Examining a reliable poll of Egyptian public opinion—a rare thing in this unfree country—David Pollock highlights some key findings about attitudes toward the Jewish state and its conflict with the Palestinians:

[T]he Egyptian public is much more concerned about domestic problems, including public health, than any foreign-policy issue. And when it comes to foreign affairs and U.S. policy, . . . only a third of Egyptians now rank “pushing for a two-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict” in first place as their priority for U.S. engagement in the region. The majority of responses to this question are split among U.S. action with regard to Iran, Yemen, Syria, and Libya. And a third of Egyptians say that “the Palestinians and the Israelis are both to blame for their continuing conflict.”

This pattern is likely due in part to the Egyptian public’s very low expectation for progress on the Palestinian problem. A mere 16 percent have even “somewhat positive” expectations of the new Israeli government elected this spring. And even fewer, just nine percent, have a favorable opinion of the Trump peace plan. [Nonetheless], 49 percent, as in previous years, continue to say that good relations with the U.S. are important for their country.

But none of this means attitudes toward Israel have warmed:

There is . . . very little popular support for further “normalization” with Israel. A mere 6 percent agree that “people who want to have business or sports contacts with Israelis should be allowed to do so.” By contrast, half the Egyptian public “strongly disagrees” with that assertion.

Examining the effects of Iran’s decision to launch nearly 200 ballistic missiles at Israel on October 1, Benny Morris takes stock of the Jewish state’s strategic situation:

The massive Iranian attack has turned what began as a local war in and around the Gaza Strip and then expanded into a Hamas–Hizballah–Houthi–Israeli war [into] a regional war with wide and possibly calamitous international repercussions.

Before the Iranians launched their attack, Washington warned Tehran to desist (“don’t,” in President Biden’s phrase), and Israel itself had reportedly cautioned the Iranians secretly that such an attack would trigger a devastating Israeli counterstrike. But a much-humiliated Iran went ahead, nonetheless.

For Israel, the way forward seems to lie in an expansion of the war—in the north or south or both—until the country attains some sort of victory, or a diplomatic settlement is reached. A “victory” would mean forcing Hizballah to cease fire in exchange, say, for a cessation of the IDF bombing campaign and withdrawal to the international border, or forcing Iran, after suffering real pain from IDF attacks, to cease its attacks and rein in its proxies: Hizballah, Hamas, and the Houthis.

At the same time, writes Morris, a victory along such lines would still have its limits:

An IDF withdrawal from southern Lebanon and a cessation of Israeli air-force bombing would result in Hizballah’s resurgence and its re-investment of southern Lebanon down to the border. Neither the Americans nor the French nor the UN nor the Lebanese army—many of whose troops are Shiites who support Hizballah—would fight them.