HOW ISRAEL CAN STILL WIN THE ULTIMATE VICTORY OVER HAMAS AND IRAN

How Israel Can Still Win the Ultimate Victory Over Hamas and Iran

Israel's 'go it alone' strategy has had a rude awakening: it needs far more backing from the US and Arab allies to confront Iran and its malevolent partners, including Hamas and Hezbollah. Biden's post-war plan offers that lifeline, but there's one more element the president should add

May 07th, 21PM May 07th, 21PM

The ultimate victory for both Israel and the U.S. in the war in Gaza, would not be Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's specious promise of Hamas's complete destruction, but the emergence of a new American-led Middle Eastern security architecture designed to counter the "axis of resistance" (Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas and allied militias).

Derailing this security architecture may have been one of the primary reasons Hamas launched the war to begin with, with Iran's backing. Its reemergence as a possible development, along with Saudi-Israeli normalization as an incentive for Israel to end the war, once again have Hamas and Iran in crisis mode.

Meanwhile, Hamas' acceptance of a Qatari-Egyptian cease-fire deal Monday, seems to have taken Israel by surprise. Israel sent negotiators to Cairo, but simultaneously also launched an operation in Rafah that could both torpedo an agreement and potentially damage Israel's relations with the U.S. – putting in stark relief just how much is at stake in this moment.

The Biden administration plan could not be more urgent. It is trying to promote a three-pronged Mideast strategy: a hostage deal and cessation of warfare in Gaza, leading to a "pathway" to a future Palestinian state; a new U.S. -Saudi strategic relationship, in exchange for normalization with Israel, including a defense treaty, enhanced access to advanced American weaponry and a civil nuclear program under strong supervision.

It would also feature new security architecture to include the Saudis, Egypt, Jordan, the UAE, other Gulf and Arab states and leading European ones - remarkably acting in concert with Israel. History rarely provides us with a preview of the future, but on April 13 we saw how this tentative coalition would operate in practice, when it jointly shot down almost all of the more than 300 missiles and drones Iran fired at Israel.

The prospects for turning this ad hoc coalition into a more structured and permanent one, is potentially no pipe dream. Indeed, if Israel makes the right call, it is achievable in the near-term.

Netanyahu is deeply interested both in normalization with the Saudis and establishment of the regional security architecture. A strategic transformation of the Middle Eastern landscape such as this, might constitute an eleventh hour means of restoring his political fortunes, averting probable electoral defeat, and stonewalling his likely criminal conviction.

His problem is political: to even talk about a cessation of warfare in Gaza, or some vague path towards a Palestinian state, will lead to the collapse of his coalition and precisely the political and legal outcomes he fears so obsessively. Hamas's acceptance of a cease-fire deal should appear to be welcome news, but for Netanyahu it presents a problem.

As the stakes keep getting higher by the day, both for substantive reasons and to strengthen Netanyahu's room for political maneuver, the U.S. should now further sweeten the pot and add a bilateral defense treaty with Israel as a fourth component of the Mideast strategy.

To do so, at a time when American college campuses and parts of the American left are engulfed with anti-Israel hatred, might appear out of touch. But to the contrary, the timing is highly opportune and might just be sufficient to clinch the overall deal. As Tom Friedman has pointed out, the highly controversial U.S.-Saudi component of the strategy will only gain congressional approval with Israel's support. Opportunity time.

First, it would be politically and strategically awkward to provide a defense treaty to the Saudis, a one-time ally long reviled by Democrats, and not to the US's foremost ally in the region, which faces even greater threats. For reasons of strategic balance and political optics, a defense treaty with Israel would now be appropriate.

Second, a bilateral defense treaty, especially as part of the new regional security architecture, combined with normalization, would present Netanyahu with such a dramatic "win", that he might be tempted to risk his coalition.

The alternative, to stay the course with a narrow ultra-right coalition, would postpone the day of reckoning, but probably not for long.

Third, a defense treaty is increasingly becoming a strategic necessity. Iran is the first adversary Israel has ever faced that is too big, too far, and too powerful, to be defeated. A regional superpower, Iran has surrounded Israel with a multi-front "ring of fire": Hezbollah's mammoth rocket arsenal in the north; Iranian forces, Hezbollah and other militias in Syria in the northeast; pro-Iranian militias in Iraq in the east; the Houthis in the south; and Hamas in the west, badly mauled, but not out for the count. Concomitantly, Iran has effectively established itself as a threshold nuclear state, able to cross the finish line in short order.

Furthermore, the danger of Iran and its allies escalating the war in Gaza to a regional one, necessitated American intervention even in a limited conflict with Hamas, heretofore mistakenly believed to have been an easy pushover. To deter Iran, Biden deployed two aircraft carriers to the region. When U.S. and Israeli deterrence failed in April, and Iran launched a massive attack against Israel, the U.S.-led international coalition roundly defeated it.

The idea of self-reliance, that Israel alone fights its battles, has always been a fundamental tenet of its national security strategy. The war in Gaza and especially the Iranian attack, however, demonstrated that the go-it-alone strategy is no longer sufficient. Israel will need far greater backing from the US and other allies to confront Iran.

Fourth, it could be argued that the extraordinarily supportive U.S, military response to the events of October 7 and since, have demonstrated its commitment to Israel's security and obviated the need for a formal defense treaty. A U.S.-Israeli defense treaty might, however, significantly reduce the prospects of such scenarios actually materializing in the future, help bring Biden's Mideast strategy to fruition, and facilitate U.S. military planning. Given the vast size of the American national security establishment, formal commitments provide clarity, the basis for force structure development and deployment, budgetary allocations, inter-agency coordination, cooperative agreements in a variety of areas, such as intelligence sharing, cyber and missile-defense, diplomatic engagement, and more.

Finally, Israel is unlikely to ever again have as good a friend in the White House as Biden, who defines himself as a Zionist and might wish to crown his pro-Israel career by ensuring its long-term robustness, by concluding a defense treaty. Given both long-term socio-political trends in America,, as well as ongoing tensions over various issues, Biden may be the last president open to such an arrangement.

A bilateral defense treaty, normalization, and a new regional security architecture, would be the ultimate victory over Hamas and Iran. They are ideas whose time has come.

Chuck Freilich, a former deputy national security advisor in Israel, is a senior fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) and the author or "Zion's Dilemmas: How Israel Makes National Security Policy", ""Israel and the Cyber Threat: How the Startup Nation Became a Global Superpower." Twitter: @chuck_freilich

2024-05-07T18:29:14Z dg43tfdfdgfd