Middle Eastern Crisis (2023–Present)

The October 7 attack did not emerge in a vacuum. Iran had materially supported Hamas for decades.[1] Hezbollah, operating from Lebanon, was also armed and supported by Iran, which supplied missiles, drones, money, advisers, and weapons transferred through Syria and Iraq.[2] The Houthis in Yemen constituted another component of what Iran and its allies described as an "axis of resistance" or "united front"—a strategy characterized by analysts as intended to stretch Israeli military capacity across Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Iraq, and potentially Iran itself.[2]

Despite this network of material support, U.S. intelligence assessed in February 2024 that Iranian leaders had neither orchestrated nor had foreknowledge of the October 7 attack specifically.[1] The Biden Administration nevertheless described Iran as broadly complicit through its longstanding backing of Hamas.[3] Iran-backed groups were understood to share important interests with Tehran but to act independently to varying degrees and not necessarily under Tehran's direct operational control.[3]

The conflict that erupted in October 2023 unfolded against a background of decades of Iranian support for regional armed groups and unresolved conflicts in Yemen, Syria, and Iraq, including debate over the U.S. military presence in Iraq.[4]

On October 7, 2023—a Saturday coinciding with Shabbat and the Jewish holiday of Simchat Torah—Hamas and allied groups launched a massive, coordinated terrorist assault from Gaza into southern Israel.[5] An estimated 6,000 attackers targeted 22 Israeli civilian communities, the Nova music festival, and approximately a dozen Israel Defense Forces bases and outposts, while thousands of rockets were simultaneously fired toward southern and central Israel.[5] The attack also included armed drone strikes and sea-based incursions.[6]

More than 1,200 Israelis and foreign nationals were killed, most of them civilians, and approximately 251 people were abducted to Gaza as hostages.[1][5] Victims came from at least 33 nationalities and multiple religious communities.[5] Israeli government reporting also identified families, children, elderly people, Holocaust survivors, sick people, and people with disabilities among the victims and hostages.[6] Forty-six of those killed were U.S. citizens.[1] The scale of Jewish civilian deaths in a single day led some sources to describe the attack as the largest massacre of Jewish civilians since the Holocaust.[7]

Israel called up approximately 350,000 military reservists in the hours and days that followed.[5] The Israeli government declared war on Hamas and stated its core objectives: the safe return of the hostages and the degradation or destruction of Hamas's military and governing capabilities so that Hamas could no longer threaten Israel.[5] Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that Israel sought "total victory" and that Gaza should eventually have "a civilian administration run by Palestinians who do not seek to destroy Israel."[1]

Israel began large-scale military operations in Gaza immediately after October 7, initially through intensive aerial bombardment and then through a ground operation that commenced on October 27, 2023, concentrating first on northern Gaza.[5] Israel's stated war aims included destroying Hamas's military and governing capabilities, recovering the hostages, preventing weapons smuggling from Egypt, and maintaining Israeli security control over the territory.[1] The Israeli government stated that complete demilitarization of Gaza and the dismantling of Hamas and all other armed organizations were necessary conditions for ending the war.[8]

Israel stated that its forces applied the principles of distinction, proportionality, and feasible precautions, and that warnings were delivered through leaflets, radio, social media, telephone calls, and third parties.[6] Beginning on October 12, 2023, Israel called for the temporary evacuation of civilians from northern Gaza and designated a humanitarian zone in southwestern Gaza.[6] The Israeli government also alleged that Hamas obstructed civilian evacuations and used civilian presence to impede Israeli operations.[6]

By October 2, 2024, more than 41,000 Palestinians had been reported killed in Gaza, a figure attributed to the Hamas-controlled Gaza health ministry that the Congressional Research Service said presumably included both combatants and civilians.[1] Israel claimed to have killed approximately 17,000 Hamas fighters, though that figure was not independently verified by CRS.[1] At least 346 Israeli soldiers were killed in ground operations during the same period.[1] More than 60 percent of Gaza's residential buildings were damaged or destroyed, and an estimate placed the cost of rebuilding at far more than $80 billion.[1]

In March 2025, Israel launched a new campaign designated "Gideon's Chariot," involving intensified bombardment and re-clearing operations across Gaza.[5] Evacuation orders and militarized zones eventually covered more than 80 percent of the Gaza Strip.[5] Israel also blocked humanitarian aid from entering Gaza from March through May 2025, stating that UN agencies had been infiltrated by Hamas and that Hamas diverted aid and used its proceeds to sustain military capacity; international governments, NGOs, and much of the press condemned the decision as collective punishment.[5][9]

The military campaign produced a severe humanitarian emergency. By September 2024, approximately 90 percent of Gaza's roughly 2.1 million residents had been displaced from their homes.[1] Displaced people faced overcrowding, acute shortages of food, water, and medicine, unsanitary conditions, and severely degraded medical infrastructure.[1]

FEWS NET assessed in August 2024 that humanitarian aid was probably preventing outright famine but warned that "hunger and malnutrition remain dire" and that hunger-related mortality was likely still occurring.[1] The Israeli government stated that trucks carrying water, food, medical equipment, and hygiene supplies entered Gaza through the Rafah crossing after security checks, and that Israel coordinated humanitarian activities with international actors and sought to prevent diversion of aid to Hamas.[6] The same Israeli government source alleged that Hamas stole tens of thousands of liters of fuel from UNRWA warehouses and that Hamas fire damaged nine of ten electricity lines from Israel—lines that had supplied approximately half of Gaza's electricity.[6]

Multiple governments, NGOs, and media organizations accused Israel of disproportionate use of force, violations of international law, and obstruction of humanitarian aid throughout the campaign, while the Israeli government maintained that its actions were necessary for self-defense and that it took reasonable steps to protect civilians.[9] The humanitarian situation remained severe into 2025, with disputes over the scale and distribution of aid continuing throughout the year.[5]

Hezbollah opened a second front against Israel on October 8, 2023—the day after the Hamas attack—launching drones, anti-tank missiles, and mortar shells at Israeli military positions along the Lebanese border.[2] Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah stated on November 3, 2023: "Some claim Hezbollah is about to join the fray. I tell you: We have been engaged in this battle since October 8."[2] Israel returned fire, and the exchange of rockets, missiles, and airstrikes along the northern border became a near-daily feature of the conflict.

Approximately 250,000 Israelis were initially displaced from 64 evacuated towns, with approximately 60,000 to 61,000 citizens ultimately evacuated from 43 communities near the Lebanese border by mid-2024.[2][10] More than 21,500 acres of Israeli land were burned by fires caused by Hezbollah rockets.[10] CRS reported that more than 2,500 people from Lebanon and more than 70 from Israel had been killed since October 2023, while approximately 1.3 million people in Lebanon were reportedly displaced by the conflict.[11]

By August 25, 2024, Hezbollah had fired more than 8,000 rockets and 200 unmanned aerial vehicles into Israel since October 8, 2023.[2] On July 27, 2024, a rocket strike on a soccer field in Majdal Shams killed 12 children; Israeli and U.S. officials attributed the strike to Hezbollah, while Hezbollah denied responsibility.[2]

The conflict on the northern front escalated sharply in late September 2024. On September 27, Israel struck Hezbollah's headquarters in Beirut, killing longtime Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, senior commander Ali Karaki, and Iranian General Abbas Nilforushan.[2] On September 30, Israeli forces entered southern Lebanon, beginning a ground operation.[5] Israel and Lebanon agreed to a ceasefire that took effect on November 27, 2024, requiring Hezbollah fighters to disarm and withdraw north of the Litani River while Israeli forces began withdrawing from southern Lebanon and the Lebanese Armed Forces were tasked with enforcing the arrangement.[5] The ceasefire halted large-scale violence and allowed thousands of displaced people to return home.[4]

The Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen began firing missiles at Israel on October 19, 2023, stating that the attacks were undertaken in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza, and later extended their campaign to commercial shipping in the Red Sea.[12] The campaign appeared to form part of a broader Iranian strategy to force Israel to fight on multiple fronts simultaneously.[12]

By the end of June 2024, more than 190 Houthi drone and missile strikes had been recorded; four commercial vessels had been sunk or damaged, one vessel had been hijacked, and four sailors had been killed.[12] More than 2,000 ships altered course to avoid the Red Sea, and Egypt lost millions of dollars in Suez Canal transit fees as a result.[12] Specific attacks included the February 18, 2024 strike on the Belize-flagged Rubymar, which sank on March 2 after leaking oil and fertilizer cargo into the sea, and the February 22 strike on the cargo ship True Confidence, which killed three crew members.[12]

Houthi attacks were not limited to commercial shipping. They also targeted U.S. and British naval vessels and struck at Israel directly. In July 2024, a Houthi drone attack on Tel Aviv killed one Israeli and prompted Israeli retaliatory airstrikes in Yemen.[12] The United States and the United Kingdom responded beginning in January 2024 with strikes on Houthi weapons-storage sites, radar installations, and missile and drone launch areas, while Israel also struck Houthi targets.[12][5] The Israeli government described the Houthi campaign as disrupting freedom of navigation and harming European-flagged vessels and sailors, and noted that EU Operation Aspides was deployed to promote safety in the Red Sea.[8]

Houthi attacks against Israel and commercial shipping continued as of early 2025, often drawing airstrikes from the United States, Israel, or other partners.[4]

Iran launched its first direct attack on Israeli territory on April 13–14, 2024, following a strike widely attributed to Israel against an Iranian diplomatic compound in Damascus that killed two Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps officers.[5] Iran fired approximately 170 drones, more than 30 cruise missiles, and more than 120 ballistic missiles at Israel; Iraqi militias, Hezbollah, and the Houthis also launched projectiles in coordination.[5] Israel, the United States, France, Jordan, and other countries cooperated in intercepting the barrage, and approximately 99 percent of the incoming weapons were intercepted by Arrow 3 and David's Sling missile-defense systems.[5]

Iran launched a second direct missile attack on October 1, 2024, firing approximately 200 ballistic missiles at Israel—a barrage Iran described as retaliation for Israel's killings of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, and IRGC General Abbas Nilforoushan.[5][13] Israel and its allies again defeated the barrage, and Israel later retaliated against Iranian military targets.[5][13]

The Israeli government stated that Iran funded, trained, and supplied Hezbollah and other organizations with missiles and UAVs, and characterized Iran as a destabilizing actor across the region through both direct attacks and proxy support.[8]

From June 13 to June 25, 2025, Israel and Iran fought a twelve-day direct war involving attacks on each other's territory and military infrastructure.[5] Israel targeted Iranian nuclear and military facilities and senior officials, while Iran launched more than 550 ballistic missiles and more than 1,000 drones against Israeli civilian, military, energy, and government sites.[5] The exchange killed 28 Israelis and resulted in 3,238 people being hospitalized in Israel.[5]

On June 22, 2025, the United States struck Iran's nuclear sites at Fordow, Natanz, and Esfahan.[5] An Israel-Iran ceasefire was reached on June 25, bringing the twelve-day war to a close.[5] Initial claims by Israeli and U.S. officials regarding the extent of destruction to Iran's nuclear facilities were subsequently questioned, and the full strategic consequences of the strikes remained a subject of dispute.[5]

The fall of Bashar al-Assad's Iran-backed government in Syria in December 2024 further altered the regional balance of power.[4] The Assad regime had served as a conduit for Iranian weapons transfers to Hezbollah and other groups, and its collapse disrupted that supply chain.[2][4] The most powerful opposition group that toppled Assad was Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham, a U.S.-designated foreign terrorist organization.[4]

Turkey-backed Syrian National Army forces seized territory from the U.S.-backed, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces in the aftermath, while approximately 2,000 U.S. military personnel remained deployed in eastern and southern Syria to counter Islamic State remnants.[4] Those troops also supported the detention of more than 9,000 Islamic State prisoners and the administration of camps holding more than 40,000 people from formerly Islamic State-held areas, underscoring the degree to which the October 7 crisis and its regional ripple effects intersected with pre-existing conflicts and power vacuums across the Middle East.[4]

Diplomatic efforts to end the Gaza fighting began almost immediately after October 7 but faced repeated failure. A temporary ceasefire began on November 24, 2023, following international mediation; during this pause, 105 hostages were released in stages, Israel released approximately 240 Palestinian prisoners, and military operations were suspended.[5] The ceasefire expired in early December 2023, after which rocket fire and ground operations resumed.[5]

The United Nations Security Council adopted resolutions 2712, 2720, 2728, and 2735 between November 2023 and June 2024, addressing pauses in fighting, hostage release, humanitarian aid, civilian protection, and implementation of a proposed three-phase ceasefire.[1] On May 31, 2024, President Biden announced a three-phase ceasefire proposal calling for an initial six-week pause, Israeli withdrawal from densely populated areas, a hostage-prisoner exchange, increased humanitarian aid, and later negotiations toward a permanent end to hostilities and reconstruction of Gaza.[1] CRS reported that no agreement had been reached as of October 4, 2024.[1]

A new ceasefire phase for Gaza began on January 19, 2025, following negotiations involving the United States, Qatar, Egypt, and other mediators.[5] Hamas released 30 hostages, Israel released approximately 2,000 Palestinian prisoners, and large-scale humanitarian aid began entering Gaza.[5] The first phase expired on March 1, 2025, after Israel offered to extend the pause in exchange for additional hostage releases and Hamas refused.[5]

An October 2025 ceasefire agreement resulted in the transfer of the remaining 20 living Israeli hostages and the release of approximately 2,000 additional Palestinian prisoners, including approximately 250 serving life sentences for terrorist attacks against Israelis.[5] The last deceased hostage, Ran Gvili, was located and returned to Israel on January 26, 2026, 843 days after the October 7 attack.[5]

The United States provided military, diplomatic, humanitarian, and defensive support throughout the crisis. Congress appropriated $8.7 billion in security assistance for Israel and more than $9 billion in supplemental global humanitarian assistance in April 2024.[1] In October 2024, the United States deployed a THAAD battery and approximately 100 troops to Israel to bolster its missile-defense capacity.[14]

U.S. forces engaged directly in the conflict's wider dimensions: they cooperated in intercepting Iran's April and October 2024 barrages, conducted strikes on Houthi targets in Yemen beginning in January 2024, and struck Iranian nuclear facilities in June 2025.[5] U.S. policy sought to prevent the conflict from expanding into a wider regional war while supporting Israel's defense and pursuing hostage releases through diplomatic channels.[14]

Approximately 2,000 U.S. military personnel remained in eastern and southern Syria as a separate but related mission, countering Islamic State and supporting detention operations, even as American attention focused on Gaza and the Iran-Israel confrontation.[4]

The crisis generated extensive international legal action. On December 29, 2023, South Africa filed a case against Israel at the International Court of Justice alleging violations of the Genocide Convention.[5] The ICJ found that it had jurisdiction over the allegations and in May 2024 ordered Israel to halt specified offensive activity in Rafah; the court has no enforcement mechanism, and Israel rejected the implication that its operations risked the destruction of Gaza's civilian population.[1]

On May 20, 2024, the International Criminal Court prosecutor requested arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and Hamas leaders Yahya Sinwar, Ismail Haniyeh, and Mohammed Deif for alleged war crimes.[5] Israeli and U.S. officials argued that the ICC lacked jurisdiction; CRS presented the applications as allegations rather than findings of guilt.[1]

The legal classification of the conflict itself remained contested. Legal experts disagreed over whether it should be classified as an international armed conflict, a non-international armed conflict, or several parallel conflicts occurring simultaneously.[6] Israel stated that it applied rules relevant to both international and non-international armed conflict and maintained that it complied with the principles of distinction, proportionality, and feasible precautions.[6]

The war also strained Israel's relationships with key allies. Countries including the United Kingdom and the United States continued to express support for Israel's right of self-defense while simultaneously demanding greater civilian protection and accountability for alleged violations.[9] Repeated UN debates produced ceasefire resolutions, while an accusation of genocide by a UN commission was vehemently denied by the Israeli and U.S. governments.[9]

The multi-front nature of the conflict imposed severe strains on Israeli society. More than 200,000 Israelis were displaced from communities in the south and north during the initial phase of the crisis.[6] The precarious security situation along both borders led to extensive evacuations and internal relocation that persisted for months.[15]

Research conducted between January and March 2024 found that evacuees reported significantly lower societal and community resilience, hope, and morale than the general Hebrew-speaking population, as well as higher levels of distress symptoms and perceived personal danger.[15] The study concluded that evacuees experienced a disproportionately severe impact and faced a more complex adjustment to wartime emergency conditions than the general population.[15]

By the end of June 2024, approximately 61,000 citizens remained evacuated from 43 communities near the Lebanese border, with return possible only after the November 2024 ceasefire with Hezbollah.[2] Communities near Gaza faced their own lengthy displacement as active combat operations in the strip continued into 2025.[5]

As of late 2025 and into 2026, agreements were described as ending fighting on the Gaza and Lebanon fronts, but underlying political questions remained unresolved. The July 2026 Tel Aviv University Peace Index was conducted amid debate over implementing those agreements.[16] For Gaza, discussions centered on transferring authority first to a temporary Palestinian government of experts and an international stabilization force, followed by the eventual disarmament of Hamas.[16] For Lebanon, tensions continued over implementation of a framework agreement signed between Israel and Lebanon.[16]

Polling from July 2026 revealed deep divisions within Israeli society about the path forward. Only 29 percent of Jewish respondents supported negotiations with the Palestinian Authority, compared with 81 percent of Arab respondents.[16] Just 12 percent of Jewish respondents believed negotiations would lead to peace in the coming years, compared with 48 percent of Arab respondents.[16] Support for a two-state solution stood at 24 percent among Jewish respondents and 71 percent among Arab respondents.[16]

The July 2026 debate showed that the sequence for interim governance, an international stabilization force, and Hamas's disarmament remained unsettled.[16] Iran's regional posture, nuclear program following the June 2025 strikes, and relationships with armed groups also remained strategic questions after major combat subsided.[5]

The crisis had significant repercussions for Jewish communities far beyond the region. In the United Kingdom, the period following October 7 coincided with a sharp rise in antisemitic incidents, including verbal abuse, harassment, vandalism, and physical attacks.[9] Jewish schools, synagogues, and community centers tightened security measures in response, while many British Jews reported feeling unsafe or excluded in social and professional settings.[9]

The scale of the October 7 attack—the largest single-day massacre of Jewish people since the Holocaust, as characterized by some sources—reverberated through Jewish communities worldwide.[7] In a 2025 survey, 82 percent of British Jews described antisemitism as a very big or fairly big problem, while 32 percent reported experiencing at least one antisemitic incident during 2024. Thirty-five percent rated their safety in Britain at the lower end of a ten-point scale, compared with 9 percent before the October 7 attack.[9]

The term "Middle Eastern crisis" is a broad umbrella label rather than a uniformly bounded name for a single event. Sources differ in whether they treat the Gaza war, fighting in Lebanon, Red Sea attacks, violence in Syria and Iraq, and direct Iran-Israel hostilities as one crisis or as several linked conflicts.[1]

Many facts and characterizations remained contested throughout and after the conflict. Palestinian casualty figures published by the Hamas-controlled Gaza health ministry were cited widely but were not independently verified by CRS, and the breakdown between civilian and combatant deaths was not systematically established.[1] Israel's claim to have killed approximately 17,000 Hamas fighters was similarly unverified by CRS.[1]

The question of Iranian foreknowledge and command of the October 7 attack was disputed: U.S. intelligence assessed that Iranian leaders had neither orchestrated nor had advance knowledge of the attack, while the Biden Administration described Iran as broadly complicit through its longstanding material support for Hamas.[3] Similarly, the degree to which Hezbollah and the Houthis operated under direct Iranian control rather than pursuing their own overlapping interests was a subject of analytical disagreement.[3]

Accounts of Israeli conduct in Gaza—regarding proportionality, humanitarian-aid access, compliance with international law, and civilian harm—were contested between the Israeli government and international organizations, governments, and legal bodies. At the stage covered by the October 2024 CRS report, the ICJ and ICC allegations and warrant applications did not constitute findings of guilt.[1] The reported extent of damage to Iranian nuclear facilities from the June 2025 strikes was also disputed after initial claims were questioned by subsequent assessments.[5]

Specific incident-level disputes included responsibility for the July 27, 2024 rocket attack that killed 12 children at a soccer field in Majdal Shams—attributed to Hezbollah by Israeli and U.S. officials but denied by Hezbollah—and competing figures within individual sources for the total number of Hezbollah projectiles fired and the number of Israeli communities attacked on October 7.[2][5]