Notes on Israel, Gaza and Trump 2.0
Hello dear readers! It’s been a tumultuous few weeks in the USA, and I can only hope American readers are feeling resilient and reading up on civil disobedience. Over here in England, I’ve been working like a madwoman on talks, essays, and my risk book. I’ve managed to sneak in a walks in the brisk (and often) wet morning air, looking for a bit of beauty amid the barbarism. Here’s one of my favorite recent photos:
This week’s newsletter offers a round-up of various Dr. Small Talk activities related to the storm blowing from Washington (rest assured I am working on a much longer essay about Donald Trump’s proposed ethnic cleansing of Gaza).
First up, I want to share this interview with the French newspaper, Le Monde, which I did back in December after the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Benjamin Netanyahu, former Israeli defense minister Yoav Gallant, and Hamas leader Mohammed Deif (who is presumed dead). While not exactly new, it’s still quite timely and unfortunately anticipated much of what we are seeing at present. What’s that? You don’t read French? I’ve got you covered. Below the break, I am sharing the original responses as I wrote them in English, which also provide a lot more context than appeared in the final version. It offers an important reminder that war provides an opportunity to do what cannot be accomplished in peacetime, and that proposals to ethnically cleanse Gaza originated with Israeli officials — not the Trump administration.
Next up, I’m pleased to share the video of an Europeaum event about the Trump 2.0 world order that I participated in at the end of January, alongside Jacob Funk Kirkegaard (Bruegel and Peterson Institute), Ian Lesser (German Marshall Fund), and Leslie Vinjamuri (Chatham House). Put it on while doing laundry to inject some nervous energy to your folding. Also, if you prefer the much shorter version, The New European asked us all to write brief reflections based on our talks, and you can read mine (on the rivalry between the engineers and the traditionalists) here. A sneak peak:
It is still too soon to say which faction will emerge victorious. What is clear, however, is that the neoliberal world order inaugurated by the Reagan and Thatcher revolutions is being dismantled from the right, the victim of its own success. That’s because everywhere they have been embraced, and to a degree corresponding to their social penetration, neoliberal policies have created a crisis of legitimacy for democratic states. This has driven people into the arms of anti-establishment demagogues who are willing to recognize the status quo as degraded and unsustainable, even as they drive us toward something worse. To grapple with this fact means acknowledging that there is no hope of “returning to normal.”
In addition to the essay on Gaza, I have new posts in the works on risk and insecurity, Peter Thiel’s millenarian turn, and the longing for Great Men of History. Stay tune and tell your friends!
‘Til soon,
Dr. Small Talk
The tense diplomatic relations between Benjamin Netanyahu and his western allies will get event more fraught after the ICC issued an arrest warrant for him. He can however rely on the support of conservative leaders abroad. How this informal coalition may help him in this specific context ?
First of all, from the United States and Israel to Hungary, Argentina, India, and Turkey, there are a considerable number of leaders who are firmly in power and who will disregard the ruling of the ICC. These leaders and the intellectuals and media figures who support them constitute an emerging political coalition of the Global Right – represented by Donald Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu, Viktor Orbán, Javier Milei, and Narendra Modī among others. These networks indicate that we have arrived an a paradoxical situation in which the nationalists—though they insist on each nation’s unique attributes and absolute sovereignty—are the new internationalists, far outstripping their counterparts on the left in terms of global coordination.
While President Biden has called the ICC charges ‘outrageous’, Republican senators are tripping over one another with proposals to sanction the lawyers involved. Senator Lindsay Graham has even threatened to sanction any allied nation that complies with the ICC warrant. Here it is worth recalling that the US signed the Rome Statute in 2000, but never ratified it (George W. Bush later indicated that the US had no intent to submit to ICC jurisdiction, and further supported a 2002 law intended to protect American military and civilian personnel from prosecution by the ICC or similar international bodies). I would expect Netanyahu to make a very public appearence in the United States early in Trump’s presidency, just to further underscore the strength of the alliance and the low regard that both countries show for the ICC and any concept of international law that also applies to them.
Could this warrant reinforce Netanyahu’s position inside this coalition? Who are his main allies in this cabinet and why ?
The prime minister seems committed to extending the war as long as possible, which has strained certain relationships within the Israeli center and right. The war cabinet was dissolved last June after Benny Gantz resigned, the latter frustrated that Bibi had no plan for post-war Gaza. But Netanyahu also clashed with the former defense minister, Yoav Gallant, who he fired in early November. Despite all this internal drama, I think Netanyahu feels that the wind is at his back following the assassinations of Haniyeh, Sinwar, and Nasrallah, and most importantly, Donald Trump returning to the US presidency. His recent cabinet appointments—Israel Katz (a loyal veteran Likud MP who has previously served as the head of several ministries) as defense minister and Gideon Sa’ar (an ultra-nationalist who played a key role in the attempted judicial overhaul) as foreign minister—indicate no desire to change course. There is further speculation that he may try to consolidate his position by dismissing the heads of the IDF, the Shin Bet intelligence service, and the attorney general, who has been a consistent thorn in his side.
Netanyahu is a singular politician – widely unpopular among Israelis, and yet many of them have nonetheless leapt to his defense with regard to the ICC charges. I think that has more to do with how Israelis perceive international institutions—illegitimate, antisemitic, always coming after poor little Israel for no reason while turning a blind eye on the misconduct of other countries—than it does the strength of Netanyahu.
Finally, it is important to remember that war offers an opportunity to accomplish what you cannot in peacetime, and I think the Netanhayu government will seize the moment to pursue three long-term goals: 1. the effective ethnic cleansing of Gaza (and return of Jewish settlements), which would ‘solve’ not only a security problem but the larger demographic one ; thereby allowing for 2. The annexation of the West Bank; and 3. The completion of the judicial overhaul package, which will remove the last remaining institutional resistance to a formalized system of apartheid rule. Of these, the first might seem the most difficult to achieve, but it’s already well underway with very little domestic resistance. The scope of destruction is only consistent with a desire to make Gaza uninhabitable. In recent days we have seen the former justice minister, Ayelet Shaked, calling upon foreign countries to receive a quota of 20,000-50,000 Gazans to facilitate their displacement, and perhaps we will soon see more formalized proposals to this end from the government.
How was this coalition between Trump, Orbán, and Netanyahu built ?
Netanyahu has been particularly attentive to strengthening relationships with nationalist leaders, not simply in the United States, but across Europe. Hungary in particular has emerged as Israel’s strongest ally in the European Union and has worked to block EU ceasefire resolutions. But this is a relationship that long predates the war. As I’ve noted elsewhere, Netanyahu and Viktor Orbán bonded after meeting for the first time in 2005 when they were both in the opposition, and in 2015, the Likud party activist Tamir Wertzberger moved to Hungary to better coordinate relations between the two countries. Orbán later employed Bibi’s American political strategists to craft the antisemitic smear campaign against George Soros, whose Open Society Foundation had also supported a number of progressive groups in Israel. In 2019, the Israeli Prime Minister helped his Hungarian counterpart move closer to the American right, reportedly interceding on his behalf to arrange a meeting with Donald Trump. Viktor Orbán has repaid him by fully supporting Israel’s operations in Gaza and Lebanon. And just on Nov. 22, he responded to the ICC warrant by inviting Netanyahu to visit Hungary, despite the country being a signatory of the Rome Statute.
This support has been crucial to countering criticism leveled at Israel by certain political leaders. For example, when the Senate Majority Leader, Chuck Schumer, claimed last spring that Netanyahu was an obstacle to peace, the prime minister arranged a video call directly with Republican senators in an obvious gesture of defiance.
What we will continue to see from all three leaders is flagrant defiance of international law and institutions on the grounds of defending their national sovereignty. What is interesting is that this practical belligerence toward international law has emerged as a key philosophical principle for the Global Right – not just for questions of wartime conduct, but also for trade, immigration, domestic violence, and LGBTQ+ rights.
What does the emerging Trump cabinet means for Netanyahu ?
There is a great deal of support for Netanyahu in the incoming Trump adminstration, including a number of Christian Zionists. These include Pete Hegseth, who has been nominated as Secretary of Defense, and Mike Huckabee, who Trump has nominated to be ambassador to Israel. The incoming Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, hails from Florida, which is rapidly becoming the center of the Republican Jewish universe. Mike Waltz, who has been nominated to serve as Mr. Trump’s national security advisor, has already promised“a strong response to the anti-Semitic bias of the ICC." Ironically, it is the notoriously transactional Trump who is probably least committed to the Zionist cause. He may put pressure on Netanyahu to wrap up the war in the interest of claiming a political victory for himself. Reporting indicates that the recent ceasefire in Lebanon was a ‘gift’ to Trump. The overall effect will be to strengthen Netanyahu’s hand to pursue settlement, annexation, and normalization deals that continue to sideline the Palestinians.
How do nationalist circle, particularly in the United State, view October 7 and the offensive led by Israel in Gaza and Lebanon?
The discourse that we see both from Trump’s circle and among many mainstream Democrats represents Israel as an outpost of Western civilization. From this point of view, an existential battle is underway between the Judeo-Christian world and that of Islam. Just as the United States did after 9/11, Israel is justified in relying on force, acting unilaterally, and disregarding warnings from the UN and other bodies about violations of international law.
You must understand that most Americans pay little attention to foreign policy unless it directly involves the lives of our soldiers. This makes it a relatively easy area for Zionist activists to shape the narrative. Americans hear that Israel shares ‘our’ values and is ‘the only democracy in the Middle East’ – despite much empirical evidence to the contrary. What’s so striking is that there is an idea of Zionism which is almost wholly at odds with the reality of Zionism. For example, a recent study found that in the absence of a two-state solution, ‘about three-quarters of Americans, including 80% of Democrats and 64% of Republicans, would choose a democratic Israel that’s no longer Jewish, over a Jewish Israel without full citizenship and equality for non-Jews living under its authority ;’ polling among American Jews has shown that only a small minority support Zionism meaning Jewish supremacy. Those numbers are bad news for the Israeli right, hence the need to employ these grander religious, civilizational, and existential discourses to shore up support in the West.
October 7 is also used by the Global Right to fuel the fire of Islamophobia. These attacks supposedly prove that cohabitation with Muslims is impossible, rather than the more obvious lesson that a people held indefinitely under occupation will resist and that resistance will not always be non-violent or measured. Certainly the US military learned this lesson the hard way in South Asia and Iraq, but leaning on civilizational discourse avoids reckoning with this political reality. The problem is not seventy-five years of dispossession and occupation, but that “they” are not like “us.”
Finally, conservatives have worked to tie the anti-war protests to all things woke – from DEI initiatives to the anti-racism uprising after the murder of George Floyd, associating them all with a form of revolutionary disorder that aims to destroy the country from within. They will use the student-led protests as a way to further undermine higher education and criminalize pro-Palestine speech, as is clearly the goal with a proposed law that would grant the president broad power to designate non-profit organizations as supporters of terrorism. In this way the conflict has been folded back into American domestic politics and tied to a number of already-existing Republican priorities.