Israel’s conduct in Gaza arises from failed policy thinking and must change fast. It has no choice but to respond to the Oct. 7 attacks and eliminate the threat of Hamas, but it can’t afford to ignore the needs and perceptions of Palestinian civilians. Excessive militarism will increase suffering, provoke antisemitism and spread violence across the region. However, advancing a route to statehood with dignity and security for Palestinians will enhance Israel’s security.
Once people come to believe that they have a better future with an insurgency than with a perceived colonial interloper, they will not align themselves with the interloper, no matter how much military force and injury is imposed on them. This is the lesson of Vietnam, Algeria and Afghanistan, and could even be drawn from the American Revolution.
An understanding of this is explicit in a U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff publication “Counterinsurgency,” which calls for understanding grievances and applying a “mixture of political reform, reconciliation, popular mobilization, economic development, and governmental capacity building” to avoid driving occupied populations into the arms of insurgents.
Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party surely understands this. So why does it make no credible effort at building a better future for Palestinian people, knowing it serves only to align their interests more closely with Hamas? And why amid all the chaos strike Iran and aggravate the risk of wider war?........