The Foreign-Policy Chess Game with Doha

Qatar is positioning itself to be a central player in Gaza’s high-stakes future. Yet the United States granting Doha such a role would be deeply unwise.

Qatar’s century-long evolution from irrelevant backwater to hyper-wealthy energy exporter has given it the resources and confidence to pursue increasingly ambitious and problematic global aims. This history matters now. As Doha pursues influence in Gaza, Washington should heed the lesson of Israel’s airstrike in September on Hamas leaders in Doha: only direct pressure can shift Qatari behavior.

The Gulf kingdom’s long record of supporting terrorist groups like Hamas makes a firm policy—with sticks, not just carrots—essential. Without it, Qatar will almost certainly help Hamas rebuild itself.

Qatar is aggressively seeking a footprint in Gaza. It is surging materials, including excavators and heavy vehicles capable of rebuilding Hamas’s terror infrastructure, into Gaza. Worrisome enough, given Hamas’s history of converting infrastructure to weaponry, Qatar also wants a role in Gaza’s new multinational security forces alongside fellow Hamas backer Turkey. That would effectively guarantee Hamas’s reconstitution.

The United States should both rebuff Qatar’s efforts and exert broad pressure on Doha to stop supporting terrorism. After all, it was Israel’s Sept. 9 airstrike and not years of U.S. goodwill that convinced Qatari leaders to force Hamas’s hand and end the war.

However, Western policymakers have yet to grasp this lesson. In October, the United Kingdom signed a defense agreement with Qatar, following a U.S. security guarantee for Qatar formalized in late September.

The United States has long played good cop when it comes to Qatar, but without results. By contrast, Israel’s daring strike ended Qatar’s de facto immunity for funding and hosting Hamas, prompting Doha to present Hamas with an ultimatum: Release the hostages and accept a ceasefire, or lose its safe haven in Qatar.

Qatar could have given Hamas this binary choice at the war’s outset, but chose not to. That is because it’s not the neutral intermediary it claims to be.

For years, the Qatari regime has shielded and aided U.S. adversaries while masquerading as a peacemaker. While negotiating an agreement over Lebanon’s stability, Doha clandestinely funded Hezbollah. That explains why a weak Hezbollah is again requesting Qatar’s mediation in internal Lebanese affairs. Qatar also hosts Taliban representatives, supposedly to advance U.S. policy objectives, but it rigidly opposes pressuring or isolating the Taliban.

The list goes on. Qatar is jockeying to mediate between Russia and Ukraine while being a leading funder of the Russian regime, helping it skirt Western sanctions. While ostensibly seeking Israeli-Palestinian peace, Qatar spent years bankrolling Hamas to the tune of billions, hosting Hamas leaders and their assets, and vilifying Israel through official statements and its Al Jazeera media mouthpiece.

Qatar’s Al Jazeera outlet is an especially insidious threat to U.S. interests. As the former U.S. deputy national security advisor recently revealed, throughout the Iraq War, American leaders believed that the network’s incitement cost the lives of U.S. troops. Since the Hamas-led massacre in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Al Jazeera has poured fuel on the regional fire, broadcasting anti-Israel invective to hundreds of millions. Despite the network’s claims of independence, in private, Qatari officials admit the obvious: It is a tool of Qatar’s radical foreign policy.

The reason Qatar plays this double game is simple: It sees no downside. As a matter of fact, Qatar has been emboldened by U.S. overtures, including Washington’s decisions to confer it ally status, provide it with advanced weaponry and ink massive investment deals. None of these incentives convinced Doha to end its material backing or public support for Hamas leaders, who privately called Qatar its “main artery” for funding.

Some argue that Qatar is essential to U.S. foreign policy because it hosts the Al Udeid Air Base, America’s largest regional military base. That is false. Not only could the base’s assets and operations be relocated elsewhere regionally with relative ease, but the base has been a Qatari bear hug constraining the United States. Qatar has previously restricted U.S. use of the base for regional operations. It likely did so again during the recent counter-Houthi U.S. campaign in nearby Yemen, explaining why the operations were launched from aircraft carriers.

The United States has considerable leverage over Qatar, not vice versa. Despite possessing advanced fighter jets, the Qatari military lacks combat experience and competence. As a result, Qatar is mostly reliant on America’s security umbrella and U.S. diplomatic influence over Qatar’s Arab rivals for its defense. Qatar’s neighbors have, in the past decade, blockaded and nearly invaded it over its Islamist support, and were stopped only by U.S. diplomatic intervention.

Washington’s history of playing nice with Doha has only emboldened it to undermine U.S. objectives. If Qatar feels it can continue to get away with its double-dealing, then it will, including in Gaza. Pressure makes diamonds and, when it comes to terror-backing states like Qatar, sound foreign policy.