Five realities about the new Middle East
Donald Trump is often called a “transactional president,” and this week, that apt description led to success. The ceasefire negotiated between Israel and Hamas was a transaction, and a complicated one at that. It’s worth placing all the caveats that this is only Phase 1 and it may break down or get stuck if the parties renege on their commitments. But the first phase is in fact a plausible pathway to ending the horrific violence in Gaza and represents a chance well worth taking. It reveals five important realities about the Middle East today.
First, Israel is in a commanding position of strength. Dan Senor, a Republican analyst and author, noted on my CNN show last week that the deal was an Israeli plan, or at least an American plan that Israelis could live with. Israel is the power on the ground, and it has become more powerful in the last two years as it defeated an array of its enemies abroad. Nothing is going to happen without its consent. As a practical matter, if you want Israel’s guns to stop firing, you need a plan that Israel can live with.
Indeed, Israel’s rise has been so dramatic that both Qatar and Saudi Arabia have warily begun to balance against that strength — Doha seeking military guarantees from Washington and Riyadh signing a mutual defense pact with Pakistan, a nuclear-armed nation.
Second, you can get concessions from Israel, but it takes political capital and skill. Trump used both intelligently in getting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to accept the deal. Trump has huge political capital with Israelis, and he used it to pressure Netanyahu. He seized the moment when Israel’s attack on Hamas operatives in Doha produced lots of blowback in the region. And he took Hamas’s partial acceptance of the plan and pretended it was a full embrace — even though the Israelis had begun to balk — forcing the deal to a close.
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Third, you see in the negotiations the reality of the new Middle East. Look at who was in the negotiating room for the deal: Egyptians, Turks, Israelis, Qataris and Americans, along with Hamas. The Egyptians are important only in this particular context because of their border with Gaza and the Rafah crossing, which is a key corridor for flooding aid into Gaza. Their attendance harkened back to the old Middle Eastern order, which was dominated by the large, populous and culturally rich countries.
The new Middle East is dominated by Israel and the gulf states. Nowhere is that more evident than in the rise of Qatar, a tiny, gas-rich country with just around 400,000 citizens but with a shrewd leadership that is willing to talk to all parties, including Iran and Hamas, making them indispensable in any conflict mediation. Where the old Middle East was led by large states that espoused pan-Arabism and encouraged Palestinian terrorism, the gulf kingdoms search for modernity, technological advancement and above all, peace and stability. Turkey is the new wild card, strong but ruled by a willful leader who has flirted with Islamic radicalism.
Fourth, the new Middle East is one where the Iranian threat has weakened considerably. Ever since the Islamic revolution of 1979, the Arab states have worried about an expansionist, ideologically aggressive Iran. But over the last 15 years or so, Iran has been in economic misery and periodically convulsed by political crises, from the “green movement” to the widespread protests of the women’s movement to divisions within its ruling elite. Through all this, Iran faced a series of devastating Israeli attacks on its nuclear scientists, military leaders and nuclear facilities, culminating in the attacks in June that were so comprehensive as to almost be akin to an invasion.
Finally, despite all the violence, extremism and animosity, there is really no long-term plan that doesn’t end with a two-state solution. The veteran American diplomat Martin Indyk, who was passionately pro-Israel and also in favor of a Palestinian state, wrote an essay in Foreign Affairs last year, a few months before he died, titled “The Strange Resurrection of the Two-State Solution.” He argued that decades of abandonment of that objective have only proven there is no alternative. Every other possible alternative — continued occupation, one state, expulsion — doesn’t work, so people will eventually, reluctantly come back to it.
But that will only happen now if Trump comes to it himself and invests it with his power and energy. His plan makes a small reference to it. But in announcing the ceasefire, he hoped not just for a ceasefire but for “Everlasting Peace.” That would require more than a transaction; it would require vision. The fruits of that vision — genuine and lasting peace — would echo through history, and would constitute a prize much larger than even the one awarded by the Nobel Committee every October.