approach what i regrettably think is a new middle east not the new middle east that we originally thought we would have , a middle east of peace and common prosperity but regrettably, a new middle east focused on this great challenge that we now face. thank you very much here and abroad for joining us at the washington institute. goodbye. >> if you ever miss any of c-span's coverage, you can find it anytime online at c-span.org. videos key hearings, debates, and other events feature workings that guide you to key highlights. these markers appear on the right side of your screen when you hit play on certain videos. this makes it easy to quickly get an idea of what was debated and decided in washington. scroll through and spend some time on c-span's points of interest.

>> a healthy democracy looks like this. where americans can see democracy at work. citizens are truly informed, are public thrives. get informed on c-span. unfiltered, unbiased, word for word. the opinion that matters the most is your own. this is what democracy looks like. c-span, powered by cable. today -- listen today on the free c-span now mobile video app or wherever you get your podcast or on c-span.org/ podcasts. >> washington journal continues. host: on your screen, michael o'hanlon, research and foreign

policy program director at the brookings institute, here to talk about the israel-hamas conflict. guest: the scope is horrible. really it is historically unprecedented, at least for a half-century in terms of israeli casualties and in terms of the sense of existential fear within israel about what is happening and what could happen in the future, especially as hezbollah remains in a state of uncertainty to the north, inside lebanon. hezbollah being an extremist group that is also part of the lebanese government, also armed by iran. hamas bei the more sunni group sociated with the gaza strip in particular and has been effectively running that stri of land along the mediterranean for about 15 years. hamas carried out the attacks on saturday, which have been

likened to israel's 9/11. israel lost maybe 700 people out of 10 million, whereas we had lost 3000 out of 300 million on that 11 -- not to compare too much but just to give a sense of the scale and scope. now israel has a problem of a magnitude it has not had in a while with palestinian extremists. it's basic decisions under the george w. bush administration was to essentially let gaza be and let its politics play out as they would in keep gaza to be sure and you try to restrict movement of supplies and supplies that could be used in military operations, keep this to a minimum but to otherwise allow gaza to go whatever way the palestinians chose.

tragically, hamas wound up in control. even though there seems to be this balance of terror and pain between hamas and the israeli government, it turns out hamas was preparing this attack, feeling a sense of extreme frustration with his economic situation, its political future or lack thereof, and hamas has been committed to the overthrow of the israeli government and the elimination of israel as a state. it is not clear that hamas could ever be bargained with, but all that led up to the attack. last thing i will say in response to your initial question is that the big uncertainty apart from what hezbollah will do next is to what extent was iran calling the shots or highly involved in the preparation of this attack? we know iran was arming hamas and preparing its fighters, but we do not know the degree to which iran helped make a decision to launch this it --

bid. but now iran, hezbollah and hamas share opposition to the study peace proposal -- saudi- israeli peace proposal. some really wanted to make sure that cannot go forward. hence, the timing of the attack, which otherwise may or may not have occurred this fall or ever, but probably is designed to make it impossible for saudi arabia and israel to compete -- complete their process of creating peace and recognizing each other diplomatically through the u.s. and stronger american security promises to saudi arabia. that is the final completing element of that deal. that appears to be off for the foreseeable future. it will be hard for arabs to negotiate peace with israel as it retaliates against hamas and

inevitably causes civilian casualties in gaza along the way. it is a big deal and it is pretty bad. host: the israeli prime minister yesterday was saying retaliatory strikes are just the beginning. cnn is reporting that israel is now calling a complete siege of gaza. given everything you just said, what do the latest actions on the ground mean for the future of israel and palestine and all of the geopolitical conversations that had been happening up until this point? guest: i think i can do best at your question by trying to speculate about the meaning of the word siege in this situation. i cannot quite believe it has the medieval meaning or even from recent centuries of

literally starving out a population or punishing everyone within the perimeter of the siege. there will be a certain amount of pain-and-suffering for everyone as electricity and water are turned off, but i cannot believe the israeli government wants to literally hurt or kill everyone inside the gaza strip. i think the definition has to mean that some kind of a process whereby there is no allowance for people moving in or out and there will be not the euro search and essentially a counterterrorism operation that will be intelligence-based. the israelis do not know where every single hamas leader, weapons cache or command a control may be but they will do their best to find as many as they can. to be blunt, causing

this is similar to what israel did it lebanon in 2006. israel went to southern lebanon and thought i could probably eliminate a lot of the hezbollah presence there. -- nonetheless, that process and that occupation lasting roughly one month cause enough pain on all side that nobody wanted to go down the same path anytime soon again. so far since then, until this month, hezbollah and israel have not fought at that scale subsequently even though hezbollah certainly had the weaponry to do so with missiles and rockets. i think here, it israel's goals are more maximalist. it will try to demilitarized gaza and hamas as much as possible. to the extent it fails, it will at least have frankly caused enough pain through this siege that in their view, the palestinian people should have learned that they cannot ever tolerate a group like hamas

being in control and taking the steps against israel that it's just done the past few days. that's my best sense of what's happening. what that means is that israel still has a dilemma -- who will be in charge of gaza one this is over? they also don't want to be the occupying power themselves because they got tired of that 16 years ago. who will step in and will they consider a u.n. trusteeship or at -- for ask the international community? right now, they are more intent on making sure they destroy hamas as much as possible even though it will probably not be a completed job. host: the phone numbers are on your screen. you can also join us on x.

the left-leaning newspaper in israel is blaming the offense this morning, blaming benjamin netanyahu from this. just for this. this is their analysis -- guest: that's pretty strong language and i don't suppose -- i understand the israelis have such emotions that those kind of words will be spoken. i have a certain amount of

sympathy with part of the organ but i would not put it that way and certainly not as an outsider at this particular moment. i think netanyahu is not done a good job with the palestinians. however, hamas has always been committed to the overthrow of israel. the kind of sheer, pure terrorist violence that hamas has employed this week reminds us the nature of that group. while i agree there is a lot of frustration in the palestinian population and i think the netanyahu government's approach to the west bank which is breaking it up through piecemeal annexation is completely wrong and i think immoral and inconsistent with a serious peace process, i'm not going to personally blame netanyahu or his government for what just happened in the gaza strip. there are certainly decisions the government is it of israel could have done that could lower the probability but hamas is a group that's always been committed to the overthrow of not just anyone is really government but the israeli state such as it is.

it has had a maximalist and violent preoccupation toward israel ever since its founding. in that regard, i think it's time to maintain a certain unity against hamas at this juncture even if the netanyahu government has been quite mediocre in the peace process itself. host: how urgent is the need by israel for the united states to provide an aid package? guest: as a sign of solidarity and to help with certain specific needs, we should move quickly. i also think israel has the capacity to do a lot of what it's doing and is about to do on its own. that's the greater limitation which is not the american aid, it will be the inherent political difficulty of figuring out what to do with gaza as this occupation unfolds. that will remain even if we give them support. host: tony in chicago,

independent. caller: hi, good morning. i had a quick question for you. i want to provide some context on this going back to a statement you had made earlier. one, about the bush administration's position on hamas and they were just simply kind of ignoring their political leanings. that was a one-sided view. at the same time, you could say the united states primarily has been ignoring just with the israeli government has been doing to the people in palestine, allowing -- necessitating a resisting force to have to be created in the first place. that context is important and secondly, you said something about equal terror on both sides. i want to point you toward the u.n. data on how many casualties

there have been over the past 10 years on the israeli and palestinian side. i would hope c-span could put that up. but just 2018, nearly 32,000 casualties on the palestinian side with only 130 on the israeli side. that is not equal terror. those statements like that are completely misleading to the public. i think when you discuss issues, you need to completely incorporate all of the historical context, the militaristic context, the political and resistance context. host: let's give him a chance to respond. guest: i'm glad you mentioned the suffering of the palestinian people. it doesn't excuse anything hamas is done and being bent on the discretion of israel that it won't enter into a peace process.

the victim here has been the palestinian people more than anybody else. this is also the week where the victims have been innocent israeli civilians. i will emphasize that. i more than willing to blame hamas for the attacks the attacks that caused this terrible tragedy and how the israeli counter reaction happened and may wind up going too far. we should keep our eye on it closely and i share tony's view that we need to get back to a peace process in israel we should not support an israeli government that is not serious about it. israel has only had the potential negotiating art with palestinians in the west bank and hamas has never been interested and that's a tragedy. the main victims as tony rightly points out over time have been the palestinian people themselves more than anyone else in the region. host: who is the negotiating group in the west bank? guest: fasa is the group that essentially runs the government such as it is. it's a government that doesn't

have contiguous territory to control. it's broken up by various israeli settlements. there is a political entity there that over the years has been a negotiating partner for israel and i will put more blame on the netanyahu government than fasa for the failure of that process to reach a combination -- to reach a conclusion. it's been the number one problem in terms of impeding successful negotiations. i'm more than willing to be critical of the israeli government especially the netanyahu government. i'm struck by how much we miss prime minister rabin who was assassinated in the 90's by extremist israelis who didn't want to peace process. tragically, that assassination at its intended purpose and achieved its intended result. that's part of why we are reaping such violence still today. host: what should the response be of the united states to the iranian role here? guest: well, we already have a

very tough policy toward iran and that should continue, clearly. the iranian bureaucracy is extremist, militant and unjustifiable in its actions whatever historical grudge it may have against us by supporting the shot in the 60's and 70's. it's an excuse for its desire to destabilize much of the middle east. i think we will have to keep the pressure on iran. it's very controversial, this reason deal by which the biden administration released iranian funds even with typed supervision over there use to make sure that american hostages were released. it will be superhard to seek -- to see anything like that happening again because iran was involved and i would say was definitely involved. it deftly deserves part of the blame whether they were making the decision to go now or not. the historical arming and equipping of hamas puts them in a very guilty position. host: ja in north carolina, a

republican. mal caller: thank you c-span. it's very interesting. we have eastern europeans, not the original hebrews who have appropriated their whole religion and culture. then they go in and take land and assume it for themselves. and then don't want to give these people more than a sliver. the biggest test it's probably big is manhattan island and you put too many people on top of it , it's an open air prison and you start scratching your head and wondering why people are shooting bombs and why people are attacking. it's total colonization and i don't support it and i think it's wrong and i think they need to get the palestinians back there land or at least a portion of a state.

it's a small piece of land to begin with. i can't supported. host: michael hanlon, what has a two state solution look like but at this stage, is it too early to talk about that? guest: it seems like it's always too early but it's also too late. it should have happened in the 1990's. there was momentum back then. you had seen the famous handshake of arafat on the white house lawn with an israeli prime minister. there was the oslo process and we can be very bipartisan here because the first president bush helped set up that process. president clinton was i think thrilled to inherit it. it involve mediation in norway or through norway, motivated and facilitated with the united states involved in trying to negotiate.

as i mentioned, the assassination prime minister rabin a couple of years into that set us back badly. other things that as well but that was really a time when it should've happened. if it happened then, i don't know where we would be but i'm confident we would be in a better place than we are. host: chris in boston, democratic caller. caller: i'd like to remind your guest that in the 1980's when hamas emerged, they were promoted and were a counterweight tofatah i the israelis. also the peace initiative proposed by king abdulla of separate dish of saudi arabia in 2002. that if the israelis were to return to the 1967 borders, then there would be peace between the arabs and the israelis. host: let's take those points. guest: i like them.

i think that israel has made a lot of mistakes historically. it has a desire for enlarging its own territory. a lot of americans including the american security situation and our hearts are with israel and the palestinians, the innocent palestinians, this week and going forward. it doesn't defend israel's reluctance to be serious about a peace process over the years and wanting to take more territory. frankly, it's often been a cynical move by people who never wanted a peace process the first place because they wanted more of the west bank in particular for israel. i think netanyahu is clearly in that category himself. i largely agree with the caller. i just don't think they justify what hamas has done in recent days. host: what are you watching for today and tomorrow? guest: i will be watching for the degree to which israel is careful about how it conducts

this so-called siege and what that siege looks like and what it means an initial thoughts on what comes next. what comes next as to be discussed very soon. i think we have to put it on the table, the idea of a u.s. trusteeship with serious international securing monitoring for gaza. that's going to require hamas be overthrown which i expect israel will undertake and achieve. it will be hard and it's not a guarantee. those are some of the pieces of the puzzle i will be watching to see how they develop. i cannot make specific direction -- predictions but those of the elements i think will be at play in coming days and weeks. host: you can find about books on

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