Chaos in Gaza spells relief for Moscow as U.S. focus shifts from Ukraine to supplying Israel
October 15, 2023
Russian President Vladimir Putin is one of the few major world leaders who hasn’t called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to offer condolences over Hamas’s attack. PHOTO: KREMLIN POOL/ZUMA PRESS
For years, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pursued what he called a “complex” relationship with the Kremlin, maintaining cordial relations with an increasingly isolated Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Even Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and its warming relations with Israel’s arch rival, Iran, failed to upend the cooperation. The leaders kept in touch by phone, and Netanyahu announced a nonaligned approach to the war in Ukraine, refusing to purvey lethal aid or air-defense systems to Kyiv, despite Western pressure.
Now, after the deadly attack by Iranian-backed Hamas militants on Israel, the conversations appear to have ceased. Putin is one of the few major world leaders who hasn’t called Netanyahu to offer condolences for the more than 1,300 Israelis killed by Hamas in the attack.
“Putin and Netanyahu used to communicate frequently,” said Vera Michlin, a former official at Israel’s national-security council and now director of education at Sympodium, a U.K.-based think tank. “The current silence is definitely indicative of the wider Russian approach.”
The ending of entente between Russia and Israel highlights a larger tectonic shift under way in Russia’s role in the Middle East since Putin launched his war in Ukraine. Scrambling for arms and allies to execute its botched invasion of Ukraine, Russia has transformed its once-carefully-balanced relationship with Iran while strengthening ties with Arab states such as Egypt, Iraq and the United Arab Emirates.
Russia has delivered Yak-130 training aircraft to Iran’s air force and is considering a deal to sell Iran jet fighters that could shift the balance of air power in the Middle East. PHOTO: IRANIAN ARMY OFFICE/HANDOUT/SHUTTERSTOCK
Moscow is now seen as laying the foundation for a strategic relationship with the Islamic republic, which supplied thousands of suicide Shahed drones that Moscow used since the invasion of Ukraine to degrade and destroy its neighbor’s power infrastructure, and which is now providing components for Moscow to assemble the drones inside Russia. Russia, in turn, has delivered Yak-130 training aircraft to Iran’s air force and is considering a deal to sell Iran Su-35 jet fighters, which could shift the balance of air power in the Middle East.
For years, Russia and Iran fostered ties with one another, but relations were sown with distrust because each side also toyed with better relations with the West. Now both sides are pariahs to the West and backed into the same corner, analysts say.
“Russia is looking for a partner who can provide arms, but its embrace of Iran is driven also by a broader anti-Western sentiment,” said Nikolai Kozhanov, an expert on Russian-Iranian relations at Qatar University.
The embrace has extended to Iran-sponsored Hamas, which carried out the massacre on Israeli civilians. Over the past year, at least two high-level delegations have flown to Moscow for talks.
Over the weekend, Hamas wrote a message on its Telegram channel praising Putin’s position on the growing violence.
“We in the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) appreciate the position of Russian President Vladimir Putin regarding the ongoing Zionist aggression against our people and his rejection of the siege of Gaza,” the statement said.
Russia hasn’t denounced the attack by Hamas. Andrei Gurulev, State Duma deputy and member of its Defense Committee, noted the effectiveness of Hamas in overcoming Israeli defenses and wrote on his Telegram channel that Russian forces could learn from their methods and the Israeli response.
“Whose ally is Israel? The United States of America,” Mr. Gurulev wrote. “Whose ally is Iran and its surrounding Muslim world? Ours.”
Israeli tanks heading toward the Gaza Strip border in southern Israel on Thursday. PHOTO: OHAD ZWIGENBERG/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Moscow’s closer ties with Iran, as well as its efforts to build stronger ties with Israel’s Arab neighbors, in many ways are a reprise of the Soviet Union’s Cold War stance toward Israel. At the time, the Soviet Union’s desire to upend U.S. partners and maintain footholds in the world’s poorer economies led it to arm Israel’s biggest enemies, leading to the Six-Day War in 1967 and the Yom Kippur War in six years later.
Russia supports a Palestinian state based on Israel’s 1967 border with a capital in East Jerusalem.
The Kremlin meanwhile has domestic reasons to welcome a war farther from Russia’s borders. With Russian presidential elections slated for March, the Kremlin has been looking for a diversion from the war in Ukraine. Putin has often sustained his 23-year rule over Russia using state-run media to ignore domestic problems while focusing on disarray abroad.
That has been a tougher act to follow with the military debacles in Ukraine, which the Kremlin had planned as a short military operation but which has drawn out into a yearslong war.
Since last weekend, Russia’s war in Ukraine has been forced off the front pages of newspapers around the world as well as inside Russia, where state-run media have pivoted from the war in Ukraine to Israel and Gaza.
Top Russian officials signal that they see other benefits in the months ahead, calling the outbreak of fighting a blow to U.S. prestige, and that Washington must now reassess just how much it can continue to supply Ukraine to fight off Russian troops while it also supplies Israel.
“This was the first, knee-jerk reaction that Russia had—this conflict is good for them, it takes pressure off of them in several ways,” said Michlin.
Putin, in his first comments on the attacks by Hamas earlier this past week, lashed out at the U.S., calling the attacks a “clear example of the failure of United States policy in the Middle East,” which has never defended the interests of Palestinians in peace talks. On Friday, he said Israel has a right to defend itself against attacks from Hamas but urged peace talks leading to the creation of an independent Palestinian state.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov likewise blamed the U.S. for monopolizing a failed peace between Israelis and Palestinians. Days after the massacre, he met with Arab League Chief Ahmed Aboul Gheit, and the two called for an immediate cease-fire and internationally backed talks.
Arab League Chief Ahmed Aboul Gheit and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov met in Moscow earlier this week and called for an immediate cease-fire and internationally backed talks. PHOTO: SERGEI ILNITSKY/ASSOCIATED PRESS
“A large number of our compatriots live in Israel,” Lavrov said after the talks. “We are concerned about their fate in the current situation and are doing everything to find out if there are people among them who need help.”
Soon after the onset of fighting last weekend, former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev called it a comeuppance for the U.S. for spending its money and attention on undermining Russia, instead of brokering peace between Israelis and Palestinians. Moscow has roundly accused the U.S. of sparking its invasion of Ukraine by supporting and arming an anti-Russian Nazi regime in Kyiv.
“Instead of actively working on a Palestinian-Israeli settlement, these idiots came at us and started helping neo-Nazis in all kinds of ways, pushing our nations into conflict,” Medvedev wrote hours after Hamas launched its attack on Saturday.
Other prominent Kremlin commentators gloated that fighting in Israel means that now two U.S. allies could be denuded of defenses. The Kremlin propagandist and television presenter Vladimir Solovyov reposted a news article about the U.S. decision in January to remove 300,000 American 155-millimeter artillery shells from a weapons stockpile in Israel and transfer them to the Ukrainian military. The post said that Israel was now without an “insurance policy.”
State media likewise covered pro-Palestinian protests in London and New York, where shoving matches erupted with police.
Thomas Graham, a distinguished fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, said Russian state media will likely pounce on any chaotic developments in Israel or elsewhere that will be a distraction to Russia’s internal problems.
Matthew Luxmoore contributed to this article.
https://www.wsj.com/world/hamas-attack-ends-a-delicate-entente-between-russia-and-israel-b5745a20
“Even Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and its warming relations with Israel’s arch rival, Iran, failed to upend the cooperation. The leaders kept in touch by phone, and Netanyahu announced a nonaligned approach to the war in Ukraine, refusing to purvey lethal aid or air-defense systems to Kyiv, despite Western pressure.
“Now, after the deadly attack by Iranian-backed Hamas militants on Israel, the conversations appear to have ceased. Putin is one of the few major world leaders who hasn’t called Netanyahu to offer condolences for the more than 1,300 Israelis killed by Hamas in the attack.”
We, here on Ukraine Today, have been criticizing Israel’s stance with mafia land all along. Israel under its current leader and the last one, too, have been playing a dangerous game with the crime syndicate. It’s baffling to think about the outlandish relationship that Israel has with the terrorists in moscow. It’s really no secret at all that mafia land is a close friend of the other terrorist, iran, which is perhaps Israel’s worst enemy on this planet.
Now, Israel has to suffer the consequences. Actually, the Israeli people and also the Palestinians.
So, what now? What will the consequences be for mafia land’s obvious involvement in the near east war?
But, Israel is not the only country that has and is playing dangerous games with evil terrorists. There is also Hungary, Switzerland, Turkey, and now Slovakia. Not to forget are politicians, business and entertainment entities, and political parties across the Western world, with more than enough in our own ranks in Congress, namely Trump, Gaetz, Taylor-Greene, et al, who are dancing on a volcano.
The war in Ukraine didn’t wake up nearly as many people as it should have, to let them see in what kind of sordid cauldron of wickedness that we’re maneuvering to. Will this newest crisis in the near east be the catalyst to hurtle the rest into the realm of reality?
After Hamas thanked putler for his support, even a dolt like Netanyahu must have realised that his arse-kissing policy to puker was a total waste of time.
I’m sure Israelis will have seen the hateful, gloating comments on putinaZi social media when those kids were slaughtered at their music festival by vermin.
As I have frequently said, apart from the ridiculous extremes of Iran, Syria and Palestine, Russia is the most antisemitic place on earth. It is the home of naziism and the the home of the notorious forgery and inspiration for Hitler : “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.”
So: you know what you’ve got to do Netanyahu : apologize to Ukraine and start helping at last.
He even said before his election that if he wins, he will “look into” providing help for Ukraine.
Now of course he will say he can’t spare anything. But Hamas will be defeated.
Then we will see…..
I think that Netanyahu’s days in his current position are numbered after all of this, including his white-glove-approach with mafia land.
Putin is one of the few major world leaders who hasn’t called Netanyahu to offer condolences for the more than 1,300 Israelis killed by Hamas in the attack.
And still friends?