The Gaza war, internal matter

“All politics is local” is a well-established principle in the US that is usually attributed to the former speaker of the House of Representatives, Tip O'Neill. But what is outside also influences what is inside. Even before hyperglobalization, which is not only about goods, but also about sensibilities. We are seeing it in the face of the war between Hamas and Israel, which, beyond the geopolitical actions and consequences, is seriously affecting internal politics in many countries, especially the center left and the left, from the United States to the British, and the Spanish, passing through almost the entire Arab world and a good part of the Muslim world. At the moment, it serves Trump more than Biden.

In the recent Democratic primaries in Michigan, although Joe Biden won them without problems, the vote of the uncommitted (uncommitted) either “without preference”, has been significant, 13.3% or about 101,000 ballots from people who wanted to go to the polls to express their opposition to the policy of the current Democratic Administration, in a State that Biden won from Tump in 2020 by 150,000 votes. The movement has been promoted by Arab Americans (about 300,000 in that State) and independents, in protest of the president's almost unconditional support for Israel, in arms, in vetoes of resolutions in the UN Security Council, and other aspects. Michigan is one of the crucial states that Biden, if he does not finally withdraw, has to secure in November to have a chance of beating Trump. He is also losing support among Muslims, who make up a significant part of the black electorate, divided before Biden. His support for Israel in this war is also alienating the vote of many young people, who were already distancing themselves from him despite having been essential to his victory in 2020.

Biden has made efforts, together with other countries – the US alone is no longer enough – to promote not just a peace plan but a ceasefire. From the beginning he has clashed with the obstinacy of Netanyahu, whom he supports militarily, and with that of Hamas. Who is truly a superpower if this term means greater freedom to act unilaterally? At the same time, Biden has to seek the support of divided American Jews. Faced with Israel and the forgotten conflict with the Palestinians, Biden had not distanced himself from Trump's policies. His criticism, in this war, has been limited to being directed against the growing settlements in the Occupied Territories. After October 7, Arab Americans and progressive voters remained largely on the sidelines, while Republican Jews praised Biden's pro-Israel response. The latter have turned against him because of the settlements. Biden has reacted by sending humanitarian aid to Gaza from the air. Whatever he does, Biden will lose support, which, as Trump (silent in the face of all this) wishes, will abstain more than the Republicans. “No win situation”, some analysts in the US define it.

A practically unconditional ally of the US, the United Kingdom, is also being affected internally. It is not the conservative Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who is clear about his support for Netanyahu, but the Labor leader Keir Starmer, whom polls place as the clear favorite to succeed the previous one after the next elections, in a year or less. Labor has traditional support among British Muslims. In the past, with Jeremy Corbyn at the helm, it had to deal with a wave of anti-Semitism in its ranks that still persists. Starmer recently withdrew his support for two Labor candidates as a result. In the recent Rochdale by-election, George Galloway, candidate of Britain's small Workers' Party, won with a radical and absolutely pro-Palestinian speech. The war is being one of the issues that have most divided Labor in recent years, the deputies and the voters. Internal criticism has grown of Starmer for not going far enough in his condemnation of the excesses of the Israeli counterattack in Gaza, following the Hamas attack on October 7, and for not supporting an immediate ceasefire. In 2019, 80% of Muslims voted for Labor Party candidates. In 2010, only 37%. Can Starmer weather the storm without giving up his strong support for Israel? There are worried Labor candidates, calling for their party to support at least an immediate ceasefire. Especially in Scotland where the Scottish Nationalist Party called for a ceasefire in the House of Commons, in a debate so chaotic that the speakerLindsay Hoyle, had to apologize for her own behavior.

In a Eurobasket 2025 match, played in Riga because it could not be held in Israel, the Irish women's basketball team – without five players who boycotted the match – refused to shake the Israeli's hand or to line up on the court to listen to the anthems. in protest at the nature of the Israeli operation in Gaza. Some Israeli players had previously accused the opposing team of anti-Semitism. In France, a country with more than five million Muslims and a murky anti-Semitic past, demonstrations against Israeli excesses were for a time prohibited and repressed by Macron's Executive, which was slow to ask Israel to stop killing “women and “babies”, and in fully betting again on the two-state solution, while raising the flag of the fight against the financing of Hamas. French Jews are divided between right and left, and even within the latter between anti-Zionists and those who give more importance to the fight against anti-Semitism. The far right has been cautious. Le Pen, in her “normalization” process, has sought to remove the anti-Semitic patina that his father had and that has marked his party, while Jean Luc Mélenchon's left has also shown a certain prudence. As for Germany, its hands are tied by its own terrible history. Unlike what happened with the war in Ukraine, Ursula von Der Leyen has reacted to the Hamas attack and the Israeli response more as a German than as president of the European Commission, in an EU plagued by different sensibilities, histories and interests.

With its disproportionate counterattack, after the wave in its favor that caused the massacre by Hamas, Israel has lost support in public opinion in much of the world. The difference between last September and December, between those who saw the country in a positive light and those who had a negative opinion, has been reduced by an average of 18.5, according to a poll in 43 countries. It has decreased in all except one. China, South Africa and Brazil have gone from a positive to a negative view. And in those that already had it, such as Japan, South Korea and the United Kingdom, it has worsened. This deterioration has been accompanied by greater suspicion towards the United States in much of the world, especially in the Arab world. The governments of some of these countries that had taken steps towards Israel, under the pressure of their public opinions – although they are not liberal democracies – have been forced to freeze or even reverse their approach to Israel. Of course to once again support not Hamas but the resurrected Palestinian cause. In some cases to reactivate a peace process that leads to two States.

In Spain, the President of the Government supports the recognition of a Palestinian State, in due course. The state of public opinion can also influence. According to a Metroscopia survey shortly after the war broke out, if nine out of ten Spaniards thought that the Hamas attack was unjustifiable, 55% thought that Israel's reaction was excessive, 70% among left-wing voters, a percentage that It was practically reversed among those on the right.

Nor can we forget the repercussions that what is happening in Gaza may have on jihadist terrorism in Spain, France and other countries. 20 years after the fateful March 11, the jihadist threat is considerable, according to Fernando Reinares, from the Elcano Royal Institute. A report of this center, by Álvaro Vicente, considers that, although it does not fully replicate the Syrian scenario, which promoted violent jihadism, the Gaza war “has the potential to increase the levels of jihadist radicalization at a global level.” Although it seems, for the moment, to generate fewer opportunities for large-scale and clearly violent mobilization, as in the Syrian case. In the midst of this war on the ground, virtual spaces have taken on a new centrality for these movements.

The Gaza war is broader than the Strip. It reverberates throughout the Levant and far beyond. It leaves almost no one indifferent, and can have unexpected consequences. Or expected. For starters, it may be a deciding factor in who and how governs the world's even most powerful country in the coming years, and most protective of Israel. What is inside and what is outside are increasingly related. No matter how many walls are erected, that is the reality. Foreign policy is also local, and local policy is foreign.