Mideast Power Plays Have Left the Palestinians Behind

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict, long a stand-in for the challenges of the entire Middle East, has increasingly come to be viewed as a local problem. The brutal scenes along the Israel-Gaza border this past week were the culmination of six weeks of demonstrations leading up to the 70th anniversary of Israel’s founding, in which scores have been killed and thousands injured. They were also a deliberate reminder of an era when the fate of the Palestinians was seen as central to the region—a time when Palestinian suffering was among the first issues raised by officials from Jordan, Saudi Arabia, or Egypt visiting Washington.

The strategic shifts over the past several years have marginalized the Palestinians. The Arab uprisings that began in Tunisia in late 2010 pushed into the open long-suppressed anti-authoritarian yearnings. Since President Donald Trump took office, concerns over the ambitions of Iran, a majority Shia Muslim nation, drew the Sunni Muslim kingdoms, headed by Saudi Arabia, into a de facto alliance with Israel and the Trump administration. And corrosive splits within the Palestinian national movement left its leadership in chaos just as Israeli commando raids, spying, and cooperation from Palestinian security forces combined to nip violent opposition in the bud. Israeli attacks against Iranian and Lebanese Hezbollah targets in Syria in recent weeks hint at the possibility of a much larger conflict to come, one that would overshadow the Palestinian problem.