Former Knesset Member Ruth Wasserman Lande: Ongoing War Must Be Understood as Part of a Sunni-Shiite Feud
Wasserman Lande emphasizes education as the solution to ending radical Islamist influence in the region
The Media Line’s Felice Friedson interviewed former Member of Knesset Ruth Wasserman Lande about the landscape of the conflict since October 7, 2023, as part of The Media Line’s special report: “October 7, One Year Later.” In their conversation, Wasserman Lande argued that international media has fundamentally misunderstood the ongoing war in Israel. According to her, this is not simply a conflict between Israel and the Palestinian people, but rather part of a broader “Shia-Sunni war that’s over a thousand years old.”
Wasserman Lande, who is a research fellow at the Misgav Institute for National Security, said that majority-Shiite Iran and majority-Sunni Qatar and Turkey are engaged in a battle for world domination in an attempt to impose Islamic law on the entire world. That battle is ongoing through attempts to infiltrate international circles of influence like think tanks and university campuses as well as covert online public opinion campaigns.
Leaders from Iran and Qatar discuss those goals publicly in Arabic-language media appearances, Wasserman Lande said. “It’s not a secret,” she said. “They don’t hide behind it. They say it proudly and openly.”
A two-state solution to a problem which is not an Israeli-Palestinian problem will not solve the problem at all
Until the world recognizes that this Sunni-Shiite feud is the source of Middle Eastern conflict, the problem will persist, Wasserman Lande said. “A two-state solution to a problem which is not an Israeli-Palestinian problem will not solve the problem at all,” she said.
She said that many young people around the world who are critical of the Jewish state are victims of Islamist propaganda.
“The majority of the people involved don’t understand what they’re doing. Had they had an inkling of what they’re doing and how much they are being made pawns in a game that is much larger, very sophisticated … they would have not participated in this,” she said.
There will not be a closure unless the world understands what’s the correct diagnosis, because it’s not about Gaza
“There will not be a closure unless the world understands what’s the correct diagnosis, because it’s not about Gaza,” she continued. “It’s not about the West Bank, where the Islamic Republic has also encouraged and funded and trained the Hamas and Islamic Jihad, by the way, to undermine the internationally recognized Abu Mazen [Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas], the so-called leader of the Palestinian Authority. Likewise with Hezbollah in Lebanon and Syria and Yemen and Iraq.”
Wasserman Lande said that the solution to this problem of “radical Islamist” indoctrination and incitement is education. “That’s not a one-minute, one-month, one-year plan,” she said. “It cannot be only in Gaza, because the indoctrination in the West Bank and in Jordan are horrific in the same manner exactly.”
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In the case of Gaza, international forces from countries such as the United Arab Emirates ought to be brought in to provide reeducation, Wasserman Lande said.
She described calls for a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas as “very misleading,” noting that Israel as a democratic state is liable to pressure in the international arena while the terrorist organization of Hamas is not. “It won’t be pressured. It just doesn’t care to be pressured. And it will not cease fire,” she said.
“The request here is a teeny bit unfair for Israel to cease fire while the other side may regain its strength and murder, rape, carnage, massacre our children and mothers and grandmothers and so on,” she continued.
A similar dynamic exists in Israel’s conflict with Hezbollah in Lebanon, Wasserman Lande said. “Eleven whole months, our people were bombarded with rockets. There was no call for a cease-fire. And lo and behold, the second Israel began to do something about it after inhuman restraint for 11 and a half months, while the entire north of the country was displaced and furious at the government for not doing anything, suddenly, there were calls for a cease-fire,” she said.
She criticized countries not facing violence for pressuring Israel into accepting a cease-fire, saying that Israel’s acceptance of such a deal would mean allowing its citizens to be slaughtered.
One of the major escalations in Israel’s conflict with Hezbollah occurred late last month when Israel assassinated Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah. Wasserman Lande said that that assassination served to “rattle” Iran and Hezbollah, but that it wasn’t sufficient to restore security to northern Israel.
Regardless of Nasrallah’s assassination, Hezbollah forces are still stationed close to civilians in Israel’s north. Wasserman Lande cited UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which calls for Hezbollah to be disarmed and for the group to withdraw to north of Lebanon’s Litani River.
She said that Israel would ensure that that resolution is carried out, with or without international support. “Iran and its regime need to be made to understand that Hezbollah needs to move back to the Litani River and be disarmed,” she said.
Wasserman Lande pointed to the Abraham Accords as a source of hope for the region. In the four years since Bahrain, the UAE, Morocco, and Sudan normalized relations with Israel, the countries have established meaningful economic and people-to-people cooperation, she said.
That the Abraham Accords have survived this current conflict sends “a very loud message,” Wasserman Lande said. “Leaders of countries like the UAE, Bahrain, and Morocco have actually wanted to bring their countries to modernity, to bring foreign investment, to make their countries open rather than closed, inclusive rather than exclusive,” she explained.
Leaders of countries like the UAE, Bahrain, and Morocco have actually wanted to bring their countries to modernity
Decades before the Abraham Accords, Egypt was the first Arab country to normalize relations with Israel in 1979. Wasserman Lande, former diplomatic adviser to Israel in Egypt, noted that Egypt has carried out a “double-edged policy” regarding Israel in recent years.
Despite being allied with Israel, Egypt has consistently turned a blind eye to tunnels installed by Hamas between the Gaza Strip and Egypt, she said.
Egypt views Hamas as an arm of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Sunni Islamist organization banned in Egypt. Yet Egypt has been willing to support Hamas in return for Hamas’ help in rooting out terrorist organizations in Gaza aligned with the Islamic State group, she explained.
“On the one hand, they’ve maintained and they treasure the strategic security-oriented peace agreement that they have for over 40 years with Israel,” Wasserman Lande said of Egypt. “And that could be seen in the past several years with a very heightened cooperation on the intelligence level, and the security level, and army-to-army level between the Egyptian establishment and Israel. At the same time, their education system is very anti-Israel. And this is something that needs to change—not as bad as Jordan, but bad enough to make 100 million people, approximately, in Egypt hate Israel. And this is significant.”
She noted that Israel has never requested that the education system in Egypt or other neighboring countries be changed or even seen such a request as plausible. “Here, I feel that we’ve done wrong,” she said. “Israel, in any regional agreement about Gaza, about the West Bank, about Lebanon, needs to put on the table a reeducation for the people of the region. Otherwise, nothing will change.”
In the meantime, Israelis and supporters of Israel need to stand united in order to make it through this tumultuous period, Wasserman Lande said.
“We have to stand together,” she said. “If we don’t, it is a significant weakening factor.”
