United Nations agencies and other aid organisations have decried the devastating toll wreaked by six months of Israel’s brutal war on Gaza, warning that the situation was “beyond catastrophic”.
“Six months is an awful milestone,” the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) said on Sunday, warning that “humanity has been all but abandoned”.
The Gaza war broke out on October 7 with an unprecedented operation by the Palestinian resistance group Hamas that resulted in the deaths of 1,170 people, according to Israeli figures.
Israel’s offensive has killed at least 33,175 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the health ministry in the besieged territory.
The UN humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths insisted Saturday that there needed to be “a reckoning for this betrayal of humanity”.
UNICEF chief Catherine Russell pointed out that more than 13,000 children were reportedly among those killed.
“Homes, schools and hospitals in ruin. Teachers, doctors and humanitarians killed. Famine is imminent,” she said on X, formerly Twitter, on Saturday.
“The level and speed of destruction are shocking. Children need a ceasefire NOW.”
‘Unacceptable’
The IFRC chief Jagan Chapagain meanwhile described the situation as “beyond catastrophic”.
Amid looming famine, he warned that “millions of lives are at risk of hunger.”
“An urgent and unhindered flow of humanitarian aid must be ensured to reach those in need. Not tomorrow, but now.”
IFRC said 18 members of its network – 15 staff and volunteers with the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) and three from Magen David Adom (MDA) – had been killed since October 7.
“These deaths are devastating and unacceptable,” Chapagain said on X.
IFRC took “no side other than the side of humanity”, he said, stressing the urgent need to ensure “unhindered access for aid into and to all parts of the Gaza Strip”.
He also called for “the protection of civilians, humanitarian workers, healthcare workers and their facilities” and “the unconditional release of all hostages”.
For the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the caretaker of the Geneva Conventions, “a steady flow of humanitarian aid” into Gaza was vital, but it was “only part of the solution”.
Tens of thousands of Israelis took to the streets on Saturday to protest against Benjamin Netanyahu, as Israel’s war in Gaza reached its half-year mark.
Organisers said about 100,000 people converged at a Tel Aviv crossroads renamed, Democracy Square, since mass protests against controversial judicial reforms last year.
Chanting “elections now”, protesters called for the Israeli prime minister’s resignation, with the war in Gaza set to enter its seventh month on Sunday.
Rallies were also held in other cities, with Israel’s opposition leader Yair Lapid taking part in one in Kfar Saba ahead of his departure for talks in Washington.
“They haven’t learned anything, they haven’t changed,” he said, adding, “until we send them home, they won’t give this country a chance to move forward.”
A placard at the Tel Aviv protests. Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images
Israeli media said clashes had broken out between protesters and police at the Tel Aviv rally and police said one protester had been arrested.
Later, the protesters in Tel Aviv were joined by families of Gaza hostages and their supporters.
Earlier, the army announced that troops had recovered the body of a hostage abducted by Palestinian militants during the 7 October.
The body of Elad Katzir, a 47-year-old farmer from Nir Oz kibbutz, was unearthed by commandos in southern Khan Younis, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said. He had been killed by his Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) captors and buried there in mid-January, it said, citing intelligence information without giving further details. There was no immediate comment from PIJ.
The recovery of Katzir’s body brings to 12 the number of bodies of hostages which the army says it has brought home from Gaza during the war. The army says 129 are still being held in Gaza, including 34 who are presumed dead.
Thousands of Israeli citizens stage a demonstration demanding Benjamin Netanyahu’s. Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images
The Hamas attack resulted in the deaths of 1,170 people in southern Israel, most of them civilians, according to Israeli figures.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive against Hamas has killed at least 33,137 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory.
In a statement marking the conflict’s half-year mark, president Isaac Herzog said Israel is fighting a “bloody and difficult war”.
“Tomorrow at 6:29 am, we mark six months since the cruel terror attack and the horrific massacre,” Herzog said on Saturday, referring to Hamas’s 7 October attack.
“Half a year since this crime against our sisters and brothers, against our state, this crime against humanity,” said the president, whose role is largely ceremonial.
In Gaza today, scalpel blades have to be reused in surgeries, but that results in them becoming too blunt to do what they are supposed to do.
In Gaza today, medics often carry out surgical procedures without pain control.
In Gaza today, nearly all patients suffer from malnutrition, so their wounds do not heal.
The infection rate among patients is “beyond imagination”, Dr Riyadh Almasharqah, 54, told Al Jazeera.
The plastic and reconstructive surgeon said instruments are rarely sterilised, and patients usually stay in overcrowded wards.
This is all a result of a siege imposed by Israel, which has severely limited food and lifesaving medical supplies from entering Gaza.
Nothing works
Medical professionals – starving, exhausted and fearing for the safety of everyone around them – are struggling to help people in the handful of barely functional medical facilities left in the besieged Gaza Strip.
They get rare help in the form of medical missions from overseas which manage to get Israeli approval to enter Gaza, like the PalMed mission that saw Almasharqah spend two weeks working at the European Hospital, the only hospital functioning in southern and central Gaza.
“It’s a frustrating situation to describe fully. I mean, everything was difficult,” Almasharqah told Al Jazeera, working in the struggling Khan Younis hospital.
The 54-year-old says most of the patients he saw were women and children [Courtesy of Riyadh Almasharqah]
Six months into Israel’s deadly assault on Gaza, following the October 7 Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel, the lack of equipment, medicine, and supplies has pushed the medical sector closer to total collapse.
The situation has drastically worsened with famine-like conditions that have affected more than 90 percent of Gaza’s 2.3 million people – most of whom are now internally displaced.
A combination of the two means that simple reconstructive procedures, like skin grafts, become very difficult to do properly and, chances are, the patient’s malnourished state often means they will not heal properly.
In every scenario, essentials were lacking.
Add to that the medics’ fear of Israeli attacks and what was to Almasharqah an unimaginable volume of patients.
“Only in the orthopaedic [department] … at one time, there were 250 patients. In plastic surgery, there were 70 patients,” he said.
The procedures needed ranged from basic wound care to emergency surgeries, and even bigger surgeries that require reconstruction.
But “simple procedures become so … complicated in that atmosphere because the instruments are not working”, Almasharqah said.
‘Emotionally draining’
Palestinian families forced to flee their homes have sought shelter in and around hospitals since the start of Israel’s assault on Gaza.
However, most hospitals have come under attack and have been raided by Israeli forces, forcing thousands of wounded and displaced Palestinians to flee and putting facilities out of service.
Israeli attacks have destroyed more than 200 medical facilities, partially or completely. At least 32 hospitals have been put out of service.
Hundreds of displaced Palestinians, medical staff, and patients have been killed.
But with a lack of places to seek refuge, families still shelter in and around medical facilities, crowding hospital courtyards, hallways, and wards even more.
The situation makes finding a post-operative patient difficult, Almasharqah said, pointing out that follow-up is essential.
“All the wards are full, so they send them to a field hospital attached to the [main] hospital,” Almasharqah said.
“It was a challenge to find where the patient had gone, and whether they received the proper post-op treatment,” he said. This is also because there is a shortage of nurses and paramedics, he added.
Oftentimes, patients do not have access to the antibiotics or fluids required post-surgery.
“It’s an inhumane situation by all means,” Almasharqah said.
“Easily, more than 80 percent [of patients] were children and women, and they were badly injured. I cannot … describe their injuries and burns they sustained,” he said.
Almasharqah, a father of six himself, lost three child patients to burn wounds within 48 hours, despite his repeated pleas that they be transported out of Gaza for treatment.
“No … action was taken,” he said. “I was approached by a number of charities, and they promised to do something, but I kept losing them, one by one.”
The first child was a little girl who had sustained about “50 percent burns”, he said. “We lost her because she was so cold and we were trying to keep her warm.”
According to the Ministry of Health in Gaza, Israel has killed more than 33,137 people and wounded some 75,815 others in Gaza since October 7.
Nearly a quarter of injuries are children, the ministry said.
Almasharqah said there are “countless memories” that will stay with him forever – from the sounds of bombardment to the sight of triage centres overflowing with patients and bodies.
“There were many faces I won’t forget, particularly the faces of innocent children shattered by war,” he said.
Yet the most memorable moments for Almasharqah were the children who “displayed incredible resilience despite their injuries”.
“Their bravery in the face of adversity was both heartbreaking and inspiring,” he said.
“I realised these people are so strong and they will never be defeated.”
Despite the immense levels of human suffering, Almasharqah said there were moments of “hope and positivity – whether it was saving a life or providing comfort to a patient in pain”.
“People were so grateful, he said. “They just want relief from pain.
“I will definitely go back again,” he said. “These people deserve better. They deserve all the help, all the care.”
Dozens of congressional Democrats in the United States have signed a letter urging president Joe Biden and secretary of state Antony Blinken to halt the transfer of weapons to Israel, as internal pressure continues to ramp up against Washington’s unconditional support for the occupation and its war crimes in Gaza.
In the letter on Friday, it stated that “In light of the recent strike against aid workers and the ever-worsening humanitarian crisis, we believe it is unjustifiable to approve these weapons transfers” to Israel, referring to the Israeli military’s killing of seven Western humanitarian workers from the World Central Kitchen organisation in what appeared to be precise and surgical strikes.
Expressing the representatives’ “shared concern and outrage” over the incident, the letter acknowledged that “Over 200 aid workers have been killed since the start of the war. These attacks and deaths are having a chilling effect with the World Central Kitchen and other humanitarian groups now suspending their operations in Gaza”.
It stated to the Biden administration that “In light of this incident, we strongly urge you to reconsider your recent decision to authorize the transfer of a new arms package to Israel, and to withhold this and any future offensive arms transfers until a full investigation into the airstrike is completed”.
Although it hailed the “recent efforts to increase the delivery of desperately needed humanitarian aid to Gaza”, the letter stressed that “these efforts will not be sufficient to meet the extraordinary need on the ground”.
Signed by 37 Democrats, those signatures included prominent figures and representatives such as Rashida Tlaib, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Barbara Lee, and even Nancy Pelosi, former speaker of the House.
Pelosi’s support for the letter was the most notable, particularly with her significant track record of support for Israel and her recent comments accusing pro-Palestinian activists of having ties to Russia. She is also a longtime leading figure in the Democrat party, having the ear of president Biden and ties to Washington’s political establishment.
Her acknowledgement of Israel’s war crimes, her advocacy for holding Israel accountable for the strikes on the aid workers, and her support for halting arms transfers to the occupation represents the significant pressure the Biden administration is under to make support to Israel more conditional, as well as the administration’s general discontent with the Israeli government over its transgressions in Gaza.
It has been six months since Israel launched its brutal assault on the Gaza Strip on October 7.
Israel shows no sign of stopping, as its allies continue to provide it with more weapons to use on Palestinians along with political support, and mediated talks have not led to a ceasefire.
The war on Gaza, Israel says, is in retaliation for attacks on Israeli territory by armed groups, led by Hamas’s Qassam Brigades, from Gaza which killed 1,139 people and took about 250 captive.
فقدت الدكتورة منى الفرا كل شيء .. منزل العائلة وذكريات الطفولة والعديد من أصدقائها وزملائها.
لكن الطبيبة التي تعيش في غزة والتي غادرت إلى مانشستر بعد وقت قصير من اندلاع الحرب في أكتوبر/تشرين الأول الماضي، لم تفقد الأمل، فهي تريد العودة إلى مدينتها التي مزقتها الحرب.
كان أبناؤها، الذين يعيشون في مانشستر، يزورونها في غزة عندما اندلعت الحرب الأخيرة. لقد اضطرت إلى أخذ “القرار الأصعب”، اضطرت إلى مغادرة غزة مع ابنتها التي تعاني من متاعب صحية، ثم عاد ابنها إلى بريطانيا بعد شهرين من بدء القصف.
دمر منزلها الذي تعيش فيه في مدينة غزة، وكذلك دمر منزل طفولة الدكتورة الفرا في خان يونس.
وكان المنزل الذي نشأت فيه في جنوب غزة مليئًا بالذكريات “الثمينة” لوالديها وإخوتها وأقاربها الذين “لن تراهم أبدا”.
وقالت الدكتور منى: “بتنا لا نسمع كل يوم إلا الأخبار السيئة، فكل يوم أسمع عن عائلة جديدة محيت من السجل المدني وقتل كل أفرادها”.
مستشفى العودة
ساهمت الدكتورة منى الفرا في تأسيس مستشفى العودة في مخيم جباليا للاجئين، وفقدت اليوم العديد من أصدقائها، وكان من بينهم أطباء في مستشفى العودة، وهو أحد المستشفيات العديدة الذي أمرت إسرائيل نزلاءه من المرضى ومرافقيهم والنازحين الذين احتموا في محيطه بالإخلاء بزعم أن حركة حماس تتخذ من المستشفى مقرا لقيادتها. لكن الدكتورة منى تنفي تلك المزاعم وتقول “لا وجود لحماس” في المستشفى الذي تعمل فيه، وتصف ادعاءات الإسرائيليين بأنها “أكاذيب”.
التعليق على الصورة،الطفل يزن (10 سنوات) في مستشفى في عيادة العودة في رفح قبل وفاته في 4 مارس 2024 بسبب التجويع وعدم كفاية الرعاية
والدكتورة الفرا متخصصة في الأمراض الجلدية، وهي مديرة في تحالف أطفال الشرق الأوسط الذي “يعمل على حماية حقوق الأطفال وتحسين حياتهم” من خلال التبرعات.
وسلمت في الأسبوع الماضي، شخصياً عمدة مدينة مانشستر الكبرى “آندي بورنهام” رسالة من نظيره في مدينة غزة يطلب فيها مساعدة زعيم حزب العمال. وتصف الرسالة، الوضع المزري في أكبر مدينة في غزة.
أجبر العديد من المواطنين في المدينة الفلسطينية الأكثر اكتظاظًا بالسكان على النزوح بعد أوامر الإخلاء الإسرائيلية.
لكن بقي بعضهم في المدينة والمنطقة المحيطة بها، بحسب الدكتورة الفرا، على الرغم من أوامر إسرائيل بإخلاء الجزء الشمالي من غزة.
“التجويع يقتل أطفال غزة”
وقالت الدكتورة الفرا إن الإمدادات “شحيحة للغاية” ويعيش الناس فعليًا تحت “الإقامة الجبرية”. وأضافت قائلة “إن الأولوية الأكثر إلحاحا هي إرسال الإمدادات الطبية والأطباء إلى المنطقة. وهناك حاجة ماسة إلى الغذاء فقد مات جوعا 29 طفلا حتى الآن”.
وفي وقت سابق من هذا العام، اتُهمت إسرائيل بارتكاب جرائم إبادة جماعية في محكمة العدل الدولية التابعة للأمم المتحدة، اتهامات تنفيها الحكومة الإسرائيلية وتصفها بأن “لا أساس لها من الصحة”.
أكد تقرير دولي أن غزة على شفا المجاعة ونصف سكانها يعانون من نقص “كارثي” في الغذاء
وتؤمن الدكتورة منى أن وعي العالم يتغير ويدرك المزيد من الدول في مختلف أنحاء العالم أن إسرائيل “تمادت جد”. وفي الأسبوع الماضي، دعا مجلس الأمن التابع للأمم المتحدة إلى وقف فوري لإطلاق النار والإفراج غير المشروط عن الرهائن، لكن الحرب لم تتوقف.
وقالت الدكتورة الفرا: “رغم كل ما حدث وما يحدث سأواصل العمل والحلم بالسلام والعدالة للأطفال، ولأحفادي، وأطفال إسرائيل والعالم”.
The Irish government has withdrawn investments worth millions of euros from several Israeli companies.
The Irish National Treasury Management Agency (NTMA) confirmed that it decided to divest almost €3 million from its global equity portfolio in the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund (ISIF).
The NTMA confirmed that it had taken the decision to withdraw about €3 billion ($3.8 billion) from its global portfolio of shares in the ISIF, according to the British news agency PA Media.
The divestment decision concerns shareholdings with a total value of €2.95 million in the following six companies: Bank Hapoalim BM, Bank Leumi-le Israel BM, Israel Discount Bank, Mizrahi Tefahot Bank Ltd, First International Bank and Rami Levi CN Stores.
Irish Finance Minister Michael McGrath explained that it was ‘the correct decision”, adding: “ISIF has determined that the risk profile of these investments is no longer within its investment parameters and that the commercial objectives of these investments can be achieved via other investments.”
McGrath continued: “The decision will be implemented as soon as possible over the coming weeks.”
Jewish British activist Miranda Pinch has said her mother Claudia Rosoux, who survived the Holocaust in 1938 and came to the UK as a refugee, always felt shame and hatred for what Israel is doing to Palestinians.
“My mother died as a Jew, ashamed of what Israel did to the Palestinians,” Pinch said on Friday at a march organised in London to protest Israel’s attacks on Gaza.
Pinch, carrying a banner with a photo of her mother at the rally, spoke to Anadolu Agency about Israel’s actions in the Palestinian territories, the treatment of anti-Israel Jews and the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
“Unfortunately, my mother is no longer alive, but she is turning in her grave in the face of what is being done to the Palestinians, who are completely dehumanised.”
In addition to the current ongoing Israeli war on Gaza, Pinch said ethnic cleansing has been going on in the occupied West Bank since 1948 and that what is happening in Palestine did not start on October 7, 2023.
She also stated that comparing Judaism and Israel is anti-Semitic and that Judaism and Israel can never be equated.
“There are many Jews who have been mistreated, expelled from the Labour Party and elsewhere for daring to accuse Israel of being racist and genocidal,” Pinch said.
Israeli actions not ‘self-defence’
Pinch said the protesters are demanding equality, human rights, dignity, freedom of movement, and the equal application of international law to Palestinians.
“The Palestinians were treated as pawns in a game played by the West, America, and Britain. Britain helped create Israel and betrayed the Palestinians from the very beginning.
“You will find that there are many Jews who are horrified by what is being done to the Palestinians. I even have friends in Israel who are horrified by what is being done and even they cannot say openly how they feel right now,” she further said.
Pinch added that she also has friends in Gaza and continued:
“There are people who have lost a desire to live because they have nothing. Everything was taken away from them and Gaza was destroyed. Ecology, agricultural lands, education, infrastructure, everything has been destroyed.”
Emphasising that Israel’s attacks on Gaza can never be justified, Pinch said: “Don’t tell me that any of these (Israel’s attacks) are in self-defence. This is deliberate ethnic cleansing, destruction, and genocide.”
“What I would say to the people of Gaza is that there are people who support you, there are people who are fighting for you, but unfortunately, I am really worried for you right now, but know that there are many people in the world who are horrified by what is happen ing to you,” she said.
As the war in Gaza enters a sixth month, the WFP said malnutrition among children is spreading at record pace, and one of three below the age of two is now acutely malnourished.
The organisation’s warning follows growing calls for Israel to take ‘appropriate’ action against those involved in killing seven aid workers in drone strikes in Gaza on 1 April.
The World Central Kitchen (WCK) staff killed include Australian Lalzawmi ‘Zom i’ Frankcom, American-Canadian Jacob Flickinger, Polish Damian Sobol and British James Kirby, John Chapman, James Henderson. They were travelling with Palestinian interpreter Saifeddin Issam Ayad Abutaha.
Israeli Defense Force (IDF) spokesman Daniel Hagari said the killing was a ”tragedy”, that the IDF takes ”full responsibility” for it and was the result of a ”misidentification” in complex conditions.
”This operational misidentification and misclassification was the result of internal failures that led to a critical information regarding the humanitarian operation to not go properly down to the chain of command,” Hagari said.
On Friday, an internal investigation led to the dismissal of two officers and reprimanding of three others. The IDF said they had mishandled critical information and violated the army’s rules of engagement.
An aircraft airdrops humanitarian aid over northern Gaza Strip as seen from southern IsraelLeo Correa/AP
The WCK has called for an independent investigation.The charity said it had been authorised by the Israeli military to transfer aid supplies. Three vehicles that were moving at large distances apart were hit in succession.
The Australian government wants Israel to preserve all evidence from its investigation of the strike to allow for further scrutiny if required. Foreign Minister Penny Wong said her government expects ”full accountability” from Israel.”This has been a deadly failure of deconfliction.
It cannot be brushed aside, and it cannot be covered over,” she said.Amid outrage over the incident, Israel said it would also take steps to increase the flow of humanitarian aid, including temporarily reopening a key border crossing into northern Gaza.
The United States and its allies continued to airdrop humanitarian aid to starving Palestinians in the isolated northern part of Gaza Strip.
The WFP said overall, the number of people in Gaza facing catastrophic hunger has doubled in less than three months, going from 570,000 in December to 1.1 million today.
It said it is providing food to more than one million people in the besieged territory each month, despite enormous challenges.
Most food is distributed in southern and central Gaza, and very little assistance reaches people elsewhere.
WFP said it needs humanitarian staff and supplies to be able to move freely and safely across Gaza. It urged Israel to allow more routes into Gaza, including from the north, and use of Ashdod port.
To really have a chance of beating back famine, WHO insists it needs a humanitarian ceasefire.
Not long ago a picture circulated from inside Gaza showing smoke billowing from the explosion of a US-supplied bomb, and discernible in the background was the outline of eight black parachutes dropping US aid in precisely the same neighbourhood. It was suggested that the picture would make an ideal cover for any book about the confused world disorder that the six-month war in Gaza have spawned – a disorder that as yet has no dominant player, value system or functioning institutions.
The great powers compete, coexist or confront one another across the region but none, least of all at the UN, is able to impose its version of order any longer. “Forget talk of unipolarity or multipolarity,” the journalist Gregg Carlstrom recently wrote in Foreign Affairs. “The Middle East is nonpolar. No one is in charge.”
Wars are supposed to be the father of all things, according to Heraclitus, and many still predict that this war will define everything in the future and prove a turning point to their advantage. Iran believes the US is closer to being forced out of Iraq than at any point in the last two decades and its president, Ebrahim Raisi, has said the war in Gaza will lead to a “transformation in the unjust order that rules the world”. Iran’s ally, the Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, whose group has traded fire with Israel across the Lebanese border, has claimed “the onset of a new historical phase” for the entire Middle East and that Israel will be unable to withstand the “al-Aqsa flood”.
Humanitarian aid packages fall on Gaza as smoke rises on 7 March. Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images
By contrast, Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, vowed on 9 October, two days after the Hamas massacre in Israel that triggered the war, that the region would be changed to Israel’s benefit. “What we will do to our enemies in the coming days will reverberate with them for generations,” he said.
Six months on, no one believes they have yet lost. And amid these conflicting assessments, China and Russia are not quite bystanders but do not lift a finger to ease US discomfort. Ever an opportunist, the Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, blamed American handling of relations between Israel and the Palestinians for the mess. “It was Washington’s policy of monopolising mediation and undermining the international legal framework for a settlement that resulted in the current escalation,” he said.
US support for Israel in the Gaza war was also seized upon as a golden chance for Russia’s rehabilitation after Ukraine. In language designed to appeal to the global south, Lavrov denounced America’s “incredible duplicity and double standards”.
Among emerging powers, the lesson of Gaza has been that it is time for new voices to join the top table. “This war is hideous but speaks to a bigger problem: the lack of reform of global governance institutions, including and primarily the UN security council,” said Filipe Nasser, a senior adviser at the Brazilian foreign ministry. “This is the point of convergence across the global south. They feel the international order is profoundly asymmetric and detrimental to their interests. The three US vetoes show how the rules are bent.”
The Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has spoken of a similar crisis. “The current international system, devoid of fundamental concepts such as solidarity, justice and trust, cannot fulfil even its minimum responsibilities,” he said. South Africa’s foreign minister, Naledi Pandor, has described Gaza as the last manifestation of the conflict against colonialism and imperialism, and went to the international court of justice to prove her point.
Among western-based intellectuals, there is a sense that something deep is afoot. “The disaster in Gaza has completely disabused a large segment of liberals and professionals in the Arab world about western claims of upholding and caring about values in the conduct of foreign policy,” said Emile Hokayem, of the International Institute for Strategic Studies. “They look at the western debacle over Gaza and feel betrayed – or, for those who were always cynical about the west, vindicated. For example, some who sympathised with Ukraine have now switched their position. Senior western officials and diplomats are mostly clueless about this dynamic.”
People mourn as they receive the dead bodies of victims of an Israeli strike in Rafah. Photograph: Ahmad Hasaballah/Getty Images
Bronwen Maddox, the director of the UK-based thinktank Chatham House, has warned of wide repercussions. “The charge is the west writes the rules to suit itself. If countries which support Ukraine and are working for peace in the Middle East do not realise how powerful this charge has become, they will fail to help solve either conflict.”
Faced by this barrage, US diplomacy has not enjoyed its finest hour, as every day it seems its inability to control events becomes more apparent. It is locked in a war it had not foreseen, in a region it was seeking to leave behind, in defence of an ally that refuses to do as it asks.
The longer the conflict has continued – and few foresaw six months of it – the more US diplomacy has struggled to withstand the conflicting pressures. Netanyahu, wanting to win more time to “finish the job”, has shown himself unwilling to listen to Joe Biden, while the Gulf Cooperation Council, regardless of its private views of Hamas, has demanded that the US makes a decisive break with Israel and recognises Palestine as a state. The foreign affairs chief of the EU, where the US has many allies, has meanwhile claimed Israel has weaponised hunger, and even the UK has been moved to show some independence from Washington.
Through its Houthi allies attacking shipping in the Red Sea, Iran has revealed itself as a supple player and claimed strategic influence over three major economic choke points: the Suez canal at the north of the Red Sea, the Bab el-Mandeb strait at its south and the strait of Hormuz at the entrance to the Gulf.
US diplomacy has suffered defeat after defeat. On 27 October, 121 states at the general assembly backed an immediate humanitarian ceasefire, with 14 voting against and 44 abstaining. By 12 December, support for an unconditional ceasefire had hardened, with 153 in favour, only 10 against and 23 abstentions. Apart from the US, the total population of the countries in the US column was a paltry 68 million – hardly the kind of support the “indispensable power” should have at its disposal.
On 18 December the US was able to announce the names of only 10 countries willing to join Operation Prosperity Guardian, the naval alliance to protect freedom of navigation in the Red Sea. Apart from Bahrain, the home of the US fifth fleet, not a single Arab state joined the US alliance.
When Biden assumed the US presidency he recruited a team of prodigious foreign policy talent, perhaps the most venerated ensemble of such experts in modern US history. They were given a clear mission: to rebuild US alliances, repair America’s damaged reputation abroad and prepare for the challenge in the South China Sea.
The Palestinian issue had not been a White House priority but at best something to be managed. The March 2023 US National Risk Assessment made no mention of the Palestinian issue. Meanwhile, spokespeople, when asked, paid lip service to a two-state solution and issued pro forma condemnations of Israeli settlements. To the extent that Biden had a distinctive contribution to make, it lay in the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor initiative, an economic artery designed to rival China’s belt and road scheme.
But Biden is confident in his foreign policy expertise and his initial advice to Israel – not to make the same mistakes that the US did in its own “war on terror” – appeared subtle, well pitched and true to himself. A decades-long Zionist and supporter of Israel in Washington, he advised: “While you feel that rage, don’t be consumed by it.” The policy was to hug Netanyahu and the hostage families close.
Families of hostages held in the Gaza Strip and supporters hold signs and photos of hostages in Tel Aviv this week. Photograph: Amir Levy/Getty Images
Biden misread how Israeli society had changed over the last two decades, and consequently how best to influence Netanyahu’s response to the Hamas attacks. He did not foresee what Netanyahu’s war cabinet was prepared to do to expunge a trauma that required not just revenge but an irreversible and ill-defined change in the relationship with Palestinians, so that Israel’s security issue could be assured once and for all. Biden “lives with an Israel in his head which probably never existed and certainly doesn’t exist today,” said Daniel Levy, a former Israeli negotiator in peace talks with Palestinian leaders. Israel says it is acting in self-defence.
At the same time, Biden should have had no illusions about the complexion of the Israeli government, a rightwing coalition including religious nationalists. In June 2023 he admitted it included “some of the most extreme members” he had ever seen, who had been given unprecedented power and legitimacy by Netanyahu so that they could govern alongside his Likud party.
Biden knew too that Netanyahu had been a polarising figure in US politics ever since he was appointed Israeli ambassador to the UN at the age of 35 in 1984. Famously, after meeting Netanyahu for the first time, Bill Clinton told his staff: “Who’s the fucking superpower here?” In 2015, Netanyahu came to Washington to urge a Republican-led Congress to reject Barack Obama’s policy on Iran. Even Jared Kushner, Donald Trump’s son-in-law and a Bibi admirer, said Netanyahu was always “on the game”.
But it took the Biden White House an inordinately long time to accept that Israel and US interests in Gaza were fundamentally not aligning. American demands were, from its perspective, simple. It endorsed the elimination of Hamas as a political and military force, but it wanted this done surgically, something the Israeli military said was impossible. It also wanted a clear understanding that Israel’s future security came through nurturing a Palestinian partner for peace, and that required a detailed plan, something Netanyahu avoided, fearing it would split his coalition.
The results of a vote on a draft resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza are seen on a screen at the UN general assembly in December. Photograph: Michael M Santiago/Getty Images
For all the times that Antony Blinken, the US secretary of state, said on his many tours of the region that the way Israel conducted operations mattered, events in Gaza appeared to confirm that Israel felt less constrained by world opinion than the US.
Briefings about Biden’s growing impatience with Netanyahu, and the candid private conversations the two men held, started appearing in the US press as early as November. The more the stories appeared and the less any real-world consequence was imposed on Israel, the more Biden appeared weak or deceitful – neither a good look in an election year.
November’s election has loomed ever larger the longer the war has lasted, so much so that it was not just Netanyahu who began to see the war through the prism of his own political survival. Biden looked at the never-ending war, the electoral clock ticking, and at the polls. The Obama-era strategist David Axelrod said: “The subtext of the whole Republican campaign is the world is out of control and Biden is not in command. That is the basic Republican argument. Age is a surrogate for weakness and it is not helpful if Bibi is seen to be punking him.” Inside the White House, Axelrod said, “there are people whose map of the world is six states, and they want the war to stop”.
“Genocide Joe” may not be the single biggest reason Biden’s overall job approval rating is stuck at an alarmingly low 40%, but for a whole generation coming of political age, the deaths in Palestine and “America’s complicity” is the great moral issue of their time.
For Matt Duss, a former foreign policy adviser to the US senator Bernie Sanders, the debate over Gaza had “morphed into a proxy for a larger debate about America’s role in the world, and about the future of the Democratic party. A younger generation are done with engaging with the world primarily through the use and supply of deadly weapons. They are tired of their government upholding a blatant double standard on human rights and then gaslighting them about that double standard.”
Increasingly, Netanyahu personally attracted the blame. William Hague, the former British foreign secretary, was one of the first in the political establishment on this side of the Atlantic to openly express such an opinion, reflecting a strong private Foreign Office view that Hamas could not be defeated militarily. A high-profile visit to Washington and London by the Israeli war cabinet minister Benny Gantz, Netanyahu’s chief political rival, was then seen as an unsubtle rebuke to the Israeli prime minister’s refusal to countenance a future relationship with a revamped Palestinian Authority.
The damn burst when Chuck Schumer, the majority leader in the US Senate, described the Israeli leader as a major impediment to peace in the Middle East and called for elections to replace him when the war ended. He said his main purpose in writing a speech that took nearly two months of drafting “was to say you can still love Israel and feel strongly about Israel and totally disagree with Bibi Netanyahu and the policies of Israel”.
It reflected a deeper change in US Democratic party thinking with which Biden struggles. “Much of what Schumer said would have been unthinkably radical on the floor of the Senate 10 years ago. Today it represents the rightward edge of the party,” Duss said. As the six-month anniversary drew near, even Trump, who in office had moved the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, said America’s natural support for Israel had evaporated.
It is telling that it took the deaths of six western aid workers for Biden finally this week to wield the power that he has had at his disposal all along, and tell Netanyahu that he had to reverse out of the diplomatic cul de sac he had taken his country or else lose the American support on which his survival depended. There was – as there should have been throughout – only one superpower in this relationship.
Israel feels aggrieved at its loss of public support and feels the world has forgotten the need to crush hostage-taking and terrorism. Eylon Levy, a former Israeli government spokesperson, complained of international organisations and agencies that he said had “simply been hijacked” by the Palestinian agenda. “The WHO cannot bring itself to condemn Hamas militarisation of hospitals. The Red Cross cannot bring itself to condemn Hamas hijacking aid trucks and Unrwa actively covers up Hamas theft of aid,” he said.
Most Israelis dislike Netanyahu but not the tactics to crush Hamas. “We are in the trauma. We are not post-trauma. We still live in 7 October,” said Michael Sfard, an Israeli human rights lawyer. “In Israeli media there is nothing about Gaza save embedded journalism or drones. Since 7 October there has not been a single interview from Gaza. It is not state censorship, it is self-censorship. We are fed by television channels and newspapers that censor and block information from us, both about events in Gaza and about our way of fighting there.”
He added: “The horror we inflicted on Gaza cannot be justified by the horrors of Hamas. The numbers of children we killed and the extent of the destruction does not add up to any explanation other than revenge.”
Six months on, the outcome is unclear. Hamas may yet be crushed and a normalisation in relations between Saudi and Israel secured. US-sanctioned raw power may have remade the Middle East.
But equally, as the UN secretary general, António Guterres, hopes, this could yet be a turning point – a moment to learn lessons of a collective failure by re-establishing a true rule of law, stronger multilateral institutions and clearer power relations. Deadlocked in Gaza, everything is in the balance.
Palestinian Children’s Day comes this year with the children of Palestine experiencing unprecedented aggression at the hands of Israeli forces.
Since October 7, 2023, Israeli forces have been carrying out a genocidal war against the people of the Gaza Strip, which has claimed the lives of so far more than 32,975 people, including more than 13,800 children, and has wounded more than 75,577 people, while more than 8,100 people, including children and women, are still missing under the rubble and on the roads.
Israeli forces and settlers have killed 114 Palestinian children in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, since October 7, according to documentation collected by Defense for Children International – Palestine.
DCIP has launched a campaign, “Marking Palestinian Children’s Day as International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian Child,” with the aim of highlighting the crimes committed by Israeli forces against them, in partnership with Palestine Network for Children’s Rights (PNCR), the Ministry of Social Development, the Independent Commission for Human Rights, and the Palestinian Bar Association.
The ongoing Israeli aggression against Palestinian children is unprecedented, and has affected the entire child rights system, particularly basic rights such as the right to life, survival, and development. More than 13,800 children have been killed in the Gaza Strip since October 7, and Palestinian children in Gaza who have survived so far have been deprived of their rights to health, water, food, medicine, and a clean environment.
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres warned, in a previous statement, that the Gaza Strip is becoming a “graveyard for children.”
The Israeli military has systematically blocked humanitarian aid from entering Gaza, prompting the United Nations to warn of a “catastrophic” food situation for half of Gaza’s population, and of an “imminent” famine, which has so far claimed the lives of 34 people, including 31 children, though the true death toll is feared to be much higher.
“People in Gaza are starving to death right now. The speed at which this man-made hunger and malnutrition crisis has ripped through Gaza is terrifying,” said Cindy McCain, Executive Director of the World Food Programme.
Food security has become a pressing concern, with Human Rights Watch accusing the Israeli authorities of using hunger as a means of war.
The Israeli military has also deprived children of Gaza of their right to maintain and remain with their families. UNICEF estimates that at least 17,000 children in the Gaza Strip are unaccompanied, orphaned, or separated. Each one, a heartbreaking story of loss and grief.
Israeli forces have also deprived Palestinian children in Gaza of their right to education. At least 111 schools have been severely damaged in Gaza, in addition to more than 40 schools that were completely destroyed, while around 620,000 students are out of school since October, according to the Ministry of Education. At least 133 schools are being used as shelters, in addition to the fact that most of the students suffer from psychological trauma.
Israeli forces have deprived children in Gaza of their right to safe shelter, by destroying 70 percent of homes in the Gaza Strip, according to Bala Krishnan Rajagopal, the United Nations’ Special Rapporteur on the Right to Adequate Housing, while forcing more than 85 percent of its population to move south, causing an increasingly dire humanitarian crisis, including severe shortages of food, water and medicine.
Various prisoners’ organizations reported that the Israeli forces have arrested more than 7,895 Palestinians from the West Bank, including at least 500 children, since October 7, while Israeli forces carry out the crime of enforced disappearance against Palestinian detainees from Gaza, including women and children, and refuse to disclose any clear information about them.
Israel forces have subjected Palestinian detainees to severe torture, including brutal and retaliatory beatings, dog attacks, stress positions for long hours, completely stripped of their clothes, sexual harassment, and deprivation of food and access to the bathroom, according to testimonies collected by human rights organizations.
Palestinian children in the occupied West Bank are subject to arrest, trial and imprisonment under the Israeli military court system, which deprives them of their basic rights.
DCIP and its partners call for an immediate halt to the Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip in order to save the lives of civilians, especially children, and to oblige the occupying state to provide protection for children, enable them to enjoy their rights under international law, and provide them with medical and psychological treatment.
DCIP and its partners hold Israel, the occupying state, fully responsible for its crimes against civilians, namely children, and stress that it must be held accountable for all these crimes.
Furthermore, DCIP and its partners stress the need for the international community to put pressure on Israel to end its occupation of Palestinian land, in accordance with international resolutions and the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination.
“لا نؤمن بوسيلة سوى القوة والعنف والإرهاب الدموي بأبشع أشكاله من أجل تحقيق أهدافنا وأفكارنا ومعتقداتنا في أرض إسرائيل الكاملة أو في الدولة اليهودية أو في إسرائيل قوية مهيمنة على المنطقة”
ناتنياهو في كتابه “مكان تحت الشمس”
شمشوم المشروع الصهيوني بن يامين نتنياهو الذي يقدم نفسه للناخبين في إسرائيل بوصفه نجما سياسيا وقائدا ذا كاريزما يمتلك عبقرية سياسية، ودائما ما يضع نفسه بمرتبة جيل المؤسسين الأوائل لدولة الاحتلال، والذي يحب تشبيه نفس برئيس الوزراء البريطاني الأسبق ونستون تشرشل، ورغم أنه أول رئيس وزراء لإسرائيل ولد فيها، إلا أنه أيضا الأصغر عمرا عندما شغل هذا المنصب، بمسيرة هي الأطول لرؤساء الوزراء والتي فاقت سنوات المؤسس “ديفيد بن غوريون” ذاته، ورغم اعتقاده بأنه منقذ إسرائيل بوصفه زعيما يهوديا يقود دولة يهودية نحو الخلاص، إلا أن البعض يراه زعيما يقود دولته نحو الخراب، من خلال هدم معبد الصهيونية عليه وعلى خصومه الداخليين، بحجة حروبه مع الفلسطينيين وبلدان الشر التي تعاديهم، وما ذلك إلا لأهواء وأطماع شخصية، كانت هي سببا لدمار شخصيات تاريخية دمرتهم وأفنت دولهم.
تطور شخصية شمشوم السياسية
في مدينة يافا ولد بن يامين نتنياهو عام 1949م، لأب من أصل بولندي وأم أميركية يهودية، وهو نجل المؤرخ بنسيون نتنياهو، الأكاديمي اليهودي بدرجة بروفسور، عام 1963م انتقلت العائلة إلى الولايات المتحدة الأميركية إثر تلقي الأب عرض عمل في منصب أكاديمي، وعاد بنيامين إلى إسرائيل لقضاء الخدمة الإلزامية في الجيش عام 1967م بعد أن أصبح عمره 18 عاما، وخدم لمدة 5 سنوات في وحدة استطلاع هيئة الأركان العامة “سايرت ماتكال، وأصبح ضابط برتبة نقيب، شارك في الهجوم على مطار بيروت الدولي عام 1968م، وعمليات عسكرية كثيرة، واثناء دراسته في الولايات المتحدة الأميركية طلب نتنياهو إجازة لمدة شهرين، سافر إلى إسرائيل واشترك بالقتال في حرب أكتوبر/ تشرين الأول 1973م، وأنهى دراسته الجامعية في الفترة ما بين 1972م-1976م، إذ حصل على درجة البكالوريوس في الهندسة المعمارية، ودرجة الماجستير في إدارة الأعمال من معهد ماساتشوستس للتكنولوجيا في مدينة كامبريدج، كما حصل على بكالوريوس في العلوم السياسية من جامعة هارفارد، تزوج 3 مرات كانت آخرها في العام 1991م من مضيفة الطيران سارة بن أرتسي ، وله منها ولدان، هما يائير وأفنير، ولديه ابنة من زواجه السابق، ويتقن نتنياهو اللغة الإنجليزية، وهو ما جعله مدافعا عن إسرائيل على القنوات الأميركية بشكل دائم في أواخر الثمانينيات ومطلع التسعينيات، بدأ حياته السياسية 1982م مساعدا لسفير إسرائيل لدى واشنطن ونائب رئيس البعثة الدبلوماسية الإسرائيلية في الولايات المتحدة، بعدها مندوب إسرائيل في الأمم المتحدة، ثم عضوا في الكنيست الإسرائيلي عن حزب الليكود، ثم نائب وزير الخارجية الإسرائيلي، بعدها نائب وزير في مكتب رئيس الحكومة، ثم رئيس حزب الليكود، وفي عام 1993م أصبح رئيس الحكومة الإسرائيلية بعد فوزه على منافسه شمعون بيريز في الانتخابات التي أجريت مبكرا بعد اغتيال إسحاق رابين، ليكون أول رئيس وزراء إسرائيلي ولد في إسرائيل، ثم وزير للخارجية الإسرائيلية عام 2002 م، ثم وزير المالية الإسرائيلي عام 2003 م، ثم رئيس الحكومة الإسرائيلية لثلاث دورات منذ عام 2009م، بعدها جلس سنتين على مقاعد المعارضة، وحاليا رئيس الحكومة الإسرائيلية منذ عام 2022 م.
نتنياهو يلقب ب “الملك بيبي”، ويتميز بمهارته في توصيل أفكاره، ودهائه السياسي، وقدرته على الإقناع وعقد التحالفات ثم إنهائها، وهو ما يبرر نجاحه واستلامه لمنصب رئاسة الوزراء خمس مرات، كما عرف بتأييد العنيف لإقامة المستوطنات، وبتشدده تجاه الفلسطينيين.
أسباب هروب نتنياهو نحو الخراب
حقيقة لم ينقص نتنياهو المهارة والصفات التي تجعله رئيسا للوزراء استثنائي، ولكن الخطورة تكمن في أن يكون لشخصية السياسية الأولى في إسرائيل صرعات على مصالح شخصية بعيدة عن مصالح الدولة نفسها، وبعيدة عن مصالح حلفاء دولة إسرائيل، وإذا كانت المصالحة ما تحكم علاقات الدول، فإن للشخصيات البشرية نفس النهج وأحيانا نفس الأسلوب وهذا واضح في شخصية نتنياهو، الا أن هناك أسبابا في فكر وسياسة نتنياهو دفعته بالتوجه نحو حتمية الخراب التي يغامر بها بمستقبله ومستقبل دولته.
السبب الأول محاكم وقضايا نتنياهو، يواجه نتنياهو اتهامات بتلقي رشاو والاحتيال وخيانة الثقة منذ مطلع عام 2020م، ونتنياهو ينفي الاتهامات الموجهة إليه، كما لا يلزمه القانون الإسرائيلي بالاستقالة من منصبه، إلا في حال إدانته من قبل المحكمة العليا، وهي عملية قد تستمر لمدة طويلة، يسعى نتنياهو خلالها إلى تأجيل محاكمته بداعي الانشغال بالحرب في قطاع غزة، عقب استئناف محاكمة نتنياهو بعد توقف دام شهرين، وتقف الشهود قبالته ومن بينهم وزير العدل ياريف ليفين، وعضو الكنيست زئيف إلكين، والمستشارة القانونية لمكتب رئيس الوزراء شلوميت بارنياع، مع ثلاث قضايا، هي الملف 1000 الذي اتهم فيه رئيس الوزراء بالاحتيال وخيانة الأمانة جراء تلقيه هدايا فاخرة من أثرياء بقيمة تتجاوز قيمتها 208 آلاف دولار من أرنون ميلتشين المنتج الإسرائيلي في هوليود، وأكثر من 112 ألف دولار رجل الأعمال الأسترالي جيمس باكر، مقابل خدمات مالية أو شخصية وإعفاءات ضريبية، والقضية 2000 التي تتعلق بمحادثات سرية تسربت إلى وسائل الإعلام الإسرائيلية، جرت بين نتنياهو وأرنون نوني موزيس، صاحب صحيفة” يديعوت أحرونوت “، حيث بحثا تقييد انتشار صحيفة” هايوم “التي يملكها الملياردير اليهودي الأمريكي شيلدون أديلسون والمنافسة لصحيفة يديعوت أحرونوت، من خلال تشريعات وطرق أخرى، والمقابل أن يتم تخفيف لهجة يديعوت أحرونت ضد نتنياهو، هذه القضية أيضا ينكرها نتنياهو بقوله، إن تلك المحادثات لم تكن جادة بل كانت محاولة لكشف النوايا، وأن الاتهامات الموجهة لا أساس لها من الصحة، كما ويتهم نتنياهو في القضية 4000، وهي منح مزايا تنظيمية لشركة بيزك للاتصالات مقابل تغطية إيجابية عنه وعن زوجته سارة على موقع إخباري يديره الرئيس السابق للشركة، كل هذه القضايا تجعل نتنياهو لا يفكر إطلاقا في التنازل عن كرسيه المتوج بالحصانة التي تحميه من أي حكم ما دام في السلطة، أو كسب الوقت حتى يستطيع الالتفاف حول القضايا واو تميعها مع مرور الوقت.
السبب الثاني فكر نتنياهو الإقصائي، هو رفض نتنياهو قبول الفلسطينيين في أي مشروع تعايشي وتحت أي مظلة سياسية أو مبادرة، بجانب إصراره طوال السنوات الماضية على تصوير الصراع الفلسطيني الإسرائيلي صراعا بين الحضارتين الإسلامية والغربية، فقد كان نتنياهو من أوائل من تبنوا مقولة “صراع الحضارات” وأعاد توظيفها سياسيا بعد هجمات 11 سبتمبر/ أيلول 2001م، وعلى هذا الأساس حشد ناخبيه ومؤيديه تحت شعار “يهودية الدولة”، وأطلق العنان للتطرف اليهودي، وأعلن بوضوح رفض حل الدولتين وأي عملية سلام مع الفلسطينيين، فمنذ أن شكل حكومته في 2009م، شن نتنياهو موجات من الحملات السياسية والإعلامية التحريضية ضد الفلسطينيين، مطالبا إياهم والعرب بالاعتراف بإسرائيل كدولة يهودية، كما صرح مرارا بأن إسرائيل لا تريد أن يكون العرب مواطنين أو رعايا فيها، وهذا بحد ذاته يضفي على قادم الأيام حروبا وتوترات لا يستهان بها وقد تطول بمرور الوقت وتعظم التكلفة مع المحيط المعادي والذي ما زال يتطور مع استمرار العدوان على قطاع غزة والضفة الغربية وتطور الاحداث شمال فلسطين المحتلة المشتعلة مع حزب الله اللبناني، وإغلاق باب المندب من اليمنيين، وازدياد قوة المعادلة الصفرية مع الكيان الإسرائيلي واستحالة التعايش معه بالمنطقة.
السبب الثالث تشكيل حكومة الخراب، بدأ صعود اليمين على الساحة الإسرائيلية منذ سبعينيات القرن الماضي، وأخذ مكانته في الكنيست الإسرائيلي والحكومة منذ انتخابات عام 2003م، إلا أن الحكومة الحالية تعتبر استثنائية عن سابقاتها، وذلك بضم تحالف مكون من عدة أحزاب يهودية دينية هي “حزب الليكود” و “حزب شاس” و “حزب الصهيونية الدينية” برئاسة بتسلئيل سموتريتش، الذي انتقد ديفيد بن غوريون، بعدم طرد جميع العرب في عام 1948 م، و “حزب يهودت هتوراه ” وحزب “عوتسماه يهوديت ” برئاسة إيتمار بن جفير، الذي كان يحتفظ في منزله بصورة لمتطرف يهودي قتل 29 فلسطينيا بالرصاص في مسجد، حيث تم تحالفهم تحت مظلة الأيدولوجيا المتشابهة، بقيادة رئيس الوزراء بنيامين نتنياهو في حكومة واحدة، بهدف الإطاحة بمعسكر اليسار، وتعزيز الجهود اليمينية، من خلال تشكيل الحكومة الأكثر يمينية في تاريخ إسرائيل، والأكثرها انفصالا عن الماضي من حيث مدى تطرفهم، ومدى التزامهم الصريح بتقويض المؤسسات الديمقراطية ومساعي ضم الضفة الغربية المحتلة، وتعارض إقامة دولة فلسطينية وتدعم توسيع المستوطنات الإسرائيلية في الضفة الغربية، التي يعتبرها معظم المجتمع الدولي غير شرعية وتهدم فكرة لحل الدولتين.
هدم الأعمدة
العمود الأول خسارة الحلفاء
أن تكون عدوا لأمريكا قد يكون أمرا خطيرا، لكن أن تكون صديقا هو أمر قاتل! “هنري كيسنجر” بهذه العبارة كان يقصد كيسنجر كل حلفاء أميركية إلا إسرائيل التي لم تكن أن ضمن توقعاته ولا حساباته، والسبب في ذلك أن مصالحهم دائما متشابهة ومتناغمة إلى حد يصعب تبيان الفروق بينهما خصوصا في منطقة الشرق الأوسط، وبسبب تأثير اللوبي الصهيوني داخل اميركا، ولكن تضارب المصالح جاء مع نية نتنياهو استمرار المعارك مع الفلسطينيين بعد 7 من أكتوبر، ومع احتمال توسيعها إقليميا، وهذا ما ترفضه الإدارة الأمريكية ويرفضه الشارع الأمريكيين اللذين أصبح غالبيتهم معترضين على الحرب حسب استطلاعات الرأي الأخيرة، ورفض الإدارة الأمريكية جاء بسبب تطورات الحرب العسكرية مع روسيا في أوكرانيا والحرب الاقتصادية والاستراتيجية مع الصين التي من المحتمل أن تتحول إلى عسكرية، فأعداء أميركا تنظر لحرب إسرائيل وانغماس أميركا بها، من أعظم الفرص لكسب الوقت في تدعيم خططهم ضد الولايات المتحدة، ناهيك عن أزمة الأسلحة العالمية التي تفاقمت مع استمرار الحرب في أوكرانيا والتي استنزفت معظم مخازن السلاح لدى بعض الدول، وبداية ظهور العجز والبطء في عمليات التصنيع، وتوسع الصراع خاصة بعد اقفال اليمنيين البحر الأحمر، وسعى نتنياهو الى توسيع الصراع مع المحيط من خلال ضرب القنصلية الإيرانية بدمشق، ليدخل الحلفاء معه في الحرب وكسب القوى الامريكية لحسم ملفات القديمة واطالة الحرب، وهذا ما ترفضه الولايات المتحدة .
إلا أن خسارة الحلفاء لم تكن فقط لهذه الأسباب، بل تعده الإصرار الإسرائيلي على النهج الدموي في عملية إعادة هيبتها المكسورة بعد 7 أكتوبر، والذي أفضى لنزول الأغلبية الغربية من مركب الدعم المطلق لإسرائيل، شعوبا وحكومات، وذلك من خلال المظاهرات والوقفات الشعبية وأعمال التضامن المختلفة، وشلال التعاطف مع الشعب الفلسطيني الرافض للعدوان ولا سيما في وسائل التواصل الاجتماعي، ليتبعه حالات التنديد البرلمانية والسياسية العالمية، وحتى من داخل الكونجرس الأمريكي، الذي اطلاق دعوات عدم تصدير السلاح ومعاقبة إسرائيل، من اعلى الشخصيات البرلمانية، خصوصا بعد دخول إسرائيل لقفص الاتهام بالإبادة الجماعية في محكمة لاهاي، تلك التهمة التي لا ترغب أي من الدول ان تحمل وزر دعم الدولة المتهمة بالابادة، خاصة مع استمرار الحرب وعدم وجود خطة واضحة للحرب، او لما بعد الحرب وتوافق عليها الدول الحليفة، الا ان الضبابية المتجسدة في فكر نتنياهو اغاضت الحلفاء وشلت تفكريهم في محاولة فهمه، خاصة بعد استمرار نتنياهو برفض دعاوي وقف اطلاق النار وتبني خيار القوة المفرطة على المدنيين التي تساهم بتحويل اسرائيل لدولة منبوذة حتى بين حلفائها، خاصة بعد قرار مجلس الامن الأخير الذي لم يأت على هوا نتنياهو الذي يغامر بخسارة حلفائه الذين لا يستطيع اكمال الحرب من غيرهم، لينقلب مشهد بداية الحرب من عناق بايدن لينتنياهو وارسال حاملات الطائرات لإغاثة إسرائيل راسا على عقب.
العمود الثاني الانقسامات الداخلية
يهودية الدولة التي ينادي بها نتنياهو لم تكن محل اجماعي داخل المجتمع الإسرائيلي لأنها تمثل فكر اليمين المتطرف الذي انقلب على فكر المؤسسين الأوائل في بناء مشروعهم، غير أنه يضع المجتمع الإسرائيلي العلماني في خانة المعاداة المتوقعة والتي مهدت لفتح قضايا لم تكن تطرح من قبل مثل قضية التعديلات القضائية التي سعت الحكومة لتمريها لصالح مغانم لا يستفيد منها إلا اليمين المتطرف، والتي قسمت المجتمع الإسرائيلي بكافة فئاته حتى وصلت لمرحة التظاهر في الشوارع بالألف وحالة من التمرد في صفوف الجيش، بالإضافة لقضية قانون إعفاء الحريديم المتشددين اليهود الذين يمثلون 13 % من الجمهور الإسرائيلي والذين لا يتجندون حاليا في الجيش، الجيش الذي يشكو القلة في العتاد البشري حاليا ومع احتمال اتساع الصراع الذي سوف يزيد الحاجة لهم، والتي لا تستطيع الحكومة تجاوزها الا من خلال تجنيد شبان سن التجنيد من “الحريديم”، والبالغ عددهم 66 ألف شاب سنويا، بحسب معطيات المؤسسة الأمنية، هذه القضية والتي يتوقع أن تكون لها ردة فعل في الشارع الإسرائيلي أكبر من قضية التعديلات القضائية على المجتمع الإسرائيلي والجيش الذي يعاني من النقص التعداد البشري فيه، الآن أن الساحة الإسرائيلية تغلي أيضا من خلال قضية الأسرى الذين في يد المقاومة منذ أكثر من 6 أشهر والذي مات بعضهم بسبب الإسراء العنيد من نتنياهو على تجاهلهم ومحاولة الحصول على صورة نصر ولو بالقوة غير المجدية.
العمود الثالث طول معركة واستهلاك الجيش والاقتصاد
لم تخض إسرائيل حربا كالتي تخوضان الآن ليس ذلك بسبب الخسائر بقدر ما هو بسبب طولها امدها التي اطالها العناد المتجسد في شخص نتنياهو، الذي لم يستطع لجم قوة المقاومة على طول شهور الحرب التي كبدت الاقتصادي تكلفة عالية وخسائر باهظة، سواء لجهة تكلفة تمديد الخدمة للجنود النظاميين والاحتياط، إضافة إلى كلفة الخسارة في المشاريع التجارية والسياحية والممتلكات تقدر ب مليارات الدولارات، خاصة بعد توسع الصراع من خلال دخول جبهات اسناد خاصة من اليمنيين الذي شلت مرفأ “إيلات” الرئيسي والحيوي التي أعلنت إدارته عن نيتها إقالة نحو نصف عمالها، والتي أدت إلى هبوط في حجم النشاط وإيرادات المرفأ بأكثر من 80 %، بالإضافة الى المرافى التي تعد من ضمن مدى صواريخ المقاومة والتي أجبرت هي أيضا على الاغلاق، كما أصيب قطاع الزراعة، بأضرار جسيمة؛ فالعمال لا يمكنهم الاقتراب من البساتين، التي لم يخسر أصحابها فقط ثمار الموسم الحالي، بل وحتى المواسم المقبلة أيضا، وبقاء نحو أكثر من 100 ألف نسمة يعيشون خارج منازلهم، والذين اصبحوا الان ليسوا من سكان تلك المناطق المتضررة، حتى لو توقفت الحرب، وإسوة بشمالي فلسطين تعيش المستوطنات جنوبي فلسطين المحتلة نفس الواقع وربما اكثر، الا ان الخسارة الأشد فتكا بكيان الاحتلال كانت في المؤسسة العسكرية الأكثر تطورا بالمنطقة ونووية القدرة، ولا أقصد هنا الخسائر المادية، رغم كثرتها بل خسارة الهيبة التي كانت محل احتفاء عند الداخل الإسرائيلي، والتي تزداد انكسارا مع طول أيام الحرب دون تحقيق الأهداف، كما اتهم نتنياهو بدعم حماس لأسقاط حلم الدول الفلسطينية، الا ان الواقع الحالي اظهر ان نتنياهو خسر حتى هذه الورقة، هذا أن صحت تلك المزاعم بوجود هذه لاستراتيجيته، بل على العكس فهناك من يرى أن الشعب الفلسطيني أصبح يملك نفسا النظرة لمعالم الصراع، والخيار الأمثل في تحرير الأرض والمقدسات، ألا وهي المقاومة…
خاتما
ما يزيد الإيمان يقينا بحتمية زوال المشروع الإسرائيلي ليست النبوآت التي يدعمها اليهود المتدينون والعلمانيون والسياسيون الذين يخشون لعنة العقد الثامن الذي تكرر فيه زوال دولهم، بل وصول شخصية استثنائية تملك نظرة إدارية لزمن الخلاص وإقامة الدولة اليهودية الخالصة، ولكنه يسعى للخراب من خلال التحالف مع التيارات الدينية المتطرفة، بعد اكتشف نتنياهو قوة الشعارات الدينية وقوة الحريديم، وجعل المجتمع المدني اليميني الظهير السياسي الأول لحزب الليكود ويشكل بعدها حكومة الخراب الحالية، التي تحزب معها ضد اليسار العلماني، واحتكار العسكرة والسياسة والأمن والتفاوض على الأسرى، انتهاج خيار تجاهل المطالب الداخلية، والعناد الحالي في انتهاج الخيار العسكري الدموي المرفوض حتى من حلفائه، والذي يذكرنا بشخصيات أدت بها طباعها وأفعالها نحو الخراب والتدمير لدولهم، رغم كم الإنجازات التي سبقت عام الدمار لدولهم، أمثال هتلر ونابليون، الذين أفنوا مستقبل بلادهم في سبيل تحصيل المكاسب الشخصية أو لاعتبارات معنوية لا قيمة لها، حيث باتت الهزيمة التي مني بها جيش الاحتلال في 7 أكتوبر/ تشرين الأول، البداية لتأرجح الأعمدة التي كانت تحمل دعائم الدولة، واصبح نتنياهو رئيس الوزراء الأسوء لإسرائيل، بعدما كان أغلبية الإسرائيليين تَعُدّ غولدا مائير المرشحة الأولى لهذا اللقب الكئيب، بسبب الفشل الاستخباري الذي أدّى إلى حرب يوم الغفران، الا ان نتنياهو كسب هذا اللقب ومازال رئيس للوزراء مع صلاحيات قد تقود لحتمية الانهيار، كالذي انتهجها شمشوم في الرواية التاريخية المزعومة والذي اختار الموت مع أعدائه على أن يسلم للواقع الذي لم يعجبه ولم يرضه.
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