Photo courtesy of CNN
Global Israel is a name coined by the Israeli historian Ilan Pappe in his latest book Lobbying for Zionism on both sides of the Atlantic and it refers to “a coalition that includes most governments, mainstream media and some parts of academia in the Global North with the US and the UK at the forefront, and some governments from the Global South, with the tacit support of large multinational corporations and the military and security industries”.
Thus, the war that began in Gaza one year ago and is escalating to draw Lebanon, Yemen, Iran and possibly Syria into the vortex is in effect a war between this super coalition and a Global Palestine, another coinage by Lappe referring to a “coalition of civil society movements around the world, working in tandem with oppressed minorities, some governments in Global South, and many human rights organizations all showing solidarity with Palestinian struggle for liberation. It includes people of all faiths and none and from all walks of life”. This is a war between two unequal coalitions of which one is immensely superior in terms of weaponry, funds, soldiery and control over international organizations, and the other with superior moral force and ever-increasing people support. In the short term the first will win but in the long term the victory of the second is unstoppable.
It is exactly one year since October 7, 2023 when Hamas the Palestinian Liberation unit in Gaza fired those deadly rockets when Israeli intelligence took a nap and created a bloody mayhem that caused the ongoing war in the Middle East. That was of course the immediate cause and Global Israel starts its war narrative from that incident. But what happened in Gaza under Israeli occupation for more than one half of a century until 2023 when Palestinian Arabs were oppressed and kept virtually under apartheid are all hidden from public knowledge by Global Israel’s mainstream media.
However, sparked by that rocket incident, the coalition let loose a reign of terror over that narrow strip of land with over two million inhabitants so that after one year the dead toll was 41,500 people, with the majority of identified victims being women and children. The rest were forced to evacuate Gaza, which has been turned into a desolate piece of territory intended by the coalition to be re-peopled with Zionist Jews. What happened in Gaza was the resumption of the 1948 program of ethnic cleansing by the newly created Israel with the creator UN’s duplicity (Ilan Lappe, The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, Oneworld).
Similarly, this second episode was undertaken with the duplicity of the coalition members of Global Israel. It was indeed a genocidal mission as South Africa convincingly proved the case at the International Court of Justice. To Isaac Herzog, the President of Israel, Gaza has no civilians and “there is an entire nation out there that is responsible”. According to an Israeli military commander, Gazans are “cockroaches” who deserved to be eradicated. The war has now escalated into South Lebanon. On September 20, the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) justified the killing of 492 civilians and wounding another 1,645 and claimed that the Lebanese were hiding long range missiles in their own homes. It was the same type of argument IDF advanced in Gaza for destroying schools and hospitals for hiding Hamas terrorists there. Global Israel’s media relayed these narratives without any reservation.
Now Iran has entered the war and may even drag Syria into it. Bret Stephens in his October 3 editorial to New York Times said, “We Absolutely Need to Escalate in Iran”. With this type of open support from Global Israel, Netanyahu has been given a free hand to bomb wherever he likes, whatever he wants and kill whoever he wishes. The International Court of Justice, the International Criminal Court and UN General Assembly can pass any number of motions condemning Israel and charging Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for war crimes but they would be ignored by his government. Israel has already pronounced the UN Secretary General as persona non grata. Israel’s domestic opposition has also been weakened and US is tied up with the election. The Republicans and Democrats are vying to prove who is more hawkish in supporting Israel. Donand Trump is willing to attack Iran’s nuclear facility and Joe Biden has totally forgotten about any cease fire. Whether the nuclear facility or oil facility, any attack on them would have shocking economic effect upon the world economy.
In the meantime, Global Palestine is gaining strength by the day. Regular public protests, peace rallies, union strikes and consumer boycott of pro-Israeli company products all in support of Palestine are beginning to have an impact on public opinion. Even electoral popularity of democratic governments that are in support of Israel are experiencing a dive. In Australia for instance, the popularity of Antony Albanese Labour Government has taken a hit. But Global Palestine has now been tarnished and condemned by Global Israel as marking the rebirth of antisemitism. Those who know the origin and history of antisemitism in Christian Europe would realize that this is a fallacy to shift the blame on the world of Islam.
The real tragedy in this war is the abject weakness of the Muslim world and particularly its Arab sector. From the time when Israel was born in 1948, the Arab regimes were not united in their response. Even when Israel unleashed its ethnic cleansing Arab regimes such as Jordan did nothing to stop it or even help the victims. That history continues even today. The casualty of their disunity is Palestine. The cause of Palestine was sacrificed by all Arab countries in their own self-interest. Azmi Bishara, when discussing this issue in his Palestine: Matters of Truth and Justice quotes Dennis Ross from the September 14, 2020 Washington Post that captures this sacrifice brilliantly: “The Palestinian issue has become far less of a priority for most Arab states. Their preoccupation is not with Palestinians but with threats from Iran and the Musim Brotherhood, and they see Israel as a bulwark against both. They see benefits from cooperation with Israel on security … Like the UAE and Bahrain others in the region are going to be driven by their own national interests. The risk for the Palestinians is that they will be left behind”. The Abraham Accord brokered by US and signed by Israel, UAE and Bahrain is the one referred to by Ross.
Given this situation, the future of the struggle for Palestine depends very much on the pressure brought by Global Palestine on Global Israel. In the end, Palestine would turn out to be the catalyst to bring an end to Israel’s settler colonialism in Gaza and the Occupied Territories and also to bring about a change in the current make of the world order.