In an unprecedented strike, Israel tried to eliminate most of Hamas’s senior leadership as it convened in Doha, the capital of Qatar, on Sept. 9.
While the results were still unclear at the time of publication, the impact of Israel’s momentous decision to attack the capital of a U.S. major non-NATO ally will be felt across the Middle East for months to come.
With the region embroiled in several active conflicts and Israel fighting on seven fronts over the past two years, many worry that Qatar’s declaration that it would “respond” against Israel means that another escalation is on the way.
Not so, says Dr. Ariel Admoni, a Qatar policy researcher at the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security (JISS), who has emerged as one of Israel’s foremost experts on the shadowy Gulf emirate.
One of the reasons fueling Qatar’s outraged response, in addition to reports that an official questioned the alliance with the United States in a phone call with special envoy Steve Witkoff, is that Qatar has consciously outsourced its security to Washington.
With the region’s largest U.S. base only a stone’s throw south of Doha, who would dare attack it?
However, this is now the second attack on Qatar in recent months, after Iran lobbed several missiles at the air base in a move to blow off steam that was likely coordinated with Qatar beforehand.
The emirate, which only has some 300,000 full citizens, has relied on protection from the U.S., only maintaining a small army that is heavily dependent on foreign mercenaries and immigrants.
So how could Qatar try to harm Israel and retaliate for the attack and the resulting humiliation?
“I estimate they’ll try to activate all kinds of think tanks and other pressure to try and build a judicial case against Israel, in judicial and diplomatic channels,” explained Admoni.
“For example, all the international condemnations – try to translate them into a kind of diplomatic move against Israel, which presents Qatar as a peace-seeking country that doesn’t choose escalation but, on the other side, will attack Israel in response.”
Qatar has already taken measures to implement this goal. “The Qataris are swift: In the last hour, a meeting of the team responsible for formulating the legal move following the Israeli attack in Doha, led by Minister Mohammed Al-Khalifi, has already taken place... Qatar is aiming for a legal-diplomatic move against Israel,” Admoni wrote on 𝕏 on Wednesday.
In addition, Qatar requested to postpone a UN Security Council meeting so the Qatari prime minister could attend and address the session.
Currently, Qatar's leaders are busy broadcasting their condemnations of Israel’s actions across every media and diplomatic channel, while almost every relevant nation on the world stage has already criticized Israel in the past days.
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