Unlike the Egyptians in 1973, Hamas doesn’t have the ability to free Gaza, or to take and hold territory; it can only kill and take hostages. The timing of the attacks was clearly tied to the ongoing negotiations between the Israelis and the Saudis; in other words, the audience for this drama consists primarily of one man–King Salman. What happens next? Are the negotiations necessarily dead?
It depends on the scale and effectiveness of the Israeli response. If the Israelis quietly grind down the militants without causing widespread civilian casualties, the Saudis will probably see the attack as an unsuccessful attempted provocation and continue with the negotiations. If the Israelis either look weak or fill televisions all over the world with images of slaughtered civilians in order to satisfy outraged public opinion at home, that will be a different matter. I make no predictions either way.