AT PENPOINT
After a year, the Israeli of Gaza has gone beyond the expectations of all concerned, but if one lesson is to learnt from the killing which has led to the killing of over 43,000 people, it is that Israel is not secure, and may well have lost the purpose for which it was created.
Israel finds that the search for security is leading it into ever wider circles of violence. Apart from the violence in the Gaza Strip, it has engaged with Hezbollah in Lebanon, and after killing its leader Hassan Nasrallah, has found itself doubly trapped.
The trap is of its own making. It has engaged in both military adventures without clear war aims, or rather it has set itself war aims which are both vague and impossible to achieve. The Israeli Defence Forces probably deserve little sympathy, because members have committed war crimes so repeatedly and frequently that the entire command structure is complicit, but they are to be commiserated with because their targets in Lebanon are probably more difficult to meet than those in Gaza, which were themselves not easy to achieve. Wiping out Hamas, and ensuring that it will never be able to endanger Israelis again is probably not possible, unless it can destroy the ability of Hamas’ external supporter or supporters to help it.
That does not mean Hezbollah, but also the power that backs Hezbollah, Iran. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has already said that Iran does not want an expansion of the conflict, but Iran’s nuclear weapons (if any) are not under his control. How far can Iran tolerate Israel’s bad behaviour? It has tolerated the assassination of its nuclear scientists. However, one estimate is that Israel cannot prevent an Iranian nuclear programme. The only way to do that would be to conquer, occupy and disarm Iraan. There is the likelihood that the USA cannot do it, so even if Israel was to ask, there is no guarantee the USA will even try.
Israel also faces the conundrum of what happens if Palestinian resistance fighters were to find support even further east than Iran. Israel may have neutralized the Arab supporters of the Palestinians, but there is the whole Ajami world east of Iran untapped. It should not be forgotten that so long as Palestine was just an Arab cause, it was that of just another Arab nationalism, but as a Muslim cause, it is that of Masjid Al-Aqsa, which is one of only three Harams, the other two being Makkah and Madinah. Iranian support for Palestine is a reflection of that, as is the Ajami support from Pakistan east to Indonesia.
Thousands of Gazans have been killed, more have been left homeless, left to suffer the vagaries of the weather. The schools and hospitals they had were already set up by refugees and aid organizations. Now even that thin social capital has been destroyed. Yet that is perhaps the main takeaway from the mind-numbing slaughter. It is the Israeli sense of impunity.
This is shown in the record of war crimes which have been filmed, and then uploaded on social media. People have been killed, prisoners tortured and civilian property destroyed. Normally, those committing a crime know it, and try to hide the evidence. As a result, certain forms of behaviour (‘loitering with intent’) have been criminalized. However, criminals who not only fil to hide, but themselves disseminate, the evidence, are obviously very confident that they will never be brought to trial.
Recognition of Israel does not mean acceptance in the Mid-East. The examples of Egypt and Jordan are not encouraging. Despite recognition by their governments, the people of these countries seem as agitated as the rest of the Muslim world. Convincing the Arab street, and the Muslim street, that Israel has legitimacy is not feasiable, not so long as any Palestinians remain as a reminder that their land was illegally occupied.
This exceptionalism is borrowed from the USA, which also denies the International Criminal Court jurisdiction over its citizens. The IDF insists that it has foolproof means of accountability, and therefore it has no reason to allow jurisdiction of the ICC. The ICC developed from the Nuremberg and Tokyo Tribunals, which tried various German and Japanese politicians and commanders for war crimes and other crimes against humanity. Ironically, one of the charges against the German accused was complicity in the Holocaust, in which six million Jews were systematically slaughtered.
Israel has continued to claim the right to try Holocaust accused. Perhaps the most extreme example of far the Israeli state was willing to go against perpetrators of the Holocaust ws how it first traced Adolf Eichmann, then kidnapped him from Argentina, brought for trial by the Israeli Supreme Court (which would not normally act as a trial court, there being no court competent to hear an appeal from it), found guilty and then executed in 1962, becoming the only ever person executed in Israel. He was convicted of having masterminded the ‘Final Solution’, or the Holocaust, in which six million Jews were killed.
By that token, it should be willing to let its troops be tried for war crimes, but it prefers to stay out. In this, it is much like the USA, and it is almost as if it has learnt its exceptionalism from the USA. Or is there something more sinister behind this diffidence? Has Israel embarked on any policy which would qualify as a war crime?
At the same time, there is the way that Israel is constantly trying to upset the peace of the world, by trying to create new crises in the region before the old ones are resolved, or even have a stopgap solution put in place. The purpose of all this seems to be a prolonging of the war, which does not suit the people of Israel as a whole, so much as it does Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyshu, not so much because it keeps him in office, but because it keeps him out of jail, where he would end up if he lost office. He would lose office too, because he has not been a good ruler, but because there is a war on. He does not have to face an election until October 2026, but if he could prolong the conflict until then, he could work for a postponement. It is another matter that Israelis would die in combat (upto April, 260 were reported killed in Gaza; more were killed in Lebanon), that the American taxpayer would pay for the munitions used by the IDF.
Another problem that has arisen is that the whole Gaza scenario has exposed the whole Israel project. Israel has bled two things: people, and money. There is a flood of Israelis, who are returning to their countries of origin, showing that Israelis are not really native to the country. Israelis not only have to serve in the armed forces, they also have to live in what is not the developed world, outpost though it may be. Now, it seems, Israel does not guarantee their safety.
Israel’s current behaviour will not cease for two reasons. First, its impunity. Second, what has been called the ‘Masada Complex.’ In 70 AD when the Roman Emperor Titus destroyed the Second Temple, the last holdouts, when besieged in Masada, committed suicide. The main account, that of Flavius Josephus, says 960 suicides occurred, though archaeologists have found only 58 remains. It is perhaps ironic that Israel seems to be laying itself open to another Holocaust.
Recognition of Israel does not mean acceptance in the Mid-East. The examples of Egypt and Jordan are not encouraging. Despite recognition by their governments, the people of these countries seem as agitated as the rest of the Muslim world. Convincing the Arab street, and the Muslim street, that Israel has legitimacy is not feasible, not so long as any Palestinians remain as a reminder that their land was illegally occupied.
