And Then? Where This All Could Lead

When you throw a rock in the lake, the first wave is impressive. But we don’t usually watch the succeeding eddies as they move away from the center. Similarly, any major world event – political or military. We’re overly focused on the immediate repercussions, but the longer term secondary and tertiary consequences could be even more profound!

No one can accurately predict the future (certainly not me), but it is important to try and consider some possibilities – negative and positive (depending on one’s standpoint) – that could be quite “unexpected” further down the road. So here goes regarding Israel’s war with Iran, Gaza, and Hezbollah.

Imagine a complete Israeli victory, including the demise of the mullah’s regime. Israel would be left with virtually no enemies: Hezbollah decimated, Hamas neutralized, Syria ready for peace, a quasi-democratic Iran turning into a friend. Utopia? Not for Israel’s extreme hard-right, especially not the country’s messianic camp. Why not? Because the “side issue” will become the main event: The Two-State Solution (with the Palestinians).

What Israel’s Right has always had going for it is “fear”— fear of surrounding enemies wishing the destruction of the country. And let there be no doubt: that fear was well-founded, if at times somewhat exaggerated. This was the perfect, certainly legitimate, excuse for refusing to move in the direction of a Palestinian State. Not that the Palestinian Authority itself constituted a mortal threat to Israel’s existence, but the potential of other Arab nations attacking Israel from outside its borders, and then the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza joining the fray from nearby – that was a serious possibility.

The second impediment to a Palestinian State from the “other” side was the political rupture between Hamas-led Gaza and the PA(Fatah)-ruled West Bank. Now with Hamas basically neutralized, this too will probably (eventually) be remediated, leaving Israel with a relatively unified Palestinian front to deal with politically.

In the past, Israel’s friends – the U.S., Germany, Great Britain, France, et al – understood these two obstacles to any realistic solution, even if they tried (perhaps only as show) to nudge Israel into serious two-state negotiations. However, assuming the removal of all of Israel’s serious enemies, what’s left of any anti-two-state stance is messianism (or “biblical promise”). That’s not something that even Israel’s friends, other than American Evangelicals, will be willing to countenance.
The surprising result: Israel’s huge military successes against its enemies these past two years, could well be a general, pyrrhic victory for those not willing to deal with the central problem close to home: what to do with the Palestinians. International pressure – as well as domestic pressure from Israel’s center-left – could increase exponentially, leaving the country exposed to what has already begun: diplomatic recognition of a “Palestinian State,” economic pressure from friends real (Europe) and putative (Abraham Accord countries), and ultimately isolation from its greatest friend and benefactor: the United States.

Regarding the latter, the Gaza War was a (warning) shot across the bow. Many younger American Jews no longer blindly support Israel, and some have crossed the Rubicon to support Palestinians in general and even Hamas specifically. While the majority of America’s general population still supports Israel, here too the numbers are in gradual decline – either due to a more general isolationist ethos (America First) or a feeling that the Palestinians also deserve a state of their own.
This is all disconcerting, and if it comes to pass even surprising, to anyone not familiar with historical examples of military victories leading to unexpected negative outcomes. The classic modern example, of course, was the end of World War I (“the Great War” as it was called back then): Germany’s defeat and subsequent financial humiliation and decimation eventually led to the rise of Hitler and a far worse (for everyone concerned) World War II.

Unfortunately, Israelis are not ready for the above diplomatic scenario. The country’s next prime minister will either be Bibi Netanyahu or Naftali Bennett – both sworn enemies of any two-state solution. Perhaps Israel’s recent overwhelming victories and definitive removal of any existential threat to the State of Israel might eventually bring most Israelis around to the realization that the only remaining threat to the country’s stability is the lack of a Palestinian State. And given the fact that the Palestinian Administration has lost all its serious backers, it too might begin to soften its demands of millions “returning home” etc. – further tempering the Israelis’ recalcitrance in the face of rising international pressure.

As I noted at the start, one cannot know for sure that anything will transpire as predicted. However, the scenario painted here is certainly reasonable, given diplomatic and political trends already in evidence. The end of these wars will bring some peace of mind to Israel’s citizenry. But without a concomitant change in perception regarding the Palestinian conflict, the victory might be only temporary.