What Might a President Harris Do on Israel?

Today on TAP: A different course on the Middle East is urgently needed, and harder than you might think.

by

I’ve been critical of President Biden for letting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu brutalize Gazan civilians, permit the stealing of Palestinian land in the West Bank, and make a fool of Biden by repeatedly changing the terms of what kind of regional deal he might accept. I’ve also been cautiously hopeful that a President Harris, who at least has indicated greater sympathy for Palestinians as human beings and as a people with legitimate aspirations for statehood, might take a tougher line with Israel once she is in office.

I’m also mindful of the fact that during the campaign, with Trump posing as a slavish friend of Israel and Netanyahu in effect trying to elect Trump, Harris can’t signal anything of the kind. And conversations with knowledgeable people who favor a tougher U.S. line with Netanyahu in service of a regional settlement have persuaded me that this will be exceedingly difficult to pull off.

More from Robert Kuttner

Suppose a Harris administration gave Netanyahu a kind of ultimatum: First, cease the bombing of Gaza and finally consummate the proposed and perennially delayed hostage exchange. Second, get serious about negotiating the regional deal that has supposedly been on the table, in which the anti-Iran powers, notably Saudi Arabia, normalize relations with Israel. This would be in exchange for an end to the assaults on Gaza and some kind of two-state solution, presumably involving some kind of “reconstituted Palestinian Authority,” as an alternative to Hamas.

As leverage, the United States could threaten to stop supplying offensive weapons to Israel. Washington could pause shipments, incrementally, if Israel refused to go along. And if this still didn’t work, the U.S. and other regional powers could negotiate the deal without Israel’s participation, and then demand that Israel accept it as a condition of U.S. aid. Variations on this approach have been discussed in various quarters.

But consider the practical challenges. For starters, there is the practical question of who would administer Gaza. Many people with more knowledge than I consider the premise of a reconstituted Palestinian Authority to be a fantasy. Likewise the idea of Gaza being administered by neighboring Arab states.

Hamas would not go quietly, and neither would Netanyahu. To accept anything remotely like this deal, which would also have to include the end of Israeli settler terrorism in the West Bank, would be the end of the Netanyahu government. That may need to be a tacit U.S. objective, but making it happen is another story.

And as soon as a President Harris tried to get seriously tough with Netanyahu, AIPAC and the rest of the U.S. Israel lobby would go into high gear and paint her as an antisemite and cause Congress to resist. Many moderate American Jews would be alarmed.

So even if Harris’s goals on Israel-Palestine are preferable to Biden’s, there is only so much that she can do. It will take a biblical miracle for the current mess to morph into a regional settlement with the long-sought two-state solution. The beginning of that miracle has to be the exit of Netanyahu.

You can count on the Prospect, can we count on you?

There's no paywall here. Your donations power our newsroom as we report on ideas, politics and power — and what’s really at stake as we navigate another presidential election year. Please, become a member, or make a one-time donation, today. Thank you!