Is Qatar the straw that breaks the camel’s back?

 

By James M. Dorsey

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Coming on the back of its merciless conduct of the Gaza war, Israel's targeting of Hamas leaders in Qatar, gathered to discuss a US ceasefire proposal, potentially is the straw that broke the camel's back.

For the first time in the war, condemnation of Israeli actions is unanimous, with the United States joining the choir in censoring Israel by endorsing a condemnatory United Nations Security Council statement.

Alongside a gathering gale of governmental and civil society efforts to sanction Israel, the US support for the Council's statement could prove to be more than words.

That is, if Donald Trump concludes that the attack on Qatar and Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's threat to strike again in the Gulf state, and possibly Turkey, constitutes an effort to sabotage the US president's endeavour to end the war.

Turkey this week denied involvement in an alleged foiled plot by a Turkey-based Hamas cell to assassinate ultra-nationalist Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, a particular bete noir of the international community.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio was scheduled to fly to Israel this weekend in part to establish whether Israel's attack on Gaza was intended to disrupt the ceasefire talks.

Few doubt that to be the case.

"The attack in Qatar cannot be divorced from the negotiations over the release of hostages and Netanyahu's obvious and repeated attempts to foil any progress," said journalist Amos Harel.

A State Department statement said Mr. Rubio would “convey America’s priorities in the Israel-Hamas conflict and broader issues concerning Middle Eastern security.”

Mr. Trump has repeatedly said he wants to see an end to the war and the release of Hamas-held hostages, abducted during the group's October 7, 2023, attack on Israel.

 

At the same time, Mr. Trump, responding to the Israeli attack, described “eliminating Hamas” as “a worthy goal.

Mr. Trump, beyond the fact that he doesn't take kindly to being crossed by others, is under pressure to demonstrate to the United States' allies in the Gulf that America is a reliable security ally rather than a partner in crime with Israel.

Moreover, Mr. Trump values winners. Israel's failure to kill any of Hamas's senior leaders in the Qatar strike and the subsequent universal condemnation of the attack don't rank Mr. Netanyahu as a winner. 

Even so, Mr. Trump appears unwilling to make Mr. Netanyahu understand that angering or crossing the president has consequences, even if much of the Israeli security establishment opposed his decision to attack Qatar.

The price for Mr. Trump's reluctance is likely to be accelerated talks with Gulf states aimed at securing more ironclad defence guarantees and provisions of what happens when the United States is perceived to be negligent in living up to its commitments.

The United States has long been negotiating defence arrangements with Saudi Arabia as part of a now moribund deal that would have involved the kingdom’s recognition of Israel.

In a first indication of the revival of such talks, Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani this week reportedly discussed tighter defence cooperation with the United States during a dinner in Washington with Mr. Trump, as well as earlier talks with Vice President JD Vance and Secretary Rubio.

Qatar hosts the largest US military base in the Middle East.

Qatari officials, including Mr. Al-Thani, have been careful not to assert that the United States was complicit in the Israeli attack and have stressed the two states’ close ties.

Credit: OpenSecrets

Funded by hundreds of millions of dollars, Qatar, the seventh-largest spender on lobbying in Washington, has built one of the US capital’s more influential foreign lobbies and has curried favour by investing in sports teams and Newsmax, an influential far-right, pro-Trump media outlet.

“This is an attack orchestrated by a megalomaniac who is leading a radical government in Israel. It has nothing to do with the United States,” said Majed al-Ansari, an advisor to Mr. Al-Thani and the Qatari foreign ministry’s spokesman.

Ironically, the Israeli attack may push Gulf states to adopt a more unified regional defence posture long advocated by the United States, involving a joint air and missile defence command.

Israel attacked Qatar as the Gulf state, alongside Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Jordan, among multiple others, participated in a joint two-week US-Egyptian exercise aimed at enhancing military interoperability and counterterrorism efforts.

The Gulf states are also likely to prioritise the development of a more robust regional military-industrial complex, building on existing Saudi and Emirati steps in that direction and a greater diversification of partners.

The UAE foreign ministry, in a rare rebuke of Israel that went beyond a public statement, summoned Israeli Ambassador Yossi Shelley to denounce what it called Israel’s “blatant and cowardly” attack.

Qatar and others are pressuring the UAE to withdraw its ambassador to Israel, if not break off diplomatic relations with the Jewish state.

A rupture in the diplomatic ties between Israel and the UAE, a driving force in the Arab establishment of relations and hitherto Israel’s best Arab friend, would be a blow for Mr. Trump’s projection of himself as a peacemaker.

Earlier, the UAE, following in the footsteps of several European countries, barred Israeli companies from participating in the Dubai Air Show, one of the largest aerospace exhibitions in the Middle East.

Similarly, Lana Nusseibeh, a senior UAE foreign ministry official, warned before the Israeli attack that Israeli plans to annex parts of the occupied West Bank would be a “red line” that would “betray the very spirit of the Abraham Accords.”

The accords, signed in a 2020 White House ceremony presided over by Mr. Trump, sealed the recognition of Israeli by the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, and Sudan.

In addition, Gulf states are likely to be more assertive in countering Israeli actions.

That could have repercussions for Emirati, Saudi, and Qatari pledges to invest some $US3.6 trillion in the United States in the coming years.

The three states could refrain from investing in US companies that contribute to the Israeli war effort, although that could be self-defeating given the breadth and depth of US military support for the Jewish state.

A less problematic approach would be for Gulf states to be more supportive of legal proceedings against Israel and its leaders in the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and the International Criminal Court, as well as legal complaints against Israeli politicians and military personnel in various countries.

States like Saudi Arabia have so far played a modest role in legal proceedings.

That could change with Qatar vowing that it would respond to the Israeli attack legally and diplomatically.

In doing so, Qatar would join numerous governmental, public, and civil society efforts signalling rejection of Israel’s refusal to end the Gaza war and resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with the creation of an independent Palestinian state.

Some of those initiatives may cause Israel further reputational damage and/or inconvenience Israeli nationals, others are likely to inflict varying degrees of pain. However, taken together, they amount to a gathering gale.

In some of the latest initiatives, the Netherlands this week joined Spain, Ireland, Slovenia, and Iceland in threatening to boycott next year’s Eurovision Song Contest if Israel were allowed to participate. Dutch broadcaster AVROTROS is one of the competition’s funders.

In a similar move, thousands of move industry workers, including actors and directors, pledged not to work with Israeli film institutions “implicated in genocide and apartheid against the Palestinian people.”

In Berlin, a human rights group filed a criminal complaint with the German Federal Public Prosecutor's Office against a German-born Israeli military sniper suspected of killing unarmed Palestinians in Gaza, which constitutes a war crime.

The complaint is based on a media investigation by several European news organizations, including The Guardian.

Israel's countering of sanctions and boycotts with similar measures of its own is a stillborn baby that weakens Israel rather than its targets.

With an economy driven by its cutting-edge technology sector, Israeli entrepreneurs are likely to pay the price for Communication Minister Shlomo Karhi's decision to cancel Israel's participation in Spain's Mobile World Congress, one of the foremost technology sector events focused on mobile technology, cellular networks, and smartphones.

Spain may not be a major supplier of arms to Israel, but can hit Israel in ways it will feel the pain.

This week, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez announced that Spain will ban Israel-bound ships and aircraft carrying weapons from calling at Spanish ports or entering Spanish airspace.

Spain controls the Strait of Gibraltar that connects the Atlantic Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea. Israeli vessels often dock at Spain’s Mediterranean ports – Algeciras, Valencia, and Barcelona, after passing through the Strait.

“The signal to…people everywhere in the world is not that this is futile and hopeless but that the sands are shifting and we can push this over the edge because that will be what gets Israel to a place where it has to reconsider its actions,” said Mr. Levy, the former peace negotiator.

Dr. James M. Dorsey is an Adjunct Senior Fellow at Nanyang Technological University’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, and the author of the syndicated column and podcast, The Turbulent World with James M. Dorsey.