I have been keeping an eye on reports about oil prices, and so far most sources claim that there is no immediate impact as neither Palestine nor Israel are significant producers. Some sources have expressed concerns that supply chains may be somewhat disrupted if this conflict spreads and other countries in the region, ones that are big players in the oil industry, get involved.
Somehow I'm not that optimistic. First of all, the West has a proven track record of cutting off its nose to spite the face. They sanctioned their biggest oil supplier not too long ago, and if they did that to Russia there's nothing stopping them from doing that to countries that aid Palestine. That would bring an economic free-fall they've been so keen to engineer rather quickly.
Another possible scenario is that oil-rich countries supporting Palestine may decide to increase their prices to the point of unaffordability under the guise of punishing supporters of Israel. Heck, given how bad the current cost of living crisis has been with imports of affordable Russian oil decreasing significantly it wouldn't really take a big spike in prices to push large masses of the Western population into poverty.
Technically, the US would be fine-ish. They are a huge producer, and although they use a little bit more than they extract, they could survive by tightening the belt. Except that they currently sell not-so-small a chunk of their own oil to other places, including the EU, which doesn't have particularly impressive production abilities. The
EU imports 91.67% of all crude oil and petroleum products consumed. So it would be 'game over' for Europe rather quickly.
Sure, there are other players in the oil industry, such as India, or the larger Asia Pacific region, but with two main players either out of the picture, or charging an arm and a leg, and the third one using their supply to meet their own needs the EU would crumble pretty quickly me thinks.
So if anyone hasn't been stockpiling meat cans and wooly jumpers - now is a good time to start catching up.