A Different Take on the Mid-East Troubles

 NYT columnist Thomas Friedman makes the case that Benjamin Netanyahu and Hamas need each other.   Opinion | For Trump, Hamas and Bibi, It Is Always Jan. 6 - The New York Times (nytimes.com):

 (Here is a link to the article in case you are paywalled out of NYT:  For Trump, Hamas and Netanyahu, it is always January 6 | Deccan Herald)

"There are many ways to understand what is happening today between Hamas and Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu of Israel, but I prefer to think about it like this: They are each having their own Jan. 6 moment."

"Just as a mob was unleashed by President Donald Trump to ransack our Capitol on Jan. 6 in a last-ditch effort to overturn the election results and prevent a healing unifier from becoming president, so Bibi and Hamas each exploited or nurtured their own mobs to prevent an unprecedented national unity government from emerging in Israel — a Cabinet that for the first time would have included Israeli Jews and Israeli Arab Muslims together."

"Like Trump, both Bibi and Hamas have kept power by inspiring and riding waves of hostility to “the other.” They turn to this tactic anytime they are in political trouble. Indeed, they each have been the other’s most valuable partner in that tactic ever since Netanyahu was first elected prime minister in 1996 — on the back of a wave of Hamas suicide bombings."

"...The latest rerun of their long-running nasty show is happening now because both were staring at an amazing breakthrough shaping up between Israeli Jews and Israel Arab Muslims — and, like the pro-Trump mob on Jan. 6, they wanted to destroy the possibility of political change before it could destroy them politically."

"To understand why I am so convinced of this, I need to take you back about 10 days to the column I was writing before this blowup happened. It began with me reminding readers that I watch trends in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict very closely, because I believe their struggle often foreshadows wider trends in Western politics..."

"...In the wake of Israel’s fourth election, and Netanyahu’s failure to form a government, a national unity coalition was taking shape in Israel — under the leadership of the secular-centrist Yair Lapid and the religious-rightist Naftali Bennett. They were on the verge of forging a cabinet that would include both Israeli Jews and, for the first time ever, an Israeli Arab Islamist party....Here is the headline in Israel’s Haaretz newspaper online from last Sunday, May 9, just before the latest Hamas-Israel conflict erupted in full: “Israel Coalition Talks: Bennett’s Party Expects to Form Gov’t ‘This Week,’ After Meeting With Islamist Leader.”

"The United Arab List, also known as Raam, headed by Mansour Abbas is an Israeli Arab “Islamic movement” party that comes from the same broad realm of political Islam that Hamas does, except that it is nonviolent; recognizes Israel; and is focused on getting Israeli Arabs — particularly Muslim Bedouins — more resources, more police and more jobs for their towns and neighborhoods in Israel, just the way ultra-Orthodox Jewish Israeli parties do."

"Abbas had broken away from the coalition of Israeli Arab parties — the Joint List, which is more focused on Palestinian nationalism — and won four seats on his own to push his agenda. And since neither Netanyahu’s coalition nor the opposition coalition that was emerging, led by Lapid and Bennett, had enough votes to form a government, Abbas’s four seats made him the kingmaker of Israeli politics. Netanyahu tried to court him at first, but a small openly racist, anti-Arab faction in Bibi’s coalition (Bibi’s Proud Boys) refused to sit in a cabinet with Israeli Arabs."

"That is what gave this emerging opposition national unity coalition an opportunity to put together a broad government that for the first time ever would have included right-wing pro-settler Zionist parties, left-wing secular progressive parties and a pro-Islamist Israeli Arab party — and possibly, eventually, even secular Arab parties."

"It would have broken the mold of Israeli politics forever. And that is why the local Jan. 6-style opponents — in Israel and Hamas — were determined to blow it up."

"Governing matters. And who leads a government matters — especially in relations between Israeli Jews and Arabs. Think about this: During the pandemic, in March 2020, Haaretz reported that it was Israeli Arab medical workers who were essential for enabling Israel’s Jewish citizens to survive the coronavirus. “According to official figures … 17 percent of Israel’s physicians, 24 percent of its nurses and 47 percent of its pharmacists are Arabs,” it noted."

"So, the next time someone tells you that Israel is a purely racist, anti-Arab country, think about those numbers. But the next time someone tells you that Israel is a paradise for its Arab citizens and that they should have nothing to complain about, think about this quote from that Haaretz story. It’s from Dr. Suad Haj Yihye Yassin, who had returned from a long shift saving Israeli Arabs and Jews from Covid-19 at her Tel Aviv hospital and had just heard Netanyahu rule out forming a government that included Israeli Arabs."

"'When I come home from the emergency room, after I’ve given my all to treat everyone,” she said, “and hear the prime minister say that we have to form a national unity government to deal with the crisis — but without the Arabs, as if we are second-rate citizens — it hurts. Why is it OK for us to be on the front lines in the hospitals dealing with corona, but not legitimate for us to be in the government?'”

"...That is why it was so important to have a true national unity coalition governing Israel, ending Netanyahu’s 12-year reign as prime minister and fundamentally challenging Hamas’s narrative that the only hope for Israeli Arabs is the destruction of the Jewish state."

Friedman segues back to the column he was writing before the current violence broke out:  "...But in that column last Monday I warned that Netanyahu — who is desperate to stay in power and avoid possibly going to prison if he is convicted in his current corruption trial — was not above “inflaming the situation so much that his right-wing rivals have to abandon trying to topple him and declare instead that this is no time for a change in leadership.”

Does Thomas Friedman make a valid point?  I don't know.  But I think it is telling that both sides heartily criticize him; those in sympathy with the Israelis saying he is hopelessly naive, and those more in sympathy with the Palestinians calling him a shill for the Israelis.  Sometimes when both sides are critical of someone, it means they are telling an uncomfortable truth.