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- [00:52]
A
Sam. Welcome everyone to the drop Site News Tuesday Morning Live Stream. I'm your host this week, Murtaza Hossein. We have a lot to get through this week. There are a couple major developments I want to touch on before we get to our main topic. First of all, over the past couple of days there's been a tremendous development which has been the breakdown of talks between Iran and the E3 countries, which are the European countries, Germany, France and the UK over the subject of its nuclear program. Obviously in June there was a major war between Iran, Israel and also the United States over Iran's nuclear program, during which the European countries also participated and providing intelligence and political and logistical support for the war. So now there have been some talks aimed at averting what are called the UN Snapback sanctions. And without going to great detail, the snapback sanctions. The snapback was a mechanism to reimpose the 2015 sanctions that were lifted on Iran by the United nations when it signed a nuclear deal under President Obama. There was a period during which these snapback sanctions may have been averted by a 30 day period of negotiations. We're reaching the final days of that period and the signs are not good at the moment. So what that means is if the sanctions are reimposed and no new deal is to govern Iran's nuclear program, its relations with France and the other European countries comes to pass in the next by the end of this month, basically you will see first of all the reimposition of these very harsh sanctions on Iran. But also it would extremely greatly increase the odds of a new war between Iran, Israel, the United States, perhaps other countries as well too, because the snapback sanctions would give great diplomatic cover and political legitimation to people who would like to engage in that war anyways. So unfortunately it looks like we're trending towards another conflict and we see preparations inside Iran and other countries as well too for what a new conflict may look like. And this conflict, if it does come to pass, is likely to be far more bloody and brutal than the war in June was. As bad as that was, this could be a far more extreme conflict between between Israel and Iran and also maybe the US and other countries in the region as well too. So it's something we're watching and we're going to be talking about more in the weeks and months to come. Another issue which is somewhat tangentially related to our main topic, but I do think it's worth bringing up, has been really interesting and alarming. Recent developments in Eastern Europe over the last week and a half or two weeks. There have been numerous incursions by drones and military aircraft believed to have come from Russia in NATO countries. And we've seen first in Poland, there was a very widespread and massive drone incursion some a week ago, happened again in Romania, there were aircraft which broke, violated Estonian airspace allegedly as well too. And then yesterday, maybe arguably the most serious incursion to date in Denmark, in and in Norway over major airports. There were large drones spotted hovering over the airports for a period of several hours. They caused a shutdown of the airports, major international airports, flight disruptions which are probably going to last until tomorrow at least. And the drones then escaped without any, you could say, interception or shooting down and so forth. But the governments of the countries have all pointed the finger at Russia and several countries have activated the Article 4 stipulation in NATO, which calls upon other countries to defend the border and airspace of countries which believe that their border airspace is threatened. That's one step below Article 5, which basically means triggering a mutual defense compact within NATO. So we're really, really close to the situation and we may not get there, but we're definitely edging closer every day to a situation where Poland or another NATO country triggers Article 5 and asks the rest of the alliance to defend them or to engage in an armed conflict with Russia. Obviously this all stemmed originally from the Russian invasion of Ukraine. As that situation has gone on, it's gotten more and more dangerous, not less dangerous in that time. And we're seeing now an escalation of this conflict right now. So, you know, it's a moment where we're seeing the international order somewhat break down. And this week, which is kind of what we want to talk about more, it's the week of the UN General assembly. And this is when the United nations, all the countries of the UN converge on New York City. They come for the assembly itself. They come for meetings, events and so forth to kind of discuss and get a state of play of where the world's heading at the moment. And so much is going on with that. But one aspect we want to discuss today particularly is the issue of the state of Palestine and the recognition of the state of Palestine by a large number of countries which had previously been obstinate and had tried to hold out for some other agreement. More clearly, there have been most of the world recognized the Palestinian state for many, many years now. But European countries and five eyes countries, Anglophone countries, have been holdouts with the US on that subject. But we've seen this week, Canada, the uk, France, Portugal, Australia, several other smaller countries recognizing a Palestinian state. And the dam is kind of breaking on that subject at this point. It's really mainly just the US now which is a significant holdout, and some other countries which are very dependent on the US like Japan, which may still recognize the Palestinian state in the near future. There's hints of that as well too. But we see a situation where pretty much a super majority of the world now acknowledges and recognizes the Palestinian state and there are efforts to instantiate one now in the Gaza Strip and elsewhere, even in a condition where obviously there's genocide taking place, an armed conflict, Israeli government which has vowed to never allow such a state to come to pass. So with the announcement of by the UK and other countries that they are recognizing the state, there's been a lot of confusion and debate about what this means. Is this just a symbolic declaration? Are there meaningful consequences to this recognition and so forth? We want to get into that a bit more and talk a bit more deeply about the broader implications and what they are, if any of this major diplomatic turning point at least. So we have a great guest coming out today and we're going to bring them on now. Ha Eller HA is long time Middle east analyst, expert, an old friend of mine, someone who I really rely on to for analysis subject and we've been talking quite a bit about what's been going on with the UN in this past week. AJ thank you so much for joining us. And I want to ask you to start off what's your reaction actually because you know we we've seen quite a bit of discussion of the subject and obviously the UK and other countries have very major G7 countries for the first time have joined this recognition. What do you think it means and how are you interpreting these events in the last few days?
- [08:25]
B
So Mass, thank you very much. It's always a pleasure to be on the program with you, deeply appreciate the work that you and job site do. So thank you. It's quite an honor. There's a few things that I'd like to mention first actually the number of countries that recognize a Palestinian state, the number was well over a super majority quite a long time ago. Actually the most recent wave of recognitions been around 10, 10 countries over the last couple of years. But if you go be before that you still had around 140 countries out of 193 countries that are member states of the UN that recognize the state of Palestine. The state of Palestine was announced I think in 1988 by the Palestinian Liberation Organization and immediately recognized by most of the global South. And then you saw more countries recognized thereafter. And then of course there was another wave of recognitions later on, particularly from Latin America, South America. So you're really in the, the last sort of phase with regards to recognition. You're correct. The United States is really isolated on this particular point. There are very few other countries that are really holding out. Japan is a, is a significant exception, but I do think that they will change that position in due course. Not that it makes a terrible amount of difference, but with all due respect to Japan, they don't, they don't really engage on this issue very much. Singapore, a lot of Southeast Asian countries, you know, they're pretty much there or done already. The question, and this is why I, I've been, I won't say skeptical, skeptical is perhaps the wrong word, but since the announcement by Keir Starmer, our Prime Minister in the UK that the UK would recognize a Palestinian state subject to certain conditions, that if the Israelis fulfilled those conditions, then he wouldn't, which I thought was a really bad fudge, but be that as it may, he was going to recognize. I found the, the announcement frankly to be a bit of a trap. And, and I want to explain what I mean by that because I'm, I'm very pleased that recognition has taken place because on a symbolic level, it puts the Palestinian people into a certain category, at least within Europe. Of course, they were in this category elsewhere in the world for many, many years. But they are recognized as a people and a people deserving self determination and any people that warrant self determination should have their state recognized. So to me it was not about punishing the Israelis. It was not about rewarding anybody in Palestine either, irrespective of what political group you might be speaking of. It was simply a recognition that we acknowledge that the Palestinian people are a people and they warrant self determination. The trap, I think, and haven't moved on from this, the trap is that recognition would take place but no policy steps thereafter that would really put pressure on the Israelis to, to stop the occupation of that state would follow. And that's a trap. And I say trap very clearly because I think a previous trap was the, frankly the peace process when the Oslo Accords were signed. I think they were built off of a lot of goodwill and good faith. But a major flaw which the Norwegians themselves recognize, in fact, I think the Norwegian foreign minister pretty much stated as such at the UN a couple months ago, major flaw was that there was no accountability mechanism within the Ostro Accords to hold to account people or individuals or entities or states that violated international law. So you had many countries, quote, unquote, sign up to the Oslo Peace Accords, recognize them, talk about the peace process. The number of times I heard diplomats and statesmen talk about the peace process in the early 2000s and 2010s, but without any, any follow ups, oh, we support the peace process. It's like, well, what does that mean? If you support the peace process, what are you going to do about those that are sabotaging the peace process? And if you're not doing anything at all, then this just becomes a rhetorical tool so that you can show politically that you're doing something. But actually on the ground, very little is changing. And on the contrary, it became a cover. So you had more settlements built in the occupied west bank during the period of the peace process than you did before. Okay, for example.
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A
Right.
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B
And of course, that's just talking about the, the structural elements of statehood that we, we're considering right now. It doesn't bring into the equation the genocidal war that is taking place on Gaza. What does this have to say about that? And I think that these things have to be kept in the picture. I wrote a piece in the Financial Times early in the summer, which I think still holds, that goes into this. It's all about the fact that, yes, recognize the state of Palestine, but make sure that there's something to be recognized that we're not simply going to be recognizing a graveyard. That's not my phrase, by the way. The recognition of a graveyard phrase actually comes from the former Israeli ambassador to Paris wrote an open letter to President Macron saying that if you don't exact consequences and a price on the Israelis, then what you may end up recognizing is simply a graveyard. And I think that's a very important warning.
- [15:05]
A
Yeah, it's a very poignant way of putting it. So, one thing I was curious in your take, and, you know, I haven't seen the specifics of this recognition, is one question is what territorial boundaries are they recognizing exactly? Because obviously the traditional formulation from Oslo in 1967 is that obviously there's the Gaza and the west bank and East Jerusalem and so forth. But we, I'm not totally clear what all these countries have the same view of what the boundaries of the Palestinian state that they're recognizing are. And one thing that I'm curious of is that it seems very likely, and we don't know for sure yet, but there's very strong indications from the Israeli side, that they are planning to take measures practically on the ground to render ineffective or moot, in their view, any recognition. So they've been hinting very strongly, maybe annexation of parts of what is traditionally legally been considered, at least since 1967, the borders of a putative Palestinian state. They may annex part of Gaza, they may annex part of west bank, they may annex the entire West Bank. These are all things which have been talked about as possible scenarios. So the thing that's interesting to me is that even if one were to take the most conservative view of what the territory legally of a Palestinian state is, it's likely that the Israelis are currently encroaching on it or are about to encroach on it in a manner which is quite extreme. Like you're actually occupying another country, a legally recognized country, I annexing its territory. You know, there are very few countries in the world which engage in behavior like that. And, you know, Russia is like one country which is trying to do it. But it's not a very. The very unique and extreme circumstance anywhere in the world. If the Israelis, you know, tomorrow or next week announce, well, we're going to respond by annexing 30% of the west bank or something like that, what would the legal sort of shift be? Because it seems to me that that would justify, even if international law, you know, is not difficult to actualize due to various coordination problems and so forth, at least domestically, in the courts of all these countries that recognize the Palestinian state, it would open the door to legal measures and potentially sanctions, derecognition of Israeli passports. It would render. It'd be very difficult to do business with Israel legally in these countries. What do you see as possible consequences? And is there a way of instantiating that, at least at a domestic level, if it cannot be done at the UN level?
- [17:29]
B
So those are some very good questions. If I can just summarize them into three One, what are the borders? Two, what are the consequences of. Of occupation and annexation if they decide to annex? And three, I suppose I'm not doing this in order. Three is what. What are the Israelis going to do with regards to recognizing recognition? So first of all, when it comes to the borders, it may be different in different countries, okay? But certainly when it comes to the UK East Jerusalem, the Golan Heights, the West bank and Gaza are all recognized as occupied territory. And apart from the Golan Heights, I mentioned these, these particular four, because they relate to the war of 1967, where Israel invaded and occupied these territories. When it comes, of course, to the Golan Heights. That's Syrian territory. For the other three, the position of the UK government, for many, excuse me, many, many years, has been that these are the occupied Palestinian territories. So when we, when we want to see what sort of borders are being considered here, I think the borders are pretty clear in the sense that the occupied Palestinian territories become the recognized borders of a state of Palestine. Now, I suspect what you'll get if you press government officials in the UK on this point, they'll say that, you know, final status of borders are to be determined between the parties. Okay. Because indeed, that was something that was mentioned earlier on in, I think it was like about 20 years ago in terms of swaps of territory. So that could very easily be one of the formulations. I don't think they've made that particularly clear. But if people want to go by law, which I think that they should, the International Court of Justice last year made it abundantly clear that these territories are occupied, that the occupation of these territories is illegal, that Israel must end the occupation of these territories immediately, and states internationally should take all steps that are necessary in order to end that occupation. So it's not as nebulous as I think people sometimes try to, to posit. They say, oh, well, what are you recognizing? We don't know what we're recognizing. It's like, actually, you do. The problem. And by the way, when it comes to recognition, the State of Israel adamantly refuses to identify its own borders. This never caused any country to say, we don't recognize the state of Israel despite the fact that there are international borders of the state of Israel. But the State of Israel itself refuses to identify its borders. It refuses to identify its borders. So I think that that's important when it comes to consequences. Actually, no. Let's go to the reactions first. There's been a lot of talk about how recognition of the state of Palestine upset negotiations that were ongoing between Israel and Hamas that caused a massive problem in terms of continuing efforts to come to a ceasefire and so on. This is all nonsense. And if you look at the timeline, it's actually abundantly clear. The negotiations were already pretty much kaput before anything had been announced. So that's 1, 2. The negotiation process over the past two years has, has been one of constant sabotage by the Israelis, as testified to by Israeli media itself many times. So really, I don't put much stock in that, but more that when it comes to retaliation, and I'm sure that the Israelis will take steps and they will try to frame it as Retaliation. But when it comes to retaliation in terms of annexing parts of the west bank or the west bank in total, I think that they'll probably go for annexation of part of the West Bank. The Israelis were, were discussing annexation about parts of the west bank, parts of Gaza for months. And if you, if you go back far enough for years, okay, very recently, weeks ago, months ago, years ago. So I think that it's, it's quite, it's quite silly, quite frankly, to try to frame what they're going to do next as retaliation on the country. I think that annexation was on the way, irrespective of any recognition. I don't think that recognition is going to make it more or less likely. I think that recognition just angers the Israelis because they don't want to have a Palestinian state. And by the way, it's not just Netanyahu. And I think this is a big mistake of observers and analysts to think that opposition to a Palestinian state is simply about Netanyahu. I don't know of many figures in the political mainstream of Israeli society that still advocate a Palestinian state, whether it be and what. And you saw the reactions, actually from that political mainstream over the last few days, including opponents of Netanyahu who were more center or, or further to the left. I won't call them left, but more further to the left, let's say they said the most outrageous things about what was happening vis recognition. Yad Galant, who's, you know, who's supposed to be an opposition figure to Netanyahu in Israel, is also indicted by the ICC for war crimes. But he sent a very, I should say, a very insulting note to the Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, saying, you know, instead of focusing on, on getting a Palestinian state here, you should focus about Islamist extremism or something in the UK trying to engage in, you know, culture wars and stuff. So it's, it's a very common opposition, I think, that you see, to a Palestinian state within, within Israeli society. And people need to, people need to understand that, because if they think that all that needs to happen is a change in government, I think they're in for a really big, rude awakening when it comes to consequences if they do, for example, annex the West Bank. I appreciate that you're positing a scenario where the Israelis could do something and the world would respond and respond swiftly with certain types of measures. Unfortunately, what we've seen over the past two years is that measures do get taken, but they get taken much, much later. Takes a long time. There are reasons for that, but that's what happens. So I don't think you would see things like, you know, forbidding Israelis to come into different countries or anything like that. When it comes to settlements, there's already a lot of grounding in law across Europe to, to take their governments, their own governments to court vis a vis products that come from occupied territories, for example. And the Irish have been discussing this, I think, over the past year, the settlements bill, I think it's called, and you have other, other discussions going elsewhere, where in some places it's about labeling. So the products are allowed, but they have to be labeled as from the occupied territories. And others saying, no, we simply won't allow for any products to come. There could be more prescriptions, and I suspect we will see more prescriptions over time of different Israeli ministers and of particular individuals and figures in the settlement movement. Again, I find this is a little bit of a trap because the settlement enterprise itself is illegal. The entirety of that enterprise ought to be prescribed if we're going to be consistent with international law. Not a figure here or a figure there like extremist settlers. The entirety of the settlement enterprise is an extremist endeavor. Okay. It's not one figure or two figures. It's the entirety of the enterprise is an extremist endeavor. Yes, I'm sure that there are people who are less extreme than others who live on those settlements, but the, the very basis of the settlement enterprises is an extremist endeavor. And, and states who are serious about ending the occupation of those territories ought to be serious about what they need to do in order to end them.
- [26:48]
A
Yeah. You know, you raise a really good point. Just I want to touch on very briefly before we move on, is that the language of Israeli officials is very, very, you know, interesting. It's actually a very extreme language directed not just as the neighbors, but the rest of the world too. When you mentioned Yoav Galant, who ostensibly is a security professional, not like Netanyahu, not crazy or so forth, saying the most vituperative, vitriolic comments. And it's not just him, it's even people you could see, say further on the left in Israeli society and Israeli diplomats at the UN as well, too, engaging in, like, antics and bringing props and these very, very strange behavior, which is reminiscent of some of the most extreme regimes of the 20th century, the way that they would this theatrical sort of rejection of the entire world. It's a little strange. And also, you know, to your point, it's very difficult for all these reasons you pointed out. To instantiate real consequences against Israel politically, economically and so forth. Not impossible with the great barriers to doing so. It's a very small country. It's only like 9 million people, of which I believe 1.5 million roughly are a part of the ultra orthodox segment society which is not really very participating in the political system. And then maybe 1.2 million people who are Palestinian citizens of Israel. So it's even like, you know, 6.5 million actually, it's not that many people, but yet they're able to sort of reject the opinion of the entire world as embodied in the un, other, other bodies and so forth. And now the almost you said, not just super majority, nearly unanimous opinion of these bodies. And it seems like the big problem here, the big bottleneck obviously is the US and the US political system. And it's interesting to note the last two years has been an acceleration of a process which I think was already in place, but is going more now, which is Israel itself is becoming a very polarizing subject within the American political, political system. So it's not even that the Israelis have the undying support of the United States per se. They have the undying support of the Republican Party and they have the undying support of the elite segment of the Democratic Party. But they've seemingly lost the support of a tremendous number of people in the United States. And even the more insurgent segments of both parties are skeptical or even hostile of the US relationship with Israel. Can you tell me what role does the US enabling play in this subject? If the US Wasn't there doing this, what may we see happening in Palestine? And I think the, my impression is the Israelis be forced to bend to global opinion, which in many ways is very generous on the subject to giving a two state solution, things like that. That's not a maximalist position by any means. If the US Wasn't there doing this, how many things may be different and what is the US doing right now to kind of block a more constructive outcome?
- [29:29]
B
So you asked two, you asked again three very important questions. One relates to the nature of political discourse in Israel at the moment and why that is what's happening in American political discourse on the subject of Israel across the aisle and also what would happen if America sort of abandoned its position when it comes to Israel's occupation of the Palestinian territories? On the first, when it comes to the extreme kind of discourse that we see, there's a bunch of factors here and I, I advise your, your, your viewers to take a look at some of the work by Dalia Schleinden, who's an analyst and commentator in Harmony, but also really good pollster and has done a lot of studies in terms of how Israeli public opinion has shifted over time.
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A
All right.
- [30:39]
B
And it's. It's very concerning because when you see the numbers and you see the statement, and it's not just one poll or two, but it's like quite a series of polls, it shows that there's. There's a massive sympathy for what we would consider to be really extreme positions when it comes to Gaza in particular. Okay. But there are reasons for this, and I want to briefly touch on some of the reasons without, of course, justifying them, but it's important to understand why. And I think October 7, of course, is one of these reasons. There is a national trauma when it comes to October 7th, but I think that just laying it at the door of October 7th is a bit of a cop out. In fact, it's a massive cop out because this trend was certainly around long before October 7th. And depending on how far you want to go, you can talk about years, you can talk about decades, you certainly see the impacts of that trend beginning at least in the 90s, and many would argue much, much further back. So I won't go too much into all of that right now, but there's definitely a trend here and a current that. That is incredibly Israeli. You can't say, oh, this is un Israeli or something. No, no, it's. It's deeply Israeli. The question is, do you not have those sorts of currents elsewhere? You do. Okay. But when it comes to the Israelis, and I think this is. Comes to the next question, I think the Israelis feel that they really have the ability to engage in an environment of impunity. I think that the way in which the United States has engaged with Tel Aviv over the past two years has really given the Israelis a sense that they can basically do whatever they want to do and Washington will back them, even if they're not necessarily very happy about it, but that they won't do anything to stop them. And I think that this sense of impunity only grew in the past nine months. And you have that sense of impunity, it's going to embolden this sort of really extreme rhetoric because there are no consequences to it. On the contrary, you see the extremist kind of narrative that's being promoted by people like Smotish and Ben gvir, two of the most radical ministers in the Israeli government. Their discourse is utterly mainstreamed. Whether people like it or not is Another question, I mean from within the West. But they can't claim that it's marginal. They can't claim that it's on the sidelines or something.
- [33:45]
A
No, no.
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B
This is deeply embedded within Israeli political discourse and I think that that's been allowed to happen because people feel that they don't have to face any consequences if they can't. If they don't feel any consequences, there's no price, then they'll simply push further and further and further. And I think you saw the beginnings of that right at the beginning of the war in Gaza continuing when it came to Lebanon and then to Syria and then Qatar as well as Iran and Yemen and so on and so on. And I think that they will just keep on going in that regard. The only way that that stops, that sort of, you know, sense of, of impunity stops is when there's, it's shown to have prices, otherwise why would you stop? You know, you just keep on going. And yes, I think that that has much to do when it comes to the United States. I think it has mostly to do with the United States, frankly. It's not the only factor, but it's, it's the most massive factor active by far. You're right to identify that there are shifts taking place in public opinion within the United States. I think within the Democratic Party that's very, very clear. I think it's also clear in the Republican Party, but for different reasons. Okay. But it's certainly there, especially divisions between different parts of maga, different elements of, you know, how America first is interpreted. I don't believe that at least within the Republican Republican Party this would have an impact on policy in the near future. I think that's much more likely when it comes to the Democratic Party, at least sooner with vis a vis the Republicans. But the long term trends are pretty clear and not very good for the Israelis. Now what would happen as a result? Well, it all depends when that would happen. So if that, so for example, if the United States used its leverage today, or didn't even use its leverage today, just simply said we're out, we're not supporting the Israelis, we're not attacking the Israelis, we're not going to veto any resolutions at the UN we're not going to support any resolutions against it, we're just going to stay out of it.
- [36:12]
A
Okay.
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B
I think that that would completely change the field and I think that it would force the Israelis to recognize that they are in a region that is not the United States or Europe, that they're in the wider Arab world. And if they want to see prosperity for themselves for the future, then they have to commit to regional integration. And regional integration is impossible without engaging constructively on the issue of Palestine and Palestinians. Until now, they don't believe that. Until now, they don't believe in regional integration. They believe constructing a regional setup where they write the rules and everybody else has to follow. So a type of hegemony, but it's a type, it's not the classical type, tactical type, because they're not trying to actually conquer the entirety of the region. They simply want to make sure that they write the rules. And this, of course, is not something the region would accept except at the down the barrel of a gun, like to be by force. And that's not regional integration. It also means that if at any point the, the power dynamics change, Israel finds itself in a very, very bad position indeed. But that's. If it happened today, if it happens 20 years from now, 15 years from now, for 30, 30 years from now, when it comes to, to what's going on today in Gaza. Well, Gaza, everything in Gaza would have been settled by then, right? When it comes to the west bank, everything would have been settled. The, the question is when this happens and then what happens thereafter. And of course, history, history has seen other periods where you had different powers try to take control within, within the Holy Land. And, you know, things did change, even though it took a while. But if we're talking about in the immediate sense, I don't think that there'll be any changes from the US Certainly not in time to, to really impact what's happening on the ground right now.
- [38:31]
A
Yeah. You know, and to your point too, it seems that the way they're behaving, the Israelis, they feel that they have a blank check right now and they're trying to cash as much as they can of this check immediately. So Iran, other countries in the region that they've been attacking last year, so Gaza, obviously, and also potentially the west bank, because obviously there's a very, very clear attempt to, to liquidate the population of Gaza, whether by killing them or disease or by expelling them to Egypt or other countries and so forth, but also with this annexation looming of the west bank, there could very well be an effort to get the population out of there or destroy the population in various ways as well in that sense. And, you know, to your point, it seems that Israel has now embraced, you know, a genocidal attitude towards the Palestinians which they're instantiating now in these policies, but also the broader region potentially as well too. If you get in our way, your sovereignty doesn't matter. We'll attack you, we'll kill your leadership. You know, we'll do whatever we need to do, justified in our own internal justifications and with diplomacy and sort of any sort of like niceties like that. Completely irrelevant to your point. It's very much an underwritten by US support, without US political cover, but also, you know, funding, resupply, intelligence, support, support, none of this would be possible. It would all have to end essentially tomorrow. Which brings me to the next question I want to ask you. Obviously, you know, a few weeks ago there was a very, very eye opening event in Qatar when the Israeli air force carried out an airstrike against the Qatari capital of Doha. And they killed, they targeted the Hamas leadership gathering which is gathered to discuss a ceasefire proposal and killed several officials of Hamas. Not the ones that they targeted, but also Qatari police officer was killed, killed and undisclosed number of people were wounded. This was a very shocking event for people in the Gulf. The Gulf obviously considered itself to be sort of an oasis from the problems of the Middle east, like the Switzerland of the Middle east, you could say during the 20th century they a safe place, you can do business. People who are rivals can even come and meet there. Including Israelis who are frequent. Yes, in Doha as well too. And this sort of shattered the illusion of that Gulf sort of bubble. And in the aftermath we saw delegations of Emiratis and Saudi's countries did not have great relations with Qatar in some past years, but also other countries like Turkey, Egypt and so forth. They convened for the summit in Doha to discuss this. And you know, I was kind of curious how the rest of the region and using this Doha question and this incident as a jumping off point, how are they interpreting Israel now? Because I will say that, you know, for a long time the rest of the Arab world and even the broader Muslim world, they had a very pragmatic take towards Israel. They said that, you know, they're here, they came, whatever, let's make a deal where you give Palestinian statehood which you're entitled to by international law, and then we can reintegrate and have ties and so forth. It seems Israelis are not interested in that anymore. And this attack on Doha showed that they're willing to shatter the sovereignty of any country, even countries that are at war with them and very distance so forth, if they think that there is an interest to do so, or if they're even just frustrated and want to lash out a little bit. What do you think the meaning and significance of that attack was for the rest of the region and how may they respond, you know, in the medium to long term, given the fact they kind of show that the US Also is not there as a protector.
- [41:58]
B
So I'll answer your question, but just what I think is a clarification on the West Bank. I don't think that the Israelis are trying to expel everybody from the West Bank. I think that what they are aiming to do is to ensure that there are population centers in the west bank, big ones, and that anything that exists outside side of those population centers, those will be removed and the residents will be forced to go to the population centers. So villages and farms and things like this, and that the remaining population centers are going to be similar to what in the United States we have as reservations in South Africa under apartheid, Bantustans, of course, not a state, but that there would be these quote unquote entities where Palestinians would continue to live in. For, for quite some time. I haven't actually seen. I mean, there, there are certain intentions around it, but they're always presented as, as options where the, the, those that remain in these population centers, as long as they accept that there is no Palestinian state, then they're allowed to stay. So it's a very different, it's a very different narrative than what you see vis a vis Gaza. Okay, now of course that could change, but I'm just saying that the, the Bantustans idea actually for me is not as pertinent as the, the Native American slash Indian reservations idea in the United States. Actually, I think the latter fits more appropriately in terms of trying to understand what's going on when it comes to Israel's wider kind of security doctrine. So the way that I look at it is that Israel's current security framework suggests offensive strategies that are aimed at establishing a form of regional paramount sea. Okay? And what I mean by that is the, the ability to ensure that they write the rules and everybody has to accept their decision making. And that amounts to localized hegemonic dominance that very importantly for them, preserves unilateral rights of intervention. And this isn't new. It's a continuation, I think, of Israeli security doctrines that emphasize military predominance and preponderance and preemptive freedom of action. Now, of course, this isn't what the region is particularly interested in, but the Israelis are not embracing regional integration. They are prioritizing qualitative military superiority and what they consider to be strategic autonomy because they, they see this as essential to, to their survival, given the threats that they identify. It's really hard to envisage how there can be a sustainable regional integration while this remains to be the, the driving force in Israeli security doctrines regionally. And it is. Okay, you, I mean, you didn't see, for example, a huge amount of opposition on, on the country. I think you saw a lot of support for a lot of these, you know, kind of adventurous things that the Israelis were doing even beyond Gaza, whether it be about Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Iran. There was, you know, some, some opposition to Qatar, but only because they thought that this would be bad for Israeli interests in the short term. But the idea that, you know, everybody should play by the same, the same.
- [46:10]
A
Rules.
- [46:12]
B
Is completely anathema. You know, if you can imagine, the Israelis have just established the precedent, which is, you know, we're engaged in a negotiation. We don't like the way the negotiation is going to, so we're going to actually assassinate those that we're negotiating with in, in on the territory of our mediating partner. I mean, that would kill mediation worldwide. You know, if everybody lived up to that, it would kill mediation worldwide. So I'm not sure how we can expect any type of wider integration take place while that is still the case. You would have seen that over the last couple days. Syrian President Ahmed Shara, he was in New York. He's, I think he's still in New York at the, at the time of recording, and he's asked about normalization with the state of Israel and he makes it very clear. Israel occupies Syrian territory and Israel is still attacking not just Syria, but other countries in the region. So, like, he didn't say this. I'm paraphrasing him saying, so what are you talking about? You know, and I think that that characterizes the, the sentiment across the region, including in countries that did normalize with the state of Israel, whether the older ones, Egypt and Jordan, or the new ones, such as Bahrain and the uae. I think nobody's, nobody's particularly comfortable about this, this the least.
- [47:44]
A
Yeah, it's a very interesting point because I agree with you. This whole concept of integration so forth seems so fantastical and remote and no one wants it. The Israelis themselves don't want it. So what's the alternative? It seems to me the alternative is obviously going to be more conflict. It's an indigestible situation. It's a conflict that can go on for generations. It could escalate to a nuclear level at some point. That's the trajectory that we're Very much on.
- [48:08]
B
I don't, I don't want to interrupt you, Mask. Please forgive me, but when you said nobody wants it, actually the entirety of the Arab League offered regional integration to the Israelis, and they did so repeatedly over more than 20 years.
- [48:24]
A
You're right. I should say that the, the Arab League, you said they did offer this for a very long time. It's just that the Israelis rejected. Still. They're still offering it. But the new paradigm, when the Israelis.
- [48:33]
B
Absolutely said that there is a rejectionism that is at work here, but the rejectionism is Israeli. I want to be very clear about that. People can argue, by the way, about whether or not this would be, you know, most sensible or whatever, but the reality is, is that the entirety of the Arab League and by the way, even the oic, okay, so many people even talk about Iran as being utterly rejectionist in this way. Their discourse is extremely rejectionist. But as a footnote in history, which still applies, huh? The OIC signed up to the Arab Peace Initiative that was signed 20 years ago, issued 20 years ago by the Arab League and the Saudis, and they have never withdrawn it, and they've actually confirmed it. So even the Iranians have accepted this particular initiative. And one can argue that the initiative doesn't go far enough because I don't think it enshrines, for example, the right of return. But in terms of integrating Israel into the region, they've been promised it multiple times and again over the past two years. And, you know, the demands are actually incredibly modest. Incredibly modest, but they're utterly in rejection of them.
- [49:54]
A
Yeah, that is a very important clarification because there is, for people who know, the Arab Peace Initiative, reiterated many times, gives Israel full integration just for the very basic. And it's not even in, you know, a demand. It's just a, you know, actually it's a. It's just a, you know, the expectation that they will abide by international law, what is determined with the Palestinian state and so forth. They reject it entirely. Now they're escalating to the point where actually I get the impression, Hisham, obviously there's been this talk, Israelis all talking about the right to exist, Israel has a right to exist and so forth. It's morphing into. No one else has a right to exist. That's kind of the way it's morphing into. Because the sovereignty of other states is deemed to be an irrelevant side issue. So obviously, in this scenario, people will, anyone, you know, the older generation of people who maybe remember Oslo and things like that are still, you know, acclimated to that sort of idea. But it seems like this impossible to make peace with a state that has such an attitude. And you inevitably will have to arm yourself or find ways to resist or defend yourself against a state which rejects coexistence with you. Not just Palestinians, but far beyond that as well too. Potentially to Syria, potentially Egypt, Jordan, the Gulf, Turkey, elsewhere. No one knows where this could end. And I want to ask you very specifically then about this issue of the Abraham Accords because obviously there was this, the Trump idea for the Middle east was the Abraham Accord. Basically for those who don't know, it was an idea that we'd sidestep the Palestinian issue. We'd make peace deals between Israel and the Gulf Arab states and then, you know, move onward from that and let the Palestinians be the last sort of step in that it's a faith accompli, just take whatever we can give you at that point. And the Emiratis sign on of the deal. The Bahrainis did, a few other countries did as well too. The big expectation was that Saudi Arabia would be the one that triggers cascade of other recognitions. It seems like that that prospect is much more dubious today. I know that Saudi Arabia is obviously not a democracy, but ordinary people in the country, very many of them, it's quite obvious that they're perturbable. It's taking place in Gaza at the moment and you know, it seems like that whole paradigm has shifted. Can the Abraham Accords, you know, it seems like it stalled at least for the time being because of these events, because of the obstinacy by the Israelis projecting the Saudi led initiative. Now it wasn't just Makan, but also the Saudis were leading the current UN2 state resolution. But could it even break? Because the Emiratis are also under pressure to do this. It seems like they're resisting that right now. But could we see a rolling back of this paradigm?
- [52:28]
B
I mean, the Saudis resisting it.
- [52:31]
A
Yeah, the Saudis resisting it. Or even like the rest of the region, you know, it's. Do you see the Abraham of course having a future future per se because it's a Trump signature idea for the Middle East. It seems like to me it seems far more untenable than it did two years ago, even for the leaders who were interested in doing it for economic reasons.
- [52:46]
B
So something that was very interesting, which I don't think is any longer the case, but it was at least, at least until a few months ago. It was certainly the case that despite the Fact that the Saudis were saying very clearly, publicly, openly, transparently, and also in private and track twos and so on, that there would be no normalization with the state of Israel unless there was a Palestinian state or an irreversible track to a Palestinian state. Somehow this, this just would not compute. And you kept on getting questions and, and statements coming out of Washington from different quarters in Washington, the Beltway, that no, no, it's still possible. It's still possible. It's still possible. It's like, no, it's not. The Saudis have just made it abundantly clear that this is out the window. We're not interested unless there's a magnificent change on the side of the Israelis in terms of their behavior. And we don't see that change taking place. I don't think anybody's really pushing that anymore. It's kind of flogging a dead horse. I think the Israelis like to push it quite a lot because they want to imagine, whether to themselves or to their supporters in the west, that somehow this is going to lead to something big and good for the Trump administration. It isn't. The Saudis are absolutely uninterested and people even spoke about the Syrians and the Lebanese. Honestly, this is absurd. And, you know, I don't usually use that sort of language when it comes to analysis. But, but it's so preposterous. The Lebanese simply want the Israelis to leave them alone and the Syrians simply want to go back to the 1974 agreement or something that looks like it again, to get the Israelis to leave them alone. They've got other things that they're concerned about in terms of reconstruction and rebuilding. They're not interested in becoming part of some, quote, unquote, new Middle east where, as I said, Israeli, a foreman is of Israeli hegemony is, is allowed to take root by normalizing on these terms. It's just not happening. So I, I don't see prospects for the. Oh, and by the way, the Saudis were never going to sign the Abraham Accords. The Saudis always wanted something that was bespoke and about them. They had absolutely no interest of becoming a part of, quote, unquote, the ABAC reports. Not at all. I think that what you are bound to see going forward unless the Israelis change behavior is more conflict. And this, unfortunately, there are many different examples of where that conflict could go. I don't see further normalization. On the contrary, I see a downgrading of relations between Abu Dhabi and Tel Aviv and Manama and Tel Aviv there's already a lot of bad blood that exists and, and I wouldn't be surprised if it went even further. I don't think that they'll break the accords, but I would, I would find it incredibly likely quite soon frankly that there would be an official downgrading of relationship.
- [56:10]
A
There's two more questions I want to ask you and you've been fantastic. Your analysis this time as well too, it was very enlightening. One is, you know, in the wake of the Doha attack there was an interesting sort of development. Obviously there was that summit and there the outcome was unclear. But then there was subsequent to that this announcement of a Pakistan Saudi security pact. That's a very kind of unprecedented and different configuration in the region. Obviously the US was considered the guarantor of Saudi and Gulf security for a very long time. That sense of security with the U.S. you know, I've been saying this for a long time. I think that they made a big mistake trying to think that the US would forever protect them and investments and personal flattering and things like that would amount to a solid bond. Obviously the US political system is also very polarized so it's very hard to win a Senate approval for, for U S defense treaty with Saudi Arabia which would be very unpopular population anyways. So instead they pivoted to the Pakistanis recently, which is fascinating because Pakistan has nuclear weapons and a very large army but has very severe economic problems and mismanagement and corruption and military control and so forth is, you know, triggering a lot of that. But they have this agreement with the Pakistanis now and it seems from statements from the Pakistani side and also illusions from the Saudi side that it also does potentially extend to a nuclear umbre umbrella. How that is actually instantiated and what happens we don't really know that. We haven't seen the fine print yet. But they're thinking of alternatives like that as well too. And the Fox signs have said that the door is open to other countries to joining this umbrella as well too, which seems to hint at perhaps some of the other Gulf countries which maybe feel insecure after what the Israelis did and after the lack of US response and probably even US foreknowledge frankly of the attack that the Israelis that did carried out and cut there. Do you see the region, the parts of the region that were aligned with the US making you know, plans to sort of get away from that alignment, hedge their bets either with, you know, Pakistan or China or other countries as well too? Is that something which is a trend which we may See more of the.
- [58:08]
B
Future, in your opinion. So I don't think it's either or. So you use the word hedging right at the end. And hedging, I think, exactly, is what is going on and has been going on since, frankly, the Obama era. Okay, because you had many leaders in particularly the Gulf, that saw in the Obama administration a United States that they did not feel had their security at heart. Whether or not people agree with this or not is really not, is not the question. But certainly this was the assessment from within, particularly the Gulf, and that goes back, you know, a good 15 years or so. It becomes, of course, I think, more the case when you see the Trump administration, but because they feel, and I think this is correct, that the Trump, that any Trump administration is simply not reliable or predictable. These states value predictability, I think, overall else, because then they can make plans and so on. Stability, stability, stability. Now, I will say that their sense in this regard is not unique or uncommon. And you have within Europe an assessment that the United States is not the security backstop that it once was considered to be, and that there has to be a new regional security architecture to respond to the Russian threat, which is a real threat. And I think people are silly to deny it. What happens in between, though, that is, from this point until they can actually take care of their own security without an American backstop, is a very sort of fudgy, blurred kind of thing, which is why I think you see images like Donald Trump hosting all of these European leaders at the White House, but he's sitting on one side of the table, and they're all huddled around like a bunch of, excuse me, school children. And he's the principal. And you see, you know, these efforts at trying to keep America engaged and not being able to really form an argument that the Trump administration will see in quite the same way. So I think they understand that. And I think you see another type of expression when it comes to this. When it comes to the Gulf, I think the engagement, the Pakistanis was less about Israel and more about that hedging instinct that the Gulf has been acting on for a number of years now, where they want to diversify these defense relationships. They don't want to rely purely on the United States. But I don't think they're looking for alternatives. So this is where I would differ with your assessment.
- [61:25]
A
I think.
- [61:25]
B
I don't think they're looking to cut off from the U.S. i think they're quite happy to keep on engaging with the US Keep on benefiting from that relationship but not rely on it. So that if that relationship doesn't actually pan out or live up to expectations on one follow or another, that they have other things to fall back on. And I think that that instinct will persist. I think that more countries will do more in that direction and they may do so by building up capacity at home. I think a number of those leaders have come to that conclusion. I've been doing things in that regard for a number of years and also try to build connections and networks with countries beyond in order again to hedge. So I think hedging is a really big thing here and it's hard to tell them that they're. They're not sensible for doing so. Yeah, very well put.
- [62:27]
A
You know, and just to wrap up, I think that what you alluded to there is extremely important because you mentioned Europe as well too, having similar dilemmas. There's a significant change in the world happening right now. Interregnum, I think, between the post World War II order that the US was inside, the post Cold War order as well too, with the US was sort of the. The center of and which is now extricating itself from. And in the introduction I mentioned, the UN is going on right now. The UN is simple also of US Centrality of the world and it's coming under attack by the US itself. These international institutions are being rejected by the US the fate of NATO, let alone security guarantees in the Middle east are very much in question. And we have potentially the emergence of a vacuum where countries which are revisionist powers, you can see, say like Russia and Israel and maybe others besides that, are going to engage in, you know, warfare. They're going to engage in trying to take advantage of that vacuum and try to maximize their own power. It's a profoundly dangerous time. Reminds me of the period Before World War I in some ways where we have this sort of a security vacuum which almost inevitably will be filled with some sort of a conflict before a new equilibrium emerges. But ha. Thank you so much for joining us. We're always a pleasure to have you on our show. We're going to have you on again and future as well, too. Your analysis is extremely insightful and well, I'm looking forward to getting more of your takes in the future as the situation develops.
- [63:51]
B
You're very kind, Maz. If I could just say one last comment on what you just said. It may not be a complete break with the old either. What we could very easily see is a combination of a break and with fragmentation into different areas. But I hope people are not, how should we say, naive about this because the costs of this change are going to be visited amongst the most vulnerable of the world's populations. The rules based order had tremendous and has tremendous flaws to it. But we may live to see a day where we bemoan those flaws because what comes next could be even more catastrophic.
- [64:42]
A
You can just imagine when the Roman Empire collapsed, whatever inequities it had, it's the period after that was, you know, people yearn for it actually in many cases.
- [64:51]
B
But thank you for having me on again. I appreciate the work that you and Dropsite do and I look forward to chatting again in the future.
- [64:58]
A
Absolutely. Thank you so much again for joining us. And that does it for this episode of the Tuesday Morning Live Stream. I was Matazo saying I'm the host this week. Next week we'll have the bigger crew back on as well too. Thank you so much everyone who joined us. Make sure to follow us again on our substack page and on social media, Twitter, Instagram, Tick Tock and so forth. We're going to continue coverage of Palestinian statehood, the genocide in Gaza, Iran, Yemen, other topics in our wheelhouse and many others besides that as well too. Keep an eye out for some really great investigations we're going to be having coming, you know, something we haven't really done in the future recently as well, but I think that the readers will find extremely interesting. Again, thank you so much for joining us. I'm Rataz Hussain and I'll see you again soon.