Update from AIJAC

 

03/20 #04

After more than a year of political deadlock, Israeli looks headed for a national unity government under a deal that is reportedly close to being finalised between incumbent PM Binyamin Netanyahu and Blue and White party leader Benny Gantz. But Gantz’s Blue and White party has split as a result.

AIJAC’s Ahron Shapiro has a piece describing all the details of the dramatic events in the Knesset yesterday that brought this about, and providing the background to understand why it happened, and what it might mean for the future. He has also produced a brief video commentary, which you can see here.

However, this Update adds some additional analysis – as well as a sober analysis of how the coronavirus crisis is affecting Israel’s broad national security situation.

We lead with David Horovitz, editor of the Times of Israel, who explores why Benny Gantz – who has long vowed not to serve in a government led by Netanyahu as long as the latter is subject to a series of indictments for corruption – changed his mind. Gantz offered three reasons, Horovitz notes –  the coronavirus crisis, Israel’s year-long political deadlock, and the recent constitutional crisis in which the Speaker of the Knesset threatened to defy Israel’s Supreme Court. He also looks at why Gantz was unable to bring large sections of his Blue and White party with him into government and why two of the party’s other key leaders – Yair Lapid and Moshe Ya’alon – have rejected any deal, leading to a split in the party. For Horovitz’s insightful look at Gantz’s moral and political calculations in doing what he did,  CLICK HERE.

Next up is veteran Israeli journalist Shmuel Rosner, offering some perceptive short dot points on what has happened so far and what is likely to happen next. He looks at the calculations not only of Gantz, but of Netanyahu and Lapid as well, and at why the right-religious bloc ultimately proved more cohesive than the centre-left led by Blue and White. He concludes by noting that a unity government is what Israelis say they want and need – and for most of them, this is good news. For all of Rosner’s knowledgeable analysis,  CLICK HERE.

Finally, we bring you a long but very worthwhile exploration of how the coronavirus crisis has affected Israel’s national security situation written by Brig. Yossi Kuperwasser, a former military intelligence chief and top strategic analyst. Kuperwasser says most countries in the region are viewing the coronavirus crisis as merely a pause, and they intend to pick up where they left off when it is over. However, the economic damage may not make this possible, and the situation with regard to Iran especially may change unpredictably – with Iran suffering badly under the pandemic, but also likely to be largely liberated from international pressure and scrutiny while the world is focussed on the medical crisis. For all the details,  CLICK HERE.

Readers may also be interested in…

• More analysis of the thinking behind Gantz’s decision by political reporters Gil Hoffman and Lahav Harkov.
• A few days ago, veteran Australian Jewish leader Isi Leibler wrote a column strongly urging Gantz to agree to serve in a unity government headed initially by Netanyahu – as has now indeed happened.
• Perceptively explaining the nuances of the constitutional crisis between the Speaker of the Knesset and Israel’s High Court that led to the dramatic scenes in the Knesset yesterday –  and the split in Blue and White – is Haviv Rettig Gur of the Times of Israel. 
• Israeli think-tanker Neri Zilber explains Israel’s unique readiness to confront the coronavirus threat.
• A few days ago, the first-ever direct Israel-Australia flight landed in Perth. This El Al flight brought stranded Australians and New Zealanders home, and ferried stranded Israelis back to Israel.
• AIJAC’s Naomi Levin asks some tough questions about Australian aid to the Palestinians, in an article originally published in the Jewish News. 

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Gantz sees ‘opportunity’ in deal with Netanyahu; ex-allies fume: he’ll regret it

Blue and White leader opts for unity pact and aims to become prime minister 18 months from now, in a roller-coaster Israel where reality is changing by the day

By DAVID HOROVITZ 

Times of Israel, 26 March 2020

Benny Gantz at the Knesset on March 26, 2020, after being elected Knesset speaker. (Knesset)

“Every crisis brings opportunities,” the newly elected speaker of the Knesset, Benny Gantz, told his fellow MKs in his maiden speech to the house on Thursday evening, in the midst of a series of political developments extraordinary even for these dizzyingly unpredictable times.

The crisis to which Gantz was referring, he made clear, was threefold: The coronavirus pandemic which, he said, has left “all of humanity” shocked and vulnerable. The paralysis of Israeli governance, which has seen no fully functional coalition emerge from three successive elections in the past year. And the accompanying, escalating threat to Israel’s democracy and internal cohesion, exemplified, Gantz said, by former Knesset speaker Yuli Edelstein’s “spit in the face” of the country’s highest court, whose ruling on the imperative to elect a new speaker Edelstein simply rejected on Wednesday.

And the opportunities? Gantz was delivering an address as the new Knesset speaker, but, he said, he is simultaneously working to advance a “national emergency government” to grapple with all three crises. “While we’re fighting the coronavirus, we’ll advance unity,” he promised, “and build up democracy.”

Under the terms of the reportedly near-finalized deal, however, that emergency government will see Benjamin Netanyahu — the leader with whom Gantz vowed endlessly never to partner in government — retain the premiership for the next 18 months. Gantz, it is widely reported, will vacate the speaker’s chair as soon as the unity deal is done and become Israel’s foreign or defense minister, and is then supposed to take over from Netanyahu as prime minister in September 2021.

Still unsigned, Gantz’s imminent pact with Netanyahu, the man he entered politics to oust, has already cost the Blue and White leader his alliance with his partner in that mission, Yair Lapid. Now heading into the opposition, Lapid said shortly after Gantz made his speech that his former friend and ally was “crawling” into the “extremist and extortionist” government he had sworn to oppose, stealing the votes of Blue and White supporters and “giving them to Netanyahu.” By evening, other Blue and White sources opposed to Gantz’s move were sniping that he had “signed his political death warrant.”

And therein lies the colossal political gamble Gantz appears to be taking — the leap of faith that will determine whether this relative political neophyte has in fact utilized an opportunity or been subverted, if not devoured, by the immensely more experienced Netanyahu.

In a television interview on Saturday night, after he had issued one of his frequent appeals to Gantz since the March 2 election to join him in a unity coalition, Netanyahu, at the request of his interviewer, looked directly into the camera and promised that if Gantz signed the deal he was offering, then, in September 2021, he would indeed hand over the prime ministership — “with no tricks and no messing about.”

Lapid, who previously served as Netanyahu’s finance minister, and Moshe Ya’alon, Netanyahu’s long-time defense minister, do not believe Netanyahu for a moment, and thus they have already removed their respective Yesh Atid and Telem factions from the Blue and White alliance. Gantz, and his fellow former IDF chief of staff Gabi Ashkenazi, slated for a top ministerial job in the imminent alliance, are evidently more trusting.

In the meantime, the most challenging opposition Netanyahu has faced in a decade has collapsed. It was the members of Netanyahu’s 58-strong right-wing / ultra-Orthodox bloc who gave Gantz the votes to become speaker, and keep the unity talks on track, and who walked over to Gantz — as they trooped through the Knesset hall one at a time because of the virus restrictions — to congratulate him. The likes of Lapid, and of that other Netanyahu nemesis, Avigdor Liberman, didn’t even bother to show up to cast losing votes against the maneuver. Netanyahu has held his bloc together through three elections, in stark contrast to Gantz, who reportedly kept hitherto allied party leaders including Liberman (Yisrael Beytenu) and Nitzan Horowitz (Meretz) in the dark about his plans.

In the surreal, radically altered new political reality, Likud MK Yoav Kisch praised Gantz for his courage; Meretz MK Tamar Zandberg lamented, “What have you done, Benny Gantz?”

Yisrael Beytenu’s Avigdor Liberman (C) meets on March 10 with Blue and White leaders Benny Gantz (2L), Yair Lapid (2R), Gabi Ashkenazi (R) and Moshe Ya’alon (L) (Courtesy/Elad Malka)

Gantz’s presence in the speaker’s chair theoretically gives him some leverage. He can, theoretically, control parliament’s agenda. He can thus, theoretically, advance legislation his now collapsed alliance was backing until Wednesday designed to disqualify Netanyahu, an MK under indictment for corruption, from serving as prime minister. Gantz has also reportedly been moving to anchor in law the “rotation” of the prime minister 18 months from now — to ensure that Netanyahu cannot betray him.

But his abandoned allies cannot be relied upon now to save his skin if the deal with Netanyahu goes sour. Quite the reverse.

Ultimately, then, as a Channel 12 reporter summarized Thursday’s bombshell developments, “Gantz chose Netanyahu over Lapid,” and the chance of becoming prime minister 18 months from now in a potentially stable, widely supported government over ongoing deadlock.

Though 61 MKs recommended him as prime minister, and he was given 28 days by President Reuven Rivlin on March 16 to form a coalition, Gantz had no realistic path to a Blue and White-led government after the idea of an alliance with the mainly Arab Joint List proved unfeasible. He chose to avoid placing Israel on the path to yet fourth elections. Incomprehensibly to ex-allies like Lapid and Ya’alon, who accuse him of betraying his principles in an act of foolish egotism, he also chose to eschew the option of supporting a Netanyahu-led coalition from the outside during the pandemic.

With his opposition embarrassed, discredited, disunited and reduced, “Netanyahu can break out the champagne,” as a second Channel 12 reporter put it on Thursday evening.

‘Putting Israel first’

Gantz’s address from the speaker’s chair was full of the high-minded rhetoric that has come to characterize his oratory.

He spoke of a nation battered by the virus — the elderly “sitting isolated from their loved ones, fearing for their lives,” the hundreds of thousands who have lost their jobs, the young couples who cannot pay their mortgages and rent, the entire nation huddled in their homes.

And he spoke of a country divided politically — its democracy battered, huge sums spent on inconclusive elections, a public losing faith in its leaders, a real danger of civil war.

The public, he told the house, is “looking to us” to act responsibly, take care of them, protect them from both infection and anarchy.

Gantz said he was “putting Israel first” in heeding what he characterized as widespread public yearning for unity; indeed, it seems unlikely that he would have acted as he did were it not for the coronavirus crisis.

He swore he would not “forget the promises” he had made to voters who supported him, but then highlighted the imperative for compromise. “These are not normal days, and they require atypical decisions,” he said. “This is not the time for rivalries… and factionalism,” he declared. “It is a time for responsible, statesmanlike, patriotic leadership.”

In his hoped-for unity partnership, Gantz said, he would be able to “advance unity, to build up democracy… to sort out the checks and balances [between the branches of government] and remove from the agenda the notion of harming the courts and the state prosecution.”

“Together, we’ll get Israel out of crisis,” he vowed, sounding veritably prime ministerial.

Except, of course, Gantz is not prime minister. Not, barring the always possible unpredictable development, for at least 18 months.

That much we know. The rest, amid the roller-coaster of crises and opportunities, is conjecture.

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Israel Goes for Unity, Blue and White is No More

BY SHMUEL ROSNER 

Jewish Journal of Los Angeles, MAR 26, 2020

From left: Benny Gantz; Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (Photos by Amir Cohen/Reuters)

1.  Benny Gantz made his decision. Under the current circumstances it would be irresponsible to send Israel to a fourth election. His Blue and White partner, Yair Lapid, made a different decision. He still refuses to sit with Prime Minister Netanyahu in a government. The result: Blue and White is splitting after about a year of existence. Gantz, and his twenty Members of Knesset, will join Netanyahu’s government. Gantz will serve as Netanyahu’s deputy and Foreign Minister. His B&W fellow, General Gabi Ashkenazi, will be Defense Minister. The agreement says that after and year and a half, Gantz will replace Netanyahu and become the Prime Minister. The rest is commentary.

2. Good generals are the ones who have luck. Netanyahu was lucky. He used one crisis to solve another. And while beating the Coronavirus is beyond his ability, beating his rivals became possible. The people wanted unity, Gantz was out of real options.

3. So, what is Lapid’s game? He also used a crisis to solve a crisis. His crisis was personal: he wanted to be the alternative to Netanyahu but for the last year had to accept a less-than-ideal arrangement with Gantz. When the general joins Netanyahu, Lapid becomes the main leader of the opposition. He hopes to be there when the next round of elections materializes.

4. What is Netanyahu’s game? Who knows? The agreement with Gantz commits him to evacuate the PM’s office after a year and a half and let Gantz become the PM. Will this really happen? A year and a half is a long time, and Gantz, as the second-fiddler head of a party of twenty, does not have much leverage over the PM. Netanyahu might decide that Gantz is no longer a threat and that he no longer needs to keep his promise. He also might decide to evacuate the PM’s office and quit politics. In such case, the leaders of Likud could decide that the partnership with Gantz hurts them.

5. Ultimately, the [right-religious] bloc was more resilient than Blue and White. Why? Because it has a leader that no one dared challenge. And because it was ideologically coherent, while Blue and White was more about what’s not (Netanyahu) than about clear ideology.

6. The new coalition sends another important message to the public and to all politicians: it is probably still too early to dream about a coalition that includes the Arab Joint List. Gantz toyed with the idea, and that was his eventual undoing. The coalition did not materialize, and he realized that another round of election would be impossible for him to win – because this time he will have no way of telling the voters that an alliance with the Arabs is not his true intention.

7. A unity government is what Israelis want and need. In half a year, or a year, when things go back to normal, they might reconsider their position. But for now, when they are all preoccupied with a deadly virus, they have little patience for petty games of politics. So, for most of them, even those among them who can’t stand the PM, this is good news.

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The Significance of the Coronavirus Epidemic for Israel’s National Security

Brig.-Gen. (res.) Yossi Kuperwasser

Jerusalem Issue Brief,  Vol. 20, No. 4

Cumulative Confirmed Coronavirus Cases in the Middle East (Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus Resource Center)

• In spite of the potential for change that the pandemic creates, it seems that most players in the Middle East (who so far report limited damage) view it as just an imposed break and, right after it disappears, they intend to keep promoting their interests. The tensions between rival camps in the region and their attitude toward Israel are not expected to change.
• The most affected country in the region so far is Iran and there is the main potential for change. Many in Iran believe that the dangerous reality of corona is the result of the problematic conduct of the regime. Meanwhile, the regime tries to blame the U.S. and is presenting its support for terrorist elements as useful in the fight against corona. Thus, the Iranians showed Hizbullah members from Lebanon disinfecting the streets of Qom.
• The possibility of beginning negotiations with the U.S. on a new nuclear agreement from the point of weakness in which the regime currently finds itself is not on the agenda. Yet if it becomes clear to the regime that all other avenues of action have failed and public anger threatens to explode, it may have no choice but to consider even this possibility.
• The Palestinian issue is completely pushed aside. The focus on the U.S. peace plan is frozen. Even if there is an increase in cooperation with the Palestinian Authority stemming from a joint interest in the fight against the virus, it is doubtful if this will have any impact on Palestinian positions regarding the conflict.
• The enormous economic damage and the blow to the idea of globalization as an organizing principle of the international system may deepen the responsibility of each country to deal by itself with the virus and later with the need for economic revival, that will likely take time. The economic recession, the potential for growing tension between the U.S. and China, and the impact on the results of the U.S. elections may affect Israel’s national security interests.
• The tension between the need to invest in the military or in health to guarantee national security and the international economic crisis may put pressure on the military budget and affect its ability to implement long-term plans.
• One clear way for Israel to deal with the new and complex challenges arising in the aftermath of the coronavirus epidemic is to invest in the advancement of responses to the virus and to thereby expedite its contribution as a center of scientific research to the security of the West and the U.S.

The corona epidemic is paralyzing the whole world, together with most of the Middle East. Except for Iran, where the number of those infected and dead is very high, the rest of the states in the region are reporting a relatively low number of infected and dead (these reports are not considered reliable). However, most have taken different degrees of steps to protect themselves. In those places where there is civil war (Syria, Yemen, Libya and Sinai), their attention is focused on the war and corona is secondary on their agenda.

Immediate Regional Consequences of the Coronavirus Crisis

An additional significant and direct consequence of the crisis on the region is the steep drop in oil prices and, although recovered a bit, they are still at a very low level. In relation to this, the damage to Iran is especially severe as its foreign currency reserves are lower than other oil exporters, its needs are greater, and it suffers from American sanctions which are getting harsher.

Some additional consequences worthy of note at this stage are:

1. Even though at this stage the damage done to the Palestinians by the coronavirus is limited (according to official reports), the Palestinian issue has been pushed completely aside. The focus on the U.S. peace plan is frozen, both because of corona and also because of the political situation in Israel. In addition, the epidemic has forced the Palestinians to cooperate with Israel in dealing with it. A joint operations room has been established. Steps were taken to allow vital Palestinian workers, including those in construction, to continue to work in Israel and in Israeli towns in the West Bank, as the PA imposed a closure.Parallel to this, there has been a huge drop in Palestinian activity against Israel, especially from Gaza, that began with understandings that had been reached prior to the crisis, but whose implementation by Hamas now appears more likely, as long as the corona situation in Gaza does not get dire and the Qatari funds keep coming.The Palestinian Authority tried to take advantage of Israeli goodwill by requesting money being held by Israel, according to the law requiring the deduction of payments to the PA in response to its payment of salaries of terrorists. Israel responded to the request in the negative.
2. Together with this, certain Palestinians are leading delegitimization campaigns against Israel. In spite of Israel looking out for the Palestinians, they are portraying Israel as if it is trying to harm them. They are spreading lies that Palestinian prisoners are being infected by or exposed to corona (even the PA has denied this as false) and are demanding their release, and spreading blood libels as if Israel and the U.S. are responsible for corona.
3. In Iraq and Lebanon, corona has removed the popular protest against Iran from the main agenda, even though many believe that the spread of the disease to these states began with Iran, which didn’t take the necessary timely steps to stop the spread of the disease from the religious center of Qom, through the Revolutionary Guards, to certain Shiites from Iraq and Lebanon who are closest to Iran (though it is hard to ascertain the veracity of this claim).
4. Also, international terror, which ideologically originates in the Middle East, seems to be frozen for the time being, mainly because travel limitations make it more difficult to implement terror attacks.
5. Beneath the smokescreen of the epidemic, the U.S. is proceeding to implement its plans to limit its presence and the deployment of its forces in the region, especially in Iraq. Within this framework, the Americans have limited their presence on a number of bases close to the Iraq-Syria border. In general, this step could make it easier for Iran and its allies to use the Al-Qa’im-Abu Kamal border crossing for the purpose of moving troops and military materiel to Syria and to Hizbullah. Russia, which is influenced less from corona and more from the drop in oil prices as a result of a dispute with Saudi Arabia, is taking advantage of the lack of attention in order to strengthen the Assad regime at the expense of Turkey.

The Impact on Iran

Iran is the arena getting the most attention. The inability of the regime to respond effectively to the crisis has brought it to a low point in its standing at home and in the region. This comes against the background of the increasing cost of the American sanctions, the implementation of financial sanctions by the international Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the consequences of the elimination of Quds Force commander Gen. Soleimani and the limited reaction to it, the embarrassment of the downing of the Ukrainian plane, and the memory of the November 2019 demonstrations after the increase in gas prices. As if all this was not enough, corona has infected a number of Iranian officials and has also weakened the regime’s standing.

Members of a medical team spray disinfectant to sanitise outdoor area of the Imam Reza shrine following the coronavirus outbreak in Mashhad, Iran, February 27, 2020. (West Asia News Agency via Reuters)

Many in Iran believe that the dangerous reality of corona is the result of the problematic conduct of the regime (not stopping flights from China in time, not closing the educational institutions, the neglect of the health system). The regime is trying to leverage the occasion to create solidarity among the Iranian people which will enable it to moderate the criticism directed against the leadership. To do this it is striving to convince the public that it is not responsible for their distress and at the same time convince the U.S. and the international community to come to their aid. Along this line, Iran is acting in a number of directions:

1. Blaming the U.S. and the sanctions against Iran. The Iranians claim that the sanctions prevent them from acquiring medications and medical equipment. The U.S. denies these false claims, but the regime continues in its efforts to sell them to the public and the international community. At the same time, Washington is offering medical help but Iran refuses to accept it.
2. Presenting their investment in the strengthening of their regional standing and support for terrorist elements as useful in the fight against corona. Thus, the Iranians showed Hizbullah members from Lebanon disinfecting the streets of Qom, as directed by Hassan Nasrallah, the head of the organization. All this is in reaction to the American claim that the regime prefers to invest in helping terrorist elements instead of using its money to improve the Iranian medical system.
3. Promoting actions against the U.S. in Iraq through allies there. The killing of two American soldiers and a British soldier brought about a strong American reaction against the bases of one of the pro-Iranian militias (Kataib Hezbollah), which resulted also in the killing of several Iranians.
4. Turning to the International Monetary Fund to request $5 billion in aid. Reasonably, the U.S. will agree to give medical equipment and aid but not money.
5. On the other hand, Iran freed an American prisoner for medical reasons and handed over a French prisoner in order to free an Iranian who was jailed in France and was going to be handed over to the U.S. This was done, of course, in the hope to prepare the ground for Washington and Paris to be willing to agree to Iran’s requests.

World Responses to Iran

So far, the U.S. has denied Iran’s requests, especially since in the meantime Iran has increased its enrichment rate of uranium beyond what is allowed according to the nuclear agreement. Moreover, Iran is not allowing the inspectors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) access to suspicious sites that the organization asked to check as a result of information that arose from the nuclear archives that Israel brought out of Tehran two years ago. (Moreover, the activity of the inspectors has been reduced due to the spread of corona in Iran).

In the meantime, the U.S. at this time is holding back from taking far-reaching action against Iran, particularly the option of requesting the Security Council’s implementation of the “snapback” sanctions provisions, the significance of which is the cancellation of the nuclear deal. Also, the Europeans (Britain, France and Germany), who are now busy dealing with corona, are holding back from taking measures against Iran, following their activation of the dispute resolution mechanism in the nuclear agreement after IAEA reports on Iranian actions. It seems that the U.S. is not interested in appearing like someone taking advantage of the crisis and that, from the beginning, the Europeans had no intention of pressuring Iran.

For Regional Conflicts, This Is Just a Time-Out

In any case, at this time, dealing with corona has not brought any change in the camps which make up the region and are fighting over the extent of their control and over regional hegemony. They include the radical Shiite axis led by Iran; the pragmatic Sunni camp in which Saudi Arabia plays a central role; the realistic radical Sunni camp led by Turkey, Qatar and the Muslim Brotherhood; and the ultra-radical Sunni camp led by the Islamic State and al-Qaeda.

Except for the danger that the epidemic can create for the stability of the Iranian regime, it does not look like it will lead to a regional change. The potential for this happening could occur in the future if the epidemic widens and especially if some of the leaders are infected by corona (some are in the endangered group).

Moreover, all of the parties are maintaining their worldviews and are not showing any tendency to compromise in light of the epidemic and the need for everyone to fight together against the threat that nature has created. Even though in the West one hears voices like this, even if their weight is very limited, in the Middle East, against the background of the corona pandemic, there is no attempt to bring up new ideas and it is considered a period of time-out, whose extent is not known, until every party renews its striving towards its aims.

The International  Impact

Unlike the Middle East, in the international arena there is a serious potential for greater change in a number of directions that may impact on Israel:

1. The enormous economic damage and the blow to the idea of globalization as an organizing principle of the international system may deepen the responsibility of each country to deal by itself with the virus and later with the need for economic revival, that will likely take time.
2. The crisis has highlighted the clear lack of international leadership. The UN and its institutions, and the leadership in the U.S., Russia, and China, did not even attempt to seek such a stance. The EU, as well, played no part and left each state to depend on its own resources to deal with the virus and its consequences.
3. The standing of U.S. President Trump was harmed because of the complacency that he displayed at the beginning of the fight against the virus and because of the massive damage to the American economy. The presidential election, that seemed to be favoring Trump, now seems to be wide open as it appears that opposing Trump will be Joe Biden, who represents an outlook more acceptable to middle America than his opponent for the Democratic nomination, Bernie Sanders.
4. Relations between the U.S and China, which prior to the crisis were problematic but were being dealt with in the framework of commercial talks and were characterized by a degree of trust between the leaders of the two countries, have been seriously harmed and are now characterized by growing tension. This is due to a growing American feeling that the situation report that it received from China regarding the strength of the epidemic was intentionally erroneous and resulted in serious damage to Americans and to President Trump, while China is recovering before everyone else from the epidemic and is returning to normal in stages.

Possible Impact on Israel

Israel’s Magen David Adom emergency services preparing for the coronavirus crisis in Israel

The implications for Israel derived from the pandemic will be influenced by the continuation of the crisis, the intensity of the damage to life, and the extent of the economic damage in Israel, in the region, and in the international system, all of which are unmeasurable and unpredictable for now:

1. At this point, the chances of a major change in relations between Israel and other active players in the Middle East are low. Cooperation in the fight against the coronavirus with the camp of pragmatic Sunni states may speed up the process of normalization in the future, but in the Palestinian realm, even if there is an increase in cooperation with the Palestinian Authority stemming from a joint interest in the fight against the virus, it is doubtful if this will have any impact on Palestinian positions regarding the conflict. It is likely that the Palestinians will try to take advantage of Trump’s possible difficulties to increase their efforts to remove the U.S. peace plan from the agenda.
2. As long as there is no serious change in the death rate in Gaza or the Palestinian Authority, the scope of Palestinian violence and terror is not expected to change. A widespread outbreak of the virus, particularly in Gaza, and delays in the transfer of financial aid from Qatar to Gaza, could lead to the government there to seek to direct the public’s anger toward Israel and, as a result, the extent of the violence could increase.
3. The Iranian regime, as noted, has reason to be seriously worried, at this point, from the implications of the virus. If they fail in their efforts to take advantage of the crisis to reduce the international pressure and to create internal public unity in support of steps to fight the coronavirus, this is likely to increase the regime’s focus on achieving the ability to produce nuclear weapons and to renew its efforts to harm the U.S. and its allies, including Israel, in order to improve the chances of the success of its policies.Evidence of this can already be seen in Iran’s increased efforts to produce enriched uranium, its increased actions against the U.S. in Iraq, and in its thwarted attempts to attack Israel from the Golan Heights using Hizbullah. Israel must continue its vigilance and preparedness in order to thwart additional attacks. If the efforts of the regime fail, it may happen that at some point public protest in Iran, which has been dampened in part by fears of contagion, may reawaken, which would result in greater danger to the regime’s stability.The possibility of beginning negotiations with the U.S. on a new nuclear agreement from the point of weakness in which the regime currently finds itself is not on the agenda. Yet if it becomes clear to the regime that all other avenues of action have failed and public anger threatens to explode, it may have no choice but to consider even this possibility.
4. Harm to the core of the senior leadership could lead to instability, whose characteristics are difficult to predict at this time, in nearly all of the states in the region.
5. Developments in the international order, in general, and in the U.S., in particular, may present Israel with new and more complex challenges as they deal with the virus and its aftermath. With the growing tension between China and the U.S. and fears of the weakening of Trump’s standing ahead of the November elections, if the U.S. fails in dealing successfully with the epidemic, this will require Israel to display greater sensitivity to the possible implications for international and American support for Israel. One of the clear ways to deal with these implications is for Israel to invest in the advancement of responses to the virus and to thereby expedite its contribution as a center of scientific research to the security of the West and the U.S.
6. Finally, the unprecedented economic implications, and the diplomatic implications, are likely to complicate Israel’s ability to provide for the full needs of its security services. The enlistment of Israel’s security and intelligence services to assist in the national effort against the coronavirus is essential and important, and illustrates the priorities that need to be set, particularly in a country that must face continuing threats. But the coronavirus epidemic will require a long-term shifting of greater resources to the field of health. The question that arises is: What is the correct balance and what level of preparedness is necessary to deal with such epidemics?