Leaders of Arab and Islamic states convened in Qatar for an emergency summit on Monday, as they navigate the fallout from a brazen Israeli strike that targeted senior Hamas officials in the Gulf nation’s capital last week.
The participants are contemplating whether to move beyond rhetoric and take tangible action in response to the attack, which sparked a wave of international condemnation, particularly from neighboring Gulf monarchies that have long depended on the United States as a security guarantor.
Analysts say that a military response is highly unlikely because further escalation could harm the domestic agendas of the Gulf’s rulers, and because they remain dependent on American military support. But other options — like downgrading diplomatic and trade ties with Israel — could be on the table.
As Arab foreign ministers met behind closed doors to hammer out a draft statement on Sunday ahead of the summit, the prime minister of Qatar urged the leaders to go beyond declarations of condemnation.
“We must not remain silent or complacent about this barbaric aggression and must take real, tangible measures at various levels to prevent further escalation, which, if left unchecked, will not stop,” the prime minister, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, said.
Prince Turki al-Faisal, the former head of Saudi Arabia’s intelligence services, echoed those sentiments in an opinion column published on Sunday in The National, an Abu Dhabi-based newspaper. He said he wished that the leaders at the summit would “mention specific actions that punish Israel for its heinous and genocidal actions in Gaza and also for its deliberately treacherous attack on Qatar.”
The Israeli attack on a residential compound in Doha killed several people affiliated with Hamas as well as a member of Qatar’s internal security forces. Hamas said it failed to kill any of officials that Israel had targeted. Israel has not released its own assessment of whether the strike had produced its intended consequences.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has defended the strike, framing it as part of a larger battle to retaliate against Hamas for leading the October 2023 attack on his country that set off the war in Gaza.
The leaders of Hamas outside Gaza, Mr. Netanyahu said in a statement on Saturday, “blocked all cease-fire attempts in order to endlessly drag out of the war.”
The attack highlighted the delicate balancing act Qatar has long navigated. An American ally, Qatar hosts a large U.S. military base. Qatari officials have said they agreed to host political leaders of Hamas to keep open channels of communication — which has positioned the country as a key mediator in talks to end the war in Gaza.
Hamas, in a statement on the eve of the summit, called for the Gulf leaders to take “decisive positions” and use of every point of leverage to get Israel to immediately end the war in Gaza.
Hwaida Saad contributed reporting from Beirut, Lebanon.
Ismaeel Naar is an international reporter for The Times, covering the Gulf states. He is based in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
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