100 days of a war that may alter course of West Asia geopolitics

In international politics, like in life, the best-laid plans get interrupted, derailed, even disrupted due to what a former British prime minister, Harold McMillan, in a different context and different era, had said about what would shape his term: “Events, dear boy, events”.

Go back to the world before October 7.

Israel was fighting an internal democratic political battle. Over the past year, as Benjamin Netanyahu’s government turned more Right and sought to institute control over the judiciary, Israel saw unprecedented protests for democracy. Even the US administration, reluctant at the best of times to critique Israel, indicated to Tel Aviv that continuing on this path will hurt the relationship, and a debate broke out within the US on the nature of Israeli democracy or the lack of it.

The US was also in the middle of engineering a historic accord that would lead to a normalisation of diplomatic relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia, building on the Abraham Accords of the past five years that has seen Israel and its Arab neighbours collaborate in ways that were unimaginable just a decade ago. I2U2, the grouping that includes India, Israel, UAE and the US, was born.

But the grand symbol of what this normalisation could achieve was unveiled on the sidelines of the G20 Summit in Delhi, as India, US, Saudi Arabia and European nations announced the India-Middle East-Economic (IMEC) corridor. Israel wasn’t a part of the official announcement but the project was predicated on its participation and harmonious ties with neighbours.

And it appeared the Palestinian issue, which has defined so much of West Asian history, was slowly fading as the most significant parameter on which countries determined their ties with Tel Aviv. The West Bank was run by the Palestinian Authority in principle, but Israel continued to both exercise control in key parts of the enclave under a complicated legal arrangement and push settlers into the West Bank in a blatant violation of the spirit and text of past understandings. Hamas ran Gaza, and through Qatar, Israel felt it had bought peace with the Islamist outfit, an illusion that Hamas was happy to sustain. An actual two state solution was nowhere on the horizon and it appeared that the world had pretty much forgotten the Palestinians.

And that’s when October 7 happened and a single event changed the course of history. The terror attacks were a result of a cynical and brutal Hamas, probably backed by Iran, deliberately inflicting damage on Israel and banking on Israeli retaliation to destabilise the region. And that is what happened.

It altered Israeli politics and national security. Ever since its formation, even as it faced wars and terror attacks and flight hijackings and abductions and killings of citizens, Israel’s national security state had taken pride in its strength — and this perception of strength was meant to be a deterrent against the kind of attack that Hamas had launched. For Netanyahu, the attacks represented his biggest political failure, for he had come to symbolise both this strength and the all-out aggression against Palestinians, but also an opportunity, for he saw in the attack the possibility of extending his term in office under the garb of national unity in war-time. In any other context, the Israeli Supreme Court verdict annulling the executive’s move to control the judiciary may have resulted in Netanyahu’s exit. But the war has saved him politically — and the extension of the war is probably his way of staying on in power as he leverages the anger within Israel to continue his politics.

The Israeli response, in turn, has been completely disproportionate and inhuman, devastating Gaza, where 2.3 million people lived. Even those who sharply condemned Hamas’s attacks are shocked at the Israeli response. Close to 25,000 Palestinians in Gaza are dead, an overwhelming number among them children and women. Close to two million people are displaced. The UN secretary general has been using his pulpit to scream about the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, and while there have been some incremental measures to provide relief, there is little doubt that Palestinians in Gaza today have nowhere to turn as they face unprecedented assault.

It weakened Joe Biden within American politics as his domestic political coalition fractured. Given the complex relationship US shares with Israel as its primary patron and supporter, the nature of the terror attack Israel faced, the history and role of American Jewish demographic within US, and given the geopolitics at play where Iran was backing Hamas, there was little doubt that Biden would back Netanyahu. US officials suggested the support was a part of a strategy of smothering Israel with love, building credibility with the Israeli government and public, and using that leverage to shape Israel’s war.

But while this may have led to some shifts — the US takes credit for the opening of the humanitarian corridor, keeping the war limited, the partial release of hostages — the Americans haven’t been able to use whatever leverage they have in influencing Netanyahu’s actions, either because Israel isn’t listening or the US isn’t trying hard enough. Either way, Biden, who got elected due to the backing of a broad coalition, including progressives and people of colour, is now facing a clear challenge for being complicit in the atrocities from his own base, even as Donald Trump surges in polls in election year. It doesn’t help that there is an already another war theatre where the US is actively involved: Ukraine. In a country where Republicans today are championing a strong isolationist impulse, Biden’s involvement in wars — irrespective of the roots of the war — is further eroding his credibility.

All of this has dented American and Israeli reputation globally too, as much of the world stood outraged at the destruction and brutality in Gaza and held Netanyahu directly responsible and Biden indirectly complicit. This has been visible in UN resolutions and now South Africa’s charge of genocide against Israel. Even friends such as India, which supported Israel on the day of the terror attacks, have had to shift positions and back calls for a ceasefire at the UN. The global south — a real theatre of great power competition — is stunned at what it sees as American hypocrisy, of backing Ukraine against the Russian offensive and backing Israel’s much worse offensive against Palestinians. It has also interrupted the process of normalisation between Israel and Saudi Arabia and IMEC now lies suspended. Neighbouring Arab regimes cannot ignore the radical mood on their streets and do business with Israel pretending little has changed.

And of course, there is a related but separate theatre that has now opened up in Red Sea corridor. As the Houthis of Yemen, backed by Iran, attacked shipping vessels across the crucial global trading route, the US first cobbled together a coalition to enhance deterrence in the region and launched a diplomatic campaign against the Houthis. And last week, the US and UK launched strikes against Houthis to degrade and destroy their capabilities which enable them to launch these attacks. The Houthis have promised retaliation, making the entire region even more unstable. Add to it Israel’s northern front where it is in a tense stand-off with Hezbollah. Add also Iran using its other proxies in Iraq to attack US assets and it is clear that the entire region remains a tinderbox and there remains the active possibility of the conflict getting wider and deeper.

So here is what you have in 100 days. The most dramatic and devastating terrorist attack on Israel in its history. A wounded Israel retaliating by inflicting the most severe damage and destruction on Gaza in history, prompting allegations of conducting a genocide. A US that remains Israel’s strongest supporter but at the cost of both internal political cohesion and external foreign policy priorities. A region where reconciliation between major powers seemed possible now engulfed in conflict across several theatres. The sharpening of the US-Iran and Israel-Iran conflict. A global South that is stunned at western hypocrisy. And perhaps most importantly, a Palestinian population that continues to suffer even after 75 years of being displaced from the land they considered their own as their homes get destroyed, loved ones get killed, their infrastructure lies crippled, hunger rises, economy gets ruined, and the dream of a two state solution becomes even more distant. Events truly have changed the world in just 100 days.