Israel: The Cost of Arrogance

Israel has been dealt three serious blows in recent weeks: one Turkish, one Egyptian and one Palestinian. All came in response to characteristically arrogant Israeli behaviour.

The Turkish government expelled the Israeli ambassador, withdrew its own envoy and external pagesuspendedcall_made military cooperation with Israel in response to Israel’s refusal to apologize for killing Turkish solidarity activists on the “freedom flotilla”. Egyptians external pagestormedcall_made the Israeli embassy in Cairo and forced out the ambassador and his staff in response to Israel’s refusal to apologize for external pagekillingcall_made Egyptian soldiers on the Sinai border. The Palestinians defied all Israeli and American pressures to prevent them from pursuing a vote at the meeting of the United Nations General Assembly that would external pagerecognizecall_madePalestine as a full member-state (see Victor Kattan, " external pagePalestinian statehood: a turning-pointcall_made", 6 July 2011).

Into the depths

In the first two cases, with Turkey and Egypt, Israeli officials have declared that they want no further “escalation” and sought to contain the fallout of Turkish and Egyptian anger. In the Palestinian external pagecasecall_made, Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu is making a final bid by external pageofferingcall_made to meet the Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas in New York at the United Nations meetings. The strident threats mouthed by foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman towards Turks, Egyptians and the Palestinians are less than worthy.

The true Israeli position is alarmed and external pagedefensivecall_made for the first time in years. It was spelled out in Netanyahu’s remarks after the sacking of the embassy in Egypt. His remarks reflect the extent of Israel’s anxiety about the transformative external pageeffectcall_made of the collapse of Hosni Mubarak’s rule and the outbreak of the Arab revolutions on the regional strategic environment, now accompanied by losing a long-time strategic ally, Turkey (see Thomas O'Dwyer, "external pageIsrael and the Arab awakeningcall_made", 9 March 2011).

To date, Israeli policy and strategy have been underpinned by a doctrine of political and military deterrence aimed at preserving the image of an all-powerful and unchallengeable Israel. Whenever it has felt under regional or international pressure to alter its behavior, Israel has lashed out violently and unremittingly to thwart it. Thus when the Arab states put forward the Arab peace external pageinitiativecall_made at the Beirut summit in 2002 - offering their collective recognition of Israel in exchange for its recognition of a Palestinian state within the external page1967call_made borders - Ariel Sharon, the then Israeli prime minister, responded by attacking the Gaza strip.

Any military action carried out by any Palestinian faction has invariably been met with massive and devastating Israeli military retribution. This Israeli doctrine of deterrence extends to the entire region, and to anything that Israel may deem to constitute a potential future threat, however slight - such as when it bombed the Syrian nuclear facility in 2007 (see Paul Rogers, "external pageIsrael's security complexcall_made", 28 July 2011).

There is a long list of Israeli political and military actions over the years that go external pagebeyondcall_made any conventional definition of “deterrence” to reach the heights of presumption, conceit and arrogance. Regional and international conditions have allowed and enabled Israel to get away with such behavior. Arab weakness tempted successive Israeli governments to vie with each other over how aggressive and extreme they could be - in the process external pageturningcall_made domestic Israeli politics into a contest between the right and the far-right (see Colin Shindler, " external pageIsrael's rightward shift: a history of the presentcall_made ", 23 February 2009).

Mubarak’s Egypt was a “strategic treasure” - as Israeli officials have described it - in this regard, acting to stifle any official or popular Arab attempt to stand up to Israel. Israeli outrages were routinely met with Arab inaction. There were several incidents in which the Israelis killed Egyptian soldiers on the border, but the Mubarak regime never reacted in any deterring manner, let alone demanded an apology or expelling the ambassador.

Nothing better illustrated the depths to which Egypt and the Arabs had sunk than the arrangement to external pagesellcall_made Egyptian natural gas to Israel at below the market-price. The fortune squandered in that corrupt deal could have gone a long way to offsetting the annual US aid which Washington external pageusescall_made to hold Egyptian foreign policy hostage. On the international front, meanwhile, the protection of the United States in particular and the West in general allowed, and continues to allow, Israel to persist with its aggressive and arrogant behavior with external pageimpunitycall_made and disregard all sources of criticism - including international public opinion (see Avi Shlaim, " external pageIsrael at 60: the 'Iron Wall' Revisitedcall_made", 8 May 2008).

The agent of change

But things have begun to external pagemovecall_made. A line is being drawn beneath the era when Israel could treat its Arab and other neighbors, government and peoples alike, with contempt. At the level of Arab region, the external pagedemisecall_made of the Mubarak regime was the big game-changer. But that is not the only factor in the equation. Even those governments that external pageremaincall_made in power will now have to rethink their relations with and attitudes to Israel in the light of the region-wide assertion of people power. The Arab external pagerevolutionscall_made have torn external pagedowncall_made the barrier that used to insulate the conduct of official policy towards Israel from public opinion. This used to be the exclusive preserve of dictatorial regimes. They alone took the decisions with little regard for their peoples’ views.

Egypt and Jordan’s peace external pagetreatiescall_made with Israel, in 1979 and 1994 respectively, were signed at the whim of rulers who lacked any democratic or popular legitimacy. The same goes for the diplomatic ties, both covert and open, that several Arab regimes, from Mauritania to Qatar, have forged with Israel. The external pageinvasioncall_made of the Israeli embassy in Cairo is a turning-point which dramatically illustrates the nature of the change that is external pageoccurringcall_made: from an era in which Israel was protected by the official Arab order, to an era of confrontation with the Arab peoples themselves - and of payback for decades of arrogant and contemptuous treatment of those peoples.

The key agent of this change in the external pagewidercall_made region is Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Turkey. The Turkey that toed the NATO line and maintained strong strategic and military relations with Israel is radically external pageredefiningcall_made itself and its role, and seeking to become a leading player in the region - an understandable aspiration given the tempting leadership external pagevacuumcall_made on the Arab side. Turkey has become increasingly tough in standing up to Israeli excesses in recent years, and Israel has accelerated this process with its disdainful treatment of its former ally (see Kerem Oktem, "external pageTurkey and Israel: ends and beginningscall_made", 10 December 2009).

But Turkey’s regional role and influence go beyond its own external pagepolicycall_made or national interests and strategic ambitions. More importantly - and more external pagedangerouslycall_made for Israel - it also provides a model for others in the region to follow. They too can refuse to acquiesce to Israeli high-handedness and opt to hit back instead. Turkey has raised the bar for all the Arab governments where their dealings with Israel are concerned. And Israel has only itself to blame.