The U.S. Cannot Let Allied Fecklessness Stand
In the Middle East, the Trump administration risks snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. Despite intense coordination between the U.S. and Israel, Washington has allowed the U.K., Canada, and Australia to recognize a Palestinian state, an action in contravention to their own interests, common sense, and allied interests. The Trump administration should actively impose costs on those allies who pursue such counterproductive policies, demonstrating the risks of legalistic pedantry and diplomatic sophistry. Allies cannot take steps that further a common adversary’s cause without meaningful consequences.
Recognizing a Palestinian state is a step far more profound than a simply legal nicety. It means the European powers will, over time, commit cash and institutional support to bringing a Palestinian state into reality. The NGO-grievance complex, primed since October 7 to undermine the Jewish state and attack U.S. policy, will throw its weight behind these efforts. The reality of recognition thus compels consideration of what a Palestinian state might actually look like.
Recognizing a Palestinian state is a step far more profound than a simply legal nicety. It creates a regional structure that will become impossible to manage by committing support to the Palestinian Authority, a decrepit, overwhelmingly incompetent, corrupt organization that Hamas will co-opt. Alternatively, it creates a playground for Gulf Arab competition just off the Eastern Mediterranean coast, creating long-term commercial and economic risks. Regardless of the precise outcome, a Palestinian state primes the Middle East for further confrontation and disruption. This stands alongside the moral repugnance of rewarding the Palestinian Islamist movement for the violence it perpetrated two years ago. Such a step has profound implications for all those who oppose the United States: it demonstrates to China and Russia that the U.S. is incapable of ensuring its allies see moral and strategic sense.
The United States, Europe, Israel, and the Palestinian Arabs have ensnared themselves in the “Oslo Trap” since 1993. American negotiators, with European help, pushed Yasser Arafat’s Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and the Israeli Rabin ministry into an agreement that theoretically fast-tracked a two-state solution. Anglophone recognition of Palestine follows Oslo’s logic. It is thus unsurprising that European powers will follow suit, with Portugal and France leading the way.
The trouble is, Oslo never worked. The supposed diplomatic triumph collapsed by 2000, when the West Bank in particular exploded into violence during the Second Intifada. But it was doomed from the start. The Clinton administration viewed Arafat as open to peace after the 1991 Gulf War had crippled the PLO’s greatest regional backer, Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, and had turned most regional governments against the PLO. However, Arafat’s internal weakness collapsed his credibility as a leader. A split within the Palestinian radical movement was inevitable: Arafat’s weakness and engagement with Israel gave Hamas ideological fuel. Hence betting on a PLO-led Palestinian state was diplomatically absurd from the start. The 2007 Fatah-Hamas war ultimately destroyed a unified Palestinian state’s credibility under the Palestinian Authority. It also allowed Hamas to eradicate alternatives to its rule in Gaza, particularly targeting local clan leadership.
The result, since the early 2010s, has been a necrotic Palestinian Authority in the West Bank that relies totally on Israeli security support and foreign cash for survival, and Hamas in Gaza, also reliant on foreign aid to prepare its Jihadist machine for the ongoing war with Israel.
Recognizing a Palestinian state does not create an alternative governance structure for Palestinian Arabs that is responsive to their needs, transparent, or even vaguely legitimate. It instead makes the non-credible, corrupt Palestinian Authority the focal point of all long-term efforts. Indeed, it guarantees that Israel must control Gaza. Otherwise, a State of Palestine will “unite” Gaza and the West Bank, which in practical terms means Hamas will rapidly co-opt the Palestinian Authority. This is, in fact, Hamas’ strategic objective.
Historically speaking, the Five Eyes countries have served as the West’s backbone. The core Anglosphere nations – the U.S., U.K., Canada, Australia, and New Zealand – have diverged on policy questions. Only Australia supported the U.S. in Vietnam, while New Zealand and Canada were both skeptical of the 2003 Iraq War. Yet 80 years of clandestine cooperation have created a world-class intelligence network. These five countries frequently share highly sensitive signals intelligence. They also coordinate on human collection, military intelligence, and other forms of technical reconnaissance. Intelligence is by definition an isolating business. Spies deal in secrets: trust is hard to build. It is thus a testament to the cultural, social, political, and interest-based unity between the Anglosphere nations that structured intelligence cooperation has existed for so long. The U.S. benefits enormously from this cooperation, gaining access to the U.K.’s premier signals and human intelligence services, GCHQ and MI6 respectively, while also maintaining critical surveillance stations in Asia on Australian territory, and coordinating with Australia and New Zealand’s special services regionally.
The Five Eyes recognition of Palestine – excepting New Zealand which has chosen not to follow Australia, Canada, and the U.K. – marks a profound rupture in this intelligence alliance. It actively undermines U.S. Middle Eastern interests, namely Israel’s ability to counter Iranian power and contain Iranian ambition, by instead creating a direct threat to Israel’s long-term diplomatic position. It undermines Anglosphere interests by extension, since Iran views the West as a key enemy, and deems the Anglophone countries especially perfidious and deserving of harm. Iran’s intelligence services are active in the U.K. and Australia intimidating dissidents and, in the latter, attacking the Jewish population.
It is undeniable that a lack of political talent, particularly in the U.K., has led to a thoroughly dangerous rupture in Anglosphere relations. It is equally true that, absent Anglosphere support, the European powers would be far less willing to risk American ire through recognition of Palestine. Portugal and Spain are unwilling to meet NATO spending targets to deter a direct threat from Russia: both Iberian states see recognition of Palestine as a low-cost diplomatic move that satisfies their ideological and domestic constituencies. If there were serious costs to recognition, then these countries, too indecisive to confront Russia, would not diplomatically side with the anti-American, anti-Western Axis in the Middle East.
The United States can credibly punish Australia, Canada, and the U.K. for their diplomatic blunder. Most obviously, it can use trade negotiations as leverage. But there are far more steps it can take. It can limit military-to-military cooperation and restrict intelligence access, particularly if individuals in Allied countries are deemed to be responsible for Palestinian recognition. It can deny state visits and other official contact until Palestinian recognition is practically curtailed, or at least the Five Eyes members commit to refusing a new embassy. It can suspend diplomatic contact on certain briefs, while also cancelling or limiting military-technological sales.
These steps are public, heavy-handed, and undeniably appropriate. The only way the Anglosphere will avoid a serious long-term fracture over the Middle East is if the U.S. sets a clear red line today. Recognition of Palestine has already crossed a threshold. The U.S.’ closest allies must be made to understand that self-destructive diplomatic posturing has an unacceptable cost. They are highly unlikely to pay that cost for an issue that, ultimately, has little relation to their political and strategic interests.
Strong alliances are built on shared vital interests, in this case the survival of Western civilization whose toppling Hamas incontrovertibly stands for and seeks to achieve. Since other allies have forgotten this, it falls to Washington to remind them.
Seth Cropsey is president of Yorktown Institute. He served as a naval officer and as deputy Undersecretary of the Navy and is the author of Mayday and Seablindness.
This article was originally published by RealClearDefense and made available via RealClearWire.
