Confounded by Trump’s Gaza folly? Let my old uni professor enlighten you

Dr Keith Suter is a foreign policy expert of 50 years standing, with a special interest in the Middle East. His first degree was in international politics, international law and international economics. He has PhDs in international humanitarian law and the economics of the arms race. I spoke to him on Thursday.

Fitz: Dr Suter, thank you for your time. I am hoping you will recall lecturing and tutoring me on Israel and Gaza at Sydney Uni 45 years ago. I remember you sometimes looking at me with the bemused expression of one who couldn’t quite believe he had to help a footballer who looked like he read Phantom comics with his lips moving understand something so complex ...?

Dr Keith Suter says that Trump’s plans for Gaza are “illegal and Immoral”.

KS: (Laughing.) I do remember!

Fitz: Well, I seek to use your expertise to help explain the situation in Gaza, historically and politically, before going into the latest Trumpian twist. To go to the core problem, you have two peoples claiming the one bit of land, historically a land they shared before the Jewish diaspora.

KS: Yes, in about 70AD, the Roman occupiers became thoroughly sick of the Jewish revolts and so destroyed the temples and scattered the Jews, some of whom remained in the Holy Land, and others went elsewhere.

Fitz: Britain got control of Palestine after World War I from the destroyed Ottoman Empire, and some Jews hoped to return. This Jewish return increased after Hitler’s rise to power in 1933 and then became a flood after the Holocaust.

KS: Yes, and so the British were confronted with this huge influx of Jewish refugees, and there were tensions between them and the existing Palestinian population. To resolve the tension, the British said, “Well, let’s divide the land into two peoples and have two states.” And basically, it has been that formula which keeps being revived. But every time it gets revived, it’s a smaller amount of land for the Palestinians.

Donald Trump has suggested taking over Gaza and turning it into the “Riviera of the Middle East”. Credit: Getty

Fitz: So the Brits were the driving force for the establishment of Israel in 1948?

KS: I think the key driving force was the guilty conscience of the Allied governments, who had not done enough to save the Jews in World War II. And with the Jews still arriving, Israel declares itself as an independent country, and some of the Palestinians were driven off the Holy Land and fled into the area called Gaza.

Fitz: Negotiations on the two-state solution fail, until Hamas launches the shocking attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. And in response, Israel unleashes all hell on all of Gaza.

KS: One of the complaints about the Israeli reprisal for approximately 1200 of their citizens being killed is that it’s out of proportion – with about 50,000 Palestinians killed. Now that the authorities are getting access back into Gaza, they’re finding more and more bodies under the rubble, and that’s why the figure continues to go up.

Fitz: And how do you characterise the previous approach of the Biden administration to restoring peace?

KS: Biden’s approach was simply to support Israel, whose own approach was to destroy Hamas. And that hasn’t worked. Israel’s aim to destroy Hamas has been effectively defeated in Gaza. Israel said it would eradicate Hamas, and yet, look who’s been handling the transfer of prisoners [in the current truce]. It’s been Hamas in bright new vehicles, wearing new clean uniforms. Hamas is still in business. Israel did not destroy Hamas. It might have killed some of the ringleaders, but you’ve got others who are coming up through the ranks. And we know from the history of guerilla warfare that you kill one person, you end up with others deciding to become guerillas, to act in retaliation.

Fitz: Which brings us, finally, to the alternative Trump approach. It seems to have gone from the “two-state” solution to what effectively looks like a “51st-state” solution – America takes over to turn Gaza into, to quote Trump, “the Riviera of the Middle East”. It seems to me a completely crazy idea that is appalling at every level. Is that fair or not?

KS: It’s not only a crazy idea, it’s illegal and immoral. It’s illegal in the sense that America can’t move in on any other country, be it Panama or Greenland or Gaza, and take it over without the invitation of the people concerned. They’d be no more than an occupying force. And it’s also immoral the way you’re going to be removing people from their own land. OK, Gaza is covered in rubble, but it is still the land of the Palestinians, and the phrase that is being used to describe the plan is “ethnic cleansing”; removing the population from that area.

Fitz: So when you say that it is “illegal” is it not that in some ways the Middle East is also the Wild West, and if Trump has the most guns, and he says it is legal, then he can make it so?

KS: No, it contravenes Article 2.4 of the United Nations Charter and it contravenes the Geneva Conventions relating to victims of war and occupied territory – and America is a signatory of both. So it really is illegal, against the very international laws and treaties the US has promulgated. And, of course, it’s immoral to take other people’s land without their consent.

Fitz: OK, but call me crazy, let’s just say Trump ignores law and morality – a stretch, I know but just go with me. Would it be remotely workable for the US to put boots on the ground, round up Gazans and move them off in every direction bar east?

KS: Where would it put them? Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Saudi Arabia have said they won’t accept them. And the average Arab in the street would never want to see their own government co-operating with the Americans to remove the Palestinians from their land. There would be a revolt against their governments. Another problem is getting enough of the American military to take on that role because America has global responsibilities and has to be careful that it doesn’t overextend itself. America just doesn’t have a large enough standing army to be able to occupy Gaza. And remember, Trump has promised to pull America out of foreign wars, not get involved in new ones.

Fitz: So, beyond illegal and immoral, it’s completely unworkable and disastrous for America?

KS: Yes. Remember, empires generally die by suicide, not murder. They die through over-extension, trying to do too much rather than being killed off by the enemy. Look at Britain. It won two world wars, and yet it finished WWII bankrupt. The problem for the US is that it is so heavily committed to all of these defence arrangements around the globe, going into places like Gaza – not to mention the other targets of Greenland and the Panama Canal – even if they could, would be a classic overextension.

Fitz: Perhaps this is just “Trump being Trump”, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing?

KS: Well, what was interesting was, on Gaza, Trump was not just firing from the hip but reading from a written statement. That’s why we’re all shocked, right? It was a prepared statement, so someone had thought it out. And the worry I’ve got generally is that we’re really just in the first two weeks of Trump’s power, and we’ve got another four years of this. But looking at it, it seems almost to be like a “children’s crusade”. So you’ve not only got these bizarre suggestions over Gaza, Panama and Greenland; you’ve got Elon Musk and his youngsters going through confidential payment files. You’ve got Trump trying to overturn the American Constitution when it comes to birthright citizenship. He’s signing all these executive orders, most of them wreaking chaos. [On Thursday] everybody in the CIA was offered eight months’ pay if they’ll resign. [Then] it was the Department of Justice winding down. So Trump’s destroying the US government. This is doing much more damage to America than the Chinese or the Russians could ever hope to achieve.

Fitz: And Australia in all this? Our classic approach for the last 85 years was emblematically expressed by Harold Holt: “All the way with LBJ”, with only Gough Whitlam quibbling, saying, “It’s all very well to say ‘All the way with LBJ’ so long as you know where LBJ is going.” Now that Australia can see where LBJ’s successor, Trump, is going, at what point is it feasible to say, “We ain’t going to the dump with Trump?”

KS: Well, there could be no easy extrication. Remember, we are caught up with the US in the AUKUS defence arrangement. But there must be plenty of people in Canberra wondering about that defence arrangement right now, right? And if I had been Anthony Albanese, after the last election, I would have set up a royal commission to investigate AUKUS to find out exactly what it entails. That would then give you the exit route to get out because you’d hope that the royal commission would find that this is not a fully fleshed-out agreement and not something that Australia should be bound up to. And now, with the election of Trump, that just adds to our disenchantment with AUKUS.

Fitz: But surely, we are bound to America on the grounds that we would be a lonely outpost without US protection?

KS: Well, we have no guarantee that we actually will have American protection. Remember, we’ve asked for American assistance on a couple of occasions. One was at the time of Timor-Leste in the ’90s and Clinton did not come to our assistance. Similarly, in the 1960s, at the time of the Malaysia confrontation – with Malaysia, UK, New Zealand and Australia supporting Malaysia against Indonesia – the Americans wouldn’t help out. So, the Americans do not have a good record in helping the allies. We have a brilliant record in always supporting the Americans, but it hasn’t been reciprocated, right? And what a number of people in Australia have argued over the years is that we need to think about how we would stand on our own two feet.

Fitz: Ideally, yes. But when Jim Killen was about to become defence minister in 1975, he told BBC listeners that Australia’s defence forces combined “would be unable to protect Botany Bay against an enemy on a hot Sunday afternoon”. Isn’t it still inconceivable that Australia could, without America, defend ourselves against any half-serious attack from anyone, bar stroppy New Zealanders?

KS: Sure, but then you’ve got to ask yourself, why would somebody want to invade this country? Maybe Indonesia, perhaps seeking to get more land, but the usually cited threat, the Chinese, won’t invade. They already own part of the country. They’re not going to damage their own investments by invading. And what the Americans under Trump would do in either case, who knows?

Fitz: Is it fair to say that while most of the rest of us are appalled by Trump’s actions, you’re nothing less than fascinated?

KS: I am absolutely fascinated by Trump. As I say, we’re only two weeks into a four-year administration. Who knows where we will be in four years?

Fitz: Do you think the American state will still be standing?

KS: Oh, the American state will still stand, but it’s going to be badly battered.

Fitz: Again, thank you.

Peter FitzSimons is a journalist and columnist. Connect via Twitter.

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