“Maybe You Were Just Sitting the Other Way Around”
A saying attributed to William Shakespeare goes: “Do not say that the world has turned its back on you — perhaps you were simply sitting the other way around.”
Much has been written, and much will continue to be written, about the eruption of events on October 7, 2023, and about understanding what took place that day. But it has become increasingly clear that anyone seeking to comprehend those events must revisit the lessons of the October 6, 1973 war. Not only from the perspective of surprise and deception — the decisive elements of that war — but also from another equally important perspective: the prevailing cultural concepts within Israeli society on the eve of that conflict.
In delving deeper, one comes across a statement attributed to Abba Eban, Israel’s foreign minister during the 1973 war: “Much has changed since October 6, and we should not exaggerate Israel’s military superiority. On the contrary, there is now an overwhelming sense in Israel that we must rethink the entire rhetoric of national discourse.”
This term — “rhetoric of national discourse” — lacks a precise definition in linguistic or political references. Yet it is deeply tied to the devastating shock Israel experienced in the first hours of that war, when the Bar Lev Line collapsed, shattering entrenched military myths. What Eban meant was that the flaw lay not only in Israel’s military preparations, but in its broader social and educational mindset. After their sweeping victory over all Arab armies in 1967, Israelis had entrenched a sense of superiority toward Arabs in both language and behavior. Fueled by overconfidence, they dismissed the possibility that Arabs could ever mount a serious challenge. Even the most precise intelligence reports were brushed aside with arrogance.
This overconfidence gave Egypt the chance to use Ashraf Marwan (son-in-law of late President Gamal Abdel Nasser and a prominent figure in Egypt’s political and security circles) to test Israel’s preparedness. Despite Marwan feeding Israel highly accurate intelligence, the Egyptians concluded that Israel was, figuratively, “sitting the other way around.” The opportunity for surprise was ripe. Within six hours, Egyptian forces had crossed the Suez Canal. Without massive U.S. intervention — military, logistical, and political — Israel might have been erased from the map.
But history, it seems, has a way of repeating itself. Fifty years later, in 2023, Israel once again turned its back on the powder keg along its southern border. Flush with Trump’s “gifts” — the recognition of Jerusalem and the Golan, the Abraham Accords with Gulf financial empires — Israel was preoccupied with fighting Palestinian diplomatic campaigns at the U.N., countering Iran’s nuclear program 2,000 kilometers away, and indulging in settler violence in the West Bank and Jerusalem under far-right ministers Ben-Gvir and Smotrich.
Meanwhile, intelligence warnings — even detailed plans leaked from Hamas — were dismissed. And so, another “Ashraf Marwan,” whatever his name may be, found Israel sitting the other way around once again. The “impregnable” smart border fence, equipped with cutting-edge technology, was trampled by pickup trucks, motorcycles, and even by ordinary civilians on foot. The spectacle evoked the fall of the Bar Lev Line. Fighters returned to Gaza with weapons, captives, and soldiers, dragging Israel back fifty years in history.
Yet Hamas overlooked a critical reality: Gaza is not Egypt with its vast army and resources, Netanyahu is not Golda Meir, Ben-Gvir is no Abba Eban, and this is not the era of Henry Kissinger. Israel not only failed to rethink its “national discourse” but plunged deeper into self-delusion, ignoring political shifts, historical dynamics, and the principles of international law.
Picture this: a prime minister clinging to office at the end of his political life still dreams of a state “from the Nile to the Euphrates.” A finance minister rushing to cut the West Bank in half with settlement blocs. A national security minister who, amid existential crises, finds time to taunt the most iconic Palestinian prisoner in his cell, spewing half-truths to a world that no longer believes him — a world that now bars his entry to its capitals.
Both Israelis and Palestinians are caught between two rising religious fundamentalist currents. Once marginalized, extremists on both sides now drive the political rhythm. Outdated myths and hollow rhetoric fill the media, disconnected from reality, culminating inevitably in the October 7 explosion. Netanyahu’s alliance with far-right settlers in the 2022 elections was a coalition of desperation, forged after his political project reached a dead end and as corruption cases loomed over him. Hamas, for its part, had exhausted its governance in Gaza, turning the strip into a place that drove its youth to risk their lives at sea in search of escape.
No one in Israel dares speak of peace anymore, and on the Palestinian side, the discourse has been consumed by swords, martyrs, and religious symbols. Netanyahu himself fueled the very “national discourse” that has now backfired, just as Yahya Sinwar rose to become the crowned leader of Islamist fundamentalism in Gaza.
Through the lens of political realism, this is less about conspiracies and more about choices. Netanyahu was politically cornered before October 7, with massive protests against his judicial overhaul and even U.S. pressure forcing him to reverse the firing of his defense minister. Instead of letting Israeli society topple his government, Hamas saw a window to strike. Was Netanyahu complicit, allowing Hamas room to grow for years as a tool to undermine Palestinian statehood — only to be blindsided by a massive deception? Or did Sinwar execute a grand strategic bluff that left Netanyahu paralyzed and strategically blind?
Today Netanyahu bombards Hamas, the very movement he once empowered, not only as an enemy but as a way to redeem himself and his legacy. Yet the cost of his manipulative containment policies will remain part of his political burden and historical record.
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