AT PENPOINT
Will the assassination of Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah prove a fresh Sarajevo moment for the world? Will it prove the fateful spark that will lead to a general conflagration? There is certainly more worry about Nasrullah’s murder than that of Ismail Haniyeh, the Hamas chief who was killed by a missile in Tehran.
Sarajevo proved to be the casus belli which caused World War I, but that is hindsight. When it occurred, it was seen for what it was. A Serb act of terrorism, the assassination on 14 June 1914 of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir presumptive to the Austrian throne, to press for the demand that Bosnia-Herzegovina be set free as part of a ‘South Slav’ Kingdom. The Kingdom of Serbia was supposed to have fomented the trouble, under the influence of its backer, Russia. Only in1903, the pro-Austrian Obrenovich dynasty had been replaced by the pro-Russian Karadordevich dynasty. Serbia itself has expanded considerably during the recent Balkan Wars with Turkey.
The assassination of the Austrian heir presumptive by a Bosnian Serb terrorist backed by a pro-Russian meant something. This was an era when everyone was part of an alliance system, or had guaranteed some country or the other. Russia had guaranteed Serbia, for example, and when Austria-Hungary demanded satisfaction from Serbia, it declared war on it on July 30, two days after Austria-Hungary began hostilities against Serbia. Everyone rushed to mobilize before the others did. Germany in particular was in a rush to defeat France, and then switch forces to the Russian front. It ended up fighting the two-front war it had dreaded.
No one really wanted to go to war, except perhaps the UK, which wanted to make Germany stop challenging it at sea and in empire-building. France knew it had to fight Germany, because Germany planned a swift defeat of France, and then going on to Russia.
Everyone seemed to know that the basic instability had been caused by Austria’s invasion and occupation of Bosnia, and ever since the beginning of the break-up of the Ottoman Empire in the Balkans, the Balkans had always been a problematic area.
Indeed, it is not impossible to trace the present Middle Eastern crises to that era. It is the period when Zionist Congress founder Theodor Herzl offered to buy Palestine from Sultan Abdul Hameed II, who refused bluntly. Sultan Hameed was overthrown by the Young Turks in 1908, and it was their government which took the Ottoman Empire into World War I. France took a ‘special interest’ in the Lebanon and Palestine areas because it portrayed itself as the protector of the Christians in this area, as well as the defender of the rights of Christian pilgrims to the area.
However, this area was not involved in the setting off of World War I. That was firmly a European war.
One commonality is the world has been teetering on the brink for several years, while in 1914, the world was also staggering from crisis to crisis. In 1914, it was a multipolar world, as it is now, if one accepts the view that the USA may have won the Cold War, but has not been really up to the task of being the world’s sole policeman. Starting with Vietnam, it has not done well, and even had to stage a retreat from Lebanon itself after 241 US personnel, including 220 Marines, were killed in 1983 by a blast in Beirut. There have also been Afghanistan and Iraq. There have been at least two threats of Indo-Pak wars in the last half-decade, with all their horrendous nuclear consequences, and the China-USA rivalry has ramped up, with China making noises both about various islands in the South China Sea, and about Taiwan.
The problem is that the USA has good reasons for its blind support of Israel. Zionists have become integrated within US domestic politics in both parties, and have a one-point agenda. However, now the Israeli government of Benjamin Netanyahu is threatening the US economy, because its bad behaviour is threatening the world. As tensions rise in the Middle East, oil prices will probably rise, nipping in the bud the rather frail US recovery from inflation
Likelier than not, the world can pull back from the brink because no one really wants a war, especially one which could turn nuclear. However, this kind of firefighting may not last forever. The conflicts just seem to be piling on.
The USA had originally intended Israel as its outpost in the region, helping to guarantee its oil supplies. A fat lot of good it does the USA, if it disturbs those very oil supplies.
Israel under Netanyahu is behaving much like Germany under Hitler, exhibiting ever worse behaviour almost as if to see when war starts.
By going after Hezbollah, Israel has infringed the sovereignty of another nation, which was not the chase of the Gaza Strip or the West Bank. Jordan has already been spoken of as the next target, because its ground forces going back into Lebanon could cost it heavily. Its attempt in 1982 ended badly, even after the horrendous massacre of Palestinians in the Sabra and Chatila refugee camps. Israel had to withdraw.
Things could escalate if Syria got drawn in. Like Hezbollah, it depends on Iran, and it not only borders Israel, but has still not signed a peace treaty with it. However, Bashar Al-Assad may prefer to concentrate on his own problems, which are by no means over.
Jordan is considered the place where West Bank Palestinians are to be pushed. The peace it has made with Israel will be brushed aside. That will make any peace made by Saudi Arabia even more dubious. One factor predisposing the situation towards peace is that no power is inclined to a war, not even a minor one. Russia is preoccupied with Ukraine. The USA is not just licking its wounds from Afghanistan and Iraq, but is faced with the situation of a client-state which ignores its wishes.
China would prefer to concentrate on economic development, as would India, but they might try preemptive attacks. It should not be forgotten that the USA wants India to keep China in check. That it is more than willing to do, as long as it is left to deal with its Muslim minority the way Israel is dealing with the Palestinians.
Iran had to respond, but its missile attack was ineffective, causing no casualties. Was this deliberate? The question must be asked, because it had tried one before, with the same result. However, Iran is the true nightmare for Israel, because it might have nuclear weapons.
Israel’s basic mistake in opening the front in Lebanon is that it lacks a coherent war aim. This was the defect inherent in its invasion of Gaza. In Lebanon it has faced rocket fire by Hezbollah, which has not been very successful. So what does it plan to do? Uproot every single Hezbollah member? It has had little success in wiping out Hamas from the Gaza Strip.
Israel should realize that the security of Jews from the Holocaust does not lie in massacring Palestinians. The Sabra-Chattila massacres should have taught them that. Jews are faced with the choice of continuing to fight the Palestinians on behalf of the Americans, or making peace with them, even if it means abandoning Israel. Israel has proved that it will never guarantee security for Jews.
World War I was primarily a European war, but World War II had a global quality because of Japan, the USA and the Pacific War. In World War I, the USA proved a counterweight, with its entry into the War determining its end. In World War II, the USA was also the determining factor. Again there is a global quality to the world’s active conflicts, with the USA as the common factor, but as a combatant but as arms supplier to one. It is backing Ukraine in Europe, Israel in the Middle East and Taiwan in the East China Sea. Russia and China are directly involved in one conflist and back the other in its conflict, but neither is involved in the Middle East yet.
Likelier than not, the world can pull back from the brink because no one really wants a war, especially one which could turn nuclear. However, this kind of firefighting may not last forever. The conflicts just seem to be piling on.
