In October 2023, a surprise attack on Israel by Hamas, a Palestinian Islamist militant organization calling for the liberation of Palestine, set off a war between the two in the Gaza Strip. Initially, public opinion seemed to be overwhelmingly against Hamas, which launched the attack, condemning its use of force. Most media reports were in support of Israel, and many around the world, the third parties here that are not directly involved in the conflict, considered Hamas the bad guy, in part because of its kidnapping of innocent civilians, among other atrocities it performed. Israel, however, has one of the most powerful militaries in the region, and its military capabilities are far greater than those of Hamas. Soon after Hamas’ surprise attack, Israel launched an intense counteroffensive against Hamas in the Palestine territories of the Gaza Strip. Of course, Israel did not and does not intend to harm innocent civilians, but it is difficult to pinpoint and attack Hamas militants only when Israel itself is in danger, resulting in the inevitable killing of many civilians living in Gaza. While Israel has an overwhelming upper hand in the war, Prime Minister Netanyahu of Israel has maintained that he will not relent until Hamas is completely destroyed, leading to the current situation of numerous civilian deaths and destruction of civilian housing and infrastructure. Every day, we are bombarded with images of buildings destroyed by the Israeli army and people’s lives being put in danger. When this is the case, the views of the third parties around the world, i.e., those that are not sufficiently informed of the situation, may change, believing that Israel has gone too far and that Israel is the villain here.

We see that the views of the third parties change with time. In the first few days of the Hamas’ surprise attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, the overwhelming public opinion was that Hamas (the Palestinians) were the bad guys. However, a couple of months after the surprise attack, the public opinion changed to condemn Israel for its cruel, deadly attack on Gaza.

Let us look at why Palestine and Israel are in conflict in the first place. The conflict has its roots in the historical dispute over land between the two ethnic groups—Jews and Palestinians—of the region. Looking back 100 years, the third parties to the Israeli-Palestine conflict may think that the Jews have intruded into the land where the Arabs were living, forcing out the native population from the region. Meanwhile, looking back 2,000 years, it seems that long ago Jews used to live in the region, and the third parties may think that the Jews simply returned to the land they originally came from.

Here again, depending on the time frame taken into consideration, the views of the third parties change: in the 100-year time frame, they may take the position that the Jews are to blame for the conflict, but if the time frame is extended back to 2,000 years ago, they may think that the Arabs are being unreasonable.

Simplifying such a complex issue with a complicated history into such broad categories may be problematic, but providing an accurate historical account of the Israel-Palestine conflict is not what I intend to do here; rather, my goal is to point out that third-party opinions may change depending on the time frame taken into account.

The same can be said of the Russia-Ukraine war. Perhaps there is a history between the two countries that only those directly involved in the conflict can understand, and the opinions of the third parties may change depending on how far back in history they look at. If we were to only look at the past few years, clearly President Putin of Russia is the villain here, but I wonder whether completely disregarding the view of one of the parties directly involved is justifiable. I will not go deep into discussing complex historical issues without thoroughly studying them beforehand. After all, the theme of this column is to point out that the views of the third parties vary depending on the time frame taken into consideration.

In the case of the US-China conflict as well, it is only natural that the views of the third parties differ from those of the parties directly involved. Yet, Japan seems to be blindingly aligning its views with one of the parties, as it has done previously. The parties directly involved in a conflict naturally hold a clear view of who’s at fault, but third parties may not, and I don’t think there is anything wrong with that. After all, the risk Japan takes by aligning its views with those of the US in the US-China conflict vastly differs from the risk faced by the US, which is not only geographically far from either Japan or China but also one of the most powerful nations in the world. I wouldn’t go as far as to say that we learn from Prime Minister Modi of India, but I believe we should understand it’s only natural that the views of the third parties differ from those of the parties directly involved in the conflict.

Hirotaka Shimizu
Chairman and CEO
Kamakura Shinsho, Ltd.