Strikes in Qatar: Netanyahu pushes the limits in Israel's war against Hamas

The Israeli strikes targeting Hamas leaders in Qatar on Tuesday opened a new front in Israel's military offensive against the group.

It is one thing for Israel to target Hezbollah in Lebanon, or even strike Syria or Iran. “But going into Qatar, defying the sovereignty of a US ally, is completely different," says Veronika Hinman, deputy director of the military education team at the University of Portsmouth in the UK.

And it is still “not quite clear yet how much of an escalation this is, or what the consequence will be", Hinman adds.

Officially, Netanyahu said he targeted the Hamas delegation in Doha after Monday's attack in Jerusalem that left six people dead – an attack for which Hamas claimed responsibility.

But even if the Qatar strike was a retaliation, Hinman says the operation “must have been on the table for a long time", and was definitely not drawn up in a single day. 

The White House seemed unsure how to react to the Israeli strikes.

In a rare criticism of Israel, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the attack on a "sovereign nation and close ally of the United States" did not "advance Israel or America’s goals”, while quickly adding that eliminating Hamas was a “worthy goal”.  

Hamas says none of its leaders were killed in the bombing.  

Reacting to the strikes, US President Donald Trump said he was "not thrilled" and even “very unhappy”.

Trump taken by surprise?

Trump went further in a call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday, telling him the decision to target Hamas inside Qatar was unwise, The Wall Street Journal reported.    

The Israeli attack appears to have taken Trump by surprise, with the New York Times reporting that it was launched "without so much as a courtesy notification to Washington". Trump officials said the White House was informed at the very last minute, when Israeli jets were already en route.

The attack must have taken careful advance planning agrees Amnon Aran, a Middle East specialist at City St George's, University of London.

Striking at the heart of one of Doha's touristy neighbourhoods while limiting the risk of collateral damage is not something that can be planned in a single day, he says.

The operation would need detailed preparation from reconnaissance of the target to choosing the method of attack, whether it be a bombing or a “targeted assassination”, Aran says.

“Then you need to decide whether you're going to actually fly over Qatari territory,” he adds.

The plan would need approvals all along the military chain of command, “from the army headquarters to the prime minister's office”, notes Aran.

Blurring the red lines 

The Qatar operation reflects Netanyahu's “reckless” approach to the war against Hamas, says Ahron Bregman, formerly a major in the Israeli army and a specialist in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict at King's College London.

"The question is whether or not Netanyahu still has 'red lines'," Hinman adds.

For Aran, the US president remains the only one who can still set such "red lines" for Netanyahu. But the White House must choose to do so. 

"Under the Biden administration, I think striking in Qatar” – which is home to the main US military base in the region – “was a complete no go”, Aran says.

Trump's approach "is a bit more ambiguous”, adds Aran, and Netanyahu seems to believe that Trump would find any means of ending the conflict with Hamas acceptable.

Despite the deals struck with the United States in exchange for protection, Qatar ultimately proved vulnerable.  

The strikes on Qatar also reveal that Israel has chosen to rely “on bombing Hamas into submission", Aran says.

Israel is pursuing this strategy despite international condemnation of the attack, and at the risk of undermining the Israeli-American relationship or of making the other Gulf countries feel threatened.

Above all, destroy Hamas  

Aran says the Doha attack reveals that, for Netanyahu’s government, the goal of destroying Hamas "takes precedence over the safe return of Israeli hostages”.

Bregman agrees. If Israel kills the Hamas negotiators, he asks, “Who will they negotiate with to secure the return of the hostages?” 

But Netanyahu seems to believe that the operation could pay off.

If Hamas's senior leadership in Doha are eliminated, Aran says, "the only people that will be negotiating on behalf of Hamas will be the people who are inside the Gaza Strip” – and under direct military pressure from Israel.

And in the absence of its most experienced negotiators, Hamas's ability to marshal the support of countries like Iran and Turkey will be compromised, weakening the group's position. 

The strikes may also cause Qatar to reconsider its key role as mediator between Israel and the Palestinians, Hinman notes, although Qatari authorities have said they want to continue to act as a go-between. 

Perhaps launching this attack was a sign that the Israelis intend to sideline Qatar from negotiations with Hamas, leaving the role of mediator to be taken over by Egypt, Aran says. 

That could be good news for Netanyahu's government. "Egypt is a country that is ideologically much less close to Hamas than Qatar is, and has a greater interest in seeing the fighting end quickly because it shares a border with Israel and the Gaza Strip," says Aran. "In the eyes of the Israeli authorities, Egypt would probably put more pressure on Hamas to accept Israel's conditions for ending the conflict." 

However, if the Hamas leadership was left unscathed by the attack, they “will emerge stronger from this, and they will most likely be much more inflexible in future negotiations”, Aran predicts. 

Even so, Netanyahu can expect to see benefits on the domestic political front.

“Politically, even if the operation failed, it will help Netanyahu with his political base at home," Bregman says. "His supporters, who are like a cult, will admire him for defying everyone and attacking Qatar.”

This article has been adapted from the original in French.