some of its closest partners. And last year, the United Kingdom, France, Canada, and Australia all formally recognized the Palestinian state. While in the United States, support for Israel that was once overwhelmingly bipartisan is fading. According to a recent Gallup poll, for the first time ever, more Americans feel sympathetic to the Palestinian cause, especially young Americans, than towards the Israelis. And now, Israelis are preparing to vote. On October 27th, Benjamin Netanyahu will face voters for the first time since 2022.
A change in government could offer Israel an opportunity to repair some of those relationships. But the conflicts since 2023 have also transformed Israeli politics. It's hardened right-wing lines, and it's reshaped the balance of power across the Middle East. Whatever happens at the ballot box, Israel's next government will inherit a very different country, region, and world than the one that existed before October 7th. Joining me to discuss all this and more, Aaron David Miller, current senior fellow at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and someone who has spent decades working on Middle East peace negotiations for both Republican and Democratic administrations. And then GZERO's Tony Masalis on grassroots efforts for peace in the region. But first, a word from the folks who help us keep the lights on. Funding for GZERO World is provided by our lead sponsor, Prologess, and by Cox, a family of businesses. Additional funding provided by the Andrew Carnegie Foundation, Coup and Patricia Euan, committed to bridging cultural differences in our communities, and
Aaron David Miller, thanks so much for joining us today.
Ian, it's great to be here with you.
So, three years after October 7th, maybe we should just start with you telling us for a moment where we are, state of the ceasefire, state of Israel relations on the ground in Gaza, implications broader.
I mean, look, on the narrow issues of the Israeli-Palestinian arena, I think we're frankly nowhere. Gaza is likely to remain divided, dysfunctional, sporadically violent, and impoverished. The fundamental challenge on which every agreement, punitive or otherwise, all of the ceasefires in the wake of October 7th and January of 2020 have all cratered on one fundamental and irreconcilable problem, and that is the Israeli vision, the vision of certainly the current Israeli government, and Hamas, which remains a preeminent Palestinian actor in the ever-shrinking area of Gaza that they control. Those two visions are fundamentally irreconcilable on the issue of security, on the issue of governance, and on the issue of reconstruction, which are the three basic dimensions that the so-called Board of Peace, US-sponsored and UN Security Council-sponsored, have been working on this problem. And the plans, the intentions, the aspirations are all quite extraordinary, but you cannot right now, as far as I can tell, overcome that basic conflict between Israel and Hamas. And it is extraordinary the degree to which the Middle East remains littered, literally, with the remains of the schemes, the dreams, the ambitions of great powers who believe, quite wrongly, that they can impose their will on smaller ones.
There's been so much focus on the desperate humanitarian situation the Palestinians in Gaza have been facing. Has that, with a ceasefire that has to a degree held for months now, has that become more normalized? Are Palestinians in Gaza able to, children attend classes, have some education? Are people not starving the way they were six months ago? I mean, I'm not... it's not like I'm fishing for good news, but I do want to know if there's been any progress on that front.
I mean, it's better certainly, but life in Gaza, I think, is relative. I mean, you have two million, roughly two million Palestinians who reside in the area, what, maybe 30% now of Gaza. You have food insecurity. You don't have famine. You don't have starvation. You have problems with lack of access to proper medical care. Shelter is still a huge problem. Huge. And then not to mention the psychological implications of what three years of conflict and abnormality in terms of the, you know, the ebb and flow of normal life that you and I would regard has been fundamentally disrupted. And I think the humanitarian situation, has it improved? Yes, it's improved. But you still have disease as a huge problem, lack of access to potable water, food insecurity. So, I think it's still a very bitter pill for these people to have to swallow.
Now, aside from a few Palestinians facing significant medical challenges to get access to care, it's still the case that none of those Palestinians that want to can leave. Is that correct?
I mean, I think it's a special case. I think there are elements within the Israeli government, certainly Ben-Gvir, two ministers, and then certainly there are others who would like to create conditions so that Palestinians leave Gaza. But no, you're not talking about a free flow, free and unfettered flow of Palestinians who want to leave for medical care or other reasons to actually exit the strip.
Now, you mentioned that Hamas is still a very significant political actor. The full capabilities of Israel's military and intelligence might have been leveled at Hamas for three years. So many of their leaders killed, so much of their infrastructure blown up. And of course, at least some Palestinians surely believe that Hamas bears some responsibility for the condition that they are presently in, given October 7th. So given all of that, how is it that today you and I are speaking and we're still talking about Hamas with this political capacity?
I mean, look, in the end, it's a matter of who controls the guns, who controls access to humanitarian assistance, who controls the black market. And I think Hamas still manages, despite the fact that it's been fundamentally hollowed out by the Israelis. Certainly, its capacity to launch high-trajectory weapons has been demolished. Tunnel structure, which was once what, half as long as the New York subway system, may have been whittled down to a third. Maybe many of the arms manufacturing laboratories have been undermined or even destroyed. But you know, look, October 7th was brought to you courtesy of small arms and small weapons, not heavy artillery, not IEDs. It doesn't take a great deal to maintain order and control, particularly in a population that frankly has never had an opportunity to choose who it wants to govern Gaza. And that still probably directs most of its animosities and anger at the Israelis. You have to ask yourself a question I do all the time: Why has there never been an Arab Spring in Palestine? Why haven't Palestinians been able to rise up? I mean, bad governance, nepotism, corruption, autocratic rule characterized... we dealt with Arafat for years. He was an authoritarian, and Mahmoud Abbas clings to power. Maybe there'll be elections on November 24th. I doubt it. I think that they're probably not going to happen. In large part, I think because certainly Palestinians have been under occupation, unable to organize, but I think they're going to blame the Israelis before they'll blame their own leaders.
So I mean, given what you just said, yes, we have Israeli elections coming up shortly, and I'm going to ask you about them, of course. But irrespective of the outcome, hard to imagine that that's going to make much of a difference in terms of a potential breakthrough on Gaza specifically.
I think that's right. I think it won't make a difference with respect to Israel's approach to national security. I mean, observing the first law of holes, that when you're in a hole, stop digging. I think it will in fact lead to, you get a state commission of inquiry, you may get a resolution to the very vexing problem of what to do about ultra-Orthodox conscription, which is hugely important. Maybe if Mansour Abbas comes into the government, you'll get a more enlightened policy about how to encompass and make two million Palestinian citizens of Israel, give them more of a stake, equity in the state. But on issues relating to Hamas, Gaza, Lebanon, and Iran, I think Gazi Eisenkot's challenge there will be, I suspect, to try to make some gains here, try not to be seen as the offending party. You may get some movement. Maybe the Netanyahu government would be more inclined to cooperate with some of the Board of Peace's suggestions and proposals, but in the main, I don't see transformation, and I see at best transaction.
Now, if I broaden the aperture to the global environment, one thing that Netanyahu has done, it seems to me, and I'm interested in your view on this, is pushed the idea that anyone out there who is critical of the Israeli government is also an anti-Semite, which is clearly useful for him, but is very damaging, in my view, to Israel and very damaging, of course, to the Jews around the world. Is that something, do you think that's the case, and if it is, is that something that you think can change with a new government? Will change with a new government?
I mean, look, in the perception of most Americans, Pew polls, I mean, Israel has become Goliath. It's no longer David, and it no longer gets the benefit of the doubt. I would argue to you that the US-Israeli relationship, which has been driven in the past by bipartisanship, which is the key adhesive that has literally held it together lo these many years, has been undermined not just by Benjamin Netanyahu, who if he could vote in American elections would vote Republican, of course, but by Donald Trump. The two of them together, and remember, Netanyahu has ruled Israel 15, 16 of the last 17 years. The two of them have done more, it seems to me, Netanyahu's policies and the administration's. And I might point out for your viewers and listeners, I work for Republicans and Democrats, and I voted for Republicans and Democrats, but I think between Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu, they have created a situation where Jews at large are not secure, and I think they have contributed mightily to that. If Netanyahu no longer is prime minister, if Itamar Ben-Gvir and Smotrich, also two racist supremacist ministers, lose tremendous control over what happens in the West Bank, if they're no longer in the scene, you have Gadi Eisenkot, you have a center-right to center-left coalition, which is probably what you'd have. I think there is the chance the toxicity that has poisoned the US-Israeli relationship, something I believe deeply in, will somehow be alleviated. Will that fix the issue of Israel's image? I'm not sure it will. I think that has become fixed in so many people's minds in the wake of October 7th that regardless of the reality of the situation or the context, Israel no longer gets the benefit of the doubt. And the darker side to not giving the Israelis the benefit of the doubt is, as you pointed out, a rising anti-Semitism.
Before we close, the fact that you mentioned that to the United States, to Americans, Israel today looks like Goliath and not David, and I completely agree. But the more relevant point is that Israel is Goliath, not David. They have the military capabilities. They have the intelligence capabilities. They have the economic and technological capabilities. They're a very wealthy country, and many around the world want to work with that. So, I guess I want to close by saying, to what extent does the conversation that you and I have been having matter to Israel's well-being long term if we're living in a world of greater impunity and a Middle East where hard power matters and the Israelis actually are doing quite well on that front?
You know, I've wrestled with this question as well. It's all about leadership, or in this case, the absence of leadership. Man, I had my 27 years working with Democrat and Republican presidents and with five or six Israeli prime ministers. The reality is when you have leaders, not just in Israel, but among Palestinians, who are masters of their politics, not prisoners of their ideologies, when you have leaders who understand how to use power effectively, when you have leaders that are not on trial for bribery, fraud, and breach of trust in a Jerusalem district court five years in running. I played this game in my head. Had you substituted for Benjamin Netanyahu on October 7th, Ariel Sharon, Yitzhak Rabin, Ehud Barak, the Israelis would have responded to Hamas the way that they responded. But within a year, by mid-2024, there would have been a fundamental recognition among the three men that I mentioned that military power was an instrument, a means to an end, and a US-Israeli relationship, as well as the importance of maintaining Israel's image and credibility. I mean, Sharon withdrew from Gaza, forced 8,000 Israeli settlers out, dismantled the settlements because he was worried about the morality and coherence of the Israeli Defense Forces. So I would like to think that if Netanyahu thinks things will change fundamentally, they will not, because Israel is now a right-of-center country. So I think there is a chance, despite what you say about the global disorder, the impunity, the irrelevance of international law, and let's be clear, when I was working, we adhered to international law when it suited our interest and we undermined it when it didn't.
And that's not going to change.
Yeah, that's the way we operate. But I think if you have leaders, Ian, I think things change, and not just in Israel. You're going to need, I keep saying, you need a Mandela and a de Klerk. I wish, I would hope. But you do need leaders who understand how to use power effectively and believe in something greater than their own personal gain and fortune or their political travails. And you don't have that.
