Why Israel is making full use of US political paralysis

WHY is Israel PM Benjamin Netanyahu going for broke? Why has Israel upped the ante in the one-year-old conflagration by expanding military operations into Lebanon and, perhaps, beyond? Will Israel take the high-risk route of attempting to neutralise Iran’s nuclear capabilities?

The answers are fairly linear. What Netanyahu is simply doing is taking advantage of a unique six-month window in the US presidential electoral cycle, coupled with a lame duck President in the Oval Office who has lost control of the events in West Asia.

The reason why the electoral cycle provides space for manoeuvre is because of the very influential Jewish special interest groups in the US that have been courted and coveted by both Democrats and Republicans alike for more than a century — the famed and feared Jewish lobby.

Some of the most prominent and formalised pro-Israel groups that have both financial and electoral muscle are the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), American Jewish Committee (AJC), Christians United for Israel, the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish organisations, Democratic Majority for Israel (DMFI) and J Street. Then, there are the informal groups that promote a pro-Israel narrative, namely the Christian Broadcasting Network, Christian Television Network, Day of Prayer for the Peace of Jerusalem and a host of others.

None of these groups are illegal or constitute a great conspiracy to subvert democracy in the US. This is just how the electoral system in the US works.

Individually, and collectively, these groups mobilise billions of dollars to support openly pro-Israel candidates on both sides of the aisle and defeat those both pro-Arab/ Palestinian or anti-Israel. The AIPAC has set up its Super Political Action Committee (S-PAC), namely the United Democracy Project (UDP) to further this cause which acquired a new urgency after the barbaric events of October 7, 2023.

Israel’s disproportionate response has alienated young people in the US and could lead to an erosion in the bipartisan support for it in the rarefied corridors of power and influence in Washington DC.

In contrast, Arab and, especially, Palestinian influence and support groups have been historically weak in the US, allowing organisations like the AIPAC and AJC to have a relatively smooth run.

Had this unique window and constellation of circumstances not manifested themselves, the US Administration may just have been more assertive in tamping down Israel’s newfound enthusiasm for widening the war. Especially relevant is the fact that the US has a military base presence and military-diplomatic ties across at least 19 Muslim Arab nations in the wider West Asia, not limited to Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and the UAE.

Across the wider West Asia, the sentiment on the street has traditionally been anti-Israel, even though its ‘regimes’ have nimbly finessed hosting US military bases/boots on their soil, despite the US being Israel’s principle security guarantor.

However, all the equities that the West Asian/ GCC countries have with the US pale into insignificance in the face of the powerful domestic US Jewish lobby. This is the window of political paralysis in the US which Netanyahu has deftly exploited, pushing the envelope as far as he can.

The next question is: why is Israel’s War Cabinet — consisting of Benjamin Netanyahu, Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, head of Israeli Resilience Party Benny Gantz and three non-voting observers General Gadi Eisenkot (retd), Aryeh Deri and Ron Dermer, Minister of Strategic Affairs — upping the ante by widening the war in the region?

Here, there is strategic convergence between the US and Israel. Both believe that the way to circumscribing the influence of Iran is to weaken its influential proxies across the Shia Crescent, which became powerful as an inadvertent consequence of the US military intervention in Iraq in 2003.

The obvious proxy on the list that needed to be first kneecapped was Hezbollah in Lebanon. Then there are the Houthis in Yemen, who recently fired a powerful ballistic missile at Israel; Kataib Hezbollah, Asaib Ahl al-Haq, Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba, Badr Organisation and Kataib Sayyad al-Shuhada in Iraq; Zaynabiyoun Brigade andFatemiyoun Division in Syria; Hezbollah al Hejaz in Saudi Arabia and Saraya al Ashtar, Saraya al Mukhtar in Barhain, to name a few.

Israel could well widen the conflict by going after these Iranian proxies across West Asia. It certainly believes that this high-risk-high-reward strategy of proxy decapitation will bring a tense but enduring strategic stability to the region.

The problem with this strategy is the inherent danger it poses of getting drawn into a conflict with various other Westphalian entities which may host and encourage these semi-state actors — as evidenced by reports of Houthis turning up in Russia, ostensibly for tactical support.

This could well prove to be both an escalatory ladder without any off-ramps, a surefire recipe to a prolonged quagmire. If Israel, indeed, goes down this path, then all bets are off.

Finally, will Israel have a go at Iran’s yet undeclared nuclear weapons programme or its nuclear enrichment processes that are a precursor to the production of a nuclear bomb? There is a lot of commentary in influential western strategic and foreign policy journals that this is the moment when Israel may well go for Iran’s ‘crown jewels’. However, the fact is that it is one thing to go after an enemy’s proxy terror groups and a completely different ball game to strike at the enemy — read, Iran’s — nuclear programme.

Even Israel in its current state of paranoia has to be aware of that.

Coupled with that is the fact that Masoud Pezeshkian, a reformist parliamentarian, has just been elected Iranian President, following the tragic demise of President Ebrahim Raisi in a helicopter crash in May. An Israel attack on Iran will only strengthen the hands of ultra-conservative hardliners who already seem to have the upper hand following Israel’s strike on Hezbollah.

Israel may want to give the new person in Tehran a chance by not taking this ‘extreme precipitate step,’ while maintaining pressure on the proxies.

The fact remains that the strategic calculations it made in the wake of the October 7, 2023, attack are making Israel play for broke. This has serious implications, to say the least.