US Intervention in Palestine Must Be Decisive

Go big or go home

The Palestine question has plagued US relations with the Islamic world and the global south for generations. The United States has previously attempted to solve the problem by trying to arbitrate a negotiated settlement between the Israelis and the Palestinians under Israeli occupation. Since the failure of those attempts, US-Israeli policy can best be described as putting a lid on the question and muddling through. American leaders have counseled a return to negotiations, or at least said so in public. Meanwhile, Israel selected to divide the West Bank from Gaza, and suppress armed Palestinian resistance through periodic ‘mowing the lawn’ campaigns.

What seems to have precipitated the Oct 7 attack was the specter of the Saudis bracketing the Palestine question and normalizing relations with Israel. On the Saudi, Israeli and American sides, this showed just how complacent the extended policy communities had become. They really and truly thought that rejectionism had worked—that the Palestine question could be put in a box. Oct 7 showed that US-Israeli rejectionism had failed. The Palestine question cannot be put in a box. Turns out, it’s difficult to indefinitely hold a million men of military age in a 25-by-5 mile open air prison.

The Israeli counterattack has been ferocious. Israel has carried out strategic bombing of the strip at the scale of the Anglo-Saxon campaigns in World War II. This is clear to the naked eye through visual inspection. Here’s the Great Firebombing of Tokyo, which killed more than Hiroshima or Nagasaki. The darkened area is that destroyed by LeMay in 1945.

Here’s Hiroshima. Note that, in 1945, Hiroshima had a settled area of just 27 square miles. For reference, Gaza has an area of 141 square miles.

Here’s Nagasaki.

And here’s the Gaza strip today.

The indiscriminate area bombing of the enclave is a grave war crime. Israel has compounded these war crimes by blocking the flow of food, medicine, and humanitarian aid, and shutting down Gaza’s electricity and water supply. The ensuing humanitarian catastrophe is reportedly the worst conflict-zone aid workers have ever seen.

The United States is, of course, paying a great diplomatic price for the catastrophe. Everyone understands that America’s authority on the world stage is being gravely undermined. Already in October, a senior G7 diplomat remarked:

We have definitely lost the battle in the Global South. … All the work we have done with the Global South [over Ukraine] has been lost . . . Forget about rules, forget about world order. They won’t ever listen to us again.

The risk of a regional war is also rising. Iran and Hezbollah have been cautious. But the Houthis—who have emerged from their war with the Saudis as a real power in the region—less so. They’ve blockaded the Red Sea, forcing tankers, container ships and bulk cargo ships plying the Asia-Europe superhighway to take the longer route around the Cape.

The Houthi escalation puts the US in a bind. If the US does not respond, it undermines America’s commitment to keep the sea lanes open for business. If the US does respond, that dramatically increases the risk of a wider war. The US, of course, cannot afford to get bogged down in a second war. For that would constitute an open invitation to the Chinese to move on Taiwan. The Biden team’s response therefore has so far been quite cautious. But the longer this goes on, the greater the risk of regional war and the greater the erosion of America’s world position.

The authority of American civilian leaders is also being undermined at home. My own poll found that 64% of my twitter followers had soured on Biden.

Biden’s campaign staff is itself in revolt. They released a strongly worded statement demanding, in effect, a wholesale termination of the US-Israeli special relationship:

1. Publicly call for — and use financial and diplomatic leverage to bring about — an immediate, permanent ceasefire;

2. Advocate for de-escalation in the region, including demanding that Hamas release all hostages and that Israel release the over 2,000 Palestinians in administrative detention being held without charge;

3. End unconditional military aid to Israel;

4. Investigate whether Israel’s actions in Gaza violate the Leahy Law, prohibiting U.S. military aid from funding foreign military units implicated in the commission of gross violations of human rights;

5. Take concrete steps to end the conditions of apartheid, occupation, and ethnic cleansing that are the root causes of this conflict.

The problem, of course, is the absolute primacy of political economy. Bill Ackman is only the ugly tip of the iceberg. What Walt and Mearsheimer called the Israel Lobby is just the institutional expression of the will of megadoners who dictate US Israel policy. No politician in DC has the balls to stand up to them, at risk of being primaried and politically destroyed. This means that there is no political room whatsoever for the United States to pressure Israel on any issue—much less end the special relationship.

In effect, Biden’s facing a double security dilemma. The Gaza war is eroding America’s world position and undermining Biden’s reelection prospects. But Biden does not have the political capital to take on the megadonors who dictate US Israel policy. So what is the way out here?

There is no possibility that any American civilian leader would throw Israel under the bus. And indeed, we should not. Israel is an American protectorate in a dangerous region. We should keep our word.

I have for a while been suggesting that the US should unilaterally interpose itself between the Israelis and Palestinians, and create a state for Palestine on its own authority.

Now, Israeli Defense Minister Gallant has suggested, as part of his “day after” proposal, that a US-led international force should maintain order in Gaza. The US should support this course of action.

Moreover, we need to go a few steps further. We have a great interest in stabilizing the region because we need to rebalance to the central front in Asia, as Bridge Colby has rightly been demanding. But this shit-show is not going to end until a permanent solution is found to the Palestine question. Any permanent solution, of course, must feature a Palestinian state.

We cannot persuade the Israelis and the Palestinians to find a negotiated solution. We also cannot expect to forge a global or even great power consensus to solve the problem multilaterally. And, as argued above, the US has a great interest in solving this problem.

It is my firm opinion that the US should intervene unilaterally and decisively. Simply put, we should take the Palestine problem off Israel’s hands. We should draw up a territorial map of the Palestinian state and impose it on the two parties. The Israelis will require some persuasion. But even they are looking for a serious solution to the problem. If the US moves in decisively, the Israelis will play along. The Palestinians would finally be getting a state—they’d be stupid to contest the imposition.

The end goal would be create a viable state for the Palestinians. Palestine will remain a ward of the international community for some time. But over time, as the security situation stabilizes and the state is rebuilt, prosperity should return. We can give Palestine preferential access to Western markets and encourage foreign investment to help the process along. This is very much doable.

This course of action would guarantee Israeli security, solve the Palestine problem once and for all, and restore America’s authority on the world stage. It might even save Joe Biden’s reelection campaign.