Unintended consequences of October 7 - opinion

It is axiomatic that the first casualty of war is truth; the second is that plans go out the window once the first shot is fired. Next come the unintended consequences.

That’s the way it has been in the year since Hamas’s bloody pogrom that resulted in the deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust.

Hamas sought to derail plans to expand the Abraham Accords and torpedo the normalization of Israeli relations with Saudi Arabia and other Arab states. At best, their massacre delayed the move and added a few obstacles. However, when Iran fired barrages of missiles at Israel in solidarity with its terrorist proxies, several of those Arab countries came to Israel’s defense and helped shoot them down.

Neither Hamas nor Hezbollah, which showed its support for Hamas by raining its missiles on northern Israel, expected they would not only be decimated but also see their leadership decapitated, most notably Hassan Nasrallah, the head of Hezbollah. 

If Hamas thought taking some 250 hostages would buy the release of thousands of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and get a ceasefire before suffering too much damage, they miscalculated Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s priorities. It wasn’t the hostages he put first but his own political career.

Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’s political leader until reportedly killed by Israel, said the goal of October 7 goal was to “expel” the Zionists “from our lands.” Instead, the Israeli messianic extremists, who hold Netanyahu’s future in their hands, are bent on driving Palestinians out of Gaza and the West Bank, annexing those territories, and building more settlements. 

Unintended political and diplomatic consequence

One of the most serious but not entirely unexpected unintended consequences has been the political and diplomatic damage to Israel, too often self-inflicted.

Hamas’s barbaric killing of so many innocents on October 7 provoked global condemnation and sympathy for Israel. The president of the United States flew to Jerusalem to personally reassure the people of Israel of his and America’s “ironclad” support. To back it up he dispatched two carrier task forces to protect Israel in case Iran attacked. The worldwide show of sympathy was soon overshadowed by unprecedented condemnation of Israel in the wake of the extensive destruction and loss of life in Gaza wrought by Israel’s massive military retaliation.

Nearly 42,000 Gazans, mostly innocent civilians, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry, have been killed; many times that number wounded and displaced, creating an enormous humanitarian crisis. The United States and others have accused Israel of impeding the delivery of food and medical aid. Throughout, Netanyahu has appeared indifferent.

American political leaders and Jews across the country were shocked by the extent of pro-Palestinian sympathies unleashed by the extensive destruction across Gaza. Pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel protests spread across college campuses, with Jewish students on both sides.

The Anti-Defamation League reported a shocking surge in antisemitism across the United States in the past year. There were more than 10,000 attacks – physical, written, and verbal – on Jews and Israel. 

Not all were attributable to the war in Gaza. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s repeated attacks on Jews, his accusations of dual loyalty, and threats to hold them responsible if he loses the election also contributed.

The war has put the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on the front burner in the presidential election. Many Arab and Muslim Americans who traditionally vote Democratic are threatening to stay home on Election Day or vote for Trump to protest the Biden-Harris administration’s support for Israel. 

Ironically, they could wind up electing an Islamophobe who promises a broad ban on Muslim immigrants, wants to round up and deport millions of migrants, threatens to deport pro-Palestinian demonstrators, and has shown an affinity for Israel’s extreme-right leadership. President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris support Palestinian statehood; Trump is, at best, indifferent.

This war, particularly Netanyahu’s conduct of it, has done great damage to Israel’s reputation and relations with the United States and other allies, notably France and Britain, which are restricting arms sales.

It is no secret that Biden does not trust Netanyahu, whom he feels has ignored American concerns and lied to him repeatedly. But that is nothing new; most presidents who have dealt with Netanyahu distrusted him.

Harris added nuance to the relationship when asked this week on 60 Minutes if she considered Netanyahu a “close ally.” She deflected, saying “We have an important alliance between the American people and the Israeli people.” Aiding Israel, she added, is “our imperative.” 

After this war, and the US political campaign ends, support for Israel will continue. But expect changes. The wall-to-wall bipartisan backing for nearly $4 billion annual aid to Israel is crumbling. 

It will start with differentiating between offensive and defensive weapons. Deep divisions have appeared on Capitol Hill, particularly among Democrats and progressives. It will only deteriorate so long as Netanyahu and the extreme Right are in power.  Israel remains more popular among Americans than the Palestinians but the gap is narrowing as images of Gaza – and now Lebanon – turned into rubble appear on American screens. Recovery of Israel’s standing will be slow and unlikely to return to the pre-war levels; much will depend on the post-Netanyahu leadership and its policies toward the Palestinians.

For now, leaders on all sides are uninterested in ending the conflict. Bibi knows his political career could end with the conclusion of the war. Hamas has little incentive to negotiate, as it sees US-Israel relations strained and watches Israeli society torn over the conflict between the “rescue the hostages” and “total victory” camps. Iran remains determined to continue using anti-Israel proxies and sometimes direct attacks against the Jewish state in its quest for regional dominance.

Hamas, which has sworn to erase the Jewish state, has unintentionally breathed new life into its rival, the secular Palestinian Authority, which has formally accepted the two-state solution. Netanyahu may reject Palestinian statehood, but this war has cemented support for it in American policy and among Israel’s supporters. 

Iran has fired hundreds of missiles at Israel, and as this is being written, Israel is deciding on its response. Biden is urging Netanyahu not to strike Iran’s oil and nuclear infrastructure as that may spark a global economic crisis or even a major regional war.  That may be the consequence Hamas intended on October 7, 2023.

The writer is a Washington-based journalist, consultant, lobbyist, and the former American Israel Public Affairs Committee legislative director.