The ceasefire which came into effect on Sunday in Gaza was “long overdue,” according to Keir Starmer, anticipating today’s breakthrough. Something about this tone jars – the weighty sonorousness, saying not very much at all.
As often when external players comment on the conflict between Israel and Gaza, the Prime Minister was speaking a careful half-truth. The wonder is that it happened at all.
The Prime Minister did not add what everyone in the region and the transatlantic relationship knows full well: namely that it was the “Trump factor” that finally pushed the Netanyahu government into accepting high-stakes trade-offs – getting hostages home in return for a complex phasing of releases and concessions with the very entity (Hamas) which unleashed civilian-targeted murder, rape and terror in Israel on 7 October 2023.
The return of Donald Trump has given Israel cover to make an agreement which is vastly unpalatable to many of Benjamin Netanyahu’s supporters and causes deep concern across a lot of Israeli society about the risks engaged in return for the joy of seeing hostages come home.
Even holding on to that mood of acceptance, once the stories of those who died or were abused in captivity are released, will be hard going. Hamas can claim that far from being destroyed, as originally mooted when the Gaza operation started, it is now a negotiating partner of Israel and still largely in political control of the Palestinian Authority.
That is why a new start in Washington is so important. Trump’s desire to grasp the mantle of world statesman instantly from his Democrat predecessor has been beneficial. In truth, Antony Blinken as a tireless Secretary of State did most of the heavy lifting with Qatar (the key intermediary) soothing opposition in Israel, but the last attempt by Biden to secure a deal fell apart. Trump will doubtless claim at the inauguration tomorrow that he pulled it off “by day one” of his tenure. Boastful it will be. But true also. Momentum matters in these things.
What happens next will set the course of the West’s engagement with the Middle East for many years to come. In crude terms, on the snakes and ladders board of interrelated Middle East dealings, Israel is now “up” – agreeing to the ceasefire will blunt some of the condemnation which has mounted in many liberal democracies over the conflict and Netanyahu’s leadership.
Yet main strategic antagonist, Iran, which has provided resource and logistical back up to violent anti-Israel groupings in Hezbollah and Hamas, has suffered a series of weakening setbacks, crowned by the fall of another of its disagreeable client powers in the overthrow of Bashar al-Assad in Syria at the end of last year.
So Netanyahu, a consummate if ruthless tactician, has traded the main nationalist right of his government (which has quit his coalition in high dudgeon) to get this deal across the line. Also, he has made considerable concessions in the small print of the ceasefire deal which his own military and many Israelis who live close to the border and were deeply shaken by the 7 October attacks do not relish – including withdrawing from some key operational areas in Gaza.
This may also be the area that could come unstuck, which is why he has underlined the right to go back into Gaza, for security reasons but equally to reassure opponents that he has not gone soft on Hamas.
Most governments outside the region, including our own, are commenting on all of this for the benefit of their own base. Starmer was personally shocked by the impact of the “Gaza effect” which unexpectedly cost him seats and exposed the volatility of the issue in Labour.
The presence of Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell at a pro-Palestinian march in London at the weekend reawakened unquiet ghosts for the party’s present leadership, after Starmer had to deal with the bitter aftermath of anti-semitism in the party.
How reactive this subject still is is evident as both Corbyn and McDonnell have agreed to be interviewed under caution by the Met as it investigates what it says was a coordinated effort by the march organisers to breach conditions imposed on the event. There have been ten charges of public order offences following arrests at the protest – and a large number of demonstrators are still in custody – a reminder of how events in Gaza resonate strongly with a large chunk of the left.
Relative to its “whatever it takes” position after 7 October, the official Starmer position has been a balancing act – evincing sympathy with the Palestinian cause, while not falling out with Netanyahu or phrasing criticism in any way which might get the UK off on the wrong foot with a new and volatile President. But fence-sitting is unlikely to be sustainable – real views on what happens will need to be embraced by the PM.
A successful cessation of hostilities in the Palestinian territories is likely to embolden the “Iran hawk” wing of the Trump administration, which would like to seize the moment of Tehran’s weakness to back Netanyahu’s wish to disrupt Iran’s nuclear weapons programme. It’s very likely Israel’s leader accepted the ceasefire on terms of increased US support against Iran getting the bomb – up to and prospectively including strikes on its nuclear facilities, which would require US military backing and diplomatic heft to succeed.
So Trump will soon be faced with setting a new direction on Iran to stop its enriched uranium programme. He might be able to prod Iran into a deal (Tehran relying on the “strategic partnership” signed with Russia earlier this week looks desperate, and Moscow has other wars to get on with).
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Read MoreBut if that fails, the possibility of major airstrikes on the rogue nuclear state may well loom sooner, not later. Britain, anxious to leverage trade and defence relationships in the Middle East from Saudi to Qatar and relentlessly targeted in cyber warfare and other black arts of espionage by Iran, will inevitably have to define – and refine – positions in this scenario.
For the next few weeks, the unfolding of the hostage releases and relative peace in Gaza will keep us holding our breath. We are not, however, near the end of this story in the big picture. It marks the beginning of an era where the choices will loom large and tepid formulations will look like evasions. Events in the Middle East have a diehard habit of echoing across the political battlefields of Britain – and soon at that.
Anne McElvoy is host of POLITICO’s Power Play podcast – daily this week from the World Economic Forum at Davos
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