The wars ignited by Israel in 2025 and in the years preceding it have not subsided, nor have their fires been extinguished. They continue to rage in Syria, Lebanon, the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, Iran, and Yemen. Their repercussions have not eased in Sudan, Libya, and the wider Horn of Africa. On the contrary, fuel continues to be added to these fires so that all fronts of war remain ablaze across the Eastern Mediterranean, the Gulf, and the greater Horn of Africa.
Israel has insisted that the year should not end without announcing the agenda of its regional policy for the year that begins tomorrow. It will not begin with peace, but with the ignition of additional fronts and the heating up of others instead of de escalation. This is the meaning of what is called “Israeli peace”. It is peace for Israel alone, at the expense of others. It cannot be achieved unless Israel remains the region’s bully, igniting wars and provoking conflicts by creating new hostile facts on the ground that frighten some states and push others toward complicity or alliance.
A Coup Against the Trump Plan
Israel is preparing for a broad coup against the Trump plan for peace in Gaza. Listen to the statements of Yisrael Katz, the Israeli minister of defence, who is positioning himself for the leadership seat as an alternative to Netanyahu. Israel is also preparing a plan to punish Saudi Arabia for its regional policy, which conditions normalisation on the establishment of a Palestinian state. Attempts should be made to read what is happening in Yemen along the Saudi border.
It is also punishing Saudi diplomacy by striking Syria and using its allies in Sudan and Libya to threaten stability in Egypt. Israel has decided to expand its regional influence into the Horn of Africa by announcing its recognition of a state that no other country in the world recognises, while it refuses to recognise a state for a people whose right to an independent and sovereign state is supported by the overwhelming majority of the world’s countries, namely the Palestinian people. It has made itself a gateway for the stability of diminutive rulers or failed governments, as in Sudan and Libya.
Israel is attempting to breach the axis of states guaranteeing the Gaza ceasefire agreement, Turkey, Egypt, and Qatar. It is also bringing Ethiopian forces to a front overlooking Sinai, strengthening Ethiopia’s position in its disputes with Egypt over Red Sea security and water security, in response to the deployment of Egyptian forces to Somalia. Israel is also declaring to the entire world that it is the actor that sets the Middle East agenda for external powers outside the region, including the European Union, China, Russia, and the United States.
Netanyahu, who announced the recognition of the state of Somaliland last Friday, 26 December, attached this recognition to the Abraham Accords sponsored by United States President Donald Trump. The president responded sarcastically that no one recognises such a state and that the United States will not follow Israel in recognising it, at least immediately.
As I stated in my article last week in this space, all developments that have taken place over the past few days confirm what I said regarding the impotence of Arab diplomacy. It does not create facts. At best, it attempts to catch up with them. It responded to Israel’s recognition of Somaliland with a rejecting statement and a call to convene the Security Council.
What is currently unfolding in the Middle East places the political agenda of the region, across its three sub regions, the Eastern Mediterranean, the Gulf, and the greater Horn of Africa, firmly in Israel’s grip. It turns policy makers in the Arab world into little more than moving puppets on a stage prepared and managed by Israel.
The recent meeting between Netanyahu and Trump at the Mar a Lago resort in Florida was no exception. The American president threatened Hamas with “severe punishment” if it did not disarm within a “very short period”, and threatened to strike Iran if it resumed its missile programme. This aligns with the agenda of the visit as set by Netanyahu.
The Bully State
Meir Ben Shabbat, former head of Israel’s National Security Council, revealed in an article published by Israel Hayom on 15 December the main principle upon which Israel’s policy toward the region should be based. He stated: “Israel must strengthen its image as a bullying state in all neighbouring regions.”
He also revealed an approach for dealing with American policy, which involves conflicting interests between the two sides. He said: “What matters most to the American administration is consolidating the ceasefire and entrenching a reality of non hostility, which would enable the American president to claim credit for this achievement and move forward with implementing his other plans. Nevertheless, under the current circumstances, it is difficult to say that moving to the second phase serves Israel’s interests. On the contrary, Israel’s army control over areas that are supposed to be evacuated not only improves its security readiness for various scenarios, but also grants Israel a powerful pressure card against Hamas and the mediating states to meet its demands.”
Ben Shabbat concluded: “It is preferable to maintain the status quo in the Gaza Strip rather than ‘advance’ according to a plan that does not achieve Israel’s objectives, but instead increases pressure on it and burdens it. A Gaza Strip in which half is under Israeli control and the other half is submerged in destruction and ruin, with no future, no hope, and no rehabilitation, is better than a plan that does not include a genuine dismantling of military capabilities.”
Ben Shabbat’s view regarding the Trump plan for peace in Gaza largely aligns with what Robert Satloff, president of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, stated on 23 December: “Ambiguity now looms as President Trump prepares to announce a transition to the ‘second phase’ of the ceasefire. This phase will see a collision between a set of promising initiatives and the reality of Gaza divided between areas of Israeli and Hamas control, with no agreed path for disarming armed groups, which is the essential condition for any real progress toward full implementation of the ceasefire.”
Satloff emphasised that Israel has a strong interest in preventing a situation that would force the White House to choose between Israel and the guarantors of the ceasefire. He called on Netanyahu to “offer solutions to avoid this highly problematic scenario”. This is precisely what Netanyahu did by declaring adherence to the Trump plan while simultaneously undermining it in substance.
While I affirm the existence of a Zionist American Israeli dialogue regarding overturning the Trump plan for peace in Gaza, involving a selected elite of former politicians, members of the United States Congress, and Middle East experts working in research centres such as the Washington Institute, the Institute for National Security Studies in Israel, the Misgav Institute for Zionist National Security and Strategy, and the Atlantic Council, I also affirm the existence of an internal Israeli alliance aimed at maintaining the cohesion of the extremist religious Zionist right wing camp. The objective is to secure a majority of Knesset seats in the upcoming elections, which Netanyahu may announce after his visit to Washington.
Within this context, the increasingly aggressive statements issued day after day by the current Israeli minister of defence, Yisrael Katz, can be understood. Katz may assume leadership of the Likud Party if Netanyahu exits the political scene. Katz’s political discourse does not differ from that of Itamar Ben Gvir, minister of national security, and Bezalel Smotrich, minister of finance and settlements. Katz stated last week during a conference organised by Makor Rishon newspaper: “Israel will not fully withdraw from Gaza, and a wide security zone will remain inside the Strip, even after moving to the second phase of the peace agreement, on the condition that Hamas first relinquishes its weapons.” He continued, emphasising: “This is what I said, this is what I am saying now, and this is what I will continue to say.”
He clarified that “if Hamas does not voluntarily give up its weapons, we will do it ourselves”. The defence minister also confirmed that if Israel relinquishes its control over the Philadelphi Corridor on the Gaza Egypt border “even for one day”, Iran will succeed in sending all kinds of weapons to Gaza.
Katz denied claims that he had “retreated” from earlier statements in which he called for establishing settlements inside Gaza, saying: “Retreating from statements is not something I do.” He pointed out that his “vision since the beginning of the war” for Gaza, which will be implemented “at the appropriate time”, includes establishing Nahal groups in northern Gaza, referring to military units that decades ago established settlement outposts that later developed into fully fledged settlements.
Israel has an agenda for Gaza, another for the West Bank, and a broad agenda for the Middle East as a whole in the coming year and beyond. This reality warrants a serious effort to search for an Arab agenda for the Middle East.
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