How Israel-Palestine War Will Shape And Reshape Gaza: Journalist Shashank Joshi | Interview

What are the immediate aims of Israel and the United States following Israel's declaration of war in response to the Hamas attack?

Well, I think the Israeli army is likely to invade Gaza in order to achieve the stated political goal to destroy Hamas but the question really is how they do it. Do they move slowly and cautiously? Or do they try and conduct major attacks directly in the city? Do they try and enter the tunnel system under Gaza which stretches to hundreds of kilometres and how much emphasis do they play on 100 plus hostages which are likely to be scattered around Gaza? But I think what is clear is that the war aims of Israel are extremely ambitious and go well beyond the aims that existed in two major offensives in Gaza in 2009 and 2014.  And that would necessitate a much more aggressive campaign, a much deeper campaign and I think much longer campaign.

I think the American aim is to protect Israel from further attacks. They have already sent an aircraft carrier to the east of the eastern Mediterranean partly to deter Iran and Iran’s allies like Hezbollah in Lebanon from entering war with Israel. The U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced Sunday that he has ordered American military ships, including an aircraft carrier and additional aircraft, to move closer to the eastern Mediterranean in response to Hamas' multi-fronted attack on Israel. The first American aim is deterrence.

The second American Aim is to keep Israel’s military supply with the weapons it needs to be able to defend itself and to also attack Hamas including sending interceptors to Israel to replenish the country's Iron Dome stockpiles. It also includes supplying artillery ammunition; and precision-guided munitions which may begin to run short if Israel conducts a very longer campaign of air strikes.

The third aim is to talk to America’s partners in the region including UEA, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Egypt to try and discuss the situation and try to see whether there is a way to de-escalate. And also to try and see if there is a way to get the civilian population of Gaza out of from southern crossing, the Rafah border crossing.

Diplomacy will be another concern as Qatar is engaged in talks with Hamas and trying to look at prisoner releases. Turkey’s government is also involved. So regional diplomacy will be another priority.

I think America’s government is very concerned perhaps that Iran may use the opportunity to do another kind of things in the region like it has an advanced nuclear programme that it may try to expand, and I think America wants to make sure it contains the threat from Iran.

What would be the impact on the Arab world if the war continued for an extended duration?

Well, Palestinian territory is already part of the Arab world. And the impact of the war will be very destructive. Gaza has already suffered with over 1200 dead; it is a humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

The first impact will be on Palestinian territory including the West Bank, where there may be a kind of uprising or violence in response to the events in Gaza.

The second impact will be in Egypt which of course has always played a critical mediating role between Israel and Hamas and wants to make sure that it doesn't get a flood of refugees and also has an obligation to try and avoid suffering where it can.

The third impact will be on the Arab states that have been steadily normalizing their ties with Israel including UAE, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia which was moving on the issue more quickly in the recent weeks.  They have to decide whether to preserve the relationship with Israel and continue that normalization or whether to break it off because of the Israeli response in Gaza. And how do they balance these considerations? That is a critical problem for the Arab states.

I think the final point is about Iran. We have been seeing a process of Iran-Arab normalization including Iran-Saudi Arabia in recent months. That is also going to be at risk if there is a sense that Iran is encouraging it allied forces like Hezbollah to take the very disruptive steps that may make the Arab states feel a heightened threat from Iran.

What will be the long-term implications of the Hamas attack on the perception of invincibility of Israel's intelligence agencies and their technological prowess?

Of course the attack has damaged Israel’s military reputation. Israel's military has been somewhat humiliated and that's going to be a problem. But of course, we will see in Gaza in the coming days, they still have an enormous amount of military strength and they still have a huge military power. What I think could challenge Israel severely is a conflict with Hezbollah, that would really stretch Israel. If you have a situation of fighting in Gaza and a fight against Hezbollah and then managing the West Bank, I think that could be a very difficult situation for Israel to manage. In fact, they have already struck Damascus and Aleppo airports in Syria and it indicates war is already spreading. The big question is does this lead to a situation where Israel will be in a military quagmire in Gaza for years to come, that is one possibility ahead of us. It's not necessarily the likeliest situation, but it is a possibility.

And another question is what does the war will do to their policy in the Arab world? Will they be forced to try and think about a political solution with the Palestinians, to try and weaken Hamas and also to keep momentum in diplomacy with Saudi Arabia and the other Arab states or will they give up on those objectives and instead realize that they have to manage the problem in a military sense and give up on these relationships and give up on any hope of the political solution.

I think it's too early to say which way things are going and it may depend on how the military campaign unfolds. It may also depend on the political future of Benjamin Netanyahu who is likely to lose power after this because of his own failure to protect Israel.

What could be the motivation behind Hamas's large-scale attack? And why did they choose this particular moment?

The honest answer is nobody knows for sure. They have been planning the attack for a long time and you can assume safely they took advantage of Israel's political chaos. Israel's government was extremely divided, propped up by right-wing Ultra-nationalists parties and there was a huge protest movement with lots of military reserves saying they would not participate in military service. So, in that sense, you could see political division in Israel. And Hamas may have been attempting to capitalize on that.  You can also say it has to do something with the balance of power within the Palestinians. Because the faction that runs the Palestinian Authority, has been weakening, their leader Mahmoud Abbas, is very old, he's elderly, and the question of succession is looming. Also, Hamas itself has failed to deliver to the people of Gaza. They're no closer to independence or a state of its own. So you could argue that this was sort of Hamas stuck at a dead end with its Palestinian rivals and unable to improve the situation anyway for Palestinians.

What would be the consequences or fate of Hamas after this war?

Hamas leaders have been killed, and more will be killed. The group may be decimated. Its stockpile of weapons may be substantially degraded. It is going to come out as weak. But the question is will it be defeated and will it disappear? And if not will in the aftermath of this war, it will control Gaza again? Will the Palestinian people respond by blaming Hamas for the damage done to Gaza and therefore turn against it? Do they instead fall in line behind it and does it increase support for Hamas? I don’t think it is clear how Hamas will come out of it. There are some warnings from the past when Israel had tried to destroy its enemies; it often had some unexpected effects. We saw that in Lebanon in the 1980s when Israel tried to drive out the Palestine Liberation Organisation, it resulted in the coming together of different anti-Israeli factions in Lebanon. We saw that in the 2000s, the marginalization of Arafat and the destruction of his power base in Palestinian territories contributed to the rise of Hamas. So I don't think we know clearly what this really means beyond the short-term military weakening of the Hamas.

US intelligence indicates that Iran was surprised by Hamas's attack on Israel. Are you surprised by such statements coming from the US?

No, I'm not that surprised. In the past intelligence has been used and politicized to justify a policy, but actually, intelligence services themselves try to stick to the facts. They try not to be pulled into policy as much as they can and if they say Iran did this or Iran didn't do this, generally they don't want to lie. I know that's not always easy for people to understand but they generally don't want to lie. They have their credibility to consider. If they say they don't have evidence that Iran was involved they're just telling the truth and they're telling it like it is.

Will this war have any impact on the Ukraine conflict?

I think it may distract attention from Ukraine to some extent. The biggest effect will be on the political bandwidth in Washington. It's difficult for American leaders and the National Security bureaucracy to handle, simultaneous crises and it is inevitable that this is going to distract it from Ukraine.

Many analysts are suggesting that internal crises in Israel, including the actions of the Justice Minister, have created political unrest that provided an opportunity for Hamas to launch attacks. What is your perspective on this assessment?

I think it's a fair assessment. Israeli Society was going through its most dramatic upheaval and division. It is a divided society. Benjamin Netanyahu's decision to make a coalition with extremist elements has done real damage to the fabric of Israeli society. The Finance Minister is considered so extreme that he was barred from serving in the Israeli Army. So this gives you a sense of how extreme the parts of the government are. I think it would have distracted Israel from being able to focus on the real threat.

India has supported Israel saying "India Stands Firmly With Israel.” Is this a shift in India's West Asia policy?

This is part of a long shift in India’s foreign policy that's been occurring for 30 years. If you look at the statements that India used to put out during the first Intifada in the 1980s, you would not have seen the same kind of language that you see now and there are several reasons for that. One is the remarkable normalisation of ties between India and Israel. It is a flourishing relationship. The second is the fact that the Arab states have also normalized ties with Israel and it has helped India to maintain good relations with both Arab partners and Israel.

And the third and this is extremely important that in India terrorism has become a more prominent issue since the Mumbai attack of 2008. And it has made India focus on terrorism and also make terrorism a core part of its foreign policy. And that has made it to find a common cause with Israel. India is an important rising power and it is a partner of Israel and Arab states. India has growing diplomatic clout. Whether India chooses to condemn this attack and stand with Israel or it remains silent and sits back, I think these are very important messages and Israel very much cares about having a large rising Asian power on its side particularly when other powers Russia and China have been much more muted.