【Text/Thomas Friedman Translation/Observer Network by Guan Qun】
There are many ways to understand today's feud between Hamas and Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu. But I prefer to understand it this way: both of them are living their own "January 6th."
President Donald Trump made a final effort on January 6 to overturn the election results by launching a mob to loot our Capitol in an attempt to prevent a man who bridged the divide and united the people from becoming president. As Trump has done, Netanyahu and Hamas have each used or bred their own mobs to prevent israel from emerging an unprecedented government of national unity — one that unites Israeli Jews and Israeli Arab Muslims for the first time.
Like Trump, both Netanyahu and Hamas hold power by agitating and harnessing the hostility of believers to the "other." Whenever they get into trouble politically, they adopt this tactic. In fact, since Netanyahu was first elected prime minister in 1996 (Hamas immediately followed by a wave of suicide bombings), Netanyahu and Hamas have been each other's best partners.
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No, Hamas and Netanyahu never communicate. That's because they don't need to communicate. Both of them understand what the other needs to hold on to power and cooperate consciously or unconsciously with each other's actions to ensure that they each achieve their goals.
Their long-played disgusting trick is now happening again, as both sides find a breakthrough in relations between Israeli Jews and Israeli Arab Muslims — and, like the pro-Trump mob did on Jan. 6, they want to put out the changes that could destroy their political careers beforehand.
To illustrate why I'm so convinced of this, I need to take you back to the column I wrote 10 days before the explosion. In this article, I first remind the reader that I pay close attention to the direction of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, because I believe that the struggle between them often heralds a more general trend in Western politics — just as a play on Outer Broadway foreshadows what plays will be staged on Broadway. Many of the stuff — hijackings, suicide bombings, wall-building, lone wolf attacks — were perfected first in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict zone and then staged on Broadway.
What I was going to write ten days ago was, "Hey guys! See what extra-Broadway is going on! Maybe it will come to the United States to perform! ”
And that's what's going on: After Israel's fourth elections and Netanyahu's unsuccessful formation of a government, an unprecedented coalition of national unity is taking shape in Israel, led by secular centrist leader Yair Lapid and religious right-wing naftali Bennett. Their upcoming cabinet includes Israeli Jews and an Israeli Arab-Islamist party that is entering government for the first time.
Here's the headline in The Israeli newspaper Haaretz on Sunday, May 9, just before the recent Hamas-Israel conflict broke out in full swing: "Israel Coalition Negotiations: Bennett's party is expected to form a government 'this week' after meeting with Islamic leaders. ”
"Bennett met with Mansour Abbas, the chairman of the United Arab List, on Sunday to convince members of the party that a government might be formed 'this week.'" After four elections in less than two years, Israel's political impasse is coming to an end. ”
The United Arab List (also known as Raam), headed by Mansour Abbas, is an Israeli-Arab "Islamist movement" party that shares the same political Islamic roots as Hamas in a broad sense, except that it is a non-violent political party; it recognizes Israel; and is committed to securing more resources, more police, and more jobs for Israeli Arabs, especially Muslim Bedouins, in Israeli towns and communities. Just like the ultra-orthodox Israeli Jewish parties did.
Abbas's Coalition party has broken away from the Israeli-Arab coalition of political parties — the Joint List, which is more focused on Palestinian nationalism — and has won four seats in one party to push Abbas's political agenda. Since neither Netanyahu's coalition nor the opposition coalition led by Lapid Bennett won enough seats to form a government, Abbas's four seats make him a key figure in shaping Israeli politics. Netanyahu initially tried to woo him, but an overtly anti-Arab racist faction in the Netanyahu coalition ("Netanyahu's Proud Boys" Bibi's Proud Boys) refused to join the Cabinet with Israeli Arabs.
That is why the emerging opposition coalition of nationalities has the opportunity to form a big government that, for the first time in history, will include pro-settler right-wing Zionist parties, left-wing secular progressive parties and pro-Islam Israel-Arab parties, and possibly even other secular Arab parties.
This will permanently subvert the Israeli political model. That is why the local Jan. 6 opponents — some Israelis and Hamas — are determined to destroy the alliance.
If they cannot destroy this alliance, it is likely to promote greater progress and integration among Jews and Arabs and to try to solve the problem of unemployment and humiliation, especially to solve, rather than worsen, the problem of unemployment and humiliation of Israeli Arab youth.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, front right, casts a poll at a polling station in Jerusalem on March 23. Image source: Xinhua News Agency
The right to rule is important. Who will lead a government is important, especially when dealing with relations between Israeli Jews and Israeli Arabs. Think about it: During this pandemic, in March 2020, Haaretz reported that Israeli Arab health workers are key if Jewish citizens in Israel are to survive the COVID-19 pandemic safely. The report said: "According to official statistics ... 17% of Israeli doctors, 24% of nurses and 47% of pharmacists are Arabs. ”
So, if someone later tells you that Israel is a purely racist, anti-Arab country, think about the numbers above. But if someone later tells you that Israel is a paradise for Arab citizens and that they should not complain, consider the following excerpt from the Haaretz report. The report is a letter from Dr. Suad Haj Yihye Yassin, who has long worked in a tel Aviv hospital treating Israeli Arabs and Jews suffering from COVID-19 and has just returned home to hear that Netanyahu will not form a government with Israeli Arabs.
"When I did everything I could to treat everyone and when I got home from the emergency room, I heard the prime minister say we have to form a government of national unity to deal with this crisis — but there will be no Arabs in this government, as if we were second-class citizens — it hurts," she said. Why are we fighting on the front lines of health care to treat COVID-19 and not legally entering government? ”
That's why it's so important to have a true coalition of national unity to govern Israel that would end Prime Minister Netanyahu's 12-year rule and fundamentally challenge Hamas's claim that the only hope of Israeli Arabs is to destroy the Jewish state.
That's why I was going to say in a column last Monday, "Hey guys! See what's going on off Broadway! Maybe that play will come to Broadway! ”
I would have liked to link this to Liz Cheney's courageous opposition to Donald Trump's lies and loudly question whether there would be a Republican faction that could split up and one day work with the center-left Biden to truly heal post-pandemic America and help pass bills that would ensure our country prosper in the 21st century.
But around 10 a.m. that day, one of my editors called and asked me what I thought of the Israeli-Palestinian, Kazakh-Israeli (Israeli and Palestinian, Hamas and Israeli) conflicts that had just erupted in Israel — shouldn't I consider writing an immediate column on it?
I realized that I could not ignore the conflict. But I warned in an op-ed last Monday that Netanyahu (who desperately wants to remain in power so he can go unpunished even if he is convicted in the current corruption case) could "dramatically exacerbate the situation, forcing his opponents in the right camp to abandon his efforts to overthrow him and instead declare that it is not yet time for a change of generals." ”
Now that the conflict has been going on for less than 48 hours, here's what's happening. Netanyahu intimidated Bennett into forging an alliance with an Israeli-Arab party, let alone to unite centrist and progressive Israelis, while Mansour Abbas was cornered by Hamas as if he were cooperating with Israeli Jews who were fighting Palestinians in Jerusalem and Gaza.
As a result, negotiations to form another coalition broke down completely. Once again, the past buried the future.
Will this continue? It is too early to draw conclusions. Because all parties are miscalculating the cost of their actions to some extent.
Netanyahu's far-right followers and police have gone too far, choosing to provoke and repress Palestinians in Jerusalem at the most sensitive moment — after Muslim Holy Day at the end of Ramadan and the Palestinian Authority's decision to postpone elections. The outrage of the Palestinians in Jerusalem has intensified not only the violence in the city, but also in Israeli towns and cities, which has ignited the anger of Israeli Arabs and Israeli Jews — which is highly likely to destabilize Israel.
The Palestinians and Israelis attacked each other
Meanwhile, Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar seems to be completely intoxicated by the idea that in the ongoing Judeo-Arab conflict, by throwing Hamas rockets at Jerusalem, he can take over the entire Palestinian cause in one fell swoop — leaving the Palestinian Authority and Jordan and all Arab countries aside in the West Bank. This is really a big mistake.
The rocket attack on Jerusalem crossed a major red line drawn by Israel, prompting the Israeli army to deal a heavy blow to Hamas tunnels and arsenals throughout Gaza and generally exacerbating the suffering of the Hamas population. By doing so, the Israeli army is also sending a message to the Lebanese Allah Party: Don't think you can drive us crazy. Note: If you threaten us with rockets, we will not be intimidated by international public opinion emanating from Gaza or Lebanon.
I wish I could say what could have prompted Netanyahu or Hamas to reflect deeply in this conflict, but I really doubt it. For the past 12 years, Netanyahu has had a mission to keep Hamas and the Palestinian Authority weak and divided, so that he can come to the U.S. Congress every year and say, "Oh my God, I would love to make peace, but on the other side of the hostility we have no partners." The Palestinians are weak and divided. ”
For 12 years, Hamas has also had a task: to keep Netanyahu in power so that Hamas and its Iranian supporters can tell their naïve supporters in Europe, on liberal university campuses, in the media circles, and in the Democratic Party of the United States that the problem is not Hamas, an Islamist fascist group without a single democratic component, which is committed to destroying the Jewish state and imposing a Taliban-like Islamic regime on the Palestinians — but Israel's terrible, Pro-settler Netanyahu government.
Netanyahu and Hamas: They need each other. They understand each other. The above behavior is repeated. Cycle. Cycle.
At some fleeting, dazzling moment, it seems that a different alliance of Israel will be formed to break this cycle. This alliance is certainly unlikely to bring peace to light right away, but it could at least open up a dialogue unlike the past — a real dialogue between the parties.
Instead, we got "January 6th" – a date that has succeeded in preventing political change. This time Israel has not succeeded in forming a new national unity alliance, and my only hope is that the drama that has been played out on Broadway will not be staged on Broadway: "Donald Trump – the sequel." ”
(Observer Network translated by Guan Qun from the New York Times)
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