Norman Finkelstein: Interview with on the Mideast 

Then, in a sense, the coup in Egypt has strengthened Israel’s hand.

It’s strengthened them in two ways. Number one, Sisi is just another version of Mubarak, which was one of Israel’s main allies. And secondly, the Palestinian organization Hamas made a tactical error by putting all of their eggs in the Muslim Brotherhood basket, and now the Muslim Brotherhood has been defeated.

Do you mean that the position they have taken during the Syrian conflict on the side of the Turkey-Egypt axis was a major strategic mistake on their side?

So double mistake, because Egypt completely collapsed and Turkey now sees more common interest with Israel to get in the Syrian conflict, so Turkey right now is in the process of completely restoring relations with Israel. At the expense of the Palestinians, they will work with Israel in order to get their way in Syria.

Do you really think that is the position Turkey is going to take?

All the reports are that Israel and Turkey are healing all of their divisions, and that Turkey now regards Syria as the bigger issue than the Palestinians. And then Israel and Turkey are basically agreed on Syria.

How about recent comments that Hamas, right now, is again trying to realign its position and trying to get close to Iran and Hezbollah. Do you see that, or it’s just a speculation?

I think they will try, but the fact that they were so disloyal, the support that they are going to get from Hezbollah and Iran will be significantly less.

Hamas is desperate for anything right now so they don’t have that many options. And there’s an expression in English, beggars can’t be choosers, and Hamas is in the situation of a beggar now and it doesn’t have that many choices.

In Egypt, right now, the Muslim Brotherhood is out of the equation. Is the current Egyptian administration going to choose not to do anything regarding the Palestinian issue?

Right, they’re going to do more than nothing, they’re going to be a positive, negative force.

Then what’s happening to Gaza right now is an indication of that?

What they’re trying to do in Gaza is two things. They want to make the situation economically intolerable so that the people of Gaza overthrow Hamas. And also they want to reestablish Palestinian Authority control, so one of the things they’re trying to do right now is reestablish Palestinian Authority control of the Rafah entry. So basically just like Sisi sees now a historic opportunity to destroy the Brotherhood, the Palestinian Authority sees a historic opportunity to destroy Hamas. Both of them think, and they may be right, that these are big opportunities.

What are the prospects of that?

A lot of it is very hard to say. So long as the attention is distracted on Syria, Sisi could do pretty much anything he wants. Nobody’s stopping him.

So the Syrian conflict is a game changer in the entire region.

Syria is a complete disaster, total disaster.