Three years ago this month, Hamas killed some 1200 people in the south of Israel, most of them civilians, in their homes, at a music festival, and on the roads in the border communities of Israel. They also took with them 251 people as hostages. Israel responded with a war that lasted for two years, not just in Gaza but all over the Middle East. The war reached Lebanon two days after it began, Yemen a few weeks later, and even Iran itself a year later. The war in Gaza came to an end only last October, with the cease-fire mediated by President Trump, and by January this year all the hostages had returned, first those that were alive and then the bodies of those that were not. The people of Gaza have paid a high price for this war. Their entire population has been uprooted, and the majority of Gaza has been destroyed as a result of Hamas’ decision to operate as an army from within the civilian population, building infrastructure underneath civilian buildings, homes, schools and hospitals. But while the war in Gaza has been stopped, the war that was started by Hamas is still in full swing and has exploded into a wider region – in Lebanon, Syria, Iran and even in the Gulf and elsewhere.
Israel may have won the war Hamas started, but lost the regional order in the process. For some, a confrontation with Iran was indeed inevitable. For others, Israel dragged the region into a mire from which it may not be able to exit. Regardless of what one thinks, three years after the start of this war, the Middle East is a world of hurt, a dysfunctional region that is further from a stable and peaceful future than it has been for generations. What follows surveys that world, front by front.
Read the full article at the Abrahamic Metacritique.
