Faculty offer historical context and predictions for the growing conflict
As part of the 2024–2025 Notre Dame Forum, the Office of the President hosted a lecture titled “One Year After October 7: Historical Backdrop and Future Prospects.” The purpose of the talk, according to the website, was to “offer a multi-lens perspective on the lead-up to the Hamas attack of October 7, 2023, and the Israeli response in Gaza.”
Charles and Jill Fischer Provost John McGreevy offered the introduction to the event. McGreevy stated, “We do this as a university, which has a responsibility to foster a learning environment that facilitates constructive discussion. … One of the ways we do that is the Notre Dame Forum.”
McGreevy referred to the theme of this year’s Notre Dame Forum, “What Do We Owe Each Other?” chosen by newly-inaugurated university president Father Robert Dowd, C.S.C. McGreevy continued, posing the questions, “How can Catholic social thought help us engage in fruitful dialogue with those whose perspectives are different from our own?”
Tzvi Novick, Abrams Jewish Thought and Culture Professor of Theology at Notre Dame, continued the introductions. He highlighted the importance of the Israel-Palestine conflict to Americans, saying “[the conflict] has long drawn the attention of and inspired emotion in Americans.” Novick added, “It matters to us as a Catholic university, one that is distinguished from almost any university in America because it has a physical campus in Jerusalem.”
Maura Policelli, Executive Director of the Keough School of Global Affairs’ Washington Office, served as the moderator of the discussion. She began by introducing the two speakers, Hussein Ibish, senior resident scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington, and David Myers, Sady and Ludwig Khan Chair in Jewish History at the University of California, Los Angeles.
Myers began the discussion by emphasizing his concern for the preservation of human rights: “One must hold up the dignity of all human life, one cannot choose sides. That’s a core guiding principle of ours.”
Ibish responded that the root of the debate concerns the motivations of both sides, rather than the facts of the conflict: “There are no competing facts. There is a body of common knowledge that … we do not disagree about. … Why those people did what they were doing, what they were intending, what was their project, what was their motivation: that is heavily contested and that is where the arguments come in.”
Myers then offered a brief history of the situation. He began with the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 after the end of British Mandatory Palestine following World War II. He referred to the historical strife between Jews and displaced Arabs in the region as a “clash of competing collective traumas” between Jewish survivors of the Holocaust and Arabs displaced by Israelis.
Myers then discussed the international response to the present conflict. He said that there was initial support for Israel and a “belief that Israel had the right to retaliate.” However, he noted that support for Israel began to diminish as the campaign continued into 2024 and negotiations stalled over a cease-fire deal with the return of hostages.
Myers noted that support for Israel in the United States breaks down along ideological and generational lines. He stated, “55 percent of Americans over the age of 65 supported President Biden’s policy on Israel” while “70 percent of individuals under the age of 30 were opposed to it.”
According to Myers, American support has the potential to be a “very significant political factor that may alter the landscape of the coming years and decades with respect to the United States’ relationship with the Middle East and to Israel.”
Support of the war amongst Israelis has also begun to fall as the goal of eliminating Hamas, which Ibish said “could not be accomplished,” has shifted to recovering hostages.
Myers also claimed that the U.S. hasn’t used its leverage as forcefully as it could, arguing that “although the United States is a declining power,” it still has the capacity to exercise its powers. “Biden could do that … after the election … in that two month period before he leaves office.”
In the Q&A session following the talk, one member of the crowd asked the speakers, “Why don’t you think it is central to call what is happening in Gaza a genocide?” Ibish responded, “[We] can have that debate. … We also need to discuss the other controversial word ‘apartheid’… although I would certainly say this is genocide.”
Ibish said the problem with classifying the war as genocide is that “international law begins with intent.” Myers added that intent is an incredibly high bar to prove in international law.
Following the speakers’ responses, at least four members of the crowd began to chant “Free, Free Palestine,” repeatedly as they walked out of the lecture hall.
Later in the Q&A, Ibish said, “Ethnic cleansing was a prerequisite for the establishment of an Israeli state. … Everything we’ve seen continues the logic of that.”
In an interview with the Rover following the talk, Myers said the U.S. should “be a fair and honest broker by indicating its strong support for Israel and its strong support for the Palestinian crisis.”
He continued, saying that the United States “should have used its substantial power to alter the map of the region and break the cycle of violence by making clear to Israel that it can’t occupy or eradicate through military means the Palestinians or their aspiration for self-determination.”
When asked about Israeli policy towards Gaza, Ibish told the Rover, “Netanyahu’s focus is on denying Palestinians a state and creating circumstances for Israel to annex large parts of the West Bank.” Speaking on the power of Israeli influence on American foreign policy, Ibish was skeptical, saying, “Increasingly, because most Jewish-Americans are Democrats, and Democrats are becoming disillusioned with Netanyahu, it’s become harder for him to manipulate Jewish-American sentiments.”
The next talk in the “Israel-Palestine Series,” titled “Peaceful Co-Existence Among Israelis and Palestinians: Vision for a Shared Future,” will take place on November 11 as part of the Notre Dame Forum.
Sam Marchand is a sophomore studying political science and finance from Beaumont, Texas. He squanders much of his spare time by reading the Current Events section of Wikipedia preparing arguments for ND Speech & Debate, of which he serves as president. He can be reached at smarcha3@nd.edu.
Ella Yates is a sophomore studying philosophy, political science, and theology from Western Springs, Illinois. She spends most of her free time desperately trying to convince her friends to have philosophical conversations with her. For anyone interested, she can be reached at eyates4@nd.edu.
Photo Credit: Irish Rover
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