Jamie Dettmer is opinion editor at POLITICO Europe.
TEL AVIV/RAMALLAH — Nineteenth-century Scottish essayist and historian Thomas Carlyle believed that “The History of the world is but the Biography of great men.” But it isn’t always great men who can shift events. And the future of the Levant is currently in the hands of three such men, all seemingly determined to survive politically.
As it stands, the future course of events in the Middle East is largely dependent on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas’ leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar. But for peace to have a chance, all three will have to recognize they can’t be part of this future — if the guns are to fall silent, their time is up.
Nearly a dozen countries are now caught up in the fighting sparked by Hamas’ grievous attacks on southern Israel on Oct. 7, and conflict is spreading across the region. But while the U.S. and Saudi Arabia have been leading intense diplomatic efforts to find a way out of the crisis, much to their evident frustration — as well as fear from the White House that the Gaza War could cost President Joe Biden the next election — their efforts continue to be stymied. Deeply suspicious of Netanyahu, Biden has reportedly dubbed the Israeli prime minister a “bad fucking guy” in private conversations.
But the joint U.S.-Saudi peace plan is a progressive one with discrete yet overlapping stages, requiring the buy-in of all the three leaders.
The plan comprises a cease-fire, the freeing of the over 100 Israeli captives still held by Hamas in Gaza, and requires Israel’s serious commitment to a two-state solution, with the ironclad guarantee of establishing an independent Palestinian state — the reward for which will be a “normalization” deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia. Another stage of the deal also requires revamping the corrupt and incompetent PA, thus allowing the West Bank to be properly and responsibly governed, and for the PA to assume civilian control of Gaza.
What could go wrong?
The choreographing will have to be meticulous, of course, and it will require Netanyahu, Abbas and Sinwar to play constructive roles even though they have few incentives to do so and much to lose — including, in Sinwar’s case, possibly his life. All three men are the key standouts in the bid for peace — the key dramatis personae distorting the plot scripted by the authors in Washington and Riyadh.
“Bibi and Sinwar are both in their bunkers — they both want to survive,” noted former Mossad intelligence officer David Meidan, who previously served as Netanyahu’s hostage coordinator. “Netanyahu wants to stay in power, but if he ditches his long-held skepticism of a two-state solution, or if he signs up to anything more than a brief cease-fire, his coalition government will fall apart.”
Meanwhile, “Sinwar is trying to figure out how to stay alive,” Meidan told POLITICO. And by that he means that the presence of hostages is restraining the Israel Defense Forces as they try to locate and kill the Hamas leader. (Sinwar is currently thought to be hidden underground in one of the Hamas tunnels in Khan Yunis.)
Former Israeli intelligence chief Yaakov Peri concurs. Without a deal guaranteeing his life or an agreement on his exile — much like Palestine Liberation Organization leader Yasser Arafat managed in 1982 — there’s little reason for Sinwar to agree to anything, Peri told POLITICO. And even then, he might refuse exile.
“Sinwar wants to remain the ruler of Gaza. And he’s now keeping the remaining hostages close by because he understands we’re not going to bomb him because of the hostages,” he said. “Giving up the hostages would be signing his own death warrant. In this sense, Bibi and Sinwar are alike — they’re both looking out for themselves” Peri added.
But for Netanyahu, there’s an added incentive for clinging to power and prolonging his coalition government, widely viewed as the most right wing in Israel’s 75-year history. The Israeli prime minister’s long-running trial on several fraud, bribery and breach-of-trust charges is set to resume after a pause due to the war in Gaza. And if found guilty, Netanyahu still hopes to pull off a legislative “get out of jail free card,” for which he may well need his 64-seat majority in the 120-member Knesset.
And what about Abbas, the octogenarian PA leader? According to political scientist Khalil Shikaki, director of the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research, “Abbas wants to survive, and he has been in this situation for a very long time. Since the collapse of his negotiations with Ehud Olmert in 2008 and the Gaza war in 2014, he’s been in survival mode, basically.”
Sitting in his office located near the Palestinian Legislative Council’s (PLC) main administrative office in Al-Bireh, Shikaki told POLITICO he believes that “Abbas is paralyzed and isn’t taking any risks — even the simplest, like deploying his police to protect communities under the control of the Palestinian Authority from Israeli settlers. It is his responsibility to protect them. Yet, he hasn’t sent a single policeman. Why? Because he doesn’t want to rock the boat or disturb the status quo.”
The PLC hasn’t functioned since the Hamas takeover of Gaza in 2007, when Abbas declared a state of emergency in the West Bank, and he has since ruled by presidential decree — the legality of which has been questioned.
Shikaki praised the overall design of the U.S.-Saudi plan as well. “If there’s a vision that links all matters, from a cease-fire to the day-after governance of Gaza, to the resolution of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, to normalization with the Saudis — if you have a single package that has all of these components, you have a chance of winning over the Israeli and Palestinian publics,” he said. “It’s not going to be easy. But this is where you have to begin to influence the decision-making of the three leaders.”
But a revamp, Shikaki argued, would require Abbas to relinquish most of his power. Abbas would need to appoint a government of technocrats, professionals, academics and business leaders, all led by a strong prime minister who agrees to do the job temporarily for around a year, stabilizing conditions in Gaza, preventing the West Bank from exploding and preparing for elections.
But would Abbas do that? “There’s another man you haven’t mentioned,” said Shikaki. “He’s not going to be able to help Abbas or all of them to survive, but he can give them a way out of this conflict — that’s Biden.”
And Peri echoed the idea: “Knowing Bibi quite well, he won’t do it voluntarily. He will have to be pushed,” he said.