The targeted killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh reminds me of this fascinating item I read recently about a huge hotel bill for Haniyeh and his entourage at the Mandarin Oriental in Doha, Qatar. Evidently, Hamas got hit with a $1 million bill for the 11-day stay, which included, needless to say, a hefty room service bill.
Not all terrorists are created equal.
Some love to live it up. While their foot soldiers were dying in Gaza in a blaze of martyrdom glory, and their people were living in sheer misery, Haniyeh and his henchmen were debating between the Rib Eye or the Dover sole.
The most important word in the Middle East is not power or honor or religion. Those are important, but the supreme word is “deterrence.” Deterrence is how sophisticated people say “scared sh-tless.”
If your neighbors are scared of you, they’ll behave. If they’re not, you’re in trouble. That’s how Israel has survived for so long– it’s the rule of the jungle.
October 7 broke that rule. One of Israel’s sworn enemies said to the all-powerful Israel: “We’re not afraid of you. We’re so not afraid of you that we are invading your country and slaughtering your people.” In fancy language, Israel lost deterrence.
The war in Gaza is Israel’s relentless attempt to regain that deterrence, to put the fear of God back into Hamas, to make a statement to everyone else in the region that no one should ever mess with Israel.
The problem is that when you’re dealing with people who worship death, deterrence can only go so far. It’s hard to scare people who see martyrdom as some kind of sacred honor. That’s why you see such chutzpah in Yahya Sinwar, the Hamas military leader who’s been in the trenches of Gaza for more than nine months. The death of his people doesn’t deter him. If anything, as Netanyahu said in his speech in Congress, those deaths are his strategy. The more his people die, the harder the world comes down on Israel.
But if dying doesn’t deter terrorists who worship death, it definitely deters those who love to live. It turns out you usually find those terrorists in the highest echelons, jet-setting in luxury from one Mideast capital to another, trying to look important.
Haniyeh, who’s worth an estimated $3 billion, was one of those luxury terrorists. The Hamas political leader has been jet-setting in his private jet for years now, usually from his home base of Qatar. According to the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, Qatar provides Hamas with between $120 million and $480 million per year. You can be sure a whole bunch of it found its way into Haniyeh’s pocket and in the coffers of Christian Dior and the Ritz Carlton.
Of course, the fact that a corrupt hedonist like Haniyeh would so visibly put his personal pleasures ahead of the interests of his people was hardly a secret, even among his own people.
Reda Shahyon, a 42-year-old mother of two living in Gaza, told The New York Times she “didn’t care” about Haniyeh’s death because “his soul is not more precious than those of the people who are dying every day.” She added bitterly that “he didn’t go through the suffering of displacement or hunger or feel any of these things we are feeling. He was sitting in a mansion, dignified, while we were dying of hunger and thirst and humiliation.”
This is just more evidence that the biggest enemies of the Palestinian people have always been their corrupt leaders, who see their people mired in misery while they luxuriate in fancy villas and private jets.
In any case, as far as Israel is concerned, they caught a very big fish, right after catching Hezbollah’s #2 man in Lebanon. It’s hunting season in the holy land. Israel is getting serious about deterrence, and not a moment too soon. These targeted strikes are a flashback to Israel’s commando mystique– to the Israel of Entebbe and other daring raids when no bad guy was ever safe.
Still, there’s reason to be concerned that these two assassinations may trigger a deadly retaliation that can get out of hand, not to mention that it risks making the hostage deal even more difficult than it already is. There are a lot of moving parts. Things can explode at any time. Welcome to the jungle.
For now, let’s just hope that those other big fish in the neighborhood who love their luxurious lifestyles, from Iran to Yemen to Syria to Lebanon, are scared sh-tless and watching their backs.
