China Playing a Careful Role in the Israel-Hamas War To Balance Its Interests

While a broader escalation can be harmful to China’s economic interests in the Middle East, the situation serves Beijing to gain greater influence in the Global South

Since the war between Israel and Hamas started, following the massacre that Hamas perpetrated on October 7, several global players have been deeply involved in the conflict, either diplomatically or militarily—or both. China, however, has restrained itself from condemning Hamas’ attack and getting diplomatically involved in a bid to protect its interests in the Middle East.

China is playing its role carefully in the conflict to safeguard its interests both in the Middle East and the general geopolitical arena. 

Since the Hamas massacre, Beijing’s priority has been twofold: “To preserve its reputation as a responsible and rising center of influence in the Middle East, and to mitigate against risks to its mid-to-long-term geopolitical and economic interests,” Dr. Burcu Özçelik, associate director at Audere Group, a global intelligence and security consultancy, told The Media Line.

Özçelik, who holds a doctorate from the University of Cambridge, said that China’s geopolitical approach is based on economic leverage, and politically, Beijing has long communicated a nebulous message to de-escalate tensions in the Middle East, promote a peace process, and support a two-state solution.

Officially, Özçelik continued, China aims to contain the Israel-Hamas war. However, she noted that it lacks real diplomatic clout. Meanwhile, “China sees in the current juncture an opportunity to appeal to the Global South and proverbial Arab street at a time when anti-American and anti-Western sentiment appears to be on the rise,” she asserted.

According to Dale Aluf, research director at the Sino-Israel Global Network & Academic Leadership (SIGNAL) Group, China seems to be experiencing a cognitive dissonance surrounding the conflict.

On the one hand, he told The Media Line, Beijing has long sought to portray itself as a neutral party in the conflict. However, he continued, “It has failed to condemn Hamas and has blamed Israel and the US for the war.”

Aluf said that he is not surprised by the Chinese response, as Beijing has long supported the Palestinians to varying degrees, ever since Mao Zedong’s era. In many cases, it has done it at Israel’s expense, as evidenced by its voting at the UN, he noted, adding that this is in a bid to gain favor with the Arab and Muslim world.

This time, however, Aluf suspects that China’s behavior has more to do with its existing tensions with the US. “Chinese media’s critical coverage of US involvement in the Middle East suggests an attempt by Beijing to draw political capital away from the US while positioning itself as a responsible global player,” he noted.

Aluf spoke about Beijing’s diplomatic approach to this conflict and said that it is part of a long-used pattern: “Blandly urging all parties to exercise restraint, calling for a two-state solution, and expressing its support for peace talks,” he said, adding that if the conflict escalates to a regional war, it can affect the Chinese interests in the area.

The Far East has significant economic investments in the Middle East, which include critical oil and gas imports, trade routes, and infrastructure projects, he explained. “China’s interest in regional stability is more pressing than ever before,” he added, explaining that while Chinese tensions with the West have intensified, China has expanded its engagement with the Global South, especially the Middle East and North Africa.

Last month, noted Özçelik, China celebrated the 10th anniversary of the Belt and Road Initiative, which includes China financing billions of dollars of investment in roads, railways, and other infrastructure across Eurasia and Africa. In this context, she added, China seeks to increase its influence in the Middle East, and the escalation of the war is counterproductive to this end.

“This would test China’s ambitions and risk over-stretching its diplomatic means. While the US and allies are looking to China to help contain the Israel-Hamas war by leveraging its special relationship with Iran, Beijing is unlikely to take this step, at least not yet,” she said, adding that this move will be held by Beijing in its arsenal and will only be used for maximum impact if tensions continue to escalate across the Middle East.

China is careful not to jeopardize its ties with the Islamic Republic, as it sees it as a conduit to spread its influence in the Middle East, and Iran’s IRGC-backed “axis of resistance” is amping up its campaign against US interests in the region, Özçelik explained.

On the other hand, according to Aluf, the Sunni Gulf states are players of interest to China as well. “I don’t think the moderate Sunni states are happy about the current situation at all; they wanted to transform their economies,” he said, noting the prewar Saudi interest in normalizing ties with Israel.

Özçelik also said that China holds, at the same time, important economic relations with Israel, which have been deepening with growing Chinese investment in Israel’s high-tech and infrastructure sectors.

“Since October 7, Beijing has been trying to balance its economic interests with Israel against wanting to be seen as a defender of the Palestinian cause—a role it has coveted for decades,” Özçelik said, adding that while Beijing’s early official pronouncements on the war with Hamas were more muted, it soon stepped up its criticism of Israel.

She believes that this change is due to the opportunity seen by China to exploit the situation of “what it sees as a moment of American diplomatic weakness and Washington’s failure to bring about an end to the war, whilst Beijing claims to speak for the ‘global oppressed masses.’”

With the US preoccupied with Ukraine and now the Israel-Hamas war, Beijing may be thinking that the US will be in a weaker position to defend Taiwan against a potential Chinese offensive—especially if the conflict spills over to Lebanon, Iraq, or Syria.

Despite the Chinese interest in the de-escalation of the war, noted Özçelik, the circumstances can be favorable for Beijing’s interests in its own neighborhood. “With the US preoccupied with Ukraine and now the Israel-Hamas war, Beijing may be thinking that the US will be in a weaker position to defend Taiwan against a potential Chinese offensive—especially if the conflict spills over to Lebanon, Iraq, or Syria,” she said.

However, Özçelik reiterated that a wider war will undermine China’s own ambitions in the Middle East, such as in Syria, where Beijing is lobbying for the West to remove sanctions to facilitate China’s role in the rehabilitation and reconstruction of the war-torn country. “China’s main interest in the Middle East is to secure its energy supplies—and it wants to avoid an escalation scenario that would disrupt its oil imports.”