Israel in the 1st Gulf War

During the 1st Gulf War Iraq launched Scud missiles against Israel in the hopes of drawing it into the war and thus pushing other Arab members of the coalition out. In OTL the Scud strikes were inaccurate and the missiles for the most part had a small payload, so the strikes were largely ineffectual.

WI the Iraqis are able to land a few lucky hits on Israel, perhaps on Haifa, Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, etc.? Israel suffers extensive property damage and enough civilian casualties for the Israeli public to put pressure on their government to intervene. Wary of joining the coalition as a full member, Prime Minister Shamir instead launches a few tactical air strikes against Iraqi targets.

What would be the effect on the Gulf War? Would the Arab members drop out of the war, as was the widely-held fear at the time? How would the US react towards Israel, especially if the Israelis did not consult the US on the strikes? Would a change in the First Gulf War in any way change the current war in Iraq?
 
One book I have on the war says that it's doubtful that the Arabs in the coalition would drop out, especially if Israel just makes a few limited strikes. For one thing, the Arab governments were rather irked by Saddam's trying to link the invasion of Kuwait to the problem with Israel (as one of them put it, "You don't free Palestine by invading Kuwait"). Secondly, the Arab government were more sophisticated than that... they wouldn't blindly turn away just because Israel makes a brief appearance in the war... there were larger problems to consider. Syria, for one, was happy about the whole war, as Assad rather loathed Saddam. Finally, the smaller gulf states were more worried about Saddam than they were mad at Israel...
 
I'm pretty sure no Arab government would be dumb enough to take Saddam's side, but adding Israel to the coalition could give them seriuous political trouble. Just because they aren't democratically elected doesn't mean they can ignore vox populi. There may be all kinds of gestures with big m,edia presence - asking navy ships to leave ports, restricting US troops to certain areas, summoning the US ambassador every time collateral damage made CNN, flying CAP along their borders, that kind of thing. They wouldn't do anything that weould really hurt the war effort or help Saddam, but they will have to visibly distance themselves. The diplomatic fallout later on will also be considerable.
 
Didn't many of these nations have large Palestinians populations who massively supported Saddam's attacks on Israel? Would this have any effect?
 
Didn't many of these nations have large Palestinians populations who massively supported Saddam's attacks on Israel? Would this have any effect?

well, Saddam didn't start all his "I did it to free Palestine!" schtick until fairly late, when the coalition was up and running and ready for war, so the Palestinian attitude didn't really matter much.... it did make a difference in Kuwait (both during and after the war), but only in local economics and politics (during the occupation, Palestinians there were favored in various ways; after the war, well, they weren't)....
 
Top