Opinion: Who will be the winner in this terrible conflict?

Opinion by Frida Ghitis

(CNN) — With every passing day, we learn ever more horrifying details of what Hamas has perpetrated against Israeli civilians since last Saturday. Now that our notion of what can happen in this troubled corner of the world has been shaken, proving that the inconceivable can become reality, questions loom. Among them: Is there a way to defy the odds in a different way, with an outcome to this conflict that overcomes enormous political and diplomatic obstacles to create more durable stability? And, to that end, is there a way to prevent Iran from emerging as the victor in this terrible war?

At this moment, the focus in Israel is on military and other security operations. But behind the scenes, with a view toward what happens in the longer term, there’s a pivotal role for diplomats and political leaders in the region and beyond.

The agenda of Israel, the US and the international community (after persuading Egypt to open the border to Gaza civilians so they can flee the fighting) should include three extraordinarily difficult goals to start building a safer, more stable aftermath to the fighting: healing the acrimony dividing Israelis, making progress in relations with Palestinian factions that are not opposed to living side by side with Israel and salvaging the normalization process between Israel and Saudi Arabia. Achieving these would make the entire world more secure.

These goals may seem out of reach, perhaps even impossible. But, as Israel’s first prime minister David Ben-Gurion once noted, “…in order to be a realist you must believe in miracles.”

We already know many of the losers in this terrible conflict: the thousands of Israeli victims slaughtered and terrorized by Hamas; the civilians in Gaza once again trapped as human shields; the peace activists, whose foes will argue this latest violence proves that peace is impossible; and the politicians and military leaders who will face a furious reckoning when this is over.

But who will be the winner?

The goals of terrorism are political, and the political ramifications of this conflict are global. The United States may want to pivot away from the Middle East, but the Middle East refuses to play along.

Iran, which for years has supported Hamas with money and weapons, has a strong stake in how this plays out in the weeks, months and even years ahead. So far, neither the US nor Israel have found direct evidence linking Tehran to the attack, but the White House has described Iran as “broadly complicit” as a full-fledged sponsor of Hamas. Israel and the US are being circumspect, because if they do find a smoking gun, if they make the accusation, that could amount to a casus belli, a justification for war, and they don’t want another head-on confrontation at this moment. Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei praised Hamas for the operation but, perhaps betraying some anxiety, publicly denied involvement in the attacks.

And yet, this war could end up turning into a triumph for Tehran, a fervently fundamentalist, anti-Western dictatorship that has threatened to destroy Israel and has worked to encircle it with a ring of militant organizations in Gaza, Lebanon and Syria, all the while depriving its own people of many basic rights.

The goals of Hamas, whose founding charter commits it to the destruction of Israel, align neatly with those of Iran’s theocracy. Both Iran and the Palestinians have watched with alarm the growing ties between Israel and its Arab neighbors. Whatever the principal objective of Hamas’ operation, it’s reasonable to believe that derailing that process, particularly the prospect of friendly ties between Saudi Arabia and Israel, entered the calculation.

The perpetrators undoubtedly expect an implacable reaction from Israel, which would help to derail the process, with images of Palestinians killed by Israeli bombs filling the screens of Arab citizens everywhere, sparking outrage and making it far more difficult, perhaps impossible, for the Saudis to draw closer to Israel. With Arab publics watching images of carnage in Gaza, the terrorist logic goes, it becomes politically impossible for Arab leaders to draw closer to Israel.

An end to the normalization process would be a victory for Iran, and a victory for Iran — now a member of the anti-American, anti-Western axis of autocrats, alongside China and Russia — is the last thing the United States, Israel and Saudi Arabia want.

Iran and Saudi Arabia recently established diplomatic relations, but the long-standing rivalry and mistrust between them, as the standard bearers of Islam’s two main divisions, Shiites and Sunnis, did not suddenly disappear.

If Riyadh were to announce that the talks with Israel are not dead, it would face strong blowback from many quarters, at home and abroad. But Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman (MBS), is not exactly risk averse.

To ease the path for reconciliation with Saudi Arabia — and for other important reasons, including the promotion of stability at home, and the need to one day solve the conflict with Palestinians — Israeli leaders should be talking to Palestinians in the West Bank, probing the possibility of working together on a path forward. It all seems barely fathomable now, but it will be necessary.

Indeed, of the three difficult goals, this one may be the most difficult. MBS may be prepared to face popular anger, but the head of the Palestinian Authority, President Mahmoud Abbas, is not. Now in the 18^th year of a four-year term, he is deeply unpopular, his position tenuous.

Many Israelis, too, will bristle at the notion of compromise with Palestinians, after having seen their men, women, children, toddlers, babies and elders massacred, and not hearing any condemnation from the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah.

If Israel’s peace camp had already grown weaker over the years, Hamas has only made it more so.

But nothing has weakened Israel more than its internal divisions, which tore the country apart after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu brought into his coalition right-wing extremist figures — the only way he could hold on to power. Interestingly, one of them, Itamar Ben-Gvir, was Israel’s minister of national security when the country was caught totally unprepared.

For months, Israelis had been protesting against a judicial overhaul — a judicial “coup,” as critics called it — promoted by Netanyahu’s ruling coalition, which would severely weaken checks and balances in the country, corroding its democratic underpinnings.

On Wednesday, in the midst of this crisis, the most serious one Israel has faced in decades, Netanyahu and former defense minister Benny Gantz announced an emergency unity government. That’s the first step in bringing the country back together. But that road, too, is long and steep. Israelis face wrenching dilemmas, and they have diametrically opposed views about how to solve them. If there’s something they surely all agree about today, it’s that those deep divisions made the country more vulnerable.

As the fighting rages on, the emotions are intense. Grief, anger, fear. But those whose job is to look beyond the immediate challenge, to consider the future beyond the crisis and look for ways to prevent it from returning in an even more devastating shape, must find a way to create a diplomatic and political miracle on the other side of the current nightmare.

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