On Monday evening, the Prisoners and Ex-Prisoners Affairs Authority announced the death of a Palestinian detainee in Israeli occupation prisons.

The head of the Prisoners' and Ex-Prisoners' Affairs Authority, Qaddoura Fares, reported the death of a detainee in "Megiddo" prison, without knowing any details yet about the identity of the martyr.

Fares said that the news of the detainee’s death comes within the framework of the occupation’s crimes against detainees in its prisons, which raised the number of detainees who died inside prisons since October 7 of last year (2023) to seven.

Fares pointed out that the seven dead detainees in the occupation prisons are the only ones known so far, noting that there are other dead detainees from the Gaza Strip that no one knows about yet.

On November 19, the Prisoners and Ex-Detainees Affairs Authority announced the death of detainee Thaer Samih Abu Assab (38 years old) from Qalqilya Governorate in the Negev Desert Prison.

On the 14th of last November, the detainee Ahmed Muhammad Mar’i (33 years old), from the town of Qarawat Bani Hassan in Salfit Governorate, was dead in “Megiddo” prison, and on the 6th of the same month, the detainee Majed Ahmed Zaqoul (32 years old), from the Gaza Strip, was dead. In addition to another detainee from the Gaza Strip, whose identity is not yet known.

On October 23, the detainee Omar Daraghmeh (58 years old) from Tubas, and the detainee Arafat Hamdan (25 years old) from Ramallah, were dead, less than 24 hours apart.

Thus, the number of martyrs of the captive movement since 1967 has risen to 244 dead, including 18 dead whose bodies are still being held by the occupation.

Since the start of the comprehensive aggression against our people on October 7 of last year, detainees in the occupation prisons have been subjected to physical and verbal torture and deprivation of the necessities of life, according to the testimonies of released detainees, and statements issued by the Prisoners and Ex-Prisoners’ Affairs Authority and the Prisoners’ Club.

An Israeli soldier revealed that an occupation army officer friend of his kidnapped a Palestinian baby from the Gaza Strip, after her family was killed by the violent bombing launched by the Israeli occupation army on the Gaza Strip 3 months ago, according to what Anatolia Agency reported on Monday, January 1, 2024.

Concerning the same incident, another friend of the aforementioned officer spoke about the latter’s transfer of the Palestinian infant to a hospital in Israel, without mentioning the name of the hospital.

Private Shahar Mendelsohn also revealed the kidnapping incident, while speaking to Israeli occupation army radio on Sunday, December 31, 2023, about his friend, officer in the Givani Brigade, Harel Itach, who was killed in battles in the northern Gaza Strip on November 22 of last year.

In response to a question about the Palestinian baby, Mendelsohn said: “He (Itach) spoke with a friend during his period of service in Gaza and told him that in one of the houses he entered he heard the sound of a baby crying and that he decided to send her to Israel.”

While the soldier did not clarify the location of the house in which Itach found the Palestinian girl in the Gaza Strip. In response to a question whether the soldier found the baby crying and decided to send her to Israel, Mendelsohn replied: “He brought her to Israel.”

Regarding whether the baby's family was likely killed by an Israeli bombing and no one was around her, Mendelsohn responded: "Correct." The soldier or the Israeli occupation army radio did not clarify the fate of the Palestinian baby.

Meanwhile, the Palestinian Ministry of Health says that it is feared that thousands of Palestinians are still under the rubble as a result of the Israeli bombing.

It is not clear whether this was a single kidnapping incident or if there were similar incidents. Since the kidnapper's Israeli occupation army officer was killed on November 22, the kidnapping occurred before that date.

While the Israeli news website Ynet quoted one of the officer’s friends as saying during his funeral, on Sunday: “Harel told me that he heard a girl crying in Gaza (..) and made sure that she was transferred to a hospital in Israel to receive treatment,” without mentioning the name of the hospital.

While neither soldier mentioned the reason why the aforementioned officer did not hand over the child to Palestinian hospitals or families near the house.

On the evening of Monday, January 1, 2023, the Israeli Supreme Court annulled the “limiting reasonableness” law included in the “judicial amendments” package proposed by the extremist government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, according to the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth.

The law had sparked controversy, reduced some of the Supreme Court's powers, and sparked protests across the country. The law also abolished one of the tools used by the Supreme Court to overturn government and ministerial decisions, but not all of them, and took away the court's power to invalidate what it considered "unreasonable" decisions.

The court (the highest judicial authority) said in a statement that eight out of 15 judges ruled in favor of repealing the law, while an immediate comment was issued by Netanyahu's Likud party, which said that the Supreme Court's decision "contradicts the people's will for unity, especially in times of war."

The “limitation of reasonableness” law could prevent Israeli courts, including the Supreme Court, from applying what is known as the “reasonableness standard” to decisions made by elected officials, including the prime minister.

According to the official Hebrew Broadcasting Corporation, “12 of the judges stated that the court has the authority to conduct a judicial review of the Basic Laws (as a constitution in Israel), and to intervene in exceptional and extreme cases in which the Knesset exceeds its founding authority.”

Yesterday, Sunday, Aryeh Deri, head of the religious “Shas” party, a partner in the government coalition, instructed his party members to draft a law preventing the publication of the court’s decision, which, according to their opinion, “will lead to deepening the rift in the nation during the war, at a time when our soldiers are sacrificing their lives in In order to defend Israel,” according to the broadcasting authority.

On the other hand, the “Official Camp” party, led by Benny Gantz, and the “Israel Our Home” party, led by Avigdor Lieberman, opposed Deri’s initiative to postpone the publication of the ruling.

According to Gantz, talk about preventing the publication of the ruling is “a dangerous precedent that affects the independence of the court,” and he added in a statement from his party that “the correct way to prevent the division expected after the publication of the court’s decision is to cancel the legislation in the Knesset.”

The Israeli Knesset ratified the aforementioned law in July 2023 by a majority of 64 out of 120 members, in the absence of the opposition, whose parties decided not to participate in the vote in protest against it.

The law, which was annulled by the Supreme Court, is one of eight draft laws known as the “Judicial Amendments Plan” that was pushed by the Netanyahu government amid massive, unprecedented protests that have spread across the country since the beginning of 2023 and continued until before the devastating war on Gaza on October 7 last year.

source: Arabic Post

A former general in the Israeli occupation army considered that achieving the goals of the war on Gaza was moving away from its path, noting that the soldiers were drowning more and more in the mud of Gaza.

Reserve General Yitzhak Brick said in the Israeli newspaper Maariv on Monday: “With the passage of time, we are moving further and further away from achieving the goals of the war in eliminating Hamas and releasing the kidnapped, and we are sinking deeper and deeper into the mud of Gaza.”

Brik considered that the failure to eliminate Hamas rule in Rafah and the failure to control the tunnels underneath it, which are considered the main passage for weapons from Sinai to the Gaza Strip, means the army’s failure to achieve the basic mission it set in the war, which is: overthrowing Hamas rule.

The former army general added that Hamas members in Rafah enjoy freedom of access to Khan Yunis and the northern Gaza Strip through hundreds of kilometers of tunnels linked to each other, despite the destruction of a large part of them.

He continued: “Hence, the continuation of the army’s fighting in the current form in Khan Yunis, and in the neighborhoods and cities in the central Gaza Strip, does not add to the achievement of the war’s objectives, and the opposite is true. This fighting inflicts on us heavy losses every day from the explosives and traps they plant for us and the anti-tank missiles that they plant.” Shoot us.

Brik considered that the continuation of the war in this way was like a useless nightmare, calling on the political and military leaders to change their plans, leave the residential areas, and rely on the air attack to destroy Hamas’ structure.

He added: "It is true that we have not achieved all our wishes of eliminating Hamas from its capabilities, but we will be able to continue controlling the region with much less losses, and we will prevent Hamas from reorganizing its ranks."

The occupation army general saw that “members of the government from the extreme right declare day and night that the fighting inside the Gaza Strip must continue with all its strength until Hamas is defeated, while they ignore the facts on the ground and live a false reality,” pointing out that some ministers and members of the Knesset understand that eliminating Hamas is unrealistic goal, but they do not express their opinions for fear of being accused of harming the fighting spirit of the fighters.

He said: "The radical wing of the coalition is in no way prepared to hold a governmental discussion the day after the war, for fear of making a decision that would allow the entry of an international administration to manage Gaza. According to their approach, large army forces will continue to remain in the densely populated areas of the Gaza Strip for years." "We will face a guerrilla war with Hamas, which will continue to confront us with booby traps and fire anti-tank missiles at our forces, causing us heavy losses."

The Palestinian presidency announced its strong rejection of any “suspicious attempts to assign (former British Prime Minister) Tony Blair or others to work to displace citizens from the Gaza Strip,” considering this a condemnable and unacceptable act.

The presidency said in a statement, “We will demand that the British government not allow this tampering with the fate and future of the Palestinian people.”

It added, “We will also call on the Secretary-General of the United Nations to do everything possible to not allow such actions that violate international law and international legitimacy, which represent interference and action that only serve the interests of Israel and harm the Palestinian people and their rights, and push them to abandon their land.”

The presidency considered that Tony Blair “is completing the Balfour Declaration issued by the British government with American participation, which established the tragedy of the Palestinian people and ignited dozens of wars in the region,” stressing that Blair is “an undesirable person in the Palestinian territories.”

Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs: We are following news of Blair’s attempt to convince the West to receive refugees from Gaza

The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Monday that it was “following with great interest” what was reported by the Israeli media regarding Blair heading a working group to persuade Western countries to receive refugees from the Gaza Strip after the end of the war.

The Foreign Ministry explained in a statement: “We are following with great interest what was reported by the Israeli media, and we hope that Tony Blair will not be involved in committing this crime, which falls within the framework of the Israeli government’s plans to deepen genocide and forced displacement among the Palestinians.”

Yesterday, Sunday, the Hebrew Channel 12 (privately) reported that Israel intends to appoint Blair as a mediator between it and Western countries to persuade them to receive Palestinian refugees from the Gaza Strip after the end of the war.

The channel said, “Blair was on a secret visit to Israel last week, where he held unannounced meetings with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Minister in the War Council, Benny Gantz, to discuss the matter.”

The Palestinian Foreign Ministry said: “If the news is true and true, this action is hostile to the Palestinian people and their rights in their homeland, a flagrant violation of international law and anti-humanity.”

It stressed “holding accountable those who carry out (the displacement of Palestinians) or participate in it.”

The Foreign Ministry indicated that it “will continue to follow up on this serious issue in partnership with Arab, Islamic and friendly countries to confront it at all popular, partisan and official levels and at the level of national courts in countries.”

The channel explained, “During the meetings... the idea was raised for Blair to be a mediator between Israel and Western countries, regarding the issue of displaced Palestinians from the Gaza Strip.”

While there was no immediate comment from the Israeli authorities, the Palestinian factions, the National Authority, and Cairo repeatedly affirmed their “rejection of the displacement plans.”

In this context, a source close to Blair denied to the Jerusalem Post what Channel 12 reported.

The source said, “The allegations related to Blair’s connection to the displacement of Palestinians are incorrect.”

He continued: “Such a discussion has never occurred, and Blair will not discuss such a proposal.”

Last November, a representative from Netanyahu's Likud Party, Danny Danon, proposed the issue of voluntary immigration for residents of the Gaza Strip.

According to the Hebrew newspaper “Israel Today”, Danon said, “The world is already discussing this matter. Canadian Immigration Minister Mark Miller spoke about these matters publicly, as did Nikki Haley (a potential Republican candidate for the US presidency).”

He added: “We must form a team in the State of Israel that will take care of this issue and make sure that everyone who wants to leave Gaza for a third country can do so.”

The newspaper quoted Netanyahu as saying: “Our problem is the countries that are prepared to absorb refugees, and we are working to solve it.”

Several times, the United States and European and Arab countries announced their rejection of the forced displacement of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip abroad.

Since October 2023, the Israeli army has been waging a devastating war on Gaza that, as of Sunday, left “21,978 killed, 56,451 wounded, massive infrastructure destruction and an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe,” according to the Gaza Strip authorities and the United Nations.

The Guardian newspaper published a report by its Washington correspondent, Julian Borger, in which he said that the Middle East is slowly approaching the brink of a wide-ranging regional war because of the war in Gaza. He said that escalation could lead to a direct confrontation between Iran and Israel, dragging the United States into war.

He said that the Middle East is approaching the abyss, since the Hamas attack on October 7 and the fierce Israeli response, which pushed the confrontation closer to falling into the abyss.

Hours after the outbreak of war in Gaza, Lebanese Hezbollah began firing against towns in northern Israel in solidarity with the Palestinians, prompting an Israeli response, along with attacks from the Houthis against commercial ships supposedly linked to Israel. Israel moved two aircraft carriers and accompanying ground forces to the region where American military bases in Syria and Iraq were attacked, which led to a retaliatory response from Washington.

At the same time, protests broke out in the West Bank, and extremist Jews tried to exploit the wave by seizing control of Palestinian lands and terrorizing the population. In each of these theatres, there is the potential for any of them to ignite the flames of war in the Middle East. Recent days have revealed the possibility of ignition and dragging the United States into war with Iran. Israel killed a leader in the Revolutionary Guards in a raid on Damascus. Iran vowed to respond to the killing of prominent leader Reza Mousavi, who was responsible for coordination with Hezbollah and the Syrian regime.

At the same time, Iran's allies in Yemen are attacking commercial ships, which led to the launch of the American coalition known as the “Guardian of Prosperity.” Central Command issued a statement in which it said that Washington “has every reason to believe that the attacks launched by the Houthis are fully supported by Iran.” . If a warship strikes, President Joe Biden will be under pressure to respond, at a time when he is entering an election year, when Republicans are trying to look for any weakness.

In an article published in an American newspaper, Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett called on hawks in Israel and the United States to confront Iran directly, otherwise they will deal with its threat and its affiliated groups permanently.

In an article published by the Wall Street Journal, he said that “the United States and Israel must set a clear goal to overthrow the evil Iranian regime.” This is not only possible, but it is necessary for the safety and security of the Middle East, and for the entire civilized world.”

At a meeting on Friday at the UN Security Council to discuss violence in the West Bank, the debate quickly turned to the regional situation. Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Gilad Erdan said that talk about settler violence in the West Bank is an attempt to divert attention from the Lebanese Hezbollah threat. He said, “The situation in northern Israel has reached the point of no return,” echoing what the Israelis say about the possibility of acting on their own and establishing a buffer zone in southern Lebanon.

The Israeli envoy said: “If the attacks continue, I repeat that the situation will escalate and may lead to an all-out war.” Lebanon must be held responsible for the aggression that emanates from its territory.” Mohammed Khaled Al-Khairy, Assistant Secretary-General of the United Nations, told the Council that most of the exchange of fire between Hezbollah and Israel took place around the border, but some strikes entered the border, “which raises the prospect of an uncontrollable conflict with devastating repercussions for the populations of both countries.” Khairy added, “The risks of miscalculation and further escalation are increasing as the conflict in Gaza continues.”

Lana Nusseibeh, the UAE envoy, expressed her discomfort with the lack of action to prevent the spread of the “Gaza hell” from expanding to the West Bank, Lebanon and the rest of the Middle East. Since the beginning of the war in Gaza, about 304 Palestinians, including 79 children, have been killed in the West Bank, according to United Nations figures, compared to four Israelis. It appears “disproportionate in the death toll” that Israel is engaging in excessive killing to prevent the emergence of a new intifada in the West Bank in protest against the situation in Gaza, according to Khaled Al-Jundi, a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Studies. “The Israeli mentality is their belief that they are preventing a third intifada.” “And “I think the way they act causes one.”

He pointed to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as an element causing tension in the region. He bears responsibility for the Hamas attack and faces the possibility of the fall of power if the war ends, but the escalation keeps him there. “Frankly, it is Netanyahu who dictates the conditions on all fronts - Gaza, the border with Lebanon, and throughout the region, and for reasons related to Netanyahu, this is his war,” and “I believe that with every passing day we are getting closer to expanding the war in the region and turning it into complete chaos.”

During his recent conversation with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, US President Joe Biden urged the transition to a “more precise operation” in the Gaza Strip, focused on the leaders of the Hamas movement and the tunnels. As reported by the American newspaper "The New York Times".

During their conversation, Biden asked Netanyahu to "refrain from large-scale bombings, and move to a phase that includes raids by special forces targeting Hamas leaders and tunnels."

The American newspaper described the conversation between Biden and Netanyahu as “charged,” and this is what the American administration also conveyed to the Israeli Minister of Strategic Affairs, Ron Dermer, during his visit to Washington last week.

It was reported that Dermer informed American officials that Israel would soon move to a more precise stage, and said, “The first signs of change in Israeli operations will appear on the ground when the army forces end their operations in the northern Gaza Strip and begin withdrawing a large number of soldiers from there.”

According to the American newspaper, Dermer did not specify a precise timetable for the Americans, and they in turn pressured him to move to this stage as soon as possible.

In this context, US Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken, is scheduled to visit Israel next Thursday, where he is expected to hold discussions with Israeli officials, including the Prime Minister, the Minister of Security, and the “War Cabinet,” and to receive a response regarding the transition to the aforementioned stage.

The New York Times touched on relations between the United States and Israel since the start of the war on Gaza, and described the recent talks between Biden and Netanyahu as “very charged,” and among what Biden said to Netanyahu was, “You have to do more and take things seriously.”

The newspaper summarized that the US administration’s messages revolve around four things: “Israel has the right to defend itself, the Hamas threat must be ended, humanitarian aid must be increased, and civilian casualties in Gaza must be reduced.”

She pointed out, "There are hints that Netanyahu will eventually agree to accept a role for the Palestinian Authority in Gaza after reform measures. He realizes that there must be a Palestinian government if he wants the Arab Gulf states to finance the reconstruction of the Strip."

On Monday evening, the Israeli occupation army announced that one of its soldiers was killed, and 4 others, including an officer, were seriously injured in battles in the Gaza Strip, bringing the death toll to 507 since the start of the war on the Gaza Strip.

The army said in a statement, “Corporal (Reserve) Amichai Yisrael Yehoshua Oster (24 years old), from the Karnei Shomron settlement (north of the occupied West Bank), a fighter in the 7020th Battalion, Hasharon Formation (5), was killed in a battle in the northern Gaza Strip.”

The soldier's death brings the Israeli army's announced death toll to 171 since the start of the ground operation in the Gaza Strip on October 27, and to 507 since the beginning of the war on October 7.

The army added that "two other soldiers were seriously injured during the same battle, and a third soldier was seriously injured in a battle in the southern Gaza Strip."

The army continued: "An officer at the College of Military Engineering was also seriously injured during clashes in the northern Gaza Strip. The fighters were evacuated to receive medical treatment in the hospital, and their families were informed."

Three Lebanese citizens were killed, Monday evening, as a result of Israeli raids targeting the town of Kafr Kila in southern Lebanon.

Israeli warplanes and drones also launched raids on the towns of Naqoura, Maroun al-Ras, Hula, Markaba, and Adissa.

The occupation artillery targeted the towns of Hula, Tair Harfa, Al-Jebeen, Marwahin, Al-Dhahira, Aita Al-Shaab, Shehin, Mays Al-Jabal, Al-Naqoura, Al-Labouneh, the Al-Tubaisha area and the outskirts of Wadi Al-Jamal.

The spokesman for the Ministry of Health in the Gaza Strip, Dr. Ashraf Al-Qudra said on Monday that the Israeli occupation army committed 13 massacres in the Gaza Strip during the past 24 hours, leaving 156 killed and 246 injured.

Al-Qudra announced, in a press statement received by the Palestinian Information Center, that the death toll since the beginning of the aggression on October 7 had risen to 21,978 killed and 57,697 injured.

He also pointed out that 326 health personnel were martyred and 104 ambulances were destroyed and put out of service since the beginning of the aggression.

According to Al-Qudra, the occupation deliberately targeted 150 health institutions in the Gaza Strip, and put 30 hospitals out of service, and the occupation continues to arrest 99 Palestinian health personnel in inhumane conditions.

He continued his speech by saying: “We are working to restart hospitals in northern Gaza,” adding, “We are discussing with international institutions the restart of health centers in various regions of the Strip.”

He issued a call to international institutions to work immediately to protect the health system and its staff in the Gaza Strip, stressing the need to send medical teams and field hospitals to meet the enormous need.

The Ministry of Health spokesman noted that there are 1.9 million displaced people in the Gaza Strip, and they are vulnerable to famine and the spread of epidemics.

The director of the Palestinian-Turkish Friendship Hospital in Gaza, Subhi Skaik, reported on Monday that there are 10,000 cancer patients in the Strip without medication, after the hospital was “forced” out of service as a result of the ongoing war on the Strip for about three months.

Skaik said in a press conference, “After the Turkish-Palestinian Friendship Cancer Hospital was forcibly taken out of service, there are ten thousand cancer patients in dire and inhumane conditions,” according to what the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza posted on Telegram.

He added that they do not have "any kind of medicine to treat cancer in the Gaza Strip."

Skaik called on all countries to restart the Friendship Hospital, "which is considered the only haven for cancer patients in the Gaza Strip."

At the end of last October, the Ministry of Health in Gaza announced that the third and last floor of the Turkish-Palestinian Friendship Hospital was bombed by Israeli aircraft, causing severe damage, and the hospital was put out of service as a result of the war.

The Turkish government funded the construction of the hospital (2011-2017), which is one of the largest hospitals in Palestine, and the only one dedicated to treating cancer patients in Gaza, with an area of 34,800 square meters, consisting of 3 floors, and containing 180 beds.

The Ministry of Health in the Gaza Strip said, on Monday, that there are 50,000 pregnant women and more than 900,000 children who lack the necessary health care in shelter centers in the Strip.

Ministry spokesman Ashraf Al-Qudra explained, in a press conference, that “the health and humanitarian conditions for more than 1.9 million displaced people are catastrophic and overwhelming.”

He pointed out that the displaced people in the Gaza Strip "are exposed to the risks of famine and the spread of epidemics and infectious diseases as a result of the lack of appropriate shelter, water, food and medicine in the places to which they have been displaced."

The Ministry's spokesman stated that "50,000 pregnant women suffer from malnutrition and health complications, especially those with high-risk pregnancies, as a result of the lack of drinking water, hygiene, food, and health care in shelter centers."

“More than 900,000 children in shelter centers are exposed to the dangers of extreme cold, dehydration, malnutrition, infectious respiratory and skin diseases, and psychological disorders,” according to a ministry spokesman.

Al-Qudra called on UN institutions to conduct "urgent interventions to save the lives of children, pregnant women, and the sick, and prevent a health, humanitarian, and psychological catastrophe in shelter centers."

On Monday evening, Israeli occupation forces stormed the villages of Nazlet Zeid and Jalboun in Jenin Governorate.

According to local sources, the occupation forces stormed the village southwest of Jenin, deployed an infantry squad, and raided its neighborhoods. The occupation soldiers directed insults and threats at the citizens.

In this context, these forces stormed the village of Jalboun, east of Jenin, raided the eastern neighborhood and the vicinity of the old cemetery, and launched a sweeping and searching campaign, in a provocative step, without any arrests being reported.

By Michael Milstein

The heads of government and the army in Israel announce that it is expected to move soon to Phase C of the war in Gaza. After taking control of the northern Gaza Strip and focused operations in Khan Yunis, a phase is being planned in which the pattern of fighting will change, as its strength will diminish, and ground maneuvering will be replaced by focused operations, mainly ground incursions and air attacks, which are supposed to take a long time and lead to the collapse of Hamas’ rule.

But the above description is vague and highly complex, which is unacceptable in Middle Eastern discourse that relies on one-dimensional facts. The third phase could turn into an ongoing war of attrition, especially if Israel does not succeed in striking the Hamas leadership, or in achieving the collapse of the movement, which has proven, after 86 days of fighting, its ability to wage a fierce confrontation even if the Palestinians pay a heavy bloody price.

For Hamas, the third phase could represent an opportunity. It will allow it to claim that it has not conceded, even if it turns into a defeated entity controlling a small enclave. In its view, this matter can present an image of victory, despite the unprecedented killing and destruction that befell the Gaza Strip, and the fact that half of the Gaza Strip is occupied by the Israeli army, but the fact that it has stood firm and continues to fight inside and outside Gaza, fulfills the principle of steadfastness.

Moreover, this ambiguous situation could continue for a long time, and make it difficult for Israel to establish a different reality in Gaza. The continuation of fighting in the Gaza Strip will not allow the establishment of a positive model in the north, different from the south. Hamas will seek to undermine any attempt to establish stable civilian control mechanisms in the Gaza Strip, and the Palestinian public will avoid cooperating with it as long as fighting continues in the Gaza Strip (even in the northern part, Hamas will try to continue its movement), and foreign investors will refrain from offering projects to a region suffering from Permanent instability.

The ambiguous reality can be seen as a problem in the region, whether from Israel’s enemies or from its friends who will interpret the complex situation as an obstacle to its strategic goals, and on the other hand, the success of “Hamas” in achieving the “resistance doctrine,” that is, breaking the Israeli effort. By showing long breath and endless fighting ability; Of course, all of this will make it difficult for Israel to restore its image of deterrence, and could increase tensions on other fronts, especially in the north.

Israel must reconsider the third stage. The only way to achieve its strategic goals in the war, most importantly the elimination of the military and authoritarian capabilities of Hamas, is to control the entire Gaza Strip, despite the time and price required to achieve such a scenario. But this will make Israel sure that it has destroyed all of the movement’s military infrastructure, severely hit its leadership, and that another regime will emerge in the border area between Gaza and Egypt. Only after that, can we try to establish another regime in Gaza.

Within this framework, it is very important for Israel to conduct an in-depth dialogue with the United States, its strong strategic ally, which is pushing for a rapid transition to the third phase, in light of concerns about the accumulation of harm to the Gazan public. In this context, it is important to explain to Washington the challenges involved in this stage, the most prominent of which is the lack of a clear military solution. In addition to the harm that could befall Israel, this will reflect negatively on the United States as well, in light of what will be considered a new failure of its ally in its confrontation with the Iranian-led resistance camp, and a kind of continuation of the bitter experience of the United States in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The October 7 theory demonstrated the need to refrain from entering into situations involving contradictions and lack of clarity. Entering into a hybrid phase could eventually lead, after great frustration, to the situation that Israel is trying to prevent at this stage, namely, controlling the entire Strip.

Tal Lev Ram

Today, with the beginning of the year 2024, talk in Israel about the next day must begin now. Currently, the IDF is about to move to the next phase of the fighting in the Gaza Strip, while there are still unresolved issues, in particular regarding the northern front facing Hezbollah. 

The army needs a set of decisions from the political level and goal setting, in order to allow it to plan in detail for the next stages of the war in Gaza and in the northern arena. Establishing a mechanism for the next day, which in many ways can be called “the present day,” is not only a political need, especially in the south, and with regard to the tripartite relations between Israel, the United States, and Egypt, but it is also, for the army, a deep practical need to establish The goal of the battle is in the Southern Command.

Regarding the interconnectedness between the different combat zones, the timeline for progress in the Khan Yunis area brings us closer to moving to the next phase of the war in the south, during which fewer IDF divisions are expected to operate simultaneously in the Strip. This stage brings the political level closer to making the required decisions in the northern arena in confronting Hezbollah.

Yesterday, Hezbollah Deputy Secretary-General Naim Qassem said that residents of the northern settlements can return to their homes only after Israel completely stops the war in Gaza. Although it is clear that the war in Gaza may last for many months. Hezbollah is hinting that even after Israel moves to the next phase of the war in southern Gaza, it plans to continue to maintain an effective battle front facing Israel, until a political solution is reached, which is not on the horizon at this stage.

For the political level in Israel, the point is that a critical turning point is approaching, such that it is not possible to continue to accept the security situation in the north of the country as a permanent situation for many months, and from here comes the possibility of a decision to be taken regarding significantly raising the degree and strength of the responses to Hezbollah, which will... It will lead to escalation and cause major unrest in the northern arena, which could turn into the central arena of war, as long as Hezbollah continues to fire on Israel, and as long as its forces do not withdraw back. They claim in the army that Hezbollah is paying prices, including the death of more than 130 fighters and damage to its military buildings, which are much greater than the damage it causes to Israel.

Even if there is some truth in this statement, it is not sufficient to change the strategic complexity that Hezbollah imposed on Israel, after the “terrorist” attack by Hamas on October 7.

Political criticism from the right and the opposition

We can understand the logic of the government’s decision-making, which calls for focusing on the war against Hamas, but on the other hand, it is clear that the situation emerging in the north as a result of the continuing fighting is an intolerable situation, even though, so far, between the use of force and Military, or using political means, there is no equation that can restore calm to the northern border with Lebanon, and at the same time, provide protection and a sense of security for the population. Hence, the distance of Radwan's forces from Hezbollah is a necessary condition.

Israel has made clear on several occasions that it prefers to try to resolve the situation politically, but when they talk about returning to Resolution 1701, this resolution includes future prices that Israel may have to pay. Also, making certain decisions could lead to political criticism of the Prime Minister from the right and the opposition, who will claim that Israel has submitted to Hezbollah’s blackmail.

So far, there is no immediate political solution on the horizon, and the method of using military force does not lead to restoring deterrence on the northern border. What is true now is that Hezbollah, at least in terms of statements, claims that it will not stop firing as long as the Israeli army continues its war. On Gaza. The IDF's transition to the next phase of the fighting in Gaza is taking place gradually, and is already having an impact on the ground. We advise all those who followed during the three months of fighting in the south, the maneuvering methods and the location of the Israeli army divisions in each stage, not to expect celebrations for the end of the second stage of fighting and the beginning of the third stage.

In the year 2024, which begins today, the coming months are expected to bring questions about the continuation of the war in Gaza, with a high possibility of deteriorating into war, or a major escalation in the confrontation with Hezbollah in the north. The central effort made by the Israeli army is in Khan Yunis, through the 98th Division, in which 7 brigades operate. This effort is what will lead to increased military pressure on senior Hamas officials above ground, especially underground, and an attempt to reach the movement's senior leaders. The intense military effort, according to the army's doctrine, is also supposed to lead to progress in releasing more kidnapped persons.

A buffer zone in the sector

In recent days, first signs have emerged, but it is too early to see more than that. In exchange for the army's central effort to continue to "cleanse" the northern Gaza Strip, with the exception of the Daraj al-Tuffah neighborhood, which has not been under operational control and is still witnessing battles. The increase in incidents in recent days against “saboteurs” in areas under the army’s control for a long time, such as Beit Lahia, or neighborhoods in the heart of Gaza City, is a good indication of the guerrilla warfare that the Israeli army is expected to face wherever its forces remain permanently.

The presence of fixed forces to protect the logistical supply axis that practically connects the north of the Strip to its south will continue in the next phase of the fighting, as will the plans related to the presence of forces securing the northern corridor, from the Erez area, passing through the beach, and up to the southernmost area in Gaza City. This presence in the field is what must provide flexibility for the army to carry out other operations in the coming months in the northern Gaza Strip...

Among the decisions that must be taken by the political level in the coming days are those related to the northern Gaza Strip in particular. Who will care for the civilian population remaining in Gaza City? Can people in the south return to the north? An issue that the Americans are expected to push to resolve, or should the current situation be maintained and pressure on Hamas from the Gazan population should be increased?

In addition to the central effort exerted by the army in Khan Yunis and in the center and south of the Gaza Strip, it is currently working to establish a buffer zone, hence the importance of the operations taking place in the Bureij, Al-Maghazi, Khirbet Khazaa and other camps.

In these areas adjacent to the border fence, and opposite the Israeli settlements, which were used as bases for the “terrorists” to launch their “terrorist” attack on October 7, the Israeli army is investing redoubled effort in demolishing the “terrorist” infrastructure, destroying the tunnels, and exposing the field towards A distance of one kilometer in order to allow the army to better control, monitor and improve the defensive capacity of the settlements.

In this style of fighting, the army advances, stage after stage, in dismantling the military capabilities of the enemy who does not want to surrender, even if the disaster it is causing in Gaza is clear in front of it, and even now, after 3 months of fighting, it is very difficult to see the end of the war.

What is certain is that without a political goal, it will be very difficult to continue the fight for a long time successfully, while the differences between the prime minister and other members of the cabinet are deepening, and political considerations are being favored, which today interfere in decision-making. All of these are discouraging indicators, in the face of... Months of long fighting lie ahead.

By Jean-Pierre Filiu

After nearly three months of Israel’s war on Gaza, one thing is beyond dispute: the long-isolated territory has returned to the center of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. For much of the past two decades, as Israel imposed an air, sea, and land blockade on Gaza, international leaders and bodies seemed to assume that the dense enclave of 2.3 million Palestinians could be indefinitely excluded from the regional equation. Catching Israel and much of the wider world completely off guard, Hamas’s October 7 attack exposed the enormous flaws in that assumption. Indeed, the war has now reset the entire Palestinian question, putting Gaza and its people squarely at the center of any future Israeli-Palestinian negotiation. But Gaza’s sudden new prominence should hardly come as a surprise. Although little of it is remembered today, the territory’s 4,000-year history makes clear that the last 16 years were an anomaly; the Gaza Strip has almost always played a pivotal part in the region’s political dynamics, as well as its age-old struggles over religion and military power. Since the British Mandate period in the early twentieth century, the territory has also been at the heart of Palestinian nationalism. Therefore, any attempt at rebuilding Gaza after such a devastating war will be unlikely to succeed if it does not take account of the territory’s strategic position in the region. The demilitarization of this enclave can be achieved only by lifting the disastrous siege and putting forward a positive vision for its economic development. 

Rather than trying to cut off the territory or isolate it politically, international powers must work together to allow Gaza to reclaim its historic role as a flourishing oasis and a thriving crossroads, connecting the Mediterranean with North Africa and the Levant. The United States and its allies must recognize that Gaza will need to have a central part in any lasting solution to the Palestinian struggle.

THE JEWEL IN THE CROWN

In stark contrast to its present-day reality of impoverishment, extreme water shortages, and unending human misery, the oasis of Gaza, or Wadi Ghazza, was celebrated for centuries for the lushness of its vegetation and the coolness of its shade. As important, however, was its strategic value, for Gaza connects Egypt to the Levant. Its advantageous position has meant that the land has been contested since the seventeenth century BC, when the Hyksos invaded the Nile Delta from Gaza, only to be later defeated and repelled by a Theban-based dynasty of pharaohs. Eventually, the pharaohs had to abandon Gaza to the Sea Peoples—known as Philistines—who in the twelfth century BC established a five-city federation that included Gaza and the now Israeli cities of Ashkelon, Ashdod, Ekron, and Gath. 

Violent tensions erupted over access to the sea between the Philistines and the neighboring Jewish tribes and then kingdoms. Thus the biblical story of Samson, the legendary Israelite warrior who sets out to defeat the Philistines. As his formidable strength depends on his hair never being cut, he is rendered powerless when he falls under the spell of Delilah, who has his head shaved during his sleep, and winds up in a Gaza prison. While in captivity, however, his hair grows back, restoring his strength, and when he is finally dragged out of his cell to be ridiculed in a Philistine temple, he brings down the pillars of the building, killing himself along with his enemies. In a similar vein, it is after killing the Philistine Goliath that young David begins his effort to unify the kingdoms of Judah and Israel.

In later antiquity, Gaza’s coveted geography made it a crucial battleground between some of the epoch’s greatest hegemons. After passing through the hands of the Assyrians and the Babylonians, Gaza was captured by Cyrus the Great’s Persia in the mid-sixth century. But the real shock came two centuries later, in 332 BC, when Alexander the Great of Macedonia launched a devastating hundred-day siege of Gaza on his way to Egypt. During this gruesome war, both sides fortified their positions by digging numerous tunnels beneath Gaza’s loose soil—providing a historic antecedent to Hamas’s strategy against Israel today. In the end, Alexander’s forces came out on top, but at a high cost to all sides. Alexander was injured during the siege and took terrible revenge on the defeated Gazans: much of the male population was slaughtered, and the women and children reduced to slavery.

But Gaza’s importance extended beyond its military value. Having become a city-state during the Hellenistic period, it later became a major religious center in the early centuries of first Christianity and then Islam. In 407 AD, Porphyry, the Christian bishop of Gaza, managed to impose a church on the ruins of Gaza’s main pagan temple to Zeus. Even more famous was another local saint, Hilarion (291–371), who founded an important monastic community in Gaza and whose tomb became a hugely popular pilgrimage site. One of the prophet Muhammad’s great-grandfathers was a merchant from Mecca named Hashem ibn Abd Manaf, who died in Gaza around 525. As a result, after the territory was conquered by Muslim armies in the seventh century, Muslims respectfully referred to it as “Hashem’s Gaza.” (In the nineteenth century, the Ottomans built the Hashem Mosque in Gaza City to mark the site of Hashem’s mausoleum.)Any attempt at rebuilding Gaza will be unlikely to succeed if it does not take account of the territory’s strategic position.

Between the medieval period and the nineteenth century, Gaza continued to serve as a coveted prize in the region’s major power struggles. It seesawed between Christian crusaders and Muslim defenders in the twelfth century and Mamluk generals and Mongol invaders in the thirteenth. During two and a half centuries under the Mamluks—Turkic rulers who controlled medieval Egypt and Syria—Gaza entered a kind of golden age. The territory was endowed with numerous mosques, libraries, and palaces, and it prospered from the renewed coastal trade routes. In 1387, a fortified caravanseray or khan, a kind of trading and market hub, was established at the southern end of Gaza and soon grew into a city of its own, Khan Yunis.

Gaza was absorbed by the Ottoman Empire in 1517 and conquered, briefly, by Napoleon Bonaparte’s army, after it invaded Egypt in 1798. For much of this span, Gaza was renowned for its fruitful climate, congenial natives, and high quality of life. In 1659, one French traveler described it as “a very cheerful and agreeable place”; two centuries later, another, the French writer Pierre Loti, marveled at its “vast fields of barley all clothed in green.” When the border was drawn in 1906 to separate British-controlled Egypt from Ottoman Palestine, it ran through the city of Rafah to create a de facto free trade zone between the two empires. But during World War I, the border was fiercely contested by British and Ottoman forces; after three attempts, the British Army finally broke through Ottoman lines in 1917. General Edmund Allenby entered the devastated city of Gaza on November 9, the same day his government made public the Balfour Declaration and its commitment to “the establishment of a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine.” This endorsement of the Zionist program was later incorporated into the mandate that the League of Nations granted Britain to administer Palestine.

Although Gaza was one of the areas of Palestine least targeted by Zionist settlement, it became a stronghold of Palestinian nationalism, especially during the Great Arab Revolt of 1936–39, in which Palestinian Arabs rose up against the British and fought unsuccessfully for an independent Arab state. Instead, in November 1947, the United Nations endorsed a partition plan in which Palestine would be divided between an Arab state and a Jewish one—the original two-state solution—with Gaza joining the Arab state.

SEEDS OF STRUGGLE

Crucially, what became known as the Gaza Strip was shaped by the pivotal traumas of 1948. First came the failure of the UN’s partition plan, which, although welcomed by the Zionist leadership, was flatly rejected by Palestinian nationalists and the Arab states, setting off an armed conflict between Jews and Arabs. Soon, the first waves of Arab refugees, mainly from the Jaffa area, were arriving in Gaza; in a bitter anticipation of today’s international dilemma, the British suggested that the area would have better access to humanitarian relief overland from Cairo. Then, following the Zionist leader David Ben-Gurion’s proclamation of the state of Israel in May 1948, neighboring Arab states attacked, with 10,000 Egyptian soldiers moving into Gaza. But the Egyptians never made it farther than Ashdod, some 20 miles north of Gaza, where they were soon pushed back by a daring Israeli operation.

By January 1949, the Israelis had not only defeated the Arab armies but also driven some 750,000 Palestinians from their homes, in what became known as the nakba, or catastrophe. The armistice signed between Israel and Egypt under UN auspices in February of that year created the Gaza Strip, a territory under Egyptian administration and defined by the cease-fire lines in the north and east and by the 1906 border with Egypt in the south. After centuries as a strategic crossroads and vital commercial hub for regional trade, Gaza had been reduced to a “strip” of land, cornered by the desert, and cut off from what had been Palestine. On top of that, the local population of some 80,000 was now overwhelmed by some 200,000 refugees from all over Palestine who then described the Gaza Strip as their “Noah’s ark.”

There was no infrastructure to welcome these refugees, and during the first winter of 1948–49, the International Committee of the Red Cross estimated that ten children died every day from cold, hunger, or disease. The immensity of the Sinai Desert forced the survivors to remain in the enclave. Indeed, 25 percent of the Arab population of British Mandate Palestine was now confined in the Gaza Strip to just one percent of its former territory, with Israel absorbing 77 percent of that territory and the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan another 22 percent, through its annexation of East Jerusalem and the West Bank.

Such was the magnitude of the nakba that the United Nations created a special body, the UN Relief for Palestinian Refugees (UNRPR), to deal with the humanitarian crisis. For Palestinians, the terrible upheaval also planted the seeds of a new struggle that would continue to the present day. In December 1948, the same UN General Assembly that had approved the failed partition plan a year earlier enshrined the Palestinian refugees’ “right of return”—whether by way of actual repatriation or mere monetary compensation—a concept that has been central to Palestinian aspirations ever since. It had special meaning in Gaza, given the extraordinary number of refugees there, and since Egypt had no territorial claim on the strip, the enclave became a natural incubator for Palestinian nationalism.

As Israel’s first leader, Ben-Gurion understood the long-term threat Gaza posed before almost any of his fellow Israelis. At the UN peace conference in Lausanne, in 1949, he proposed annexing the Gaza Strip and allowing 100,000 Palestinian refugees into their former homes in Israel. But the plan generated an uproar in both Israel, where there was enormous opposition to any return of Palestinians, and Egypt, where the defense of Gaza had become a national cause. As a result, the UN admitted its impotence to settle the Arab-Israeli dispute, terminating the Lausanne conference and establishing open-ended “interim” institutions instead. Thus, the UNRPR was turned into the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), which ever since has been the main employer and main provider of social services in Gaza. Eight refugee camps were founded in the enclave, the largest ones being Jabalya, in the far north, and the Beach Camp, on the shoreline of Gaza City—the same camps that have now been destroyed by the Israeli onslaught.

In fact, it took some years before Gazan refugees turned to militant activism. At first, both Israel and Egypt managed to tamp down on the so-called fedayeen—guerrilla fighters mainly drawn from the camps in Gaza who sought to infiltrate Israel. But by the mid-1950s, the Egyptian leader Gamal Abdel Nasser began using them for proxy raids against Israel, thus beginning the cycle of attacks and reprisals that is so closely associated with the territory today. In April 1956, the security officer of a kibbutz close to the Palestinian enclave was killed by infiltrators from Gaza, causing Moshe Dayan, the Israeli chief of staff, to warn Israelis of the unresolved grievances simmering in the territory: “Let us not, today, cast the blame on the murderers,” Dayan said. “For eight years now, they have sat in the refugee camps in Gaza, and before their eyes we have turned their lands and villages, where they and their fathers dwelt, into our home.”

Eradicating the fedayeen presence from Gaza became a top priority for Ben-Gurion and Dayan. In November 1956, the Israeli army took control of the strip as part of a coordinated offensive with France and the United Kingdom against Nasser’s Egypt. During four months of occupation, around a thousand Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces (including two massacres documented by UNRWA in which at least 275 were executed in Khan Yunis and 111 in Rafah). The trauma was so profound that when the Israelis withdrew under U.S. pressure, the Palestinian population called for the return of Egyptian rule instead of the UN trusteeship that had initially been envisioned. A historic opportunity to build a Palestinian entity that could evolve into a state had been lost. Meanwhile, the fedayeen fled to Kuwait, where they founded, in 1959, the Palestinian Liberation Movement, known as Fatah, with Yasser Arafat as its leader.

Israel’s second occupation of Gaza started in June 1967, after the Israeli triumph in the Six-Day War. Dayan, now minister of defense, with the future prime minister Yitzhak Rabin as his chief of staff, erased any trace of the border between Gaza and Israel, betting that the attraction of the Israeli labor market would dissolve Palestinian nationalism. But the local population nonetheless supported for four years a low-intensity guerrilla war, until Ariel Sharon, the Israeli commander for the region (also later prime minister), bulldozed parts of the refugee camps and broke the back of the insurgency. Today, the Israeli army is using the very same map that Sharon did to distinguish the so-called “safe areas” from the combat zones in the ongoing offensive.

MAKING A MONSTER

Israel’s more visionary leaders had long recognized that the Gaza refugee problem would not go away. In 1974—following Ben-Gurion—Sharon proposed resettling tens of thousands of Palestinian refugees in Israel to address Palestinian grievances, at least symbolically. But once again, the idea was rejected. Instead, Israel started to play off the Muslim Brothers in Gaza, led by Sheikh Yassin, against the now Fatah-controlled nationalists of the mainstream Palestinian Liberation Organization. Notably, the Israeli military governor attended the inauguration of Yassin’s mosque in Gaza in 1973, and six years later, Israel allowed the Islamists to receive foreign funds while repressing any established connection with the PLO.

For a time, this divide-and-conquer policy seemed to work well for Israel in Gaza, with clashes flaring between nationalists and Islamists in 1980. But by the late 1980s, an entire generation had grown up under the constant pressure of the Israeli settlers who, though numbering only in the low thousands, led the occupying army to exclude the already cramped Gazan population from one-fourth of the enclave. It was in Gaza’s Jabalya refugee camp that the first intifada began, in December 1987, from which it soon spread to the whole strip and then to the West Bank. Young Palestinians defied the Israeli military with their stones and slingshots but also forced Arafat and the PLO to endorse the two-state solution. In response, Yassin transformed his organization into Hamas (an acronym for the “Movement for Islamic Resistance”) accusing the PLO of having betrayed the “holy” duty to “liberate Palestine.” Once again, Israeli intelligence played on those tensions to weaken the intifada and waited until May 1989 to imprison Yassin. But the popular uprising went on until support for peace in Israel brought Rabin to office as prime minister, in July 1992.In opening secret talks with the PLO, Rabin’s priority was to disengage Israel from the Gaza Strip yet still protect the Israeli settlers there. The Oslo accords, signed in September 1993, created a Palestinian Authority to take charge of territories evacuated by Israel. Arafat moved into Gaza ten months later, believing he had himself liberated the territory, or at least the portion under Palestinian control, while the local population was convinced it had paid the hardest price for such a liberation. This misunderstanding, along with the rampant corruption of the PA, played directly into the hands of Hamas. In 1997, a botched Israeli intelligence operation against the Hamas leader Khalid Meshal in Jordan led to the arrest of Israeli agents. To secure their release, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was forced to hand over Yassin, who had been serving a life sentence in Israel and who returned triumphantly to Gaza.

Hamas’s growing aggressiveness and the crisis of the peace process led to the eruption of the second intifada in September 2000. The shocking wave of suicide attacks helped bring Sharon to power in a February 2001 landslide. After laying siege to Arafat in Ramallah and killing Yassin in Gaza, Sharon believed that his victory would be complete only after the Israeli evacuation of the Gaza Strip. Such a unilateral withdrawal was meant to secure a new Israeli defense line around the enclave and was carried out without any consultation with Mahmoud Abbas, who had succeeded Arafat as head of the PLO and the PA. But Sharon’s gamble ruined the ambitious $3 billion development plan for Gaza that James Wolfensohn, the special envoy of the Quartet for the Middle East (Russia, the United States, the European Union, and the United Nations) had designed.

Hamas naturally claimed the Israeli withdrawal as a victory and went on to win the internationally sponsored parliamentary elections a few months later, in January 2006. Embarrassed by the unforeseen outcome, the United States and the European Union decided to boycott Hamas until it recognized Israel and renounced violence. But by the following year, the unreformed Hamas, having killed hundreds of its rivals, had gained total control of the strip, which was then put under full Israeli blockade (with the cooperation of Egypt, which controls the Rafah crossing point in the south). In many ways, Israeli policies had brought Hamas to power in Gaza, a power that the blockade has only consolidated since then.

A PATH TO PEACE?

A legacy of the policies that have been followed since 2006, the current war between Israel and Hamas is also a result of the denial of Gaza’s rich historical identity. During the past 16 years, Israeli leaders thought they had found the optimal formula for sidelining Gaza entirely: more than two million Palestinians could be excluded from the demographic equation between the Jewish and Arab populations in Israel, East Jerusalem, and the West Bank; and the PA, blinded by its bitter feud with Hamas, resisted any effort to alleviate the blockade in Gaza, an approach that further undermined the PA’s already waning legitimacy. Meanwhile, the division of the Palestinian leadership doomed any effort to revive the peace process and allowed the Israeli settlements to steadily expand in the West Bank. From time to time, Israel engaged in what counterterrorism experts described as “lawn-mowing” wars on Gaza, with, from its point of view, a sustainable ratio of largely military casualties, although the Palestinian killed were mainly civilians. In 2009, 13 Israeli soldiers were killed, and 1,417 Palestinians. In 2012, the ratio was six Israelis to 166 Palestinians. In 2014 it was 72 Israelis to 2,251 Palestinians, and in 2021, 15 to 256. Meanwhile, the European Union and the Gulf states were always ready to foot the bill to reconstruct the ruins in the strip.

But the idea that the terrible human reality of Gaza could be simply ignored was a delusion. On October 7, 2023, the status quo collapsed in Hamas’s horrific killing spree. The unprecedented violence that Israel has been unleashing on Gaza ever since, in which more than 21,000 Palestinians have so far been killed—and, in a cruel replay of the memories of the nakba, an overwhelming majority of its 2.3 million inhabitants have been uprooted from their homes—has sent shock waves through the Middle East and beyond. Netanyahu’s declared war aim—the “eradication” of Hamas—echoes those of Ben-Gurion in 1956, only on a much larger scale and with the whole world watching. Even supposing such a goal can be accomplished, there will be no Nasser to bring order to the enclave after the Israeli withdrawal. So Israel seems destined to be haunted by the very “Gaza Strip” it created in 1948, with the continuing cycle of wars and occupation leading only to more radical Palestinian activism.

For the Israelis and the Palestinians to ultimately enjoy the peace and security they so deeply deserve, Gaza must once again return to its roots as the prosperous crossroads it was for centuries. To start with, the policy of siege and blockade must end, allowing the territory to finally reconnect with the rest of the region. At the same time, drawing on Gaza’s historic role as a major trading hub, a concerted strategy of redevelopment, echoing Wolfensohn’s 2005 plan, must be put in place to allow Gaza to move from international assistance to a self-generating economy. This is the key for the territory to be demilitarized under international supervision and in the framework of a two-state solution. Of course, it will be extremely difficult to make any of this happen, particularly after a ruthless war that threatens to spawn a new generation of Palestinian militancy. But there are no easy solutions left. This strategy might be the only way out of the current murderous spiral. As it has been for centuries, Gaza is once again at the center of a major war but also the key to peace and prosperity in the Middle East.

JEAN-PIERRE FILIU is Professor of Middle East Studies at Sciences Po in Paris and is the author of Gaza: A History and The Middle East.

By Hamid Dabashi

The reason Zionists have the full support of European and US leaders is because the genocidal drive to 'exterminate all the brutes' is embedded deep in their psyches

As millions of Palestinians trapped in Gaza were facing starvation and mass murder, Israel's invading army made sure to film themselves enjoying “rejuvenation complexes”, where they were lavished with “concerts, massage chairs, buffet, and more”. It is surreal to watch Israelis being pampered while slaughtering Palestinians in their own homeland. This is the genocidal practice of settler-colonialism, dating back at least as far as Bartolome de las Casas in his A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies (1552). In it, he documented for posterity the vicious brutality of the Spanish, butchering “savage Indians” in an orgy of violence. Israelis are doing the same to the Palestinians.  In North and South America, Australia, Asia and Africa, European settler-colonialists have left behind the evidence of their psychotic genocidal practices.

The European transatlantic slave trade may have halved the population of Africa, some historians believe. The US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and many African colonies were all built on the systematic extermination, displacement and internment of the original inhabitants.  Stay informed with MEE's newsletters

In the Israeli settler-colonialism now on violent display in Gaza and the rest of Palestine, European colonialism is living up to its murderous infamy and has returned to the global stage with a vengeance. For decades, scholars of European colonialism have been working hard to document, archive and connect these episodes of the premeditated mass murder of native people around the globe. 

But such painstaking scholarship has been unnecessary in Gaza and the West Bank. For there, the barbarity of the Israeli army and the settlers has been on full display on social media, and in the mainstream media in the global south, for anyone who cares to look for themselves. Israel has put the entire history of Euro-American settler-colonialism and its genocidal instincts on full global display. While the western media works tirelessly and shamelessly to whitewash Israel's murderous activities - offering “alternative facts”, demonizing Palestinians, valorizing Israelis, and sanitizing Zionism to assure the world that Israel is “the most moral army” the globe has ever seen - the world at large has been liberated from their pernicious journalism.

Settler colonialism and genocide

While Israel goes about its genocide against the Palestinians, US Congress has been busy persecuting those voicing opposition to Israel's actions and prosecuting imaginary threats to Jews, supported by billionaires frightening university presidents out of their wits.

For decades, critical thinking by leading anticolonial and postcolonial thinkers had been radically altering our perceptions of the savageries committed around the world by Europeans and Americans. In the US, critical race theorists and intersectional feminists have staged groundbreaking challenges against "established" world history.

Israel is a microcosm of that colonial history, all jammed inside a Zionist nutshell. “In a matter of weeks, a far greater number of children have been killed by Israeli military operations in Gaza than the total number of children killed during any individual year, by any party to a conflict since I have been secretary-general,” said UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on 30 November 2023.

How Israel's genocidal war against Palestinians is a colonial tradition

Read More »Yet Palestinians have been consistently dehumanized, their fate de-historicized, and Israelis cast as victims retaliating against an unprovoked attack. The entire history of the Zionist conquest of Palestine with the aid of their European and American benefactors is being consistently erased. Palestinians have no history, no humanity, no culture. Israelis have been in Palestine since the creation of heaven and earth. Evangelical Zionism was the paramount story of the world at large. What the Israelis are doing in Palestine is what the French did in Algeria, the British did in India, the Belgians in the Congo, the Americans in Vietnam, the Spaniards in Latin America, the Italians in Africa and the Germans in Namibia, another chapter of European genocidal history.

In his essay, Settler Colonialism and the Elimination of the Native (2006), Patrick Wolfe demonstrated how, “as practiced by Europeans, both genocide and settler colonialism have typically employed the organizing grammar of race”. Even more poignantly, the Martinique author and politician Aime Cesaire, in his 1950 seminal work Discourse on Colonialism, described the pernicious drive of colonists to enslave the natives and dehumanize them, while stealing their land, exploiting their labor and vandalizing their resources.  

Manifest destiny

How dare a people do this to another people - unless, of course, they think of themselves as destined by divinity. Zionism is the Jewish version of the racist US doctrine of “manifest destiny”, a belief in the racial superiority of white people and definitive to the American colonial conquest of the Native Americans and other groups they exterminated. 

Like the American version, Zionists believe Palestine was their promised land, that it was destined and promised to them by their God, and that the native inhabitants were a nuisance that must be brutally eliminated. What the Israeli army is doing in Gaza is the Zionist version of “the great replacement” theory, which holds that people of color are replacing white people and that the process must be reversed.

When such sentiments are uttered in the US, serious newspaper columnists ridicule it and dismiss it as a conspiracy theory. But when such views are expressed in Israel, they support, endorse and ideologically arm and weaponize them.  

A Christian zealotry was at the roots of the American manifest destiny ideology, which has now morphed into evangelical Zionism, with its drive to conquer “the Holy Land” and prepare for the second coming of their messiah. (This figure has nothing to do with the Palestinian Jesus Christ or Latin American liberation theology and is an entirely fictitious construct of America's imperialist imagination.) 

'Exterminate all the brutes'

In his classical 1893 essay, The Significance of the Frontier in American History, historian Frederick Jackson Turner theorized that American settler colonialists saw their destiny framed by the European civilization they had left behind and the barbarism they faced in the "new world".

Turner believed that the American character was shaped by those beliefs. Through evangelical Zionism, that frontier, that fight against "barbarism", is what drives the Israeli settler-colonial project against Palestinian resistance.

“Exterminate all the brutes,” whispers the character Kurtz, an ivory trader sent by a shadowy Belgian company into the heart of an unnamed place in Africa, believed to be the Congo Free State, in Joseph Conrad's 1899 novella Heart of Darkness.

Swedish author Sven Lindqvist borrowed that phrase for the title of his 1992 book, a moral meditation on the roots of European colonialism, racism and genocide in Africa.

When the Haitian documentary filmmaker Raoul Peck made his 2021 HBO miniseries Exterminate All the Brutes, in part based on Lindqvist’s book, he went around the globe documenting the barbarity of European colonialism, but dared not go near Palestine, except for a quick liberal Zionist cliche reference to how things there were “complicated”. Things are not complicated in Palestine.

In fact, things there are very simple: a pernicious European settler-colonial madness of conquest, colonization and genocide is unfolding right in front of our eyes. 

Zionists have the loyal and unreserved support of other settler colonists from Europe, the US, Canada and Australia behind them.

For that reason, the entire world, long brutalized historically by European savagery, has become Palestinian.

French academic and professor Jean-Pierre Filiu believes that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Russian President Vladimir Putin, who are counting on the return of former US President Donald Trump to the White House, will do their utmost to prolong the war on Gaza, which will have disastrous effects on the European Union, whether In its relationship with the Middle East or in Ukraine.

It is worrying, as Filho sees it, that the war in Gaza has become accustomed to more quickly than the war in Ukraine, even though the casualties in Ukraine are mostly military, while the threshold for killing 1% of the population is about to be crossed in Gaza, which means compared to France 650,000 French people were killed, including 250,000 children, in addition to millions of wounded, orphans, maimed, and psychologically traumatized.

However, the professor says - in his column in Le Monde newspaper - that nothing foretells the end of this tragedy, because Netanyahu has a great interest in prolonging the war, with the possible re-election of Donald Trump.

In doing so, he is not only gambling on his political survival, but also on ensuring the preservation of immunity as head of government, and removing the judicial prosecutions opened against him since 2019 on charges of corruption, fraud, and breach of trust, which could drag him to prison.

Double bet

For this reason, as Filho, an expert on Middle East affairs, says, Netanyahu assigned his army a more rhetorical than military goal, which is to “eliminate” the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas), so that the continuation of hostilities becomes a goal in itself for him, not just to maintain power. But also to weaken US President Joe Biden, hoping for the return of Trump, who provided him unconditional support during his term.

Netanyahu is not the only one who relies on these calculations. There is also Putin who is convinced that Trump’s re-election will guarantee him victory over Ukraine, so that he will be the biggest winner from the war in Gaza, after Western democracies have proven their inability to defend in the Middle East the principles of law in whose name they supported Ukraine. A blatant embodiment of "double standards."

With the prospects of Russian success in Ukraine increasing with each day of the prolongation of the war in Gaza, Filiu believes that it is time for Europe to gather its strength to avoid such a disastrous scenario, and mobilize in favor of a permanent settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with the same energy it did in supporting Ukraine in 2022.

The writer concluded that the costs of Europe's marginalization of itself in light of the ongoing crisis in the Middle East may be high, which means the European Union must harness its short- and medium-term policy to achieve the "strategic goal" it has set for itself, which is a two-state solution.

According to Filho, this requires re-evaluating all forms of cooperation with Israel and suspending any project that promotes, even indirectly, settlement in the occupied territories of East Jerusalem and the West Bank.

In the end, the Union should not be satisfied with the role of financier for the reconstruction of the destroyed areas in Gaza, the role assigned to it by the United States and Israel, to exempt themselves from responsibility for such a disaster, which necessarily means that the fate of Europe in 2024 will be determined in Gaza, according to For Filio.

Source: Le Monde +Aljazeera

South Africa has submitted a request to the United Nations International Court of Justice for a case against Israel, accompanied by a request for provisional measures against it for its potential failures to prevent the crime of genocide, to which the besieged and bombarded Palestinians in the Gaza Strip appear to be subjected.

The French news website Media Part alerted that this court - which is different from the International Criminal Court - has jurisdiction to adjudicate disputes between countries.

He pointed out that the powers of this court are limited due to the sovereignty of states, which are subject to their jurisdiction only from the moment they give their consent, or if they sign an optional clause related to compulsory jurisdiction, which is what only a third of the member states of the United Nations have done.

Because of the limitations of this jurisdiction - as the site says in a report by Antoine Perrault - South Africa took a third path, which is to resort to the court on the basis of an international treaty that includes a jurisdictional requirement, which is the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, which was unanimously approved by the United Nations General Assembly on the ninth. From December 1948.

Therefore, Pretoria wants to condemn and prevent "genocide" in connection with Israel's war on the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas), which turned into a war on the Palestinian people, because this crime must be prevented or suppressed from the moment the intent that defines it is revealed, which is to commit Certain acts “with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.”

The request submitted by South Africa on December 29 confirms that “Israel’s actions and omissions constitute genocide insofar as they are accompanied by the specific intent required to destroy the Palestinians in Gaza as part of the larger national and racist community.”

A specious argument

A request for an advisory opinion was submitted in The Hague this year to the International Court of Justice on “the legal consequences arising from Israel’s policies and practices in the occupied Palestinian territories, including East Jerusalem,” based on a resolution adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on December 30. /December 2022.

Israel's representative at the United Nations unsuccessfully opposed such a resolution, which "demonizes Israel - in his opinion - and absolves the Palestinians of any responsibility for the current situation."

The Israeli delegate added that referral to the institution “would eliminate any chance for reconciliation between Israel and the Palestinians,” which is the deceptive argument adopted by Washington, London, and Ottawa, in contrast to Paris.

In 2004, the International Court of Justice issued a clear advisory opinion against the “separation wall” built by Israel, which, according to the United Nations Foundation, constitutes an element of obstruction of the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination.

The advisory opinion recommended demolishing the wall, compensating for the damages, and preventing companies from continuing construction, but Israel found it difficult to tolerate such an interpretation of its systematic policy.

Since then, the Court has lost 15 of its wisest and most experienced international judges, according to one observer, and they were replaced in a single day by diplomats, experts in the art of division, motivated by the desire not to offend anyone.

He refused in disgust

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has just rejected with "disgust" South Africa's assertions, saying "we will continue our defensive war, which is unparalleled in justice and morality," adding that the army "is doing everything it can to avoid harming civilians, while Hamas is doing everything to avoid harming civilians." "In order to harm them and use them as human shields."

Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Lior Hayat had described the request as “defamation without a legal basis,” while stressing that his country “respects international law in its war against Hamas in Gaza.” However, the request submitted by Pretoria will leave traces that cannot but disturb those. They count on erasing it.

According to Filho, the path to achieving justice in this matter remains long and winding, so that the word of the strongest is no longer the first or the last, and until it becomes clear to those who rule us that no one is above the law.

Source: Aljazeera + Mediapart

Ideas usually come to mind, which later become topic titles, and then you return to them after a while to write articles inspired by those titles. This is exactly what happened when I was preparing this article: I created a title that I forgot for a while, but Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov’s strange statements to the “Russia-1” channel on January 28 revived this title in my memory: “The problem of comparing Ukraine and Gaza.”

Lavrov’s statements in that interview conducted with him by Dmitry Kiselyov, Director General of the Russian international media agency “Russia Today” and presenter of the weekly news harvest on the first state channel of Russian television “Russia-1”, seem, to say the least, unsuccessful in terms of Presentation formula. But in reality, it was shocking and confusing in its content and significance. 

Rather, allow me to assume that it comes as a conclusion of Russia's position on the genocidal massacre committed by the barbaric and brutal Zionist entity against the Palestinian people in Gaza, and even in the West Bank, in a systematic manner over a period of about three months. Why can it be assumed that it is a summary of Russia's position? Because it is the last statement made by a senior official before the end of 2023.

What do we read in the statements of the head of Russian diplomacy and how do we understand them?

Lavrov described the “Al-Aqsa Flood” as a terrorist act, then crossed out his country’s position declared in the UN Security Council by Russia’s permanent representative to the United Nations, Vassily Nebenzia, who said that “Israel” does not have the right to self-defense as it is a state occupying the lands of others, which gives the people Those who are under occupation have the right to resist by all available means, in accordance with international legitimacy.

Lavrov called Hamas a “terrorist organization.” This contradicts Russia’s well-known position on the Islamic Resistance Movement, which raises the question: Has Russia changed its classification of Hamas? For what considerations?

Lavrov concluded from the statements of the Prime Minister of the Aggression, Benjamin Naten - Yahoo, that “Israel”, by seeking to destroy the military capabilities of Hamas, is implementing a “disarmament” process in Gaza, and that by trying to eliminate the resistance men, it is “uprooting the extremists.” According to the Russian Foreign Minister’s logic, “Israel” is doing something similar to what Russia is doing in Ukraine – disarming Ukraine and uprooting the Nazis from it.

Lavrov expressed his relief that the stinky Yahoo did not allow himself to utter harsh words towards Russia and its leadership, as many leaders did, whether in the West or in the Zionist entity itself, after the start of the special military operation.

Lavrov praised the “efforts” of the Zionist entity and Egypt in releasing the “Russian-Jews” detainees in Gaza, even though their release was a show of good faith on the part of Hamas towards friendly Russia!

Lavrov spoke about the common history and shared genetic code of both Russia and the Zionist entity, guided by the so-called Holocaust (“Holocaust”) of the Jews, many of whose details are questionable, during World War II.

Once again, we have to ask: Are Mr. Lavrov’s statements a slip of the tongue, or are they a reflection of the crystallization of the Russian position in its final form by the end of 2023? If it was a slip of the tongue, we must count at least six slips of the tongue, as we mentioned above. So the issue is much bigger than a slip of the tongue, taking into account the timing and the media platform that was chosen!

Here we must address the other part of the article’s title – the Ukrainian issue. Russia achieved some military successes a few days ago, including controlling the city of Mariinka, adjacent to the city of Donetsk - the capital of the so-called “Donetsk People’s Republic.” Recently, there has been an increase in the intensity of Russian aerial bombardment of Ukraine using missiles and drones. All of this is accompanied by talk, in public and behind the scenes, about the possibility of freezing the fronts and opening channels for negotiation between Moscow and Kiev. If this indicates anything, it indicates that certain communications are taking place and messages are being exchanged between the parties involved in the Ukrainian conflict (Russia - the United States and the West - Ukraine - mediators (?)). 

The “Al-Aqsa Flood” operation created a new reality in the world, which shows that without resolving chronic international issues, most notably the Palestinian issue, it is not possible to resolve emerging issues, such as the conflict in Ukraine, in order to move forward with the project of building a new world, which is intended to be pluralistic. Equal and respectful of diversity. On the one hand, we have the United States and its allies, who do not want to lose the West’s collective hegemony over international decisions, and on the other hand, another group that includes countries such as Russia, China, India, and Iran, that wants to break the unipolar equation. 

It has become clear to both parties that victory of one over the other is unlikely in the near future and that a truce must be concluded in order for each party to arrange its affairs in preparation for the next stage. Will Russia bite twice from the hole and be deceived by an Israeli mediating role with Washington? By the way, the truce concluded between the Soviet Union on the one hand and the Anglo-Saxon alliance on the other hand to eliminate Nazi Germany in World War II, resulted in the establishment of the United Nations and the adoption of the resolution to partition Palestine and the Nakba in 1948. 

From this angle, any truce is possible between Russia and the collective West. Regarding the conflict in Ukraine, it could once again be at the expense of the Palestinian people and what remains of their land. This is what we can conclude from Mr. Lavrov’s words, if he meant what he said!

What is blamed on the Russian Foreign Minister, who is a seasoned and veteran diplomat, is that his comparison between Ukraine and Gaza is completely unsuccessful: Russia claims that in Ukraine it is fighting the collective West and, essentially, the Anglo-Saxon alliance, which is the same opponent that supports the Zionist entity in its criminal war against the Palestinian people. Mr. Lavrov describes legitimate resistance to the occupation as terrorism. So he must acknowledge that the struggle of the Algerian people against French colonialism is terrorism, the war of Vietnamese fighters against the American invaders is terrorism, and the struggle of Nelson Mandela and the African National Congress against the racist oppressive regime in South Africa is terrorism. 

Rather, he must consider the guerrilla war waged by his Soviet ancestors against the Nazi invaders as terrorism. also. As for the shared genetic code of both Russia and the occupying state entity, we can only call on the holders of the shared genetic code among the Jews of Russia to return to their homeland from which they came and live in safety, peace and tranquility, instead of taking away the land of the Palestinians and settling it, and for the Russian authorities to stop Naturalizing Palestinian refugees from Gaza and settling them in the Caucasus republics.

We must tell the truth: The Soviet Union, which was succeeded by Russia, played a fundamental role in the Nakba of 1948, and contributed to deepening it by opening the door to Jewish immigration to occupied Palestine after its collapse in 1991. 

Therefore, Russia bears a historical, political and moral responsibility before the Palestinian people and must It is up to this responsibility today and clearly stands by Palestine, listening to the actual public opinion of the Russian people, and not to what the Zionist propaganda makers are promoting in the Russian media. We expect the honorable Mr. Lavrov to clarify his position, so that the peoples of the free world do not doubt Russia's credibility and justice.

Source: Sama News

The Israeli newspaper Haaretz said that the security establishment and the Israeli Attorney General's Office fear that the International Court of Justice will attribute genocide crimes to Israel in Gaza.

One of the senior jurists dealing with the case warned the occupation army commanders of the danger of the International Court of Justice issuing an order for a ceasefire.

Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian and his British counterpart David Cameron exchanged views on escalating tensions in the Red Sea as well as the conflict in Gaza.

During a phone conversation, Amir Abdollahian accused the United States and some Western countries of applying double standards, according to a statement issued by the Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

He said it was wrong to allow Israel to “kill women and children in Gaza” and “set fire to the region,” while “the arrest of an Israeli ship in the Red Sea is seen as endangering the security of the economic waterway.”

The Iranian diplomat also condemned the silence of some Western governments regarding the Israeli attacks on Gaza during the past 80 days.

Amir Abdullahian also urged Britain to adopt a "realistic and constructive" approach to regional developments and bilateral relations.
On the other hand, Cameron expressed his country's views regarding developments in Palestine and the Red Sea, and urged Iran to help prevent an escalation of the conflict between Israel and Hamas and ensure maritime security in the region, according to the Iranian statement.

In a post on the social media platform ((X)), Cameron stated that he spoke to Amir Abdullahian about the Houthi attacks in the Red Sea, which he said threatened the lives of innocent people and the global economy.

Cameron said he had made it clear that Iran shared the responsibility for preventing these attacks, given its long-standing support for the Houthis.
The Yemen-based Houthi group has claimed responsibility for several attacks on commercial ships in the Red Sea in recent weeks, saying they came in solidarity with the Palestinian people. American and British officials accused Iran of "being behind these attacks," which Iran strongly rejected.

Today, Monday, the Israeli occupation forces arrested 13 citizens, including a woman, and summoned others, in the town of Qatana, northwest of occupied Jerusalem.

Local sources said that the occupation forces arrested: Lawyer Abdullah Hoshiyeh, Mustafa Tabanja, Imad Shamasneh, Mahmoud Shamasneh, Iyad Mohsen, Laith Al-Faqih, Muhammad Osama Dawoud Hassan, Youssef Hassan Al-Faqih, Jamal Joudah Hawsheba, Abdullah Hoshiyeh, and Jihad Jabr. Deacons, and Yaqoub Al-Faqih.

The same sources added that the occupation forces arrested Umm Assef Shamasneh, to pressure her children to surrender.

It indicated that these forces handed over reports to others to review their intelligence.

The occupation forces also set up a tent in the middle of the town, and began field investigations with dozens of citizens, after storming their homes.

In a call with Al-Quds.com, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair denied what was reported by Israeli Channel 12 yesterday evening, that he would head a team working to convince European countries to receive refugees from the Gaza Strip.

Blair denied that he had discussed any such plan with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and War Council Minister Benny Gantz.

According to the channel, the goal of this visit is to be an envoy who will actually mediate between Israeli desires “the next day” after the war on the Gaza Strip, and between the moderate Arab countries, and to study the possibility of accepting refugees from Gaza in the countries of the world.

Later, Channel 12 reported that Tony Blair's spokesman denied what was contained in the channel's report and said: "The reports that Tony Blair has a connection to voluntary immigration are incorrect, and there was no such discussion and he does not intend to look into it either."

This comes as Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich renewed his call on the Palestinians in Gaza to leave the Gaza Strip, “to make room for the Israelis who can transform the desert into prosperous valleys.”

Smotrich's statements seem to confirm widespread fears that Israel wants to expel the Palestinians from the lands on which they want to build their future state, in a repeat of the mass exodus of Palestinians that followed the declaration of Israel's establishment in 1948.

“What needs to be done in the Gaza Strip is to encourage immigration,” Smotrich told Army Radio. “If there were 100,000 or 200,000 Arabs in Gaza and not two million Arabs, the discussion for the next day would be completely different.”

He added that if Gaza's 2.3 million residents who "were raised with the ambition to destroy the State of Israel" left their land, Gaza would be viewed differently in Israel.

He continued: “Most members of Israeli society will say, ‘Why not, it is a beautiful place.’ Let us turn the desert into thriving valleys, and this does not come at the expense of anyone.”

Smotrich, whose far-right Religious Zionism party enjoys the support of the Israeli settler community, made similar statements in the past, entering into a dispute with the United States, Israel's most important ally.
The Palestinians accuse the occupying state of seeking a new “nakba,” similar to what happened following the 1948 war, when hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were forced to flee their homes when the establishment of Israel was declared.

Since last October 7, the Israeli army has been waging a devastating war on Gaza, which as of Sunday left 21,822 dead, 56,451 wounded, massive infrastructure destruction and an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe, according to the Gaza Strip authorities and the United Nations.

Olivier Corten is professor of international law at the Free University of Brussels. The accusation of “genocide” brought against Israel before the International Court by South Africa could, according to him, change the situation in the conflict.

Elisabeth Fleury

“As early as October 19, several UN special rapporteurs warned of a “risk of genocide” before reiterating their warnings, based both on the systematic and massive nature of the attacks on Gaza, on the number significance of Palestinian victims and on certain particularly shocking statements by senior Israeli officials,” recalls Olivier Corten, professor of international law.

South Africa has just petitioned the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to condemn Israel for “genocide”. Does this surprise you?

No. This approach did not surprise me. It is open to any party to the “Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide” adopted in 1948, whether or not that party is directly affected by such a crime. This is not the first time that the ICJ has been contacted in this way. Its judges had to rule in the context of conflicts which pitted Bosnia against Yugoslavia and Croatia against Serbia in the 1990s. Two other requests are currently being examined: the first targets Russia, at the initiative of the 'Ukraine. The second, filed by Gambia, accuses Myanmar of genocide against the Rohingya.

Invoking the notion of genocide, in this case, is it relevant?

On the scale of international crimes, genocide constitutes the supreme crime. This notion is therefore not used lightly and refers to particularly demanding criteria. For there to be genocide, there must be an intention to destroy, “as such”, an ethnic or religious group. This was the case with regard to the Jews during the Second World War, the Shoah having directly inspired the development of the 1948 convention. This was also the case in July 1995, in Srebrenica, when nearly 8,000 men and Bosnian teenagers were liquidated by Serbian forces on the orders of General Mladic. In the present case, from October 19, several UN special rapporteurs warned of a “risk of genocide” before reiterating their warnings, based both on the systematic and massive nature of the attacks on Gaza. , on the significant number of Palestinian victims and on certain particularly shocking statements by senior Israeli officials. The hypothesis that a genocide is underway must therefore be taken very seriously.

And yet the United States continues to deliver weapons to Israel...

Yes. And this could be considered a violation of international law. Because the 1948 convention does not just prohibit genocide. It also obliges its States parties to try to prevent it from being committed. By continuing to deliver weapons to Israel, despite repeated warnings from observers, the United States is doing the opposite. They take the risk of being accused of having also violated the convention.

We must therefore closely follow what the ICJ will say…

Absolutely. His decision will be made in two stages. First, the emergency. The judges in The Hague will very quickly hear representatives of South Africa and Israel and, if they consider that there is indeed a risk of genocide, they will be able to decide on precautionary measures to put an end to it. Secondly, they will have to establish, on the merits, whether Israel has indeed failed in its obligation to prevent or repress genocide within the meaning of the convention. In this phase, the other States parties to the 1948 Convention could also intervene to explain their position regarding the interpretation of this convention. The judges' decision could take months, even years, especially since Israel could also increase the number of preliminary objections on which the Court would have to rule before addressing the merits.

And all the while, the number of civilian casualties continues to rise every day...

The State of Israel has repeatedly shown a flagrant lack of respect for the decisions taken by the competent United Nations bodies. Furthermore, the decisions of the ICJ, which are legally binding, are in principle guaranteed their application by the Security Council on which the United States sits. This provides two good reasons to believe that South Africa's approach will only have symbolic significance. But limiting ourselves to this reductive approach would be a mistake.

For what ?

Firstly because the judges of The Hague enjoy an excellent reputation. Their independence is unanimously recognized and most of their judgments are respected. Then, because South Africa’s initiative could gain momentum. Other states could indeed join in, and the unconditional support of the United States or others for Israel would then become increasingly problematic. However, it is difficult to predict which way the Court will rule. The judges are unlikely to unilaterally castigate Israel. They could demand more generally that all parties take all possible measures to prevent or repress acts of genocide. Regardless, if they admit that the Genocide Convention is relevant to judging the events taking place in Gaza, that could be a game-changer.

ZAKA is one of the leading organizations alleging Hamas atrocities on October 7. But the organization’s volunteers have systematically given false testimonies, and continue repeating them to journalists on behalf of the Israeli government.

Many of the reports in Israeli and international media networks — including CNN, the BBC, the New York Times, and many others — that accuse Palestinians of committing systematic wide-scale gender-based violence against Israeli women on October 7, 2023, rely on testimonies by Israeli ZAKA volunteers.

ZAKA is a non-governmental religious Haredi organization specializing in collecting dead bodies and body parts from sites of “unnatural” deaths and transporting them to morgues according to strict Jewish religious laws. The organization was founded in the late 1990s by Yehuda Meshi-Zahav. Meshi-Zahav was previously the leader of “Keshet,” an ultra-Orthodox Jewish terrorist group that targeted forensic pathologists and used explosives against shops selling “secular newspapers.” Meshi-Zahav led ZAKA until 2021, when he attempted suicide after shocking revelations of dozens of rape and sexual assault cases committed by him. Since its inception, the organization — described as a “militia” by the highly esteemed Israeli journalist Yigal Sarna — has been subject to incessant criticism, investigations, and demands to dismantle it.

The testimonies provided by ZAKA’s members — all men, most of whom are volunteers — on sexual violence on October 7 are based on their interpretation of what they claim to have seen on bodies they collected after the attack. Not only do these men lack the professional qualifications to make such assessments (they are not medical experts), but their testimonies also lack details: no age, no location, and no time. Details and/or evidence have not even been given to journalists who have asked to see them while reporting on these testimonies. This means that it is impossible to either confirm or debunk them. In other words, the organization’s testimonies hold no value unless one blindly trusts what its men say.

Since October 7, ZAKA has been playing a key role in Israel’s orchestrated propaganda campaign, spreading fake news and vague information in the service of Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza. Looking closely into ZAKA reveals that the organization and its volunteers lack credibility. In fact, a significant part of their testimonies has been proven to be fabrications. “We need to buy time, which we also buy by turning to world leaders and to public opinion. You have an important role in influencing public opinion…[ZAKA testimonies] give us the maneuvering room. “Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to ZAKA teams.

For those familiar with the organization, this is consistent with the organization’s questionable reputation. The organization has a troubled and problematic history that further undermines its legitimacy and credibility, from involvement in massive cases of sexual violence and silencing victims to financial corruption and the exploitation of tragic deaths to enhance its media appearance and grow its financial resources.

ZAKA’s reputation for spreading fake news has been known since its early years of activity. As the Israeli Army Radio correspondent in Jerusalem stated back in 2002, “ZAKA sends everything: what happened, what they think happened, and what didn’t happen as well. We verify everything, but they fulfill our need to know as quickly as possible…in the past, they sent numerous pieces of news that turned out to be lies.” 

Vital role in government propaganda

On November 12, 2023, the Israeli website Ynet published a report about how ZAKA was recruited to join Israel’s hasbara campaigns on the events of October 7, and conducted interviews with dozens of foreign journalists coordinated through the Government Press Office. Hasbara is the Israeli term for “public diplomacy” or government propaganda campaigns.

The director of the GPO, Nitzan Hein, stated, “It is difficult to imagine the Israeli hasbara with foreign correspondents without the remarkable, valuable, and effective role of ZAKA’s men. Their activity is extremely important in hasbara.” ZAKA also closely collaborates with the National Hasbara Headquarters in the Prime Minister’s office. One of the employees in the headquarters told Ynet how the state “worked on cementing the narrative that Hamas equals ISIS and enhancing the state’s legitimacy for a very forceful response…ZAKA’s men’s testimonies have shocked and exposed, in front of the correspondents, the kind of human monsters we are dealing with.”

On November 23, 2023, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with the organization’s teams. The meeting revolved around their role in Israeli propaganda. The Prime Minister heard from the volunteers “about their public diplomacy activity in Israel and the world” and urged them to intensify their efforts, as they are important for legitimizing and extending the timeframe of the war: “But we need to buy time, which we also buy by turning to world leaders and to public opinion. You have an important role in influencing public opinion, which also influences leaders. We are in a war; it will continue. The war is not only to take care of the 1,400 people…but also to give us the maneuvering room.”“

Non-governmental” organization

ZAKA utilizes its official designation as a “non-governmental” body to present itself as credible, and it is this supposedly independent status and ostensible lack of politicization that gives it particular legitimacy — by the organization’s own admission. For instance, one spokesperson for ZAKA told Ynet, “Being a voluntary organization without a political agenda leads to openness and more receptiveness…our testimonies are fully accepted as if they are dealing with an international humanitarian volunteer or a doctor.” In practice, the status of ZAKA is more complex in terms of both function and legal status. This complexity makes disseminating fake news effective while allowing them to evade responsibility. ZAKA is technically a non-governmental organization, but it enjoys significant governmental funding, working in full coordination with security and rescue forces. Indeed, ZAKA is recognized by the state as the only entity responsible for dealing with dead bodies in “unnatural” deaths.

In terms of political agenda, ZAKA is open about operating from and being guided by Zionist ideological objectives.

According to Yehuda Meshi-Zahav, ZAKA is also “acting as an arm for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,” and “Ideologically, we are a nationalist organization seeking to integrate the Haredi public within Zionism.” 

In 2015, the Israel Medicine Association issued guidelines regarding “mass casualty incidents” and how to prioritize the order of medical attention according to the injury severity following objective medical standards. In response, ZAKA’s “operation unit commander” stated that “he puts aside medical consideration and decisions are made on who deserves treatment based on whether they are Jewish.” This policy was dictated by the religious ruling by Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky, who said during the discussion: “If it’s clear he is an Arab, don’t save him.” A fake medical image and a track record of false testimonies

ZAKA’s men deceivingly draw on a false image of medical credibility, which is designed to make their testimonies trustworthy. However, the organization’s volunteers lack any medical or healthcare qualifications, and its members are not qualified to infer or confirm any medical or forensic assessment of the bodies. ZAKA men are solely trained to recover and collect dead bodies according to strict religious laws, to ensure the dignity of the deceased, and to prepare bodies for burial.

Most of the so-called witnesses who were interviewed by media work in industry and commerce. Furthermore, as an orthodox Haredi organization, it has a radical religious position against autopsies and forensic procedures. In fact, it is within the organization’s official mandate to work to prevent autopsies, and the organization takes legal action to prevent having to comply with the state’s requests for forensic autopsies.

This murky position between governmental and non-governmental, medical and non-medical, facilitates ZAKA’s ability to lie without bearing responsibility. In early December, when an investigation by Haaretz uncovered several lies propagated by the organization’s men since October 7, ZAKA’s official response was: “ZAKA volunteers are not medical experts and do not have the professional means to identify the deceased, ascertain their age, or declare the manner in which they were killed…due to the difficult condition of the bodies, it’s possible that volunteers misinterpreted what they saw.” Among ZAKA’s lies, Haaretz listed a falsehood about the “bodies of twenty children with severed heads,” “piles of burned children,” and a “pregnant woman’s stomach ripped open, and her fetus stabbed.” It is hard to conceive of all these false testimonies as accidental “misinterpretations.” 

Simcha Greiniman’s testimonies

In early December 2023, Israeli organizations held a session at the United Nations on the allegations of sexual assault on October 7. One of ZAKA’s men, Simcha Greiniman, spoke and was identified by some media outlets as the organization’s foreign media spokesperson. His testimony was featured in a position paper by Physicians for Human Rights Israel on gender-based violence on October 7. A settler from the illegal “Modi’in Illit” settlement on the lands of the Palestinian villages Bil’in, Ni’lin, and Saffa, Greiniman’s main profession is carpentry, but he takes pride in his media performance: “They say I do a good job. When I sit in front of a foreign journalist, even if he is anti-Israel, I can make him cry,” Greiniman told Ynet. This was evident in his testimony to the United Nations. His speech was emotionally intense. He delivered it very slowly, interrupted by sips of water, holding back tears, and struggling with speech. 

However, while the testimony focused on three different alleged cases, he gave zero concrete details that can be confirmed or disproven. While it is understandable that he did not mention the victims’ names, he omitted other details that could have been mentioned for credibility, such as their ages, the name of the town where he saw these bodies or the time of finding them. In one case, he couldn’t even discern if the victim was male or female.

One might assume that Greiniman accidentally omitted these details due to his intense emotions. However, this was a premeditated decision: the British news website iNews published an interview where he presented the same testimony. When asked about the name of the kibbutz from which he described one of the scenes, he refused to answer. Any possible reason? Previous false testimony exposed

Previously, Greiniman presented a horrifying story about two burnt bodies of children found under the rubble of a house in Kibbutz Be’eri. This story first appeared in a long interview with Greiniman on October 19, 2023, spanning two pages in a local Haredi newspaper. No further details about the incident were mentioned there.

Later, he repeated the story twice, but the story evolved in its details. On November 7, in an interview with the Haredi site “Kikar Shabbat,” he added that the age of the first child was 5 or 6 years old. As for the second child, whose age was not specified, he claimed the child was found with a large knife lodged in his face. The next day, former minister Ayelet Shaked posted a video of Greiniman stating that the second child was 3-4 years old.According to Israeli lists, the closest ages of the deceased children in Be’eri are either 12 years old or 10 months old, and there are no children matching the ages mentioned by Greiniman. Furthermore, in the case of Be’eri, several testimonies by survivors have confirmed intense battles, with survivor Yasmin Porat testifying that the 10-month-old infant was killed by a shell from an Israeli tank amid gunfire exchanges. However, in his testimony, Greiniman stated that when he entered Be’eri, he “did not find any signs of fighting whatsoever.”

Baseless data

Several pieces of strange information emerge in ZAKA interviews. For instance, Greiniman reiterated in one of his interviews that “85% of the bodies of women arriving at the morgue were naked.” Despite the hundreds of workers at the Shura Military Morgue, this detail has not been repeated anywhere. Some have spoken about the presence of “some” or “many” naked bodies, but no one came close to describing the quantity and proportion as Greiniman did.

Another official from ZAKA, Yossi Landau, claimed that “80% of the bodies showed signs of torture.” In another interview, the same official said, “70% of the bodies were shot from behind.” Later, he said that “80% were shot in the back.” None of the statistics above was ever officially stated or confirmed.

Another baseless claim is Greiniman’s testimony that they found in the pockets of Hamas fighters’ bodies foreign ID cards that prove “the fighters came from different countries.”Greiniman also claims to have seen a video in which Hamas fighters killed Gazan workers who worked with permits inside Israel. Greiniman assured the interviewer that the fighters “knew they were from Gaza” because “the car plate was Palestinian…and you cannot mistake a person from Gaza. Their appearance is different from Israelis, even from Israeli Arabs, the mentality is different.”

This is another baseless lie. Apart from the racist assessment that “their appearance is different, the mentality is different,” there is no video showing such an incident. Moreover, Gazan workers are not allowed to enter Israel with cars, and Palestinian car plate numbers are generally not permitted in Israel, except in very rare cases of businesspersons and VIP permits.

In the same interview and others, Greiniman asserts that he has photos proving everything he says. He challenges anyone in doubt to come to Israel to personally show them the photos. However, in his interview with the Times of Israel on November 9, 2023, he was asked about the photos and replied: “I don’t have one picture in my phone.” Times of Israel reports that Greiniman claims that “some emergency workers did photograph other scenes and sent pictures directly to official authorities.” They, however, add that: “The Times of Israel was not able to obtain images from various government sources.”

Yossi Landau, another source of fake news

The earliest mentions by ZAKA members of rape allegations appeared in the testimonies of Yossi Landau, a central figure in the organization who made multiple international media appearances. His testimony was also endorsed, without any verification of authenticity, by Physicians for Human Rights Israel in their report that accuses Palestinians of using sexual violence as a weapon of war. YOSSI LANDAU. (PHOTO: WIKIMEDIA COMMONS)Similar to Greiniman, Landau has also been discovered to have disseminated fake news. On December 3, 2023, Haaretz published a report detailing several false testimonies disseminated by Israeli entities, confirming Landau’s personal responsibility for propagating some of these fake stories.

Among Landau’s lies was the myth of “dozens of beheaded children,” a claim that was refuted. Another reported lie was about the piles of children’s bodies burned together, a narrative that he repeated time and again, likening it to the Holocaust.

Landau also claimed, while crying in front of foreign reporters, to have seen “a pregnant woman, her abdomen ripped open, with the fetus outside her womb tied by the umbilical cord, and the fetus itself stabbed with a knife.” This has also proven to be a fabrication. Haaretz refuted any knowledge of a similar known case and interviewed the residents of the kibbutz, who denied the existence of such a case or even of a pregnant woman among their neighbors. Landau’s lies shouldn’t come as a surprise. In a conversation with foreign journalists, he said, “When we go into a house, we use our imagination. The bodies were telling us stories that happened, that’s what happened.” Disturbingly, despite being proven to be a pathological liar, Landau’s testimonies are still cited in PHRI publications and are circulating in major international media networks, including The New York Times‘ latest report on “how Hamas weaponized sexual violence on Oct. 7”.In the Times article, 

Landau claims that ZAKA volunteers are not allowed to take pictures. Other volunteers, such as Haim Otmezgin and Simcha Greiniman, assured reporters that they have photos. The Times report also says that ZAKA volunteers “inadvertently” destroyed evidence. Sources in the Israeli army claimed this happened when ZAKA members changed the body bags to take photos of the bodies in bags bearing their logo.

Haim Otmezgin defending rape victims?

The head of ZAKA’s “special unit,” Haim Otmezgin, testified on November 30 in front of the “Women’s Affairs Committee” in the Israeli Parliament.

The Israeli press widely covered the testimony, which was endorsed by many Israeli women’s organizations. When he posted the video of his testimony in parliament on his Facebook page, he wrote: “The world needs to know in order to support us and enable us to accomplish the task.” Like other testimonies by ZAKA’s men, his testimony lacked information and repeated false stories (beheaded babies, again). Otmezgin claims to “possess photos” of “a naked woman with a sharp object stuck in her crotch.” Nearly two months into the propaganda campaign, not a single journalist reported seeing these pictures. This isn’t the first time he has claimed to have evidence unseen by anyone else.

Since we are left to believe Otmezign’s words with no evidence to back them up, we must question his credibility. Otmezgin is a reserve soldier in the Israeli army and the owner of a human resources company. His name appeared in the press earlier this year after his participation in the Israeli rescue team following the earthquake in Turkey. Upon his return, Turkish authorities opened an investigation against him, accusing him of stealing and smuggling from Turkey into Israel an antique manuscript from “the Book of Esther” found under the rubble. But when it comes to believing Otmezgin, one must consider his connection to ZAKA’s founder, Yehuda Meshi-Zahav.

ZAKA leaders and the silencing of rape victims

In 2021, two investigative reports shook Israel. The first appeared in Haaretz newspaper, followed by TV reportage by the investigative news program Uvda. Both presented testimonies from victims of sexual assaults committed by the ZAKA founder over decades against both males and females, including children from the age of 12 and adults. The victims confirmed that those sexual crimes were widely known in Meshi-Zahav’s surroundings, likely also to Otmezgin, who was one of his closest trusted friends and worked alongside him for over 25 years. Otmezgin publicly defended Meshi-Zahav, even after a series of testimonies emerged: “I recently spoke to him, asked how he’s facing the case, how he spends these days, supported him, and we talked about faith matters. Anyone who knows him knows he cannot harm any person.” But Haim Otmezgin wasn’t the sole supporter of Meshi-Zahav. The ZAKA leadership, which is still in power, provided full support for him as well. Meshi-Zahav, according to evidence, used the organization’s funds, volunteer cards, and other properties for his criminal acts. In one of the first testimonies that emerged in Haaretz, a woman recounted how Meshi-Zahav threatened her during the rape: “If you utter a word, a ZAKA truck will run you over.” Once the police investigation began, investigators announced they planned to interrogate the organization’s leadership on suspicions of silencing victims and concealing evidence. With Meshi-Zahav’s suicide, the file was closed. 

In June 2023, Channel 12 revealed that the ZAKA organization, using donation funds, hired a private investigation office to track and gather smearing information about Isaac Weinhaus, an Orthodox Jewish activist working to expose sexual violence in the community. Weinhaus was one of the figures who contributed to breaking the silence surrounding Meshi-Zahav.

The fact that women’s organizations are now endorsing the statements of ZAKA leadership and demanding the world to blindly believe Meshi-Zahav’s defenders when it comes to the events of October 7 is not only absurd and cynical but is indicative of how deep anti-Palestinian racism runs.

In addition to killing thousands of Palestinians in Gaza, Israel has been routinely attacking at least four other nations in the region: Iran, Yemen, Syria, and Lebanon. Why does the U.S. media keeps the American public in the dark?

BY JAMES NORTH  

For years, this site has warned that Israel, especially Benjamin Netanyahu, have tried to instigate the U.S. into a wider war in the Mideast, particularly with Iran. We’ve also regularly indicted the U.S. mainstream media for ignoring this danger.

Today, the threat is greater than ever. And, true to form, the New York Times, National Public Radio, and the others continue to cover it up, instead treating Netanyahu as the embattled but honest leader of an Israel that is only trying to defend itself. For more than a decade, Netanyahu’s main aim was to destroy Iran’s alleged (and unproven) program to build nuclear weapons. He openly tried to sabotage the Obama administration’s successful nuclear deal in 2015, and then vigorously encouraged Donald Trump’s abrupt decision to end the agreement 3 years later. 

Secretly, Israel conducted a long campaign of sabotage against Iran, which included cyber warfare, and actual assassinations inside the country, including the November 2020 killing of an Iranian scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh. Netanyahu wanted to provoke Iranian retaliation, which would draw in the U.S., and — he hoped — trigger an American attack that that would set back or even destroy Tehran’s nuclear program.

Since October 7, the stakes for Netanyahu are much higher. Israelis blame him for the Hamas attack, and the opinion polls show his popularity has never been lower. A number of Israeli commentators have called him the worst leader in the country’s history. If just a handful of members from his own coalition in the Knesset abandon him, his government will fall, and he will be trounced in new elections. Even worse, the pending court cases against him for corruption will then revive, and he could well end up in prison.

Luring the U.S. into a conflict with Iran will distract from his own troubles, and give him time to maneuver. So: On December 24, an Israeli air strike assassinated Iran’s top commander in Syria, Razi Mousavi. The always valuable Iranian/American expert Trita Parsi, asked: “Did Israel kill Iranian commander to provoke a wider war?” Also last week, a cyber attack “caused two-thirds of Iran’s gas stations to suddenly stop working,” yet another sabotage effort with Israel’s fingerprints all over it. No country will be able to endlessly ignore such provocations.(Netanyahu is not the only Israeli leader who wants the U.S. to attack Iran. Former prime minister Naftali Bennett just published an opinion article in the Wall Street Journal headlined: “The U.S. and Israel Need to Take Iran On Directly.” He disclosed 2 secret Israeli attacks inside Iran during his 2021-2022 tenure as prime minister: the destruction of a drone base and the killing of an Iranian military commander. After the article appeared, some Israeli officials criticized Bennett “for revealing classified information saying that he was potentially putting the country in danger.”)

The New York Times did run a brief report on the December 24 air strike that killed Ravi Mousavi in Syria. But the article was a model of dishonesty. The paper feigned ignorance in the report’s opening sentence: “Iran accused Israel on Monday of killing a high-level military figure in a missile strike in Syria at a time when concerns are growing that the war in Gaza could escalate into a regional conflict.” Nowhere do we learn that many observers, including some Israelis, believe that Netanyahu may actually want a wider conflict, as long as he can embroil the U.S. in it.

National Public Radio was even worse. In recent days, the network ran three on-air reports, including one from a correspondent in the region. The broadcasts were uniformly inept. They barely mentioned Israel’s provocative killing of Mousavi. In one, host Leila Fadel asked: “Does the U.S. or Iran really want this to become a regional war?” Somehow, she forgot to add Israel or Netanyahu to her question, although anyone who follows the story using a range of non-U.S. mainstream sources, even including some in Israel itself, would have known to broaden the inquiry. The Washington Post report has a single throwaway sentence about how an “airstrike” by an unnamed air force killed a “senior [Iranian] officer” in Syria. That was it.

Of course, the situation in the region is complicated. Ansar Allah, Iran’s allies (commonly referred to as the Houthis) who control much of Yemen, have been attacking shipping in the Red Sea, and Hezbollah, the political/military movement in southern Lebanon that is also allied with Iran, has been clashing with Israel across their mutual border. (This site’s estimable Mitchell Plitnick has explained at length how the Biden administration’s flawed response to the Red Sea shipping crisis could also trigger a broader conflict.) It is doubtful that even Benjamin Netanyahu would want to widen the conflict to bring in either of these other two actors.

But what makes Israel’s provocative killing of General Mousavi and its latest cyberattack even more dangerous that it also raises the risk of a lethal accident. Let’s go back to July 1988, when tensions in the region were similarly high. A U.S. Navy warship in the Strait of Hormuz accidentally shot down a civilian Iranian jetliner, killing all 290 people on board. Iran did show restraint, and so the conflict thankfully did not escalate further. 

Today, the danger is arguably even higher. Israel continues to murder thousands of Palestinian civilians in Gaza and attack at least four other nations in the region: Iran, Yemen, Syria, and Lebanon. Israel’s desperate leader is rolling the dice for his last time, and the Biden administration is letting him get away with it — while the U.S. media keeps the American public in the dark. The chances for a greater tragedy are high. 

In politics, preferring intentions over outcomes, and action - any kind of action - over thinking, and choosing the noisy and tumultuous over the calm or measured, are among the defining characteristics of a romantic mindset.

We thus see, for instance, that the call for establishing a "Palestinian state," which the Palestine Liberation Organization advocated after realizing that violent methods were a dead end, and which was later endorsed by Arab and international states and institutions, did not become a popular slogan that spoke to and stimulated the popular imagination. This slogan has always seemed insufficient for alleviating the masses’ accumulated frustrations. Moreover, it does not turn attention away from genuine concerns in the countries around Palestine, concerns that some regimes in our region were keen on turning attention away from. Consequently, the slogan of a "Palestinian state" is a "dwarf" compared to the "giant" that is "liberating Palestine from the river to the sea, annihilating Israel," or "liberating Al-Aqsa." That is part of a robust tradition of Arab political culture: even Gamal Abdel Nasser, who is not generally associated with workable strategies, could not make his famous yet modest slogan of "removing the effects of aggression" popular, unlike almost everything else associated with the Egyptian leader.

However, Benjamin Netanyahu, and his friends on the furthest end of the Israeli right, thought differently: they knew that the “giant” slogan did not scare them, and that, in the end, it was hot air that would vanish in the heat of the Arab streets. If it did scare them, they could dispel their fears through their military and technological superiority and their infinite capacity for killing Palestinians. When Iran became the region's largest giant slogan factory, the Israelis became more convinced that the real issue was not the slogans but the specter of Iran developing a nuclear weapon. As for the slogans, they are frail to an extent that has rendered them a game Tehran uses.

Netanyahu and his political school were and remain consistent on one matter: they are afraid of seeing this Palestinian state that has failed to capture our collective imagination come to light, as the emergence of such a state is feasible in principle. Moreover, the unequivocal justness of this demand undermines the narrative that Netanyahu and his allies have been using to blackmail the world: Israel’s existence is constantly questioned and threatened. On the other hand, such a state fulfills both Arab and international demands, paving the path for its legitimation.

This awareness led Netanyahu to bet on killing it, sometimes through procrastination and evasion, breeding despair among Palestinians and leaving the world disillusioned, and at others through direct violence, which began with the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin by an extremist right-winger (a move that found a partner in Arab and Iranian rejectionists, albeit from opposite position), and thirdly, by supporting Hamas. Since October 7, Israeli and international media outlets have been brimming with reports about the Israeli leader's facilitations to the Islamic movement, be it by allowing the entry of Qatari aid into the Gaza Strip or consistently giving Gazan workers preferential treatment. This support aimed to foster a distinct entity in Gaza that encouraged independence from the West Bank.

With a Palestinian state seemingly the only possible theoretical solution, Netanyahu's war on the Oslo Accords continues. He recently called it the founding father of the October 7 attack and took a hard line in opposing the return of the “Ramallah Authority” to Gaza.

The fact is that Israel can, as we are seeing today, retaliate to the Hamas attack with security and military operations, and by ratcheting up its genocidal brutality, which is helped by the fact that Hamas is a non-state actor. On the other hand, the attack helps strengthen the hateful ideology of the extreme right - the Likud's bloc also calls for a state “from the river to the sea,” as well as reinforcing accusations of anti-Semitism, which are brandished with or without reason to blackmail others. In addition, the October 7 attacks could be used as a pretext for bringing the global far-right together in backing a universal war against “ISIS terrorism,” as Netanyahu called it, and in the meantime getting away with paying the massive debt the Israelis owe the Palestinians. As for a legitimate Palestinian state, it is the only thing that could undermine this extreme right ideology and its raison d'etre, deny Netanyahu the talking points that Hamas provides him with, liberate the Palestinian cause from the clutches of Iranian-Israeli competition, and end wars instead of fanning their flames in perpetuity.

In this sense, two wars are being fought today: a destructive one, the Gaza war, and a political one, the Palestine war. While some have claimed that October 7 “put Palestine on the table,” the total opposite seems to be true, unless the Gaza war manages to find shade under the Palestine war and the forces of Gaza can stand behind the forces of Ramallah. That is perhaps precisely what is being engineered today in Cairo and Doha, and perhaps elsewhere as well.

However, the theoretical solution, the Palestinian state, will not emerge unless we see shifts in Palestine itself, as well as Israel. Besides the Israelis removing Netanyahu and his ilk and showing genuine readiness to resolve the settlement issue (there are 750,000 of them) in a way that paves the way for a Palestinian state, what is required, above all else, is sharpening a Palestinian political instrument and rendering it vigorous and dynamic, qualities that do not apply to the current Ramallah authority. Although bringing about this happy eventuality will not be simple, easy, or swift, its slow emergence late on certainly remains better than its non-occurrence.

Source: Alsharq Alawsat

Although the normal date for the Israeli elections is in 2026, after the Al-Aqsa Flood operation shook the Israelis’ confidence in Netanyahu, calls began to escalate to isolate him and dismiss the Israeli government, but this matter requires an internal coup in Likud or the collapse of the government coalition.

A report by the Israeli newspaper Maariv says that in terms of strategic value: Is it right and wise to hold elections simultaneously with war? What if the Knesset was dissolved and Yahya Sinwar bragged by saying that “Netanyahu threatened to bring my head, and in the end I brought his head”? How will Israel manage a military campaign in the north amid a political campaign? What if submitting elections harms the management of the front against Hassan Nasrallah?

The second question is tactical: Who will press the button? Who will break up the government coalition alliance? The answer to this dilemma is not the best; It is an answer that does not provide a solution. But after October 7, there are no comfortable answers; but it is more disturbing, according to the newspaper.

The newspaper says that the principle that grants immunity to the ruler and the government as long as the war is ongoing characterizes authoritarian regimes. Neville Chamberlain and Joseph Stalin made a mistake in analyzing Adolf Hitler's intentions, just as Benjamin Netanyahu made a mistake in analyzing Sinwar's intentions. The British dismissed Chamberlain eight months after the outbreak of World War II.

As for the Russians, they were unable to dismiss Stalin. He continued to abuse, starve, kill, exile, and send his people to hard labor in labor camps. Therefore, when some claim today that the overthrow of Netanyahu and the dissolution of the Israeli government or the Knesset, or both, is tantamount to offering a gift to Hamas, it is like someone saying that the overthrow of Chamberlain was a gift to Hitler.

The prevailing dynamics in Israeli society call for the overthrow of the government. Since Israel's situation is closer to that of Britain at the beginning of World War II than to the Soviet Union, the public's influence will inevitably be focused on the political system.

The Israeli newspaper Maariv says that the best outcome as long as Israel is still fighting under a state of mistrust is to form a broad unity government without dissolving the Knesset and heading to elections, as proposed by Yair Lapid and Avigdor Lieberman. But this step is impractical; Because it is unlikely that the Likud will include five rational men who support this step.

How will the Israeli government collapse?

Therefore, the practical question is: Who will take the initiative and call for early elections? The obvious answer at this moment is Itamar Ben Gvir. The leader of the Jewish Greatness Party has the ability to dismantle the government in two ways: by remaining or stepping down, and both measures seem to reinforce this step, with the possibility that his stay will be more influential than his resignation.

Bezalel Smotrich's hesitation regarding taxation of sugary drinks and disposable dishes, as well as the mismanagement of coalition funds, despite being publicly criticized, also indicate that the government's days are numbered.

Every moment in power is of great importance, hence the frustration of the ultra-Orthodox Jewish partners with Ben Gvir, who is accelerating the government's demise. His recent actions, such as announcing that the term of Israeli Prisons Commissioner Kathy Perry would not be extended (in violation of the plan to form a war government) indicate a trend in which only those who comply with him will retain their positions.

Netanyahu appeases Ben Gvir with state funds, and this may hasten the overthrow of the government

In the case of Ben Gvir, as in other cases, Netanyahu chose to manage the conflict by providing financial incentives from the Israeli state treasury to this provocative minister. Ben Gvir reached a clear conclusion that provocation is not only permissible, but necessary to fortify and expand his support base. With every statement Netanyahu issues, Ben Gvir escalates to another level of provocation.

Each rise increases popular opposition to the government and accelerates the possibility of the departure of Benny Gantz and Gideon Saar. When they step down, Ben Gvir will be ready to dismantle the government, after Netanyahu allows him to reach a position that only leads to elections.

Even if Ben Gvir wanted to stop at the last moment, he would face difficulties in curbing the dynamic he started.

The newspaper says that Netanyahu could have shown a little statesmanship by curbing this unruly minister; In any case, Ben Gvir would not have submitted his resignation during the war. Even if he chooses to resign, Gantz and Sa'ar will provide the government with the necessary majority until the end of the conflict. But what Netanyahu is doing is allowing Ben Gvir to cause problems that will worsen after six months of war.

When there is a clear majority in the public that does not trust the government, its days will be numbered. Whether because of Itamar Ben Gvir, or because of coalition actions in the wake of any future reservist protest, or for any other reason. And in 2024, someone is sure to push the button.

Experts and observers in Washington estimate that the presence or emergence of a wing in the US Congress has begun to pressure the Biden administration to transfer the Palestinian Authority’s financial dues suspended by the Israeli Ministry of Finance, a step that once again indicates the isolation experienced in the United States by the extremist fundamentalist crew in Benjamin Netanyahu’s government.

A letter continues to be signed by members of the US Senate calling on President Joe Biden to pressure Israel to transfer Palestinian funds held by Israel, contrary, of course, to the direction of the entity’s Finance Minister Smotrich.

As of Friday evening, more than ten members had signed a document in this context to express their concerns about the deteriorating security situation in the West Bank, with a particular focus on the lack of tax revenue transfers from Israel to the Palestinian Authority since October 7.

“Israel must take steps to address the growing instability in the West Bank,” including settler violence and deteriorating economic conditions, which “threatens the lives of innocent Palestinians,” the senators said in their letter, whose signature collection is being led by Intelligence Committee Chairman Mark Warner. civilians and “risks opening an additional front to the conflict, at the great expense of Israeli and regional security.”

The letter said that after October, “economic conditions reduced the PA’s revenues by 80%, raising concerns about the PA’s continued ability to pay the salaries of members of the Palestinian security forces and public employees.”

The letter specifically raised concerns that the Israeli government's decision to withhold a significant portion of the tax revenues it collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority and the PA's refusal to accept the reduced funding offered by Israel "significantly exacerbates economic volatility in the West Bank."

It “directly threatens the economic situation of the security services in the West Bank.”

The letter warned that gaps in the wages of these employees could lead to the withdrawal of security forces or allow armed groups to “financially coerce these services,” which could create the possibility of war on two fronts in Gaza and the West Bank.

“We urge you and senior members of your administration to continue to prioritize the resumption of these transfers in any talks with the Israeli government as well as Palestinian Authority officials,” the letter read.

  “Israel’s commitment to immediately transfer the full revenue allocations to the Palestinian Authority is vital to stave off a significant increase in instability, and will represent a decisive step by Israel toward de-escalating tensions in the West Bank,” she said.