Preet Bharara:

From CAFE and the Vox Media Podcast Network, welcome to Stay Tuned. I’m Preet Bharara.

Richard Haass:

I actually think there’s something of a debate or conversation going on inside Israel, inside the government, and more broadly, within Israeli society about what the definition is of winning here, what the war aim should be.

Preet Bharara:

That’s Richard Haass, a veteran diplomat. He’s currently President Emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations after having led the nonpartisan think tank for two decades. Haass is the author of over a dozen books, including his most recent, The Bill of Obligations: The 10 Habits of Good Citizens. After serving in the US Defense and State Departments, Haass played a pivotal role in negotiating a monumental peace treaty in Northern Ireland in 2013. This earned him the Tipperary International Peace Award. Haass joins me to discuss the Israel-Hamas war and the potential pass to a resolution. That’s coming up. Stay tuned. Now, let’s get to your questions.

Q&A

This question comes in an email from Mark, who writes, “Dear Preet, It has come to light that former President Trump predictably violated the limited gag order imposed by Judge Engoron on October 3rd in the civil fraud case. Recent reporting has shown that a $5,000 fine was imposed when it was discovered that Trump’s campaign website continued to post disparaging accusations about one of Judge Engoron’s law clerks. Why did it take the court almost three weeks to make this discovery? Doesn’t this failure of oversight undermine public confidence in the rule of law going forward in a swift and competent manner? As always, I love your show and appreciate the weekly education that I, a layperson, receive about the many facets of the law that would otherwise remain unclear. Many thanks, Mark.”

Well, Mark, thank you for your well-crafted and reasonable question or set of questions. So, people may remember that the judge was very unhappy, that disparaging material about one of his court staff was posted on Truth Social and he demanded in connection with his limited gag order that no such postings should remain. It turns out that Trump and his team took down the post from social media, but left it up on their campaign website. As to your question, why did it take the court three weeks to make the discovery? I don’t know. It’s not really the court’s responsibility necessarily to be checking all the places in which something that was contrary to an order might still exist and should be taken down. That’s the responsibility of Donald Trump. That’s the responsibility of his lawyers. It’s the responsibility of his team.

This next question is also about a gag order, but a different gag order. It’s hard to keep track of all these things. There are four criminal cases against Donald Trump. There are multiple civil cases against Donald Trump and they’re also, if you’re paying attention to the statistics, two gag orders pending against Donald Trump as well. This question comes from Reno who asks, “Hi Preet. Can you explain why Judge Chutkan temporarily froze her gag order on Trump? How does that work?” So, you’ll recall, just to keep this straight, Judge Chutkan presides over the matter pending the District of Columbia, the criminal case brought by Jack Smith, the special counsel at DOJ in connection with January 6th. And you’ll recall in that case that there was a heated discussion court proceeding in which the judge was talking about issuing a limited gag order about what Donald Trump could and could not say in the lead up to that trial.

So, Judge Chutkan does not want witnesses to be intimidated essentially, and tried to come out with a somewhat difficult balance of what Donald Trump can and cannot say going forward so as not to prejudice the public or intimidate witnesses. And the problem with that is it’s complicated. So, Trump is not allowed to criticize or attack witnesses, potential witnesses at the trial. But it turns out one of the potential witnesses at trial is Mike Pence, who is not only a potential witness at trial, but also one of Donald Trump’s adversaries. So, that becomes complicated. She’s also drawn a somewhat fine line in other respects as well.

In her limited gag order, Judge Chutkan said Donald Trump cannot attack Jack Smith and criticize and disparage Jack Smith, but can criticize to some degree the Department of Justice for which Jack Smith works. So, it’s quite a balancing act. It’s difficult, it’s complicated. It has to take into account the First Amendment rights of a person who is running for president, probably going to get the nomination on the Republican side versus trying to have a fair trial, intimidation free. So, what’s the reason for the freeze? The reason for the freeze, or the pause is that the Trump team, as is its right, has appealed the gag order to the DC Circuit Court of Appeals and has asked the court, Judge Chutkan’s court to pause and wait until the higher court, the Court of Appeals makes a decision.

So, given what’s at stake, given the nature of the dispute, given the fact that there’s an appeal pending at the higher court, I think it was the judicious and proper thing to do for Judge Chutkan to, as you have said, to temporarily freeze the gag order and we’ll see what the Circuit Court of Appeals has to say, but I expect some version of a gag order to remain in place. It may be modified, it may be altered to some degree, even though it’s a complicated thing to do given the circumstances as I’ve described. But probably, some version of a gag order will survive and then it will go into effect most likely after the DC Circuit Court makes its decision. I’ll be right back with my conversation with Richard Haass.

THE INTERVIEW

The Israel-Hamas war has entered its third week. Foreign policy expert, Richard Haass joins me to discuss the state of play in Israel, Gaza, and the rest of the region. Richard Haass, welcome to the show.

Richard Haass:

Good to be with you.

Preet Bharara:

I should timestamp this because events keep unfolding at a rapid pace. You and I are having this conversation on Tuesday, October 24th at the end of the business day in the 4:00 P.M. hour. So, lots of things are in flux. The last thing I saw before I walked into my little podcast room in Manhattan was that Gaza says that its healthcare system is on the verge of collapse. And understanding that all this is very fluid, what’s your best sense of what it is like in Gaza at the moment?

Richard Haass:

Well, the baseline was never good to begin with. Gaza is one of the more densely packed real estate on the planet earth. I haven’t checked the per capita income levels, but they have been extremely low. A lot of people are dependent upon the work of international relief agencies. So, you began with an impoverished population. Hamas is not known for its economic leadership. And now, on top of that, you’ve got a full-fledged conflict or a near full-fledged conflict. And it’s involved both in this case now retaliatory attacks by Israel from the air thus far, for now, some two weeks. And there’s been elements of cutoff of Gaza from the outside for things like fuel, food, and the like.

So, whatever the situation was to begin with, which again was anything but good, now, it’s significantly minus from that. So, I would assume for a lot of Gaza, it’s fairly miserable. Stockpiles such as they were have been drawn down. So, I would think that a lot of the area, and we’re talking about 2 million plus people, is running short of the basics and this includes hospitals, schools, homes, you name it.

Preet Bharara:

And how do you think, to begin with, Israel’s closest allies are thinking about the situation that you’ve described in Gaza at the moment?

Richard Haass:

I’ll speak about this closest ally, the United States. I think there’s some slight differences with Europe, but the United States is by orders of magnitude, Israel’s closest partner and ally, and tremendous sympathy for Israel given what happened on October 7th, support for the obligation on the part of Israel to retaliate, to reinforce the norm that terrorists cannot act with impunity, total understanding given our own experience, say with 9/11. But as President Biden has pointed out on more than one occasion, also concern for Palestinian lives, for non-combatants, for civilians, both for humanitarian reasons, but also for political reasons.

Because there’s an understanding that if the world sees that a lot of Palestinian civilians are suffering, either as a result of, however unintended, getting hurt by aerial attacks or by the cutoff of some of the necessities of life, pressures will grow enormously in the UN Security Council and elsewhere for a ceasefire. It’ll also create all sorts of political and diplomatic problems for the United States, which is obviously seen around the world as Israel’s biggest benefactor. So, there’s a tension. On one hand, the United States supports Israel’s right and again, obligation, duty to respond militarily against Hamas, but the United States wants Israel to respond in ways that make a distinction between Hamas and the people of Gaza.

And as if that were not complicated enough, there’s also the fate of the hostages. So, there’s just lots of tensions here in Israeli policy and US policy towards whatever Israel may do.

Preet Bharara:

So, let’s talk about one of the most basic things. What are Israel’s goals? Is it to defeat Hamas, degrade Hamas, some other goal? And how do you compare what their goals are to what they should be?

Richard Haass:

It’s the right question, and I don’t think there’s a clear answer to it as yet. Indeed. I actually think there’s something of a debate or conversation going on inside Israel, inside the government, and more broadly within Israeli society about what the definition is of winning here, what the war aim should be. And you mentioned two words. One is to degrade Hamas, which is a gray area. It could mean a lot of things, which is something fundamentally different and less than say, eliminating Hamas or rooting out Hamas. So, the vocabulary on the Israeli side has been more towards eliminate, but it’s not clear to the likes of me that is possible.

And even if it were to be possible in the physical or military sense, it would be extraordinarily costly to the Israeli military. Lots of lives would be lost, more hostages would be taken. It would obviously be extraordinarily costly for the people of Gaza. And it doesn’t answer the question of what you would do the morning after. How would you create a legitimate acceptable political authority that could take the place of Hamas, which has been ruling Gaza for just over 15 years? So, I have doubts about the large definition of Israeli goals.

But my own sense is the Israelis are debating it, that along with the concern about hostages might be the reason that as of this afternoon, they’ve held off and obviously the Biden administration has been pressing them to think more modestly, to think twice before doing something large on the ground in a very populated urban environment. So, as of October 24th at 4:00 P.M. that is very much probably the biggest single open question because all sorts of other ramifications, I believe, would follow on the answer to wherever the Israelis come out there.

Preet Bharara:

You said a second ago that there’s a conversation, a debate going on within Israel and the Israeli government. Can we talk about the standing such as it is of Netanyahu, who is a controversial figure who came under great criticism for his attempts at “judicial reform?” What’s his standing at the moment? Will there be reckoning with respect to a perceived failure of intelligence and anticipation? What is his position, his standing, and how is that interacting with how he’s dealing with the situation?

Richard Haass:

His standing right now is at the center of what you might call two currents. One is there’s a crisis, an enormous crisis. Clearly the greatest crisis in Israel for 50 years since the October ’73 war. And there’s a rally round the flag quality to life there. All these reservists who during the democracy protests said they would never answer a call-up. Every single one of them, as best I can tell has answered the call-up. Israelis have come together over this and Bibi Netanyahu, Prime Minister Netanyahu leads an expanded government and he’s still the prime minister. So, there’s all that, but, and it’s a big but, he is personally held accountable by many Israelis for the failure of October 7th, which was both an intelligence failure but also a defense policy failure.

The idea that readiness was so low that even if the intelligence was to some extent missed, either because it wasn’t collected or wasn’t analyzed correctly, the idea that Israelis were so poorly prepared for what hit them. Israelis feel truly let down by the state. In some ways, the most they’ve ever felt let down in their history. The time for reckoning is not now because this is still an unfolding crisis. And the question is, how is Israel going to respond? The time for it will be when the crisis passes, when the dust settles, and then you’ll have Commissions of Inquiry and you’ll have, whether it’s out of the Knesset or independent commissions, and you will have a reckoning with what happened.

That said, obviously the mood or the context of that reckoning will depend not just upon the facts, what happened at that time, what was known, what was done and all that, but also what happened since. What are the effects of whatever Israel decided? What you and I were just talking about a few minutes ago, whatever Israel decides to do, how effective, how successful is that scene? And that, my guess is, that will also affect the nature of that day of reckoning, but it will surely come. There were such inquiries after the ’73 war and after Lebanon and so forth. Israel has a powerful rule of law tradition.

So, that day will come. What Bibi Netanyahu is clearly hoping is that when it comes, his own position is stronger than it is today because he is seen as not just the person who let the country down on October 7th, but as the person who rallied the country subsequently. We’ll see if that is in fact the case.

Preet Bharara:

But for now, for an indefinite period of time, his actual position of power politically is safe for those reasons.

Richard Haass:

Yes sir.

Preet Bharara:

How’s our president, Joseph Biden, balancing all the various interests and American interests versus Israeli interests? How’s he doing with respect to the public commentary he’s been doing? Give us an assessment of how Biden is handling all this.

Richard Haass:

First thing to say, this is an extraordinarily difficult crisis. There’s a lot of players on the chess board, a lot of moving parts, people were not anticipating it. And just weeks ago, the National Security Advisor, Jake Sullivan, was quoted as talking about how the Middle East essentially quieted down, allowing the United States to safely focus on both Europe and what’s now called the Indo-Pacific. All that said, all things being equal, I actually think President Biden deserves high marks.

Preet Bharara:

Yeah.

Richard Haass:

And when I say this, I’m someone who’s been critical of him on some other foreign policy issues. So, this is not partisan. I was a Republican for most of my professional and personal life. I’ve worked for one Democratic president and three Republican presidents, so I tend to like a good baseball umpire, calls him like he sees him. But I think the president here deserves high marks. He has been giving Israel what I think is wise advice, but he’s done it in a very interesting way. He’s been extraordinarily supportive, not just supportive in terms of policy sending aid, but he’s been, I want to call almost emotionally supportive. The empathy, the emotion. The two speeches the president gave, one on October 10th, if my memory serves me correctly, and then the one in Israel during his short visit, I thought those were the best speeches of Joe Biden’s presidency, just powerful statements.

Right now, Joe Biden is the most popular man in Israel. He has banked more goodwill with the Israeli people than any American president in recent memories, far more popular. We were just talking about Bibi Netanyahu. He’s far more popular than the Prime Minister just to do that. But I think the president has essentially gotten it right. He’s been supportive. He’s talked about Israel’s right to respond, it’s duty to respond. But privately and publicly, the administration has essentially said, “Make foreign policy with your head and not just with your heart and think it through and don’t make some of the same mistakes we made after 9/11.” So, I think both directionally and in many of the specifics, the administration’s been right in both tone and substance.

Preet Bharara:

Do you think that as you described, President Biden’s popularity in Israel gives him a certain extra kind of influence over the hearts and minds of the Israeli people that will then translate into influence over Netanyahu’s course of action? Or does it not go that far?

Richard Haass:

It’s a good question. We’re about to probably have a test because the administration has been counseling restraint. Again, not that Israel should hold off. Though they might say you might want to be very careful so long as there’s so many American and Israeli hostages. The administration’s clearly opposed Israel on the idea of laying siege to Gaza in terms of cutting off food stops and fuel and the like. What we’re going to have to test on is the administration advice that Israel goes in retail, not wholesale, that it continues to emphasize targeted error attacks, but any ground operation be relatively small and focused. And again, that comes to the big question for Israeli strategy, which is whether they’re going to heeded that strategy or whether they’re going to go enlarge regardless and we’ll find out.

Preet Bharara:

You wrote recently in the Wall Street Journal, “The proper role for the US is not to try to prevent a significant Israeli military action, which is all but inevitable, but to shape its scale and duration.” When you say all but inevitable, what are the possibilities otherwise?

Richard Haass:

Well, we’re already seeing several hundred attacks from the air a day. So that’s going to continue, I think, for some time. So long as there’s intelligence suggesting that there’s useful Hamas targets. I think there will be some ground component at some point. I think that’s inevitable. But it could be the potential ground component ranges from what you, I guess you could describe as commando-like raids, special forces raids, we would call it when you had specific intelligence about this or that military target conceivably even a rescue mission, though, it’s extraordinarily hard to pull off.

Or it could go to the other extreme, the other end of the spectrum, where you’d put in several hundred thousand Israeli troops and you would reoccupy Gaza, something the Israelis haven’t done since 2005. I find it hard to imagine that Israel will do the complete thing. There might be some in-between options. I’m hoping they lean towards the small end of the menu of options. But again, I think that will be a truly fateful decision. And I’d say one other thing, what concerns me about the big option about going in very heavy is not simply the direct costs of it, but I worry also about the potential for war widening.

I think that’s a scenario that increases the odds that Hezbollah would jump into the war. And Hezbollah has a military capability that, I don’t know if it’s 10 times, 20 times that of Hamas and a lot of northern and central Israel is vulnerable, and that type of an expansion of the war worries me because then it also opens up the possibility of direct American and Iranian involvement. So, I would rather, to say the least, see things not go down that path. And one of the ways to reduce the odds of all that happening, I believe, is for Israel not to go into Gaza in a really big way and in a way that would cause a lot of civilian casualties.

Preet Bharara:

Do you think, and I know it’s impossible to know, given what you’re saying, has Netanyahu decided already whether he’s going to go large or go more minimalist and he’s just waiting for the right time possibly in consideration of the jeopardy that would place the hostages in? Or do you think they’re undecided and they don’t know how small or large they want to go?

Richard Haass:

Preet, the honest answer is, I have no idea, but those are the kinds of questions. The former would be a tactical decision. Indeed, it’s one of the reasons that Hamas both took all those hostages and is liberating them at a very slow pace. Is it from Hamas’ point of view, very much ties Israel’s hands and gives Hamas a lot of leverage, whether it’s to spring their own prisoners in Israel, maybe to get certain delays or halts in Israeli military activity, maybe to exchange it for various types of fuel or food. So, it gives them a lot of leverage.

It doesn’t much matter in the sense whether the Israelis have decided extra Y unless it’s imminent. It can always change. So, whether if they’ve decided not to go in big, they could change their mind depending upon events or vice versa. So, I think it’s one of those things that we won’t know it until we know it. And anything before then doesn’t much matter.

Preet Bharara:

Am I correct that Hamas has suggested that if Israel enters into a ceasefire, they would release the hostages?

Richard Haass:

Yeah, I just can’t remember if they’ve said exactly what the phraseology was, but it’s inconceivable that Israel will enter into a ceasefire. I’d say nothing’s inconceivable. I find it hard to imagine that Israel would enter into a ceasefire at this point given the events of October 7th. I think the question is not whether Israel reacts strongly, it’s the scope and duration. It’s how it reacts strongly. And my guess is that what the Israelis are trying to do is find a middle ground, at least for now, that they can react to degrade Hamas, but they don’t act in ways that Hamas will start killing hostages. And Hamas has to think that if they start killing hostages, the Israelis will then say, well, “There’s no reason to hold off anymore. If they’re going to kill innocent people again, then we’re just going to go in big.”

Preet Bharara:

Right. I mean, what you’re describing it feels like is a situation of great brinkmanship on both sides.

Richard Haass:

Yes, sir.

Preet Bharara:

How does one manage that when one false move on either side escalates everything dramatically?

Richard Haass:

Look, it’s one of the things that worries me here. Think about the Gaza Hospital compound because that was Palestine, Islamic Jihad. So, you’ve got multiple actors here. You’ve also got Hezbollah and so forth. So, the complexity of this is not to be underestimated. You have to be an optimist to think that this could be managed, that we can get from where we are to a situation where all the hostages are released, where all sorts of food and the light gets into Gaza. There’s a ceasefire at some point and so forth. So, like I said, you’d have to be a real optimist to think we get from here to there.

And again, for Israel, the goal is not a ceasefire per se. The question is what would be the preconditions or the requirements of a ceasefire? And that, again, at the risk of circling back, that’s to this basic question of what is the Israeli definition of not maybe absolute winning if that means decimation of Hamas, but what’s enough? What is the level of degrading that Israel would say is sufficient, where the Israeli public would say, “Okay, we paid an enormous price, but now what we forced Hamas to pay is we feel that we have reinforced the norm or that we have restored to a degree deterrence.” And I don’t have a hard answer to that question.

Preet Bharara:

My worry about that is if one of the preconditions to a ceasefire or a drawing down is a belief and a conclusion that Hamas has been degraded to a certain level or by a certain level, how do you prove that to people? You can’t walk to the battlefield and show a certain number of war prisoners, I don’t think, even if you got to that point, how does everyone know and trust and believe that that degradation has even happened?

Richard Haass:

Well, I think the Israeli military is not going to spin it for the Israeli government. The Israeli Intelligence Community will not spin it for the Israeli government. So, I believe they still have some credibility, particularly the military with the Israeli public. So, I think they would’ve a pretty good sense of what it is they claimed. And the bigger question is what do you just say they could prove that Hamas is down from 25,000, 30,000 fighters to half that. Is that a level of degrading that people would say is adequate. And that’s a larger conversation for Israeli society and for the Israeli body politic.

And the Israelis are, we haven’t even talked about it, but one of the big challenges I think also is in addition to whatever Israel does to Hamas, what does Israel do to reconstitute its defenses inside Israel? This never should have happened. The idea that Hamas tried to do this, that may have been a surprise. What should have happened though is they failed. And to me, the tragedy or scandal of this is that Israeli defense readiness and capability allowed Hamas to succeed. So, a big issue in addition to anything Israel can inflict on Hamas is what can Israel do? Assuming you can never change Hamas’ goals or agenda, what can you do to raise the bar significantly? So, if and when they try something like this again, the next time they will fail.

Preet Bharara:

I’ll be right back with Richard Haass after this. You’ve mentioned Hezbollah a couple of times. How worried should we be about the opening of a second front, and given what you just said about Israeli capability, can Israel fight at two-front war?

Richard Haass:

Well, we should be worried about a second front, but a lot of that is in Iran’s decision-making. It might though be harder for Hezbollah to stay out and for Iran to stay out. Either, they’ll feel political pressure or they’ll see opportunity. If the Gaza situation gets really, really, really ugly, Israel can fight a two-front war. The problem is that Hezbollah can throw a lot at Israel. You’ve got on the order of what, 150,000 rockets of various ranges. Iron dome, no matter how good it is not going to be able to handle 150,000 rockets. I don’t know how many could actually be shot off in what timeframe, but it would cause real harm. Lots of Israeli citizens would be killed, certain towns would have to be evacuated. The economy would be heavily disrupted. Ben Gurion airport could be closed for a time.

So, this would, even if Israel could hold its own, ultimately, it would be an extraordinarily costly extension of the conflict. And we’ve seen wars in Lebanon, the cost to the soldiers who go in, the cost to the Israeli towns within range of Hezbollah rockets. So yes, Lebanon and Hezbollah would also pay a large price. Parts of Southern Lebanon would be devastated. A lot of Hezbollah, whatever you want to call them, militants, terrorists would be killed. But look, we’ve seen that movie before and it could happen again. But yes, Israel could prosecute or could deal with two fronts, just the costs would be extraordinarily high.

Preet Bharara:

I asked a previous guest on this show the question, “Did Hamas sign its own death warrant or does it understand that it signed its own death warrant?” Let me ask you the opposite question. Do you think there’s an argument that the leadership of Hamas is proud of itself and thinks it did a strategically desirable thing given what it’s unleashed?

Richard Haass:

With one exception, I’d say yes, I’ll answer the yes part. The fact that Hamas was able to mount a surprise attack that was so effective against Israel, reinforce Hamas’ message that they are the Palestinian entity that is both willing and able to take the fight to Israel. So, from that point of view, I think Hamas would see it as a major success. Where I think Hamas went way off the rails was in the targeting of civilians and the savagery of the attacks, and that forfeited a tremendous amount of international opinion, and it hardened Israel, the United States and others against Hamas.

So, if this had been, if you will, a more narrow traditional military action, it would’ve been bad, but it would’ve been one thing. But what Hamas did and the way it did it, the beheadings, the mistreatment of individuals, the taking of civilians, the reports of rape and all that, that put this over a different line, and I think that was a major miscalculation on its part.

Preet Bharara:

Why did they do that? Is it because it’s in their nature?

Richard Haass:

Well, there’s different schools of thought. Elliot Cohen was on Morning Show today talking about it, that yes, it’s in their nature, and that was sort of his, that’s what terrorists of this sort do and there’s a depravity to these groups. And there’s a strategic argument that they hope by doing such despicable things, it’s a way of showing they’re not intimidated, that no one is safe. It’s a way to essentially say they’re willing to take the fight with no limits. Another argument would be that the leadership miscalculated that they did all these things and they didn’t understand the reaction. Another possibility is that certain groups or individuals went beyond whatever instructions or writ they had. There was no, obviously, needless to say, no discipline or control.

I don’t know it, but there was a certain inconsistency between some of the savagery of the behavior and the taking of hostages. Because if the goal was to get as many hostages as you could, it wasn’t quite clear to me why the terrorists acted the way they did. But whatever the reason or reasons they did what they did, and that was, I would argue from their own perverted point of view, truly counterproductive.

Preet Bharara:

Is there some merit to the argument or any merit to the argument that maybe it was done intentionally for the purpose of drawing an overreaction and an over response?

Richard Haass:

Quite possibly. But they wouldn’t have had to do this to do it, to get that kind of a response. A more traditional attack would’ve done the same thing. I think what they did was they put themselves on the defensive in many ways because it was seen as an excuse. It’s one thing, I’m not justifying it, but I think there’s a qualitative difference between attacking military targets and civilian targets. And even if you attack civilian targets, there was a level of savagery to this, a barbarism to this that offended anyone who would call himself or herself civilized. So again, I don’t know if this was a matter of calculation or what, but whatever it was, even from its own, again, I would say a perverse perspective, it was counterproductive.

Preet Bharara:

People who are not experts on foreign policy, international relations or the Middle East, and I’m in all three of those categories, some people look at this and they see the horrendous actions of Hamas. They see what Israel is doing in response. The United States has an interest. There’s Hezbollah, there’s Lebanon. Now, you talk about Iran, which is attempting to become a nuclear power. So, that’s a lot of countries. Can you paint, if you would, a reassuring portrait as to why we should not worry that all of this that’s going on will result in a mini world war on that side of the planet?

Richard Haass:

Look, I can’t sit here and say there’s not going to be war widening. And as we’ve talked about it, it could. I could imagine this extending to Lebanon and Israel on the Lebanese border, possibly United States and Iran. And that to me, is probably a worst possible case. It wouldn’t be a world war in the sense that it wouldn’t draw on the other great powers directly, I don’t think. And one of the reasons I think the odds are somewhat against that with the emphasis on somewhat, is China is heavily dependent on importing oil from Iran. And the last thing, China, which already faces a lot of economic headwinds, is going to want, is a cutoff of oil and far more expensive oil. Russia wouldn’t mine more expensive oil, but China clearly would.

So, great powers are not as integrally involved in this as they are, say, in what’s going on with Ukraine and in Europe or the way they would be if there are a crisis over Taiwan. I think this is a little bit more separated, but what we’re learning is this is a world of both medium powers and local powers. So, Iran is a medium power. Hezbollah, Hamas, they’re local actors with real capability. So, it’s not World War stuff, but it’s local conflict stuff. And as we’ve seen it, that’s plenty bad.

Preet Bharara:

What’s the best way or the best path for preventing Iran to have a widening role?

Richard Haass:

I would think the best way to keep Iran from having a widening role is a couple of things. One I’ve already mentioned is China counseling restraint on Iran, it would be the United States signaling Iran, what sort of economic or even military price it might pay under certain scenarios. And as I suggested before, one of the many reasons I’d rather the Israelis not go into Gaza in a big way is I think by doing that, that would increase the chances of war widening, bringing Hezbollah in. So, I think if we can keep Hezbollah out and keep the war from widening, then I think the odds of direct or Iranian participation go down dramatically.

Preet Bharara:

What’s the reason that other Arab countries like Egypt and Jordan don’t appear to be taking in Palestinian refugees?

Richard Haass:

Because affection for the Palestinians in most of the Arab world, if it exists at all, is theoretical rather than actual. In 1970, Palestinians were behind the threat to the Hashemite throne in Jordan. And Jordan lives in a precarious demographic and political balance. And the idea they would allow more Palestinians in the country, inconceivable, because it would potentially undermine the stability of the Hashemites of the king. Egypt sees Gaza, which by the way, some of your listeners may not know, Egypt administered Gaza until the 1967 six-day war. Egypt has zero appetite to get back into Gaza, and often sees the connections between groups like Hamas and its own Muslim brotherhood. So, worries about opening up Gaza because it fears that that could become a supply line to help militants in Egypt. In Egypt, the scars of what happened in the wake of the Arab Spring, shall we say, are still fresh. So, in most of the Arab world looks at Palestinians, it’s without much affection. People also tend to forget that Palestinians were cheering for Saddam Hussein when he invaded and occupied Kuwait.

So, when the Saudis and others look at the Palestinians, they have long memories. So, there’s any number of reasons where support for the Palestinian cause has popularity and the “Arab Street.” But a lot of the governments around the Middle East are quite suspicious of Palestinian refugees and of Palestinian militant or terrorist organizations.

Preet Bharara:

And do you see that changing at any point in the near future?

Richard Haass:

No, sir.

Preet Bharara:

I’m going to go back to the hostages for a moment. Is one way this could potentially play out, given the past history, that there would be a massive exchange of Palestinian prisoners or Hamas prisoners for Israeli hostages?

Richard Haass:

It could. The complicating factor is that this is taking place in the middle of a conflict. If it weren’t for a conflict, I’d say, sure. But now that it’s in the middle of a conflict, the question is to what extent does Hamas see the presence of hostages as a way of delaying or limiting any sort of large-scale Israeli military action? And I think that slows down any pace because there’s a larger consideration in simply getting back those Hamas fighters who are in Israeli jails or other Palestinians in Israeli jails. The real question from the point of view of Hamas is how they can use the hostages to essentially deter certain types of Israeli military action. So, I don’t think an exchange is likely in the absence of something larger in terms of a political outcome.

Preet Bharara:

And the occasional release of a hostage or two, you believe that’s a kind of a delay tactic?

Richard Haass:

I do.

Preet Bharara:

Is it an effective one?

Richard Haass:

Well, so far, it has been. But I can’t sit here and tell you it’ll continue to be, but it’s very hard, I think, for Israel to take the sort of military action that would endanger the hostages if they are gradually being released in good health. I think it complicates Israeli decision-making.

Preet Bharara:

You’ve already alluded to this, but let’s suppose that Hamas is at least severely degraded, if not eliminated, and they can no longer govern in Gaza. A. What does a post Hamas, Gaza look like? And B, our people in Israel and elsewhere thinking about that enough?

Richard Haass:

It’s a really good question. It’s one I keep coming back to. It’s very hard to constitute political authorities. A political authority has to not just have capability, but it also has to be deemed acceptable and legitimate by the population. Otherwise, it has to be imposed. So, imagine a scenario where Israel went in big to Gaza. It “defeated, decimated Hamas.” So then, you’d have an Israeli occupation authority. And then gradually, what? It would either invite in or try to encourage the emergence of a Palestinian political and security presence. Well, in Gaza, who would you turn to? There’s nothing there to, you’d have to start from scratch.

And the question is, could the Israelis midwife that I find that? I find that really, really hard to imagine that any group of individuals could emerge under Israeli tutelage and somehow have any legitimacy, any acceptability in terms of how they’re seen by the population. So, what are the external alternatives? Well, I can only think of three. One would be the Palestinian authority, which “governs the West Bank,” but I put it in quotes because the Palestinian authority is weak and its competence, shall we say, is finite. The idea that they could take over Gaza, they’re not wildly popular there, and they can barely govern the West Bank. So, I think it’d be an enormous reach on their part, not inconceivable, but a reach.

The idea though Arab like kind of force or Egypt brothers we were just talking about, I think there’s very little appetite in the Arab world to take that on. Could the UN Security Council do something? In principle, yes. In reality, I think no because I don’t think you could ever get people to agree on the terms of reference. And also, UN peacekeeping forces almost always only want to operate when there’s a peace to keep. It might be very hard to first establish a peace. The concern would be, well, as soon as the Israelis left, say Hamas like or Palestinian Islamic Jihad like forces would come out of the woodwork and they would say, “We want to kill anyone who was “collaborating” with the external forces.”

So, I find one of the weaknesses in all this is this idea that you could have a successful handoff of authority that could maintain order and would be politically acceptable and pick up the garbage and run the economy. I just find that I haven’t seen anybody write about it or speak about it at a level of persuasive detail.

Preet Bharara:

Well, that’s very worrisome because Gaza with Hamas is terrible, and Gaza without Hamas, as we’ve just been discussing, is also a mess.

Richard Haass:

It is. So, I come out in a really controversial, uncomfortable place. I don’t like it myself, but I can’t think of anything, which is, Israel goes in, not wholesale, but retail from the air, a little bit from the ground dramatically reduces and degrades Hamas. But Hamas is still there, and Israel puts a lot of emphasis on reconstituting its defenses. So, something like this can never succeed, even if Hamas were so prone to try it again.

Preet Bharara:

And you go back to sort of equilibrium?

Richard Haass:

Right. You go back to a version of the status quo ante. It worked for the last 15 years. And then, simultaneously, Israel would try to develop a Palestinian partner in the West Bank. And that’s something that’s been missing both from the Palestinians and from the Israelis. But the long-term goal would be to make the West Bank a more viable place, perhaps to create a Palestinian state there. And I realize this could be the stuff of decades, fundamentally different Israeli government, very different Palestinian authority. But ultimately, I come from the you can’t beat something with nothing school.

And the only way I think to make things in the long run work would probably be to have a Palestinian state that looked pretty good. And what Hamas was doing in Gaza looked pretty bad. Or you could have a three-state solution one day. I can imagine a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Hamas or somebody led entity in Gaza. There’s lots of ways this can play out. But as distasteful as Hamas is, there have been prolonged periods of deterrence and equilibrium, whatever word one wants to use. And I don’t think it’s impossible to re-establish a form of it. And I understand that nobody likes it when I say that. And people say, “How could you coexist with these people after what happened on October 7th?” I understand, but I have yet to see a persuasive, viable plan for eliminating them and replacing them with something that could work.

Preet Bharara:

What’s the phrase that I think you have used in the past, which is, “Things were always very awful before they get even worse.”

Richard Haass:

Yeah. It’s one of my two laws in the Middle East. Things get worse before they get even worse.

Preet Bharara:

What’s the other law?

Richard Haass:

The enemy of your enemy can still be your enemy. Right, right.

Preet Bharara:

How does that second adage play out here?

Richard Haass:

Well, I’m not sure who it would apply to here. Look, the Middle East ought to, what’s the word? It should breed a kind of modesty. The idea that people look for solutions in the Middle East. It’s a word I ban. What I constantly think about when it comes to the Middle East are things like management, what’s good enough. Because whenever you look for solutions, I worry about them. I think that tends to have overreach written all over it. And then, I think, the United States overreached badly in the Middle East and tried to transform societies and polities and so forth.

So, I think Israel has had experience in Gaza, has had experience in Lebanon, and I think there’s a danger in overreach. So, I mean, how would I put it? I’m in favor of Israeli reach here, just not overreach. And I think that’s a legitimate area then of conversation. What would be a reasonable definition of ambition here? Of success? But again, as I said, it will be unsatisfying because I do not think the elimination of Hamas and turning Gaza into this friendly neighbor, I just don’t see that in the cards.

Preet Bharara:

I don’t want to let you go without asking whether or not your experience working on studying, dealing with the previous situation in Northern Ireland tells you anything about the Middle East or the hope that intractable situations ultimately can be resolved and there can be a path towards peace because you’ve been pretty negative in the last few minutes.

Richard Haass:

I apologize.

Preet Bharara:

No.

Richard Haass:

My kids call me Debbie Downer or Daddy Downer.

Preet Bharara:

Daddy Downer.

Richard Haass:

Northern Ireland has had a big impact on my thinking because I do think there is something not perfectly analogous, but somewhat analogous. For those of the listeners who are not familiar with Northern Ireland, Northern Ireland went through three decades of at times brutal internecine civil conflict. And again, you had multiple parties. You had the provisional IRA and other groups, violent and nonviolent on the what’s called Republican or Nationalist or Catholic side. And then, you had various on the Protestant loyalist, paramilitaries, various political parties, unionist parties on the other side. And then, you had British military and British police forces and so forth, and local police forces.

So, you had all sorts of actors and it was messy. And for three decades, during the so-called troubles, you had violence. And roughly, 3,500, 3,600 people lost their lives over these three decades. Ultimately, it came to an end 25 years ago in the so-called Good Friday or Belfast Agreement in which my predecessor in the job of US Envoy, George Mitchell, played an important role helping to bring the parties together.

But I think what made it all possible was a decision, in part by Margaret Thatcher, more by Tony Blair to basically have a two-prong policy. And one prong was a security policy, a very large heavy security presence, which essentially sent the message to the provisional IRA that you will never be able to shoot your way to power. You will never be able to force us out, us the British, out of Northern Ireland. You will never be able to bring about a united Ireland by force. So, try as you might, you will fail.

But, and here was the interesting part of what in particular Prime Minister Blair did. They offered a second track and said, “We will offer you, however, a political track, a political path that will give you a considerable degree of what you want in the civil rights area because Catholics historically had been second class citizens in Northern Ireland.” It will give you a large role in local government along with local Protestants. There’ll be an Anglo-Irish dimension and so forth. And you won’t get everything you want, the British government said, but you will get a lot of what you want and more important, you’ll get more of what you want than you will ever get by force and terrorism.

And it was that combination of a hard line, but a political opening that I think worked. It took a while, but it worked. But I think that’s the same formula here where the Israelis have to make clear that Hamas is never going to get close to destroying the Jewish state, that terrorism will never accomplish goals. But, and here’s the second thing, there has to be a political path for those Palestinians who are willing to rule out violence and negotiate in good faith to find an accommodation with Israel. Israel’s going to have to meet them halfway with things like limits on settlements and so forth. That’s a long negotiation, but that’s what I think this will take.

So, right now, we’re at the point where we’ve got to re-establish order. The Israelis have to re-establish order. That has to happen first. But after that, the only way to get out of this cycle ultimately will be to open up a serious, attractive political track that’ll take a different Israeli government rather than undermining a potential Palestinian partner. As the Israelis have often done, they’re actually going to have to try to empower a Palestinian partner. And the reason Israel should do this, and I bang on my drum as loudly as I can on this, not as a favor to the Palestinians, but as a favor to themselves. If Israel wants to remain a democratic Jewish state, a secure and prosperous democratic Jewish state, it has to end the occupation.

Either you have an occupation and people are denied political rights and you cease to be a democracy or you have an occupation and people are given full political rights. In this case, you cease to be a Jewish state. So, it’s in Israel’s own self-interest to open up a political track. I acknowledge they’ve tried it in the past, and Yasser Arafat and others, I would say kicked away offers that look, shall we say, pretty good, and then some through the rear-view mirror. But we are where we are, where we are. And I would argue that going forward, the United States ought to be pushing Israel hard to do this.

Preet Bharara:

So, Daddy Downer, I mean Richard Haass, thank you. Thank you very much for educating us and giving us your insight. Thanks for being on the show.

Richard Haass:

Thanks for having me.

Preet Bharara:

My conversation with Richard Haass continues for members of the CAFE Insider Community. To try out the membership for just $1 for a month, head to cafe.com/insider. Again, that’s cafe.com/insider.

BUTTON

I want to end the show this week with an inspiring story of collaboration between Israelis and Palestinians. It can be difficult to remember these moments of peace during such a tense time of conflict, but these stories tell of our common humanity.

Back in 1999, the Israeli conductor and pianist, Daniel Barenboim and the late Palestinian American academic, Edward Said co-founded the West Eastern Divan Orchestra. The group, based in Spain, brings together Israeli, Palestinian, and other Arab musicians to make beautiful music and to talk openly about their differences. Over the last 24 years, the group has performed iconic classical works around the world. In 2016, the United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon designated the group a United Nations Global Advocate for Cultural Understanding. The orchestra also spawned the Barenboim Said Academy, a music college in Berlin that offers degrees to aspiring musicians from North Africa and the Middle East. Ninety students are currently enrolled.

Since the horrors of October 7th, and the subsequent escalations in Gaza and around the Middle East, the orchestra and academy’s aims of peace, have loomed, especially large. In its October 14th War in the Holy Land Special, PBS NewsHour even ended their coverage with a musical excerpt from the group. Barenboim also published an op-ed in The Guardian calling for continued cultural exchange amid the ongoing violence. His words are applicable not just to the Israel-Hamas war, but to the power of music to bring together opposing groups around the world.

As Barenboim wrote, “In the current situation, I naturally ask myself about the significance of our joint work in the orchestra and the academy. It may seem little, but the mere fact that Arab and Israeli musicians share a podium at every concert and make music together is of immense value. Over the years, through this commonality of music making, but also through our countless sometimes heated discussions, we have learned to better understand the supposed other, to approach them and to find common ground. We start and end all discussions no matter how controversial, with the fundamental understanding that we are all equal human beings who deserve peace, freedom, and happiness.”

“This may sound naive, but it is not. For it is this understanding that seems to be completely lost in the conflict on both sides today. Our experience shows that this message has reached many people in the region and around the world. We must want and will continue to believe in our shared humanity. Music is one way to bring us closer together.”

Just two months ago at the Lucerne Festival in Switzerland, the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra joined Russia, German Jewish pianist, Igor Levit in a rendition of Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 1 in C Major. Although Beethoven’s composition is almost 230 years old, its beauty, especially given the diverse politics and heritages of the orchestra is truly timeless. We leave you this week with a brief excerpt from the concert, and we wish you and your families continued health, calm, peace, and musical healing during this difficult time.

Well, that’s it for this episode of Stay Tuned. Thanks again to my guest, Richard Haass. If you like what we do, rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen. Every positive review helps new listeners find the show. Send me your questions about news, politics, and justice. Tweet them to me @PreetBharara with the #AskPreet. You can also now reach me on threads, or you can call and leave me a message at 669-247-7338. That’s 669-24Preet. Or you can send an email to letters@cafe.com.

Stay Tuned is presented by Cafe and the Vox Media Podcast Network. The executive producer is Tamara Sepper. The editorial producers are David Kurlander and Noa Azulai. The technical director is David Tatasciore. The audio producer is Nat Weiner. And the CAFE Team is Matthew Billy, Jake Kaplan, Namita Shah, and Claudia Hernández. I’m your host, Preet Bharara. Stay tuned.