Angry Planet - Ever More War: A Conflict Without End

Episode Date: November 17, 2023

The war between Israel and Hamas shows no sign of slowing. More and more (just as was predicted on this show) sympathy for the Jewish State is drying up around the world amid horrific losses among Palestinian civilians, especially children. College campuses are flooded with students and faculty calling for the end of Israel itself.In this episode, we look into the origins of the conflict, as well as its causes, with Steven Cook of the Council on Foreign relations. Everyone's done that, though. What makes this episode worth listening to—beyond our natural charms—is that we try to get a grip on the region and even what the end game could possibly look like.Angry Planet has a Substack! Join to get weekly insights into our angry planet and hear more conversations about a world in conflict.https://angryplanet.substack.com/subscribeAngry Planet has a Substack! Join to get weekly insights into our angry planet and hear more conversations about a world in conflict.https://angryplanet.substack.com/subscribeSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/warcollege. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Love this podcast. Support this show through the ACAST supporter feature. It's up to you how much you give and there's no regular commitment. Just click the link in the show description to support now. So Stephen Cook, I noticed that you have a visit Palestine poster behind you. See, isn't that the setup? Oh, that's a lovely setup. Thank you, Matthew. That's the best. So we are talking about Israel and Palestinians as our our audience will be shocked to hear as this war continues. With us is one of our favorite guests, Stephen Cook. He has been here a number of times. He will tell you who he is in a second and we'll just sort of jump into it. So, Stephen, introduce yourself to the lovely people. Well, hello, lovely people. I'm Stephen Cook, senior fellow for Middle East and Africa Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. And last time we had you on, we were actually talking about

Turkey and the election and the afternoon. That was fun. So, well, this is, I'm sure, going to be less fun. It is definitely less fun to talk about the war between Israel and Hamas than most other things, to be completely honest with you. I thought that one reason we should definitely talk to you is you know about the surrounding area. You know about the history and the surrounding area. And I'd like to eventually get to, you know, what the rest of the region is doing and is it likely to blow up. But Matthew was not entirely wrong. You have a wonderful visit Palestine poster over your shoulder. What does that mean? Where's it from? Yeah, it's actually from Jerusalem. I have all kinds of artifacts in this office that picked up along

the way in my now almost third. years of traveling to and from or living in the Middle East. In any event, this is a poster that I bought in Jerusalem. It is of, you know, this kind of mid-century modern travel posters. And it does, in fact, say, visit Palestine. And it often gets a reaction from people. And what people don't realize is that it is a, it's a reproduction. It's not an original. It's a reproduction of poster that the yeshuv the pre-state jewish communities sort of put out that it's it's it's proto state in the making put it out as part of their tourism board if you look carefully at the poster says visit palestine and this kind of big block letters but underneath it is all

hebrew and that's because you know for a long time the jews of palestine were referred to as Palestinians or Palestinian Jews. So there was, before the state of Israel declared, there were the structures of the state. And there was, in fact, a tourism board. And they put out these posters that said, visit Palestine. Gets people who don't know that story a little riled up when they see it if I'm doing some, you know, media from my office here. So what is a Palestinian then? if they were used to include Jews, at some point it stopped.

At some point? I mean, after the declaration of the state of Israel, David Ben-Gurion declared the provisional government of the state of Israel in May 15, 1948, all those people referred to themselves as Palestinian and Palestinian Jews began referring to themselves as Israelis because there was now a country called Israel. Obviously, the Arabs of the same territory did not refer to themselves as Israelis, and they colloquially became known as Palestinians. Of course, they had this identity that was well before then, but it took on a kind of different meaning once the communities were distinguished by essentially sectarians. Now, there were, of course, Arab or Palestinians who remained within Israel. they now make up about 20% of the population.

And they're referred to either as Arabs, Palestinian citizens of Israel, or as Israelis prefer to refer to them as Israeli Arabs. Within Israel, they call it the Arab sector. But now for political purposes and diplomatic purposes, there's a clearly distinguish between Israeli or Israeli Jews and either the Arab sector or Palestinian citizens of Israel, even though they're all Israeli citizens.

In the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, obviously, they're not. These are territories that the Israelis occupy and have occupied since the June 1967 war. And the population there, with the exception of Israeli settlers in the Gaza Strip are not citizens of the state of Israel, and they are known globally as the Palestinians. would it be awful if I ask you to sort of take us through the history a little bit from 48 until 67? I think there's a lot of misunderstanding right now. When people are talking about occupation, people are talking about colonialism people are talking about genocide people are talking about. Right.

I mean, you've heard all the. Yeah. I think there's a lot of loose talk among people who don't, are not experts in international law about, Genocide. Both sides have been accused of engaging in genocide. Both sides have been accused of engaging in war crimes. But if you find the people who know something about these terms, they have not used these terms. They have not used for either part, genocide. War crimes is something that there have been some war crimes that have been committed. I think that's undoubtedly the case. But most of the people, who are throwing around these terms are people who aren't well equipped to do it. It's mostly kind of social media fulminating more, more than anything else. But if you want to talk about the history from, you know, 48 up through 67, I mean, you know, how long do you have? But I'll, I'll do my best. And we'll actually take back a little bit before 48. We'll talk about 1947 in the UN

partition plan for Palestine, UN Resolution 181, which created a Jewish state and an Arab state out of that territory that is historic Palestine from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, from the north, from the Lebanese border, all the way down to the southern part of what is now Israel, the southern city of Eli. And there were these two states, one set aside for Jews and one set aside for Arabs. And the Jewish leadership accepted it. And the Arab leadership did not, saying it was. unfair to the to the Arab population, which was the majority, but that the best land and whatever was allocated to the Jewish state. And that it was unfair because it was their country. And it shouldn't be, shouldn't be divided. Obviously, Jews, Zionists had a different perspective on whose country it actually was. Zionism about the in-gathering of the exiles, Jews returning to their ancestral homeland. It's a liberation movement. And so that partition led to essentially a civil war inside the territory. And then once British forces, Britain had been the occupying power since World War I. It was a British mandate for the area. What led to the UN partition resolution was that the Brits wanted to wash their hands of it, didn't know what to do, and were

frustrated by this competing claims of these two communities. And so the UN partition was the answer to that. The civil war then gave way once the Israelis pronounced the provisional government in the state of Israel on May 15th into the first war, the war of 1948, Israel's war of independence, in which surrounding Arab armies moved in and tried to quash the Jewish state at its independence. The Israelis prevailed in that, and the eventual state actually was bigger than what the UN Resolution 181 had envisioned. Let's stop there for a second and say, what became of the Palestinian population, the Arab population during that war. Well, some left. Many were driven out by Zionist forces. Others were killed. There is obviously,

dueling narratives between Israelis and Arabs over what was the impetus for Arabs leaving, how the refugee crisis where, you know, large numbers of Arabs fled their homeland to surrounding countries, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, even some to Egypt, many of them to the Gaza Strip. there are vastly different narratives of this. But suffice it to say that there was a war that was going on and that some of these people were quite obviously consciously driven out, driven out of their homes, while others fled for their safety hoping to come back to their homes. And of course, there were those who never left. And those are sometimes referred to as the 1948 Arabs. and they remain, those are the ones who make up them and they and their descendants make up 20% of the Israeli population. They carry Israeli passports.

I've spent some time in some of these Arab cities and villages within Israel, as well as time in the West Bank and a couple visits to Gaza way back when in the 1990s. And it's very, very interesting how the Palestinians, who are Israelis, who are Israeli, who are Israeli, Israeli citizens, whatever you want to call it, whatever makes you feel comfortable, have in some ways become integrated into Israeli society and other ways they haven't. And so, and that they remain. And one of the reasons they say they remain is that they, that being the remnant of that Palestinian population means that they've never given up their claim to it. Of course, there's somewhat controversial within a broader Palestinian population because I think some of them see those people who have integrated well is not.

They are both integrated within Israeli society who has often fought with their cousins in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, an extraordinarily difficult, difficult situation for Arab citizens of Israel, Palestinian citizens of Israel. So anyway, so the state comes into being. it's bigger than it was. And just to, there was conflicts in 1956. Israel, France, and Great Britain attacked Egypt. And in an effort to, for the Brits and the French, to take over the Suez Canal, which Egypt's strongman, Gamal al-Dunasur, had previous to then nationalized.

And the Israelis wanted to take Nasser down a notch because the Egyptians were a threat to Israel's security, and he had closed waterway called the Strait of Tehran, which leads to the port of A Lot, which could choke off the Israeli economy at the time. That conflict came to an angering the United States. President Eisenhower forced all three Israel, Egypt, and Israel, France, and Great Britain, out of Egypt. And there was a UN force that was put in place from the Sinai Peninsula to keep the Israeli and the Egyptians apart. And then in the spring of 1967,

Nasser, the Syrian leadership, threatening the Israelis, Nasser threw the UN peacekeeping force out of the Sinai Peninsula. And on the morning of June 5th, the Israelis undertook, you know, one of the most famous preemptive strikes on three Arab armies,

concentrating mostly on the Egyptian front, and conquered the West Bank, the Golan Heights, which is Syrian territory, and drove from the Western Negab Desert across the Gaza Strip, which at the time was occupied by Egypt, all the way across the Sinai Peninsula to find themselves on the east bank of the Suez Canal. And that's where things stood until the peace treaty in 1979. and now I'm going beyond 1967. But I'm trying to give you a listen as a sense of how Gaza became what it is. And the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel

did nothing to about the Israeli occupation of the Gaza Strip, which continued, even though the Israelis eventually withdrew their forces from the Sinai. By the spring of 1982, there were no Israelis in the Sinai Peninsula. But there was some notion that there would be some negotiation over Palestinian autonomy

or statehood in the West Banking the Gaza Strip, which never happened, and the Israelis continued to occupy and even settle in the Gaza Strip. Buried in there as well, I think, is evidence that as horrifying as the ongoing wars right now, it is not a genocide because of the 20% population of Arab Israelis, right? It is not as if they are being... Well, right. I mean, yeah, I think one of the aspects of, you know, genocide is to actually wipe out a population, whereas the population of Palestinians has increased over years by like 20%. Whereas, I mean, if you just want to go by comparison and you're thinking about major communities, that the number of Jews in the world still has not recovered from the Holocaust from, so it.

on numbers alone, obviously. I think those who are making the claim of genocide is that part of genocide is to kind of erase the history and the identity, the presence of people. And that is a, I think it's a contested claim. But as I said, I don't think, and I'm not a specialist in international law. I think that's probably something, you know, maybe you guys want to have a guest on who is a specialist international law, although most international law, you know, makes you want to watch paint dry rather than discuss international law.

But I think... How big can a cheese be? Oh, that's EU law. That's EU. That's EU. That's EU. All right. So, you know, I think that these terms are being thrown out.

And it's being used as well, you know, in response to Hamas' attack on Israelis on October 7th. And I also don't think that that qualifies. But again, I'm not, I'm not an expert on international, international law. But I don't think that either. raised to that level. And much of the accusations are part of this very heated environment that we live in that is turbocharged by 24-hour news cycles, social media, the activism on both sides of this conflict that makes it, you know, very, very hard for people to maintain some

perspective about what's happening and maintain their humanity, to be completely honest with you. I've been just absolutely appalled and shocked that we have come to the point where, you know, there's a debate about killing children, like, which way is, you know, like, it just is shocking to me. But that's, that's a, that's a separate issue. And I think what we're, what I've been trying to do is try to give people this perspective, um, to think about this conflict in a more, I don't want to use term rational, but a way that, um, I guess the best way is put in a proper historical perspective. The Palestinians talk about the Nakhba. That's their word for the beginning of the war, the Israeli War of Independence, and what followed immediately thereafter.

It's interesting. Actually, for many Palestinians, Nakhba has continued because their dispossession has continued over all of these years. Okay. Okay. No, thank you. Is it, do you think that that's an equivalent? There's such a weird effort, it seems like, to create an equivalence between the Holocaust and the Nakhba. This is their great, you know, horrific event. This is the turning point of all things horrible.

I mean, is that a fair comparison, do you think, in any way? it strikes me that that comparison is a political move. Obviously, Anakba is terrible. It is the dark underbelly of Zionism. I mean, there is no question that Palestinians were dispossessed. Villages were emptied out. People fled. They've never been allowed to come back.

Gaza is a unpleasant place for people to live. So it's undeniably the case that it is a historic injustice to the Palestinian people and they've never, there's been no redress for it. There was great hope in the 1990s that there might be, but it hasn't come to pass. But in the, it's it's hard for me, and it's hard for me to make the equivalence between the kind of systematic extermination of European Jewry. and what's befallen the Palestinian people, both terrible, terrible things. But the, but, but, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and there are enormous consequences for the Palestinians of the knock-up, but, but it is, it strikes me as something fundamentally and qualitatively different from what the Nazis try to do, was just exterminate

Jews from the face of the earth. This is such a fun subject. I think, kinds of questions. And so my point is, my point is there has been, I think among, I think among, I mean, I under under under under under under under under under under some activists not necessarily Palestinian's although some have it has been to attack the legitimacy of the state of Israel which is seen as being born out of the Holocaust by saying that this is there is an equivalence to these two horrible events.

and so that undermines the legitimacy and the kind of moral exigency of the creation of Israel after World War II. Because Zionism goes back way back, much further than World War II. But there was, if you think about Harry Truman's calculations and other calculations about whether to vote for it to recognize, whether to vote for the partition in 1947 and whether to recognize the provisional. government in the state of Israel on May 15th, 1948. There is some, there is a through line here that there is a moral commitment to the Jewish people after, after the Holocaust. But again, like I said, Zionism is very different. So, so like I said, this equivalence is a way to undermine that.

And I think activists have, have done that. And in some ways, this is something that has captured the imagination of large numbers of people. and this moral equivalence lives on. I think you can recognize the enormity of the Holocaust and also recognize the dispossession of the Palestinian people as also being terrible, but of being kind of magnitudes that we are talking about two really fundamentally different things here. All right, Angry Planet listeners,

want to pause there for a break. We'll be right back after this. All right. Welcome back, Angry Planet listeners. We are back on with Stephen Cook. What do you make of American activist lack of support for the war, the pushback, the protests? Is it different than other times? Does it feel like it's more now?

Do you think it's more? Does it for a long time, basically, entire life, it feels like most Americans have had pretty across-the-board support for Israel. Obviously, there's caveats and asides there, but this, the pushback and kind of the, I would say outright, like pro-Hamas talking points from some people that I have seen in the past few weeks is kind of taken me a back. What do you make of it? You know, I think if you look at the polling, it still demonstrates solid American support for Israel and what Israel is doing. First of all, I think most Americans aren't really paying that much attention. They care much more about, you know, who's playing whom in college football this coming weekend.

But I think overall Americans do. I think what you're seeing, but I do think it feels different. I think it feels different for a number of reasons. One, as I alluded to before, I think, you know, we are in kind of a moment of like full on social media, but not just social media, but full on kind of miss and disinformation that's happening. And so it is, and since people are very, very online, it feels like the stakes are much, much higher than they were before, even though they may not, even though they may not be. classes online. The people that are talking are online. Right. That's exactly right. That's exactly right. And then I think the other thing that has taken people back is, in particular, college campuses, in particular elite college campuses. I mean, there's thousands of colleges in the United States. But, you know, there's focuses on places like the University of Pennsylvania, where I earned my PhD, Harvard, Cornell, had that terrible incident, a number of other, a number of other places. And I think that, those are, I think it's important to recognize that there's certainly issues on these campuses that is a fusing of a number of different phenomena, including in addition to the social

media phenomenon, I think the faculties have become quite radical, particularly on this issue. And it's one thing, you can be a package. advocate for Palestinian rights, but at the same time, be horrified by these horrific acts of terrorism perpetrated against Israelis. And somehow the faculty and some, I don't want to say all, some student activists are unable to make, to think those two things at the same time. And I think it comes from a systematic kind of delegitimization of. of Israel and the Israeli state, as well as the dehumanization of Israelis and Jews, quite frankly. It has been, I think, a long-term project, and that has now kind of entered into the lexicon within at least at the universities.

And to the point where it's probably hard to find professors in the social sciences who work on this issue or adjacent issues, who will have a very kind of nuanced view of the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. And so that's how you get, that's how you get to this point where, shockingly, and let me underline again, some have articulated. views that are consistent with Hamas's views, where you have, you know, I've been sent, you know, social media posts, screenshots to social media posts of tenured faculty, like out and out support for Hamas or critical of American politicians for expressing their outrage over terrorism. because there is a view here that Israel is a settler, colonial apartheid state that resistance in whatever form is legitimate, even if it means killing innocence. I think that's wrong.

It would be extraordinarily difficult for me, given what I work on and how I view things. And I come to you as someone who's been critical of Israeli government policies, critical of Israeli settlement policy, annexation. But I think that what has been stunning to me is the inability to hold these two views that this grisly terrorism. What, you know, people who fought in Iraq called ISIS-like violence and an Israeli military onslaat on the Gaza Strip, they can't hold these two views that, that one is terrible and the killing of children in another place is also terrible. And that a state has an irreducible responsibility to protect its people. So it's, that's why I think that's why it feels so much like so much is at stake is that it's not just about the conflict

between Israelis and Palestinians. It's not just the fact that you have passionate partisans on both sides is that in the debate about this, some kind of basic elements of, you know, of what we thought we agreed upon or suddenly not we can't agree on. We can't agree that the murder of innocence is a terrible thing. Or that it happened. Or that it, yeah.

I mean, I've seen, I have seen people on social media, people who had been imprisoned in the Middle East that the United States had passionately advocated for, basically saying that the murder, of Israeli babies is fake news, that the mainstream media got taken in by Israeli propaganda. I mean, how is it that people are tearing down pictures of oddlers who've been taking hostage? This is quite madness.

And so that's why, again, I think quite honestly that when we come to an outcome here in Israel and Palestinians, we're not going to see a huge change. I think we will see some version of the status quo, but what I think is shaking people in the United States is, as I said before, certain kind of norms and thousands and things that we thought we could agree on. We clearly don't agree on. It also is happening with our own kids, though. I mean, I'm not going to speak for your kids, but I will speak from mine, kids in our

family. We have, I've known that my son is a big believer in the colonialism and, you know, that the Palestinians have been, you know, that it's, what's happened is basically he's on their side. I do not know whether or not he would applaud the murder of innocence. I'm assuming not. But we don't talk about it anymore. We just don't talk about it. We just don't talk about it. Well, let's say that not everybody, obviously not everybody does, but loud voices, voices that want to frame the terms of the debate certainly have been saying things like that. Yes. It's amazing. No, no, no. People, young Jewish people are going to marches and rallies that are, you know, pro-Palatine and shouting from the river to the sea. Right.

You know, I'm just saying it's the best PR job I've ever seen. seen. Well, look, I think there's, I mean, to put it colloquially, there's no doubt the Palestinians were screwed. I think also what makes this very, very difficult is that there was always been a Jewish presence in Palestine. Jews were scattered to the four corners and that there was in all those years, particularly in the kind of Jewish mysticism in the, in the, in the and the pale and Eastern Europe and stuff, this longing for a return to Zion. And that there, so there is this, there is an indigenous thing that's going on. There is this longing to go back to them. And there is clearly colonialism, right? There, there is a colonial aspect to the in-gathering

of the exiles. Not everybody who's indigenous, obviously, to the area. But of course, Now there are nine million Israelis, seven of whom are Israeli Jews, 50% of whom are actually native-born, 50% of whom hail from some part of the Middle East. They're not European. So that's what makes this, I think, a more difficult thing than, let's say, French colonialism of Algeria, right, the most thoroughly colonized country place. on Earth. Algeria, of course, wanted to independence in the early 1960s, but that there is this connection and there's irrefutable archaeological historical evidence of this connection between Jews and this area. I think that the settler colonial paradigm is something that people are learning about without the nuances and complexities of this issue. I think one of the problems, and this is one of the problems with the discussion about this, is that this conflict now demands that everybody have moral absolutes.

And if you have moral absolutes, you can't discuss the complexities and nuances of the conflict. It's either one or the other. And that's why it's hard. for people to hold, say, wow, this terrorism was horrifying. It was grisly. And wow, Israeli policy in the West Bank and Gaza Strip has been questionable. They've been annexing territory and its military onslaught is horrifying. People are unable to hold those two things. And it's because we live in this time of moral absolutes. I think it's beyond questionable. I think one of the reasons that people are so

exercised now is that the power imbalance is obvious. Right? The power imbalance is overwhelmingly obvious. And most people that live in

Gaza are not members of Hamas, right? But it's those people that are going to suffer the consequences of both Hamas and Israel's policies. and that is what people see. And that is the tremendously,

one of the horrifying aspects of this is that Palestinians have been victimized again by these forces in many ways beyond their control because of these power imbalances and they're paying, and innocent Palestinians are paying the price. It's also, I don't know. I don't see any way

to make what's happening now okay. I mean, there's just no okay for killing children on either side. It's been interesting to read the moral arguments on both sides, too. People trying to make, you know, various arguments that, and the idea that Hamas, unless you utterly defeat them, will just do what they did on October 7th again. Personally, I think that sounds true. That sounds likely. Well, if you're familiar with the Hamas Charter and its subsequent guidelines and principles,

I think that's really one of the most important conclusions that you can draw here. And it's also very hard to, I mean, it's incredibly densely packed in Gaza. I think people don't really understand that it's 25 miles long about. And there's two. That's why. Yeah. And it's two million people, right, who live there. put that together with the tunnels, which I'm not going to talk about very much because I don't know very much, but I'm just saying it's supposed to be riddled with tunnels.

It seems like an impossible operation, even if you, how do you do it right? I guess that's the question that I've been wondering all, you know, along. Right. I know, how do you do it right? Is there a right way to do it? Yeah, I'm not a guns and trucks analyst, but it does. We got to go. No, don't leave me to the traffic.

But it does, I mean, just by looking at this, just knowing a little bit, you have to figure that this is extraordinarily difficult. I think made more difficult by the fact that, and I think this is undeniable, that Hamas wants civilians to be in the way, that they, they have put bunkers and tunnels in places where there are civilians. Of course, as you point out, it's a very small area. But this does seem to be a tactic that creates an impossible situation for the Israelis. They know that they're going to end up killing lots of innocent people as they try to get at these tunnels and command bunkers and so on and so forth. I think, though, with the number of Israelis killed on October 7th, the damage done to Israel's deterrence and the reputation of the idea that the constraints that might have been there during previous rounds of

violence, 2014, 2021, 2012, 2008, 2009 are not there. I think the Israelis have been clear that they're changing the rules of the game and that you can turn out the entire British population to Trafalgar Square to denounce the Israelis, they're not going to bend because their responsibility is the protection of the people. And they've defined this in existential terms. Unless they defeat Hamas, they cannot repopulate parts of southern Israel. What state would live like that?

That's one of the things that strikes me about this. And in Western media coverage of the calls for a ceasefire is, you know, how much does Israel care about as you said British citizens flooding Travolgar Square and also how does this is how does Hamas feel about a ceasefire would they agree to it well I think that they're going to release the hostages in exchange well I think the the Israeli calculation is that they're unlikely to and that a ceasefire or humanitarian pause accrues to the benefit of Hamas and why give them that? Because, you know, there are people in the streets in London and Rome and Washington and New York who, you know, are not only that, not on, many of them are passionate supporters

of Palestine, but many of them are also kind of anti-Semites, right? So why would you bow to that and give your, who you've defined as your mortal enemy an opportunity to rearm, have a breather, regroup. And of course, the way in which these bunkers and tunnels were built was through humanitarian aid coming into Gaza or, and so why would they, why would they, especially under these circumstances,

especially with the death and destruction that Hamas caused on October 7, why would they do that? And that's, that's, their view is we're not going to. And as I said, the horrifying result is basically this takedown of northern Gaza. And there is a reason. There is obviously a military reason for taking down these buildings to airstrikes. It's to better access tunnels and get that the Hamas leadership, which is where they are. So an impossible, impossible situation that the Israelis, I think, are aware of, but at this point, don't give, are not in, let's put it this way, are not in a place where they want the advice of people who have not necessarily been supportive of Israel, like the U.N. Secretary.

general or any number of like senior UN officials and things along those lines. The other thing that I think that gets lost, and I don't know how important it is honestly, but I mean, Hamas hasn't actually stopped shooting rockets. I mean, I know that for a fact because I was just talking to someone who had to jump off the phone with me in Tel Aviv and head for a shelter. I mean, I think the rate has slowed down, but they have continued to fire rockets at Israel. And people rely on iron dome to try to, but that doesn't mean that rockets aren't being fired. I mean, it's still an active war on both sides.

I think people just see it as one directional entirely. Well, I mean, I think that's because, one, the amount of firepower that the Israelis can bring to bear on this is, you know, of a military that it has, in some cases, bigger, you know, is, in some cases, more proficient than some NATO militarists. And because the focus has now shifted to the humanitarian catastrophe in the Gaza's trip, which is also undeniable. And so the, and that Israeli, you know, ground forces are engaged in a battle there. So it seems in the way in which your average person is getting this news to the extent that they're interested in it is that there's, the shots aren't really being fired in the other direction at this point because Israel's this rather powerful, has this powerful military. You mentioned one thing earlier that I thought was really interesting, which is has the IDF lost some of its deterrence just because of what happened? on October 7th. And then that actually can take us to the discussion about the region.

Does Israel look weaker now in a substantial way than it did on October 6th? I think that everybody was surprised that Hamas was able to enter Israeli territory and hold that territory for days. days. I mean, it took three days for the Israelis to gain control of parts of their own country. It hasn't happened since 1948. No Arab force has been able to take Israeli territory. And so I think that that did have an impression, make an impression upon people. And I think part of the ferocity of the Israeli campaign so far has been to reestablish that to turn. And I think, you know, I think, I think one, You know, there is obviously fighting going along Israel's northern border, but it's more of, it is kind of below the threshold of all-out war. And I think part of that is Israelis still can bring a lot of force to bear. So they are, Hezbollah seems unsure of how much Israel can bring to bear and still seem to be somewhat tentative. So there is some indication that deterrence continues. But also keep in mind, there's a lot of American forces in the region. And the United States has never fought with Israel.

It's never fought to save Israel. What American interest has been is to help Israel insured security, to help prevent challenges to Israeli security. So the presence of those aircraft carriers and the fighter aircraft and the Marines on call in the area is to deter Hezbollah and Iran from widening. widening the conflict. So far, everybody was in tinderhooks when Hassan Asrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, spoke last Friday, and he essentially punted it. He said, you know, we hate Israel down with Israel. Time for decisive action. Recall your ambassadors. We're pinning them down in, you know, to help our brothers in Hamas. But at the same time, Hamas has been saying, where is Hisbalah? So I think that I think that it's unclear though whether the reason why Hezbollah has kind of kept it below this threshold of war is because the United States is there or because Israel is regardless, it's a good thing that there is in a second front.

But I do think that look, if you're Saudi Arabia or the UAE or Bahrain and you're looking and, you know, on October 5th and 6, you're like, this is this powerful country. we want to be aligned with it. It has unique capabilities. It has been getting the best of the Iranians in the shadow war that they've been fighting the last five years. And then you wake up on, you know, Saturday, October 7, like, oh, these guys may not be as good as we thought they were. Everybody loves a winner. I know I do. I have a grim joke to underscore your most recent points.

Ladies, if he gives you mixed signals, says he needs to talk to you, but delays the conversation until he's ready, keeps dropping cryptic hints, monologues for hours, but actually saying anything. He's not your man. He's Secretary General for Hezbollah. I heard that line. It's good. I like to take it. It's funny. He is the Castro of the Middle East. I mean, he's got in the car for a long time. I got in the car in the D.C. area. Lots of lots. As he was going on, I was like, all right, I'll just watch a video of it or get, you know. And anybody who knows what traffic looks like in D.C., although it was a Friday, so it wasn't so bad.

And I got to the office. And he was still warming up. He still went on for a couple more out. They didn't say much. Can I ask a big question about the region? if I can. Pardon me. So political Islam is still dominant.

And I think it would be shocking for some of our younger listeners to know that like a secular Arab nationalism used to be the hottest thing. Maybe like a generation before I was born. But you know, it's in the, you know, Turkey, it's in the name, right? as we've talked to you before, do you see political Islam continuing to hold strong for a long time, or do you think that it will eventually give over to something else? And will it change anything? I think one of the things,

a good way to start answering that question is to think like Islamists. And Islamists believe that they have all the time in the world. But they don't think like you might think, they think in kind of generational terms. And so then the answer to your question is no. I mean, I think that they are here to stay. They have certainly suffered setbacks. Just think about 2021, Islamists in Morocco lost an election badly.

There was a coup in Tunisia, essentially a palace coup, that really targeted the Islamist political party that had played a very important role in Tunisian politics after the 2011 uprising that overthrew the long-time secular nationalist dictator, Zina Labidine Ben Ali. The Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt had been on the run since 2013, since a coup there that overthrew a Muslim Brotherhood presidency. In Gaza, the West Bank, Hamas was under pressure and seemed to be, you know, the Israelis seem to have established some sort of wild and wary deterrence with them. the Turkish Islamist party, which is different from the Muslim Brotherhood, but it's definitely sought to be a leader in the region, was its kind of needlessly aggressive approach to its

neighborhood had very little practical returns for them. So President Erdogan was seeking to patch up relations with governments in the Gulf that were opposed to political Islam and seeking a rapprochement with Israel. So it seemed to be in retreat. But in fact, it has this Not been. It continues. It continues at a grassroots level. It continues in places where it is welcome, Doha, London, Istanbul. And again, think about time. And if you think that you have lots of time on your hands, you're likely to be around for a long period of time. You'll just see this as one setback among many. if you do suffer a setback. So I think it's there. And I think also to the extent that, you know, governments have failed. Not all governments.

You know, the Gulf countries have a lot of money to spread around and not as big populations. But, you know, Abdu Thessisi in Egypt has failed to deliver on what he promised. He overthrew a Muslim Brotherhood apparatchik who became president in 2012 and deeply flawed elections, although that's not the dominant narrative. If you read a newspaper, they'll say, Mohammed Morsi was elected in free and fair elections. That's not the case. I was there. And he promised Egyptians when he overthrew Morsi, prosperity and security and better governance. They've gotten a little more security, but they haven't gotten any prosperity, and they don't have any better governance.

And so those provide kind of political openings for politicians, Islamists, who particularly in the case of the Muslim Brotherhood, who are able to use a religious vernacular, they speak in a way, but to advance a political agenda and a non-democratic agenda. So I think that they, I think it remains an important political force in a region, even if in, we. recent years they suffered a setback. And Hamas is suffering a setback right now. Last question for me, not least of which, because we have kept you forever. But does Israel survive this? And does it come out weakened or strengthened, which I'm going to doubt? I look, I think the Israelis are defining this struggle in existential terms, but Israel is a

is a state whose existence, I think, remains beyond question. This is not, you know, 1950s Israel. This is a vibrant society, a successful one. I think it is yes, weakened and it is its belief in itself in the immediate aftermath.

You know, maybe Israel's have suffered a blow, an important psychological as well as military blow. My sense is, however, that it will not come out weak as a result of this conflict. There has been a rallying around the flag, if not the leadership of Israel. And I think one of the reasons why the Israelis are prosecuting their campaign the way that they are and vowing to destroy Hamas. And there's a lot of people saying, well, you can't do that.

It's impossible to do that. Yeah, but at the same time, you know, we haven't destroyed ISIS, but it's not the existential threat that it was to the Iraqi state that it was in 2014, right? So I think the way in which they're prosecuting this campaign is a way to demonstrate that Israel really isn't going anywhere. Of course, there are risks. Israel gets sucked into a long grinding counterinsurgency in the Gaza Strip. It will sow political different differences in the country, weak in morale, which is something that Hamas would want. I have to think the Israelis are aware of that and want to avoid those pitfalls.

So I don't know. I think that kind of, especially in the early days afterwards, you know, Israel will be destroyed. I think that this was not reality. But, of course, you know, there's still the possibility of. of a widening regional conflict. And Hezbollah is armed with, if Hamas has a lot of rockets, Hezbollah has many, many more that could overwhelm Israel's defenses. So this is not over, but I do think that Israel ultimately will survive.

Does Netanyahu survive it? Unlikely. But I will say this. And I touch on this on a column that I'm going to have. coming out in foreign policy in the coming days, is that it seems unlikely that someone who has built a political legacy on providing security can survive when that person's the prime minister and ultimately responsible when the worst security disaster in the state's history happens under their watch. And the polls, I think, show that. What I do think, though, is Israelis,

probably are going to elect another center-right-right coalition when it comes to the next elections. This is not going to revive the peace camp, which was already pretty much dead and buried. It just will be a Netanyahu-less coalition. May not have the people like Bezalelz Motritch and Itemar Ben-Givir, some of these people are like way out, way out on the right. But you can imagine a center-right-right coalition coming to power would mean very little in terms of progress with Palestinians towards some sort of resolution of the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, but maybe a more stable coalition without Nathaniel. All right.

Well, Matthew? That's it, unless you want to talk about nukes. No. We're not going to talk about nukes. We can talk about demone. You should have like a trigger warning on that. this episode. People have to remove all sharp objects wherever they're listening to this.

I mean, just adding nukes would just... Then you say, trigger warning, remove all sharp objects, listen to this on a lower floor, and make sure you have some alcoholic beverages within reach. I'm sorry, they came up this week. All right. Stephen Cook. Thank you, gentlemen. Thank you.

Always nice to chat. Thanks for listening to another episode of Angry Planet. The show is produced with love by Matthew Galt and Jason Fields with the assistants of Kevin Medell. This is the place where we ask you for money. If you subscribe to us on substack.angriplanet.com, it means the world to us. The show, which we've been doing for more than seven years now, means the world to us, and we hope it means a lot to you.

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