Given the tumultuous events of the past several years, it is tempting to herald the emergence of a “new Middle East.” But how many times have we heard that? The Six-Day War was thought by some to be a critical turning point—surely Israel’s Arab opponents would make peace now?—and it didn’t happen. Ditto the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty, the first Gulf War, the Oslo Accords, the U.S. invasion of Iraq, and the Arab Spring. And yet events like the Sept. 11 attacks, the Syrian civil war, the Oct. 7, 2023, assault by Hamas, the ongoing genocide in Gaza, the recurring destruction of Lebanon, the Houthis’ attacks on Red Sea shipping, and the recent airstrikes on Iran keep happening.
We have seen extraordinary developments over the past decade—and especially since Oct. 7, 2023—but the underlying conditions that have made the region so conflict-ridden for so long remain unchanged. Some of the players are gone, others have gained or lost power, and several have embraced different policies, but the more fundamental sources of instability are still intact.
When I hear talk of a new Middle East, therefore, I’m inclined to be skeptical.
To see why, consider first what’s new and then what remains unchanged.
The most obvious and important development of the past several years is the dramatic weakening of the “Axis of Resistance” (Iran, Hamas, Hezbollah, Iraqi militias, the Assad regime in Syria, and the Houthis in Yemen). Following Hamas’s brutal attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Israel unleashed a massive campaign against every part of this loose coalition, and with telling effect. Hamas has been gravely weakened, though it has not been eliminated and is still resisting Israel’s genocidal actions. Many of Hezbollah’s top leaders have been killed and its military arm is much weaker than it was two years ago. Deprived of support, the Assad regime has been swept away, and Israel has seized this opportunity to bomb arms caches in Syria and to occupy additional territory there. It has exchanged airstrikes with the Houthis in Yemen. Last but by no means least, in June it launched an ambitious air campaign against Iran (subsequently reinforced by the United States) in an attempt to destroy Iran’s nuclear infrastructure and possibly topple the clerical regime itself. Apart from Assad, none of the other parts of the so-called axis have been eliminated and all remain stubbornly defiant. But each is substantially weaker now than a few years ago.
A second development is the gradual shift in power and influence within the Arab world, away from Egypt and Iraq and toward Saudi Arabia and the wealthy petrostates of the Gulf. Egypt remains an economic basket case, while Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) are racing to modernize and diversify their economies and to play more active diplomatic roles. Not surprisingly, some experts now believe these states can play a mediating role in the region, if only out of necessity.
Third, Russia’s influence in the region has been greatly diminished by the fall of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and the burdens of the long and costly war in Ukraine. Moscow could not prevent Assad’s collapse, and it has done little to help Iran despite the various forms of assistance that Tehran has provided to Russia since the war in Ukraine started. Russia under President Vladimir Putin is no longer able to play the spoiler role it has played in recent decades, and that development marks another significant shift.
Lastly, the role of other outside powers—including the United States—may now be changing significantly. Although the United States has been hostile to Iran for decades, the Trump administration’s decision to participate actively in Israel’s bombing campaign is a significant step, especially given President Donald Trump’s threat to renew the attacks if Iran tries to sprint for the bomb. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and some parts of the Israel lobby in the United States have been pushing for this step for a long time, and they finally got their wish.
But at the same time, the brutality of Israel’s assault on Gaza is undermining political support for Israel in both U.S. political parties and around the world. As former Israeli diplomat Alon Pinkas recently observed in the New Republic, 60 percent of Americans now disapprove of Israel’s campaign in Gaza, and recent polls show that a majority (53 percent) have an unfavorable image of that country. Leading newspapers are denouncing Israel’s actions with growing frequency, and distinguished experts on genocide—including in Israel itself—are increasingly accusing Israel of that heinous crime. And even if one rejects that specific term, there is no question that Israel has committed war crimes on a vast scale. The fact that Hamas committed crimes of its own on Oct. 7 is no justification for continuing to bomb and starve a helpless population. The Democratic Party is now deeply divided on this issue, and the GOP’s once rock-solid edifice of pro-Israel sentiment is cracking. When you’ve lost the likes of Tucker Carlson, Steve Bannon, and diehard Trumpian Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, you know the ground is shifting.
Similar trends are happening all over the world: A recent Pew poll of 24 countries found that majorities in 20 out of 24 had unfavorable views of Israel, and the governments of France, Great Britain, Canada, and possibly Australia have pledged to recognize the state of Palestine. Given that Trump has no sentimental attachment to Israel (or any other country, for that matter) and is more interested in currying favor with wealthy Arab oil magnates, it is at least possible that the United States will at long last use its considerable leverage to pressure Israel into halting its futile war and end its efforts to create a “greater Israel” incorporating the West Bank.
Put all this together, and one can understand why some people believe we are witnessing a potential sea change in the region. I don’t doubt that some important elements have changed, but a “new Middle East”? Not so fast.
For starters, the Middle East remains an anarchic, multipolar setting, and there is no dominant or hegemonic power that can impose order there. The Bush administration tried to transform the region during America’s brief “unipolar moment,” and it failed miserably. Netanyahu and other Israeli hard-liners may have hoped that their recent victories would establish their status as the region’s hegemonic power, but as I’ve explained in a previous column, a state governed by roughly 7.5 million Jews (along with about 2 million Israeli Arabs) that remains heavily dependent on generous American backing is not going to establish durable dominance over hundreds of millions of Arab and Persian Muslims. To repeat: Neither Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, nor Iran has disappeared, and all remain defiant. Those increasingly influential states in the Gulf or the Arabian Peninsula are not happy with what Israel has been doing of late, either, because they seek stability above all else, and that is definitely not what Israel has been providing.
What this means is that the Middle East will remain a region where different states compete for power, security, and influence. Iran still wants a latent nuclear weapons capability to balance Israel, and its desire for a deterrent of its own has undoubtedly increased in the aftermath of the Israeli/American bombing campaign. Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, and Egypt will continue to compete for status and influence within the Arab world; Turkey will intervene on occasion to protect its own interests; and all these states will court outside powers in an effort to bolster their positions. None of the events of the past few years seems likely to alter this recurring feature of regional politics, and institutions like the venerable Arab League or the largely moribund Gulf Cooperation Council are far too weak to make much difference.
Furthermore, the United States is still there. Although U.S. leaders have repeatedly tried to disengage from the region—in part so that Washington can focus attention on Asia—none of them has succeeded. Trump tried to get U.S. forces out of Syria during his first term and failed, and the U.S. military footprint remains roughly what it was when he first took office back in 2017. As noted above, Trump’s decision to attack Iran directly is hardly a sign of disengagement, and U.S. special forces recently went after leaders of some remnant Islamic State factions in post-Assad Syria. Trump has also bombed the Houthis (to little avail), and presidential envoy Steve Witkoff keeps flying over in a thus-far fruitless effort to end the carnage in Gaza. And despite growing public discontent with its actions, the U.S. government is still shoveling money and arms at Israel. Plus ça change; plus c’est la même chose.
Unfortunately, this situation is a perfect recipe for resurgent Islamic extremism, and it will be a small miracle if we don’t see new waves of terrorism emerging in response to the events of the past couple of years. That fear is one reason the Arab oil states are so alarmed by what Israel is doing; they may not have a lot of genuine sympathy for the Palestinians, but they know that their plight remains a potent recruiting tool for extremists and underscores their own failure to address the problem.
Here’s something else that hasn’t changed: We are no closer to a political resolution to the Palestinian issue and in all likelihood further away. Even allowing for the 60,000-plus Palestinians who have been killed in Gaza and the West Bank since October 2023, there are still roughly equal numbers of Palestinian Arabs and Israeli Jews living in the territories that Israel controls. Most of these Palestinians have no political rights, little agency, and no realistic prospect of getting a state of their own. Until that situation changes, some of them will continue to push back as best they can against their Israeli overlords, just as the Zionists did against the British and just as Israeli Jews would do today if the situation were reversed. If, as is likely, the two-state solution is no longer feasible, then Israelis, Palestinians, and the rest of the world will have to explore other visions. (For one such proposal, see the forthcoming study by Michael Schaeffer Omer-Man and Sarah Leah Whitson.) Until they do, this reliable source of regional trouble will still be present.
The bottom line is that the Middle East remains a region with deep political divisions, where the most powerful actors dominate others and deny them rights, agency, and recognition. One sees this in the repeated efforts to marginalize Iran through sanctions, non-recognition, exclusion from regional diplomatic efforts, and most recently, airstrikes. One sees it in the long campaign to deny Palestinians a state of their own (or even to insist “there is no such thing as a Palestinian nation”). And one sees it within the Arab world itself, where monarchs and military dictators suppress calls for greater openness and political rights (Remember the Arab Spring, anyone?).
Conditions such as these inevitably generate pushback, which in turn leads to increasingly harsh acts of repression, which in turn means continued instability. Rinse and repeat. A stable regional order will require a more even balance between power and legitimacy, and legitimacy ultimately requires a measure of justice, fairness, and the provision of political rights. As long as these features remain, the “new” Middle East will be a lot like the old one. Keep this firmly in mind, and as the song says, you “won’t get fooled again.”