The October 7th Terrorist Attack in Israel

TOPICS DISCUSSED

  • The October 7th Terrorist Attack in Israel

  • Conflict and Terrorism in Israel and Palestine with Kerry Boyd Anderson

  • Outside of Politics: The Role of Social Media when the News is Intense

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EPISODE RESOURCES

KERRY BOYD ANDERSON

PANTSUIT POLITICS EPISODES ON THE PALESTINIAN-ISRAELI CONFLICT

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES AND REPORTING

TRANSCRIPT

Sarah [00:00:09] This is Sarah Stewart Holland.  

Beth [00:00:10] And this is Beth Silvers. Thank you for joining us for Pantsuit Politics.  

Sarah [00:00:34] Welcome to Pantsuit Politics, where we take a different approach to the news. We're back together after fall break and we'll be talking about the horrific attack on Israel and resulting violence in Gaza. We have invited Kerry Anderson back for literal years. Kerry has helped guide us through the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and she is back to talk about the events of October 7th and the new phase as it’s ushered in, in the region. 

[00:00:53] Music interlude.  

[00:01:13] We are recording on Tuesday, October 10th. And as of this morning, the numbers of dead being reported from Israel continued to rise. More than 1200 people have died. At least 700 Israelis and 560 Palestinians and citizens from many other nations. I read a story about Thai nationals who often work in Israel and how many of them were killed. Eleven Americans have been reported as killed in the conflict. We have over 2000 people wounded. We have over 100 Israelis taken hostage by Hamas during the attacks on October 7th. The reporting this morning is that Hamas is threatening to execute those hostages should the bombing in the Gaza Strip continue. And over 123,000 Palestinians have been displaced. The United Nations is reporting today.  

Beth [00:02:10] The attack on Saturday was the worst breach in Israel's defenses since 1973. We will see over the weeks and months ahead a lot of analysis about why this attack was such a surprise to Israel. What we know is that in the Gaza Strip, Hamas has been in control effectively since 2006. There have not been elections since then. Hamas won those elections with a plurality of the vote, only about 44 percent of the vote. So we really don't know what the level of support for Hamas is overall in the Gaza Strip. But we know that under Hamas's leadership, there has been repression and corruption and violence. And as you'll hear Kerry talk about, the response of Israel and Egypt has been to effectively section the Gaza Strip off, to blockade it, meaning that the people living there have very little freedom of movement and very few resources coming into the area. Very little control even over their own power supply, water supply, ability to grow crops and fish. So it's a horrific situation. And now coming out of that horrific situation, we have this absolute reign of terror on Israel and Israel's promise to respond in a way that will secure its ability to continue to exist as a nation, which means a lot more people, Jews and Palestinians, are going to die. And that is the almost incomprehensible horror that we have been trying to wrap our minds around for the past few days as we understand what happened here and why it happened as best we can.  

Sarah [00:03:48] We have been talking about war and suffering in this region and in the wider globe since the invasion of Ukraine. And I think that it's really hard to hold this ethical tension of that there is a right way to kill each other. I know that sounds insane. I know that sounds insane that we have agreed to a list of rules post-World War Two in which we will engage with conflict with each other. The pragmatist in me respects that. I wish to live in a place of peace without conflict. Of course I do. We all do. But for decades, we operated under the assumption that there were rules when conflict arose that we did not invade other countries, that we did not target civilians, that we did not kill children and the elderly, that we did not take them hostage. That we do not kill people and then take their phones and post their dead bodies on social media. What happened on October 7th, what happened in other conflicts around the world recently, to me, it's like we've lost something. We've lost the ability to distinguish. We've lost the ability to threaten and cajole and hold a certain amount of order around the globe. We talk with Kerry about that this is a new phase in this region, but it feels like a new phase generally around the globe. Began to a certain extent with the invasion of Ukraine. But just the sense between China and Taiwan and other places in the world that the rules are changing or the rules are being abandoned. And that is terrifying. It's not that we haven't had terrorism, but this reign of terror from either state actors or semi-state actors on women and children and civilians, it's scary. I don't know another word for it. I don't know another word, but to use scary and terror and horror until they don't have any meaning anymore. Like, it's just so impossible.  

Beth [00:06:14] You talked about how for decades we've had this order. I mean, for centuries we've been asking how do you behave morally under immoral circumstances? How do you behave morally when the worst comes to your door? What is your right to defend yourself in a principled way? I really appreciated Anne Applebaum's piece in The Atlantic about the connection between what Hamas has wrought in Israel and how Russia has approached Ukraine. And the sense that jumped out at me is where she said the point is to create pain, cause civilian deaths and sow disruption, nothing else. And that to me is that distinction between a moral approach to war. And again, I abhor war, as I think all reasonable people do. But that is a distinction between a moral approach to war, where you have an objective and terror. And Hamas is a terrorist group that has brought about terror. And as you'll hear us discuss with Kerry, like, you can't find an endgame here or an objective that helps you make sense of what they've done.  

Sarah [00:07:28] It's impossibly hard and it feels like splitting the baby, like distinguishing between suffering at the actions of a state and horror from the actions of a terrorist group. And I know that sounds ridiculous to people, the same people that call Barack Obama a war criminal. And I'm sorry, I'm running out of patience with those people. I really am. I feel like you look around the globe and understand that there is-- I don't even want to use a spectrum. I don't even want to place this on a spectrum of behavior. I want to say there is a line. And when it is crossed, we must respond in kind. I don't want to live in a world where terror goes unchecked. I just don't. I don't want to live in a world where strongmen and autocrats and Vladimir Putin moves around with immunity and says, "I can cross your border and kill people." I mean, even to this situation with Canada and India, responsibilities are here. They must be met. And the sense that because some people are perfect actors, including America, that they have no voice or role to play in this situation is mind boggling to me. Not because I don't want peace, not because I don't want justice, not because I don't want an end to human suffering in the world, I do. I want all those things. But I think saying no one's good enough, no one's perfect enough, and their policy or behavior or even military actions to act as a peacekeeper, that we're going to buy the argument from China or from Russia, that sovereignty is all that matters, except when I cross your sovereign borders to assassinate somebody within them. Like, no. I'm seeing this play out. And I would like to say firmly, no, that's not going to work. What we had before wasn't perfect, but it worked better than this.  

Beth [00:09:33] It wasn't perfect is the whole thing. We have in America largely a luxury of safety because of our geographic isolation, that we are surrounded by two nations which are mostly friendly to us. And oceans on either side of us gives us the ability to engage in real contemplation about our actions in other conflicts when we should become involved, how we should become involved, what we should sacrifice, what we should not. When you read accounts of people in Israel right now, and when you speak to your Jewish friends who live with the generational trauma of the way that violence has been perpetuated on Jews throughout time, you realize those of us who have not lived in war cannot fully understand the experience of living in war, and cannot appreciate both how important those distinctions in the way that you have a principled fight are and the tradeoffs that you have to make in pursuit of a larger, principled objective. It's true that no one wins a modern war. It's also true that there are outcomes that the globe simply cannot tolerate if we want to live peacefully with one another. I keep thinking as I take in the reporting out of Israel about President Vladimir Zelensky statement, and I'm going to not get every word right, but it's something like war is pain and mud and death. It's horrible. And also if you are the Israeli government, what are you to do now except respond. Just like the United States in the face of a very amorphous enemy after 9/11 said, "What are we to do except respond?" And we got a lot wrong in that response. And also, what are you to do but respond. It is truly terrible. And I think that, again, our uniquely American safety allows us to take that awfulness and that complexity and that confusion and decide, well, there are some words that we're allowed to use and not use in this. And there are some statements that we're allowed to make and not make. And let's just rip each other to pieces over our response instead of trying to hang back and realize that this is mostly not about us. And to the extent it is, we need to be thinking in terms of that global rules-based order that allows you to live in a moral way under immoral circumstances.  

Sarah [00:12:21] The challenge of a multicultural democracy is to hold the truth that we are safely nestled and that our Jewish friends and neighbors do not feel that way right now. I think that's hard to comprehend if you are not Jewish, to understand that this was terror on the global population of Jews. That because of the history, thousands of years long, but particularly the history of the Holocaust, this feels like a hunting. And that is a horror that is hard to comprehend if you have a different background and you have grown up in the United States or other countries. And I think holding that as well as with our Palestinian neighbors, this sense that like must we tear ourselves to shreds because we think one side, either the Palestinian Americans or Jewish-Americans, wants the suffering of the other? There's one party who wants suffering here. It's terrorist organizations like Hamas. And the sense that we can't draw a red line because it doesn't hold enough criticism-- we get into this with Kerry. If you want criticisms of Israel, go to any Israeli paper. You will find them, lots of them right now, of the Netanyahu government in particular. So we don't have to do this. And who needs a random American's take on this on social media? Your friends and neighbors are watching, but they're not watching for your policy suggestions. They're watching for your support. They're watching for your recognition, watching for your heartbreak of all the suffering that has taken place and your recognition that this was horror on the next level that is hard to comprehend. Truly, truly hard to comprehend.  

Beth [00:14:09] I think that's right. That if nothing else, what is called for from random Americans like us is care. It's just care and a lack of tolerance for this type of tactic and an understanding that Hamas acts not out of protection of the Palestinian people or a desire for their flourishing, but from a place of wishing death and humiliation and destruction. From a policy perspective for Americans, the other thing that I think is called for is just a sobering up, just recognizing that a lot of what we fight about here is so trivial compared to what the rest of the world has demanded. And we have a critical role to play, whether we want it or not, in maintaining that rules-based order. And we need leaders who are willing to grapple with that. I never want to be the language police, but we do allow our leaders to speak to us in a level of hyperbole that doesn't give us space to grapple with really catastrophic things when they occur.  

Sarah [00:15:21] Yeah.  

Beth [00:15:21]  And I think it is time for us to insist on more seriousness of leaders from lots of different schools of thought. By just saying we need you to recognize what our role is in the world and shepherd us through that role judiciously and examine the challenges that we have here in America in some kind of perspective vis a vis the rest of the world.  

Sarah [00:15:46] Well, perspective is called for, which is why we called Kerry Anderson. Next up, we're going to share our conversation with her.  

[00:15:53] Music interlude.  

[00:16:04] Kerry, thank you so much for coming on Pantsuit Politics at such last minute notice to help us sort through all this.  

Kerry Anderson [00:16:13] It's my pleasure. I'm sorry about the circumstances, but it's always great to talk to you guys.  

Sarah [00:16:17] Yes. Now, you told us before we started that you wanted to lay out some sort of foundational principles because this is such a surprising, horrific, fraught turn of events.  

Kerry Anderson [00:16:31] It's a topic that it's hard to discuss at the best of times, and this is the worst of times. So just given how emotionally fraught and difficult this topic can be, I just wanted to let listeners know I have my principles that I apply to my work. And so, first of all, Israeli and Palestinian lives all matter. And I always approach this with all lives matter regardless of their nationality or ethnicity or religion. They all matter. There's not a difference there. Also, targeting civilians is never acceptable. It's not okay. Regardless of the reasons military has or militant groups or whoever should not be targeting civilians. And then finally, I think just any time that we're talking about a terrorist group or a state or anyone engaging in violence, we need to be able to discuss their worldview and their motivations and why they do this. And I think we need to be clear that that does not equal justifying their actions. One thing I love about Pantsuit Politics is you guys talk about holding the tension, and this is a case where you need to hold the tension. So I do want to be clear that there is nothing I say is in any way intended to justify the use of violence against civilians.  

Sarah [00:17:54] And I think it's so hard because, like you said, this is so difficult to discuss. You've been on our show many times. You've traveled to this region. We've discussed the complexities. And when you see something so escalatory in an area that is so escalated already, it is really hard. I mean, this was a campaign of terror. I struggled to take in, as I'm sure both of you have, the stories. I watched a granddaughter last night talk about how her grandmother was murdered and the terrorist took the grandmother's phone and uploaded the video of her body to Facebook. This was on a news channel. This was not a Twitter thread, okay? And I've heard this like social media strategy, taking people's phones, calling their relatives. This is just so difficult to even watch, view, think about, understand, contemplate emotionally, much less put in this context of this historical, incredibly complicated part of the world.  

Kerry Anderson [00:19:16] Yeah, it's a lot to process. And we are talking about the latest phase of a conflict that goes back around 100 years. And I think it is important from an analytical perspective to acknowledge this is a new phase. This is a big deal. This is a new phase. This is going to shift the dynamics specifically in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to some extent and the broader region. I think we need to be a little conscious as we think about that and talk about that. But, yeah, this is obviously an enormous deal for all of the individuals who are affected. But also as we think about things in terms of geopolitics, this is a major turning point. We are turning into something new.  

Beth [00:20:09] Can you help us, as best we can, understand Hamas's objective in bringing about that new phase? Because as Sarah described it, and every report that I've seen, it doesn't seem like anything but the horror was the point here.  

Kerry Anderson [00:20:25] Yeah.  

Beth [00:20:27] So what are you understanding as the motivation for this specific attack that was conducted on the significant anniversary on a Jewish holy day? How did we get here?  

Kerry Anderson [00:20:38] Yeah, the analysts who I tend to really respect, I've been looking at what they say, are also saying at this point we don't really know what the endgame is. However, I think we can place in sort of the overall context of the situation in the Gaza Strip specifically and maybe among Palestinians more generally. So Hamas runs the Gaza Strip. It does not run the West Bank. It runs the Gaza Strip. It has done since 2007 when it basically took over the Gaza Strip. And there is a minor war with the Palestinian group Fatah which is a rival of Hamas. And Hamas won that. So Hamas has been running the Gaza Strip. And also since 2007, the Gaza Strip has been under a blockade, siege by Israel and in partnership with Egypt, that actually started before 2007. But in terms of the current iteration, that's sort of where we can trace that back to. And one thing that is really interesting about what happened here, is Hamas clearly had coordination with other militant groups like the Palestinian Islamic Jihad and some other groups which often are rivals. They don't necessarily all get along, even this tiny little territory of the Gaza Strip. So it is real that is definitely a sort of a political change.  

[00:22:02] It is quite possible that Hamas is trying to simply demonstrate, I guess, its relevance. I think a really important thing here is to understand that Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and in the West Bank, their situations are different. Feel a total lack of agency, especially in the Gaza Strip, where this is about five miles wide on average, it's 25 miles long. There's basically no fresh water. You're about 2.3, maybe a bit, more million people. It's a very young population. I think it's really hard to describe the hopelessness of their situation. And we can discuss who's responsible for that. But whatever, that is the thing. There's no hope for them. There's no hope for their children. There's no hope for their grandchildren. The West Bank is a different situation. But similarly, it has been under a lot of pressure, military pressure from Israel. And also it feels like there's just no hope. And so I think part of this and part of what you're hearing from them, there are a lot of Palestinians who don't like the brutality of Hamas attack, but they also have a sense of somebody did something. Somebody did something to defend us and I think it was a great form of defense. But that is how many of them feel. Somebody did something to prick our enemy who feels so far above us, so removed, like Israel can do whatever they want to us and we have no agency. And so I think to some extent, this is just saying, hey, we can do this. And showing that Palestinians and Hamas specifically have this power in this agency. So, again, not to justify anything, but that's part of what's going on here.  

Sarah [00:24:05] Well, And I think what's so hard to comprehend, though, is that anyone could see that this would rain down death and destruction inside the Gaza Strip. I think that's what's so hard to understand, is to say any consequence of this is going to mean the loss of Palestinian lives, children, women, the elderly, inside the Gaza Strip. And I think what's so hard, too, is this idea that, well, Hamas has power and agency. Well, also anyone with any level of expertise is saying this was not Hamas by themselves. Like, there are other players in this reality. There is Hezbollah. There is Iran. And these are people who are on different sides of a religious conflict. So what is motivating these groups to come together? There's been a lot of discussion of Iran. There's been a lot of discussion of the approaching normalization of relationships with Saudi Arabia between Saudi Arabia and Israel. How do you see the bigger players as components in this puzzle?  

Kerry Anderson [00:25:19] I mean, you're absolutely right. There is no question that Hamas knew that Israel would respond in an intense military way. So as we try to consider what could be their endgame, they definitely knew that. I don't know quite what they were planning there.  

Sarah [00:25:34] Yeah.  

Kerry Anderson [00:25:34] It is possible that what they were hoping to do is to inspire a larger regional uprising. And particularly timing this with the 50th anniversary of the start of the Yom Kippur War is incredibly symbolic in that sense. So it is possible that they were trying to sort of shame the Arab states that have--  

Sarah [00:25:55] Many of who have normalized relationships with Israel in the last several years.  

Kerry Anderson [00:25:59] So Arab states like the UAE have normalized relations. Saudi Arabia, which reports have suggested was seriously considering that. So part of this is maybe a way to try to-- obviously, Egypt and Jordan have a longstanding peace agreement with Israel. So this may have been a way to kind of shame the Arab states. It may have been an effort to prompt an uprising. But I think we just don't know a lot about that yet. In terms of who's supporting Hamas in the region, its primary support comes from Iran. There's a lot of stuff that's being said about that that's not a careful analysis. It does seem quite clear that Iran provides weapons funds and military training to Hamas. And Iran has a closer relationship to Palestinian Islamic Jihad. However, Hamas is not a proxy of Iran. Hamas is independent, is autonomous. It has a relationship of convenience with Iran where when their interests align, they're willing to work together. So the relationship between Iran and Hamas, for example, is different from the relationship between Iran and Hezbollah, which is closer. Hamas's main reason for existing is resisting Israel, and it will work with who is willing to help it and right now it's basically not getting any help from Arab states. And so it turns to Iran. And Iran, for its own reasons, is more than happy to provide that support.  

Beth [00:27:36] Can you talk a little bit more about the distinction between the situations in Gaza and the West Bank? And I'm specifically trying to think about what is existential to Hamas. And so what is the relationship between Hamas and the leading Palestinian authorities in the West Bank?  

Kerry Anderson [00:27:54] Yes. So this is important to understand. Hamas runs the Gaza Strip. The Palestinian Authority, which is led by the Palestinian group Fatah, runs Palestinian enclaves and the West Bank. So Israel controls most of the territory in the West Bank, but through peace agreements, primarily the Oslo Accords, the Palestinian Authority has governing authority over parts of the West Bank, though Israel can send in military whenever they want. So it's Palestinians in the West Bank either live under direct Israeli control or they live under Palestinian Authority control. But Israel still controls all the key policies that affect their economy, their lives, their day to day transportation. And then Hamas and Fatah have a very long standing rivalry as they fought a minor war in 2007. The two of them really don't get along. Occasionally, they've tried to form unity government. They've not worked. But I think it's also really important to note that the Palestinian Authority has lost all credibility with Palestinians. We're talking about Mahmoud Abbas as the president. There haven't had elections in years and years. There have these very old guys who are functioning as autocrats. Or from the Palestinian perspective, they have failed to achieve anything through negotiations. They've failed to provide any kind of military resistance or defense. They're just useless. So for a lot of Palestinians, they're very hard to find an option because a lot of them don't like Hamas. But their choices are like Hamas or a completely incompetent, useless Palestinian Authority. So there's a lot of disillusionment with their leaders.  

Sarah [00:29:51] When you talk about the Oslo Accords, what you see is terror groups like Hamas disrupting that peace process, creating campaigns of bombing and terror to disrupt any path forward. The motivation, the endgame to me with this attack is hard to see. But overall, it seems like they want the annihilation of Israel. They don't want Israel. They don't want peace. They don't want a two state solution. They want the annihilation. And, to me, when I look at these global players, well, that's the global players that are aligning across previous wars, across religious disagreements. That's the common theme. And I think that is scary. It's just scary.  

Kerry Anderson [00:30:30] Yeah, I think it is important to know as part of the Oslo Accords, the PLO, which was dominated by Fatah, accepted Israel's right to exist. That was part of the crucial part of those accords. Hamas never did. And Hamas opposed the Oslo Accords, opposed that peace process, which does not accept the right of Israel to exist. Many Palestinians will say Israel has not accepted their right to exist. So nobody's interested in the Gaza Strip. Israel used to have a few settlers there, but they unilaterally withdrew in 2005 because nobody wants-- and this is a horrible place to live. There's kind of nothing of value there in terms of national resources and so forth. So nobody wants to be there. Egypt doesn't want to do anything with it. Israel doesn't want to do anything with it. The Palestinians are just stuck. So what Israel's much more interested in is the West Bank. And so I think in particularly under Netanyahu, and particularly since the 2005 withdrawal, Israel's approach has been kind of just lock these people up in this big open air prison and just kind of hope it will be okay. They have a term called mowing the grass, where occasionally bombs Gaza to diminish the military capabilities of Hamas basically as a form of containment. And so I think there was this idea that Israel-- they have this incredibly high tech fence and wall system that they built all around Gaza.  

[00:32:01] And so I think there was just this sense of like, okay, we've got that covered. Like, we have this big fence, we have this high tech stuff, we occasionally degrade their military capacity, so we're good. And they had actually under the current Israeli government-- which is a very, very, very far right government, and that far government is much more interested in the West Bank. They have certain members who want to annex the West Bank, others who generally support the settlers and the Israeli settlers in the West Bank. And so they had actually moved a lot of soldiers from Gaza and from southern Israel to the West Bank, where we've seen a significant increase in Israeli military actions in the West Bank Palestinian responses as a part of that gave Hamas an opening. So part of the problem is, I think that Israel just sort of thought-- well, not all of Israel, but the Netanyahu government thought that they could just kind of manage and contain the Palestinians in Gaza and focus elsewhere. And I think this is clearly shown that it obviously didn't work. I think the Gaza raises important points, that you can have the world's most high tech fence and a wall but if you don't have people there manning it, you have a problem.  

Sarah [00:33:18] Right.  

Beth [00:33:20] Kerry, predictably, the American political system is responding in a way that feels somewhat chaotic and myopic. Political system is a bad phrase to use there. I mean, people running for office are responding in ways that are discouraging. What should the United States be doing? I think the State Department has been very wisely circumspect about Iran's role, for example, What else would you advise if you were there at the table saying how should we be looking at this?  

Kerry Anderson [00:33:56] Yeah, I guess I would like to say two things in our foreign policy issue. One is caution. And I think you're right, the State Department has done a good job of-- and Israeli sources is also large etc.. We don't know what, if anything, Iran's involvement was in a specific attack. Obviously, they provided weapons and funds. And so there is a degree of culpability there. But everybody needs to take a deep breath before we jump into some sort of massive regional war and kind of pause. This has been very surprising. Many really good analysts don't really understand exactly what is going on. So we kind of need to pause and use some caution. I would also like to see the U.S. government take a more principled approach. And the principle of, as I was saying, as we started talking, all of these lives matter. Targeting civilians is unacceptable. Atrocities against civilians is unacceptable. And we will condemn these actions regardless of who has committed them, regardless of who the victims have been. I would like to see a more principled approach, a cautious approach.  

[00:35:10] But I think the other thing I would mention is the concerns about a broader regional conflict. This was terror, obviously. This was pretty much the definition of terror. And I've heard a couple of really good analysts on terrorism making comparisons with Islamic State and the types of atrocities we sow into Islamic State. And I'm very concerned about the extent to which this might inspire other terrorist groups. So I would also hope that part of our U.S. policy-- I think, has been very tempting for us to kind of say, oh, terrorism doesn't really matter anymore. Let's focus on China or whatever. And China is a problem, I'm not saying we shouldn't focus on China, too. But I think we need to be taking seriously and in a cautious way that this could be a real boon to different terrorist groups. So that's something we need to prepare for as well.  

Sarah [00:36:10] I want to get back to what you were saying about sort of the Israeli approach. I think people are tying themselves in knots making sure that they're saying something critical about Israel, to which I say you don't have to look far. You can go look in Israeli newspapers to hear Israelis loudly denouncing Netanyahu's government and approach. If this is compared to America on September 11th, I didn't see editorials on September 16th in prominent American newspaper calling for George W. Bush to leave office. That's not what I remember. And they are loud voices. I read this morning that some of the kibbutz along the border with Gaza were very left leaning Israelis, peace activists, activists who use the language apartheid, and they have been killed or taken hostage. And so there are voices, Israeli voices, that say this mowing the grass, this saying that directing forces up to the West Bank, this Netanyahu approach-- there was a really great quote from Dave Pell's newsletter where he said strongmen protect their own power, not their countries. And I think that is the resounding critique I hear from so many Israelis about Netanyahu and how this came as such a complete and total surprise to a security and intelligence force that is revered the world over for its advances. And I think that is so important to point to.  

Kerry Anderson [00:37:39] Yeah, I think it's really interesting, given the news about this attack first broke. My initial thought was, well, this will be great for Netanyahu and his far right government. I'm not suggesting any conspiracy theories. [Crosstalk]. 

Sarah [00:37:55] But history shows that that's usually what happens. Yes.  

Kerry Anderson [00:37:58]  Israel has, of course, been dealing with these really significant internal political divisions as Netanyahu's government, as in my view and the view of many Israeli, has been trying to undermine democracy and to gain more power for his particular government. And so when all of this first happened, I thought, Israel's seeing huge protests over this type of thing. And so at first I thought, oh, well, this is great for them. Like, now everybody's going to rally behind the government. And that has happened, but along side of it has been this fascinating criticism. So I think it's really interesting that, of course, you have a lot of Israelis rallying around under the whole-- previous to this attack, there have been Israeli reservists who've been refusing to serve in the military because they felt like Netanyahu was doing things that were undermining their democracy. And that's not what they fight for. And, of course, they are all showing up now. And that movement has said, like, right now we have to go fight and defend our people. And at the same time there is an open criticism that this government, which has all been all about we're going to keep you safe and keep you safe, not only failed to see this coming, not only failed to respond, but that there are these communities who there is no protection for them for hours.  

Sarah [00:39:27] I read this morning they just got to a community that had been held hostage for, like, three days.  

Kerry Anderson [00:39:33] Yeah. And if you listen to the stories from a lot of the people in those southern Israel communities there, there's this real sense of abandonment and that the government abandoned them. And so I think we're going to see I think everybody's going to rally together right now. You respond to this situation. But I think it is going to be a real accounting in Israel eventually. So we'll see what happens.  

Beth [00:39:58] I think that strongman critique is really important to internalize about the Hamas side as well, though. This is not, to me, an act of Palestinian resistance or about advancing the well-being and safety and freedom and prosperity of people living in the Gaza Strip. This is about Hamas, and Hamas is serving up its people to the retaliation that is going to come from Israel's legitimate defense of itself. So it is so devastating to me to think about how many people who have no interest in fighting are being killed and disappeared and tortured right now.  

Kerry Anderson [00:40:40] Yeah. Well, and I definitely agree that it's important to understand both why there are Palestinians who support Hamas and why there are Palestinians right now who don't support Hamas but are kind of sympathetic to, if not necessarily the specifics of the attack. But there are a lot of Palestinians who don't support Hamas, but right now also kind of feel like, look, somebody did something. Finally we did something. We hit back at Israeli power. So I think it's important to understand that perspective.  

Sarah [00:41:13] As Americans that elected Donald Trump, we should be able to understand that.  

Kerry Anderson [00:41:17] We should be able to understand this.  

Sarah [00:41:18] There is a thread there.  

Kerry Anderson [00:41:19] And 100 percent agreed that Hamas has no interest in the well-being of the Palestinian people. I mean, every single time Israel and Gaza go to war, far more Palestinians die than Israelis. And that will totally be the case this time too. Many, many, many Palestinians are going to die in this and this is why I'm still trying to understand fully what Hamas's endgame is. Because the entire Gaza Strip, which is already in really, really, really bad shape, is just going to be destroyed. And I don't understand unless they really thought that there would be this larger uprising. Or maybe they thought that by taking hostages, they could sufficiently use them as human shields so that Israel wouldn't attack. That's possible. I think it's foolish, but it's possible that Hamas made some miscalculations here.  

Sarah [00:42:17] And I think they just wanted to create terror and kill Jews. That's what terror is about. It is about creating death and destruction, even if it rains down on your own people as well.  

Beth [00:42:27] And a lot of what I've read this morning is that Hamas is surprised by how effective this attack was like. They expected to do damage, but they didn't expect to do this much damage. And so what the calculations were on their end of what the retaliation look like might have been off in that respect too.  

Kerry Anderson [00:42:43] I think that's very possible. I've just wondered personally, for example, the rave that was happening where many young people were killed or many hostages taken from there, did Hamas know that was going to be happening? I don't think that had anything to do with it. The date was chosen because it was the start of the anniversary of the Yom Kippur War. But I just kind of wondered, did they know that was going to happen or did they just sort of break through the fence and were like, oh, look, here's all these people right here. I honestly don't know. But possible more effective than they expected.  

Sarah [00:43:16] Well, and I think it's so hard. It is hard in a moment like this to focus on analysis and not look for logic. It's really difficult because I think that that's a trap in a situation like this, in a campaign of terror like this. Like, where am I supposed to find the logic in the murder of entire families and babies? There is no logic. There is decision making that we can examine at the top. But in those moments of just complete and utter horror, there's no logic to be found. I think that's hard. That is impossibly hard to especially take in from where we are.  

Kerry Anderson [00:44:00] Well, I think it's one of those things where whether we're looking at the Islamic State or we're looking at Al Qaida and we're looking at 9/11, in this case looking at Hamas, terrorist groups have from their perspective of logic-- and that logic may simply be kill a bunch of Israelis, parade them around and get a big PR boost among fellow terrorists. There's a lot of literature on this. There's been a lot of studies of what are terrorist trying to do, what they're trying to achieve. Often, they are competing with each other. So you'll often see them do something because they're trying to show that they are a bigger deal than their rival. And so for sure, this is typical in the sense of terrorist groups often will do something big intentionally to get attention, and it will help them in certain sources to get funding and to get support. And the fact that a whole bunch of their own people are going to die is just completely irrelevant to them.  

Beth [00:45:10] Kerry, what are you watching for over the next week or so? Kind of the immediate hallmarks of escalation or de-escalation.  

Kerry Anderson [00:45:19] Definitely one major thing will be does Israel launch a ground incursion into the Gaza Strip so that there is a ground invasion? There's been lots of bombings in Gaza, but it looks there are clear indications that they may actually send the military into Gaza. If they do, and I'm not saying they shouldn't, I'm just saying it would be really deadly for both the Israeli soldiers and the Palestinians in Gaza and probably the hostages. So that's one thing to be watching for. I also then would have to wonder what's Israel's endgame? You'd think they would have to go back to direct occupation of Gaza. So I'm not sure. But, yeah, that's definitely a major thing to be watching for. I think a major thing to be watching for is what Hezbollah does. They have been interestingly restrained so far as we're talking on Tuesday. Do they really open up a new front in this war or not? And if not, why not? And I think that could be quite interesting, definitely, as we learn more maybe eventually about Iran's role, and did Iran know about this, did they help plan this? Or did Hamas use some Iranian resources and mostly do this on their own?  

[00:46:35] That's going to be another big question. And what does that mean for Iranian-Israeli relations? A lot of analysts are looking to see this completely derail efforts to normalize relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel. I think at a minimum, it has to postpone that. I don't know what that will mean in the long term, but I think in the short term everybody has more pressing things to deal with right now. And then I just think I personally have to limit myself to the amount of stories I take in. As we're already starting to learn about just how horrific this attack was and the fighting in Gaza is going to be horrific. It's going to be bad. I don't know how anybody stops it. I mean, we can send an aircraft carrier and-- honestly, I don't really see what that achieves other than symbolism. But the wheels have now been set in motion of something that I don't know how it's going to stop. And I am deeply concerned that I think we're going to see many more Israelis and many more Palestinians die in this war.  

Sarah [00:47:43] Like you said, we're in a new phase and we appreciate you coming, as always, to help us to talk and think and navigate through this incredibly difficult new phase.  

Kerry Anderson [00:47:55] Well, thank you. I appreciate your listeners for they are trying to understand-- I've been working on terrorism issues on and off for years. And it's always hard because you want to understand why it happens. And to do so, you have to go to some dark places and understand some perspectives and worldviews. But that doesn't take out any of the sting of the atrocities and the deaths that are happening.  

[00:48:24] Music interlude.  

Sarah [00:48:41] We want to thank Kerry for coming back on the show on very last minute notice. She's always so generous with her time and her incredible analysis that is always so helpful to us. It's not necessarily Outside Politics, but we did want to spend a little time just to talk about the social media component when tragedy, when terror breaks out in other parts of the world or in parts of our country. How we think about that and how we behave online in those moments.  

Beth [00:49:10] I really struggle with this. This is one of the times when I, again, kind of feel like a dinosaur with the asteroid. I just think I don't know that my brain has evolved enough to manage everything that social media can bring up, where you do kind of feel like I need to say something, but what is it that I need to say and to whom and why am I saying it? And how am I doing it without making it about me? I mostly stayed off of social media for much of the weekend until I started doing preparation to talk about this on the show because I feel a responsibility to have like a sociological awareness of what people are taking in. My first response to something like this is always to go to newspapers from around the world to see what they're saying, because I want good information. And then I try to hit the kind of citizen reporting, influencer-based sphere that Instagram and Facebook and X and whatever else represent, knowing that that's a different sphere than the newspaper verified reporting space. Not that I discount it, but knowing that it's different. And then the last thing that comes in for me is how do I personally want to manage this? What is your approach?  

Sarah [00:50:30] Well, I wish mine was as carefully compartmentalized as yours, but I think the hard part is my news sources are tied up with my social media. I saw the video from the festival in Israel and Instagram. That's where I saw it first. It was in my feed and I know that my beloved friends are watching my Instagram stories and seeing if I respond and if I show language of support because I see their statements, because I see what they're sharing. I see those sort of citizen reports and the videos flowing through their feed. And I think it's also tied up together. That's what's so hard. And I was out of town. I was on vacation, which is a really weird experience to be on vacation when war breaks out in another part of the world, when there are videos of the utmost terror being perpetuated on other human beings. And so it was like I'm on my phone a lot anyway, because when I travel I'm on my phone, I'm posting, I'm looking at things. And so I'm in this very disjointed place where I'm standing with my family and this beautiful location and we're trying to enjoy each other's company, but I'm also holding this other world in my palm that is flooding me with videos. And it wasn't just disjointed video, it was people I love who were suffering and heartbroken. And I could feel it. I could feel it through my phone.  

[00:52:05] And so then I'm texting them and then I'm messaging them and we're sharing sources and we're discussing the news. And so it's just so tied up together. And I think for the first time this time I thought, I don't need to talk about this. Not that I don't need to talk about the event, but that I don't need to have some moment where I'm sharing. I'm just going to embrace it's messy and tied up together. I am going to post about sharing my Instagram stories, a vacation pic, and then going to share this. And I'm not going to talk about like-- sort of what you did. I have a place to talk about this and process this. I'm not going to do it on Instagram. I'm not going to say I'm heartbroken and this is where I am emotionally. I don't owe that to anybody. I want my friends and neighbors to see my posts of support, so I largely shared other sources. And so it was just messy. And I think I just kind of embraced the mess because in the scheme of things it felt both weirdly important and unimportant. So it was a messy, messy situation. And I think that's just the reality. It's just we have tied these things so closely together, our relationships with each other, our news sources. It's even reflected in what happened. The social media component of this terrorist act cannot be ignored. It cannot be ignored. And I think just holding that, this is it. This is all it. This is life. This is how we live now. It's all tied up together.  

Beth [00:53:37] I don't disagree with any of that. I just can't manage it myself. And that's why I try to just articulate. I'm compartmentalizing because that's the only way I know to cope with this. I was also out of town. We took our kids to Disneyland on Sunday. I mean, it's the weirdest. You just feel pulled in so many different directions. And I did on Monday start to really get into the social media space and decided this morning on Tuesday to just say, I don't speak well about these kinds of events here. The space that I do that is on the show and if you want to hear from me, that's where you'll hear from me. Not to be callous at all, but just to recognize I use my personal Instagram largely to share memes that I think are funny. I just try to have that space be frivolous. And so when something huge happens, I don't know how to turn that from my frivolous space into let me really give you my sense of what's going on here. And I feel a responsibility to always speak from a really grounded, informed space. To me, the reason to talk about this, in addition to saying here's how we think about it as Sarah and Beth, who have a political podcast, is also to just say, I don't think there's a right way to do this. And I don't think there's necessarily a wrong way to do it, except that I want people to be really discerning about what they share and what they internalize, because I think the Internet is so filled with bad information. I loved how Maggie over the weekend said in one of our group chats that she needs to hear from people who did not get their degree in Middle Eastern studies from Twitter. She's really looking for credible, thoughtful resources, and there is a flood of stuff out there that doesn't meet that bar.  

Sarah [00:55:28] Well, And I just think that this is a big deal for me as an Enneagram one, because for so much of my life I lived in a very black and white space. And both the gift and burden of age is that you can't do that anymore, that it's so complicated and the suffering is so widespread. And I just don't feel that obligation anymore. I felt a sense of obligation really honestly to one person in my life, one of my most beloved friends who is Jewish. And that was my number one priority. And I just thought the rest of it like it doesn't matter. I get this moment, I get it right with her, I'm with her, I'm supporting her. It doesn't matter. I think that's the reality moving forward, the sense that there is a right way to be. It's going to be different for every person. Some people are going to need to express righteous anger and policy statements, whatever. I don't even care anymore. Like whatever you need to do, you want to fight it out in the comments section, that's how you feel more in control in a moment like this, Godspeed. I have not found a lot of comfort doing that, and I have tried.  

[00:56:58] But I think sometimes I'm also not going to rob people of that learning. There's only one way to learn that and that's to do it. And I think that that's in moments like this where you're just torn to pieces either personally or just sort of as a human being in this moment, witnessing the suffering and the horror of other human beings. What I hope is because social media and because our online lives are so tied up together that we are leaving behind the idea that there is like a right way or a wrong way. There is just a human way. And so it's going to be really messy. And so that's going to involve heartbreak and anger and every other human emotion that would happen if we were just in one big meeting room together, which is basically what happens a lot of times on online life. And I've just come to a place of acceptance and grace around that. Like, it is what it is. And I cannot do the thing I used to do, which is to try to perfect it or improve it or find my way to control it and sort of tackle it. I just can't do it anymore. I can't do it anymore. And that's probably because we have this space here.  

Beth [00:58:27] I think that's right. I think we have the luxury of an outlet that not a lot of people have. And so there's going to be a different approach. And I completely respect that for me. Channeling my energy into getting that right on social media is just not the best, most productive work for me. And so I have tried in this and other crises to just channel my energy to the place that is the most productive approach for me, where I can contribute what I think is the most I have to offer. And I think there's some value in just recognizing the brain space that it takes up for everybody to figure out who you want to be online when something is happening, especially at some distance from you, but that you know is extremely personal to people you love. It just takes up a lot of brain space. It is very thorny. And one person will scroll past and see you post something funny, something personal, something warm, something light, something not attached to the tragedy and say, thank goodness this person still embraces joy because joy is incredibly important when things are terrible and another person will scroll past and say, how offensive. And neither of those people are wrong in their reaction to it. It's just more than we can all process in the midst of that kind of emotion and terror.  

Sarah [00:59:55] Yes, it is a luxury to have an outlet and it is also an enormous responsibility to have this community that we care about where we both heard listeners say, you have said too much and you have not said enough.  

Beth [01:00:05] Right.  

Sarah [01:00:06] Because we care about each and every one of you and we would never want to increase the suffering in a moment like this. And so it is enormously fraught. In what universe would something like this happen on October 7th and the normal human reaction in any space at any time with any other human being not be fraught? Of course it's fraught. That's it, right? That's it. And I think the wanting to equalize that fraughtness or wanting to correct it or contain it or, like I said, perfect it, that's where we get into trouble. Instead of just letting it live and walking through it as best we can.  

Beth [01:00:54] And I hope that in walking through it, that the thing that comes across more than anything else is that our hearts are broken about this. And we are trying to offer what we can offer in the midst of it. But the first thing is just that care and that love for all of you.  

Sarah [01:01:12] So thank you for joining us during this incredibly fraught time. We never take your time or your heartbreak or your input or any of it for granted. We'll be back in your ears on Friday. And until then, keep it nuanced y'all 

[01:01:30] Music interlude.  

Sarah: Pantsuit Politics is produced by Studio D Podcast Production. 

Beth: Alise Napp is our managing director. Maggie Penton is our director of Community Engagement. 

Sarah: Xander Singh is the composer of our theme music with inspiration from original work by Dante Lima. 

Beth: Our show is listener-supported. Special thanks to our executive producers. 

Executive Producers: Martha Bronitsky. Ali Edwards. Janice Elliott. Sarah Greenup. Julie Haller. Tiffany Hasler. Emily Holladay. Katie Johnson. Katina Zuganelis Kasling. Barry Kaufman. Molly Kohrs. Katherine Vollmer. Laurie LaDow. Lily McClure. Linda Daniel. Emily Neesley. The Pentons. Tracey Puthoff. Sarah Ralph. Jeremy Sequoia. Katie Stigers. Karin True. Onica Ulveling. Nick and Alysa Villeli. Amy Whited. Emily Helen Olson. Lee Chaix McDonough. Morgan McHugh. Jen Ross. Sabrina Drago. Becca Dorval. Christina Quartararo. The Lebo Family. 

Sarah: Jeff Davis. Melinda Johnston. Michelle Wood. Joshua Allen. Nichole Berklas. Paula Bremer and Tim Miller. 

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