By Mohamed Harees –

Lukman Harees

‘Don’t Wonder Why people are capable of committing horrible crimes. Wonder why people stay silent and protect them’ ~ Anonymous 

The world is watching a genocide unfold in real time. As professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies Raz Segal argues, what Israel has unleashed on Gaza is “a textbook case of genocide.” More than this, the Israeli government is doing little to conceal it. “Israel’s genocidal assault on Gaza is quite explicit, open and unashamed,” Segal writes. “Perpetrators of genocide usually do not express their intentions so clearly.”

Western governments, led by the US, are fully complicit in the bloodshed. Biden, the entire US Senate, and the overwhelming majority of the House of Representatives have all voiced their full-throated support for Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza. Only a handful have dissented, most notably, Palestinian American Rashida Tlaib. All the historic powers of Euro-American colonialism have lined up behind Israel. The western European imperialist powers have parroted Biden’s talking points and turned to repression against their Palestinian, Arab, and Muslim populations.

Both the prominent Western leaders and its Western media have been vociferous in reiterating the right of Israel to defend itself while oblivious to the disproportionate military response of the Zionist regime to inflict collective punishment on Gazan population, in violation of international law. The leaders of the UK, US, France, Germany and Italy released a joint statement expressing “steadfast and united support” for the state of Israel and fell silent when thousands are being killed by Israeli bombs on the guise of defending itself. In fact, US’ Joe Biden, UK’s Rishi Sunak and French Macron did not lose time to visit Israel and show their support to  Bibi to do as they deemed fit. Anyone going against this official policy were dealt with an iron fist. A ruling party ministerial aide in the UK Paul Bristow was sacked over call for Gaza ceasefire while Labour MP Andy McDonald was suspended after he spoke at a pro Palestinian rally. Even UK Opposition leader Labour’s Keir Starmer’s response in an interview to LBC’s Nick Ferrari fell in line with this official pro Israeli policy, which incidentally led to resignation of many Labour councillors. He was asked if he thought the siege on Gaza denying water, food and medical supplies was justified, and he said ‘Yes’.”

Starmer’s inhumane response reminded me of what Former US Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright said when asked about the adverse effects of the sanctions in Iraq. Interviewer asked, ‘We have heard that half a million [Iraqi] children have died. I mean, that is more children than died in Hiroshima” “And, you know, is the price worth it?” Albright answered “I think that is a very hard choice”, “but the price, we think, the price is worth it. With this response, Albright showed that she sees innocent Iraqi children as nothing more than disposable fodder in a conflict between the US administration and the Iraqi leadership. She demonstrated, with no room left for any doubt, that she had no humanity – that she cannot and shall never be described as “a force for goodness, grace, and decency”. This is the similar thinking the Western leaders have been pursuing by condoning implicitly the collective punishment of the Gazan people by Israel in the latest conflict which has already taken many thousand lives.     

After Hamas’ surprise attack on Israel on Oct. 7, Israel has been besieging and bombarding the Gaza Strip, worsening a humanitarian crisis. The Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza released the list last Thursday, documenting the deaths of more than 7,000 Palestinians, including nearly 3,000 children, since the war began on October 7. Jo Biden has cast doubt over the figures, whose remarks according to human rights activists not only seem to question Palestinians’ humanity “even in death”, but also outrageous, irresponsible and flat-out racist and anti-Palestinian. Despite the world opinion for a ceasefire in the Gaza and resumption of supply of essentials to these suffering 2.2 Mn in the ‘largest concentration camp in the world’ was duly expressed not only in the resolution in the UNGA recently, (but effectively vetoed by the US), but also in the slogans mouthed by millions all over the world including in the West, the open licence given by the West has emboldened the Israelis to commit war crimes at its own discretion. The overwhelming support for the resolution, albeit watered-down and non-binding, has though demonstrated Israeli isolation within the international community. But the Israeli authorities ignored it altogether, clearly moved by the principle of “the world says what it wants, Israel does what it must”. As Palestinian-American poet and physician Fady Joudah put it, their response is worse than collective punishment of civilians: “It is collective death.”

Israel is clear in its intentions with regard to its response. That the worst is to come is not supposition, but evident from the public pronouncements of Israel’s political leaders. They have made no effort to disguise their intentions, and thus they have left their cheerleaders with nowhere to hide, no ignorance to plead. “The emphasis is on damage, not accuracy,” declared the Israel Defence Forces (IDF). “Gaza will eventually turn into a city of tents,” said one IDF official, adding, “There will be no buildings.” Israel’s economy minister, Nir Barkat, told ABC News that hostages and civilian casualties will be secondary to destroying Hamas, “even if takes a year”. Yet others referred to Gazans as animals and will be treated as such. Despite this, the fact that the Western leaders are falling over one another to express support to Israel to ‘defend itself’ smacks of complicity. Groups of Lawyers in both US and the UK have already expressed their intention to take actions against those governments for being complicit under international law for encouraging Israel to unfold genocide of the Palestinian people.

Besides, there appear to be one international law for Ukraine and another for Palestine, in the eyes of the West and their double standards are telling. The major issue with the West and its mainstream Media on Israel and Palestine is that it omits context. George Orwell, when discussing propaganda in general terms, likened it to a clock starting and stopping. For many Western outlets, the moment of a Hamas strike is when the clock starts, so to speak, it was simply an “unprovoked attack” by Hamas that emerged from nowhere. Even UN secretary-general said recently ‘Hamas attacks on Israel did not happen in a vacuum’ which earned the ire of the Israelis. Critics say that this becomes the sole focus of the Western media’s attention, framing Hamas in simple terms as the sole antagonist, with all wider and immediate political context removed. 

Recently, UK Channel 4 News journalist Cathy Newman spoke to Palestinian Ambassador to the UK Husam Zomlot immediately after she interviewed an Israeli Likud politician. The very first question Newman asked Zomlot was if he would condemn Hamas’ actions. The Fatah envoy refused to answer the question, explaining: “The business of always being obsessed with blaming the victim, the occupied, the colonised, the besieged, when in fact I didn’t see you asking her [the Likud politician] to condemn … with your first question the killing of an entire family [in Gaza] that your reporter just mentioned.” The question Newman asked is one that is often presented to Palestinians in the Western media. In the past, as hundreds of Palestinians have been killed by Israeli air strikes, Western media outlets have focused on Hamas rockets — even at times when they have killed no one. The BBC Newsnight interviewer Kirsty Wark was also blasted as “heartless”, “rude” and “unprofessional” for a similar recent interview with Palestinian ambassador Zomlot.

As analysts have pointed out, there is a myriad of factors that occurred before the media “started the clock”. Once the situation is resolved, such as in the past when Israel has stopped bombarding Gaza, the clock is stopped again by the media and focus goes elsewhere. This creates a timeline of events that begins with Palestinian provocation and ends with Israeli retribution. The context of Israel, as a nuclear-armed US-supported regional superpower that illegally occupies, besieges and carries out daily documented crimes against Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, is completely erased. In fact, Ambassador Zomlot cleverly exposed the de-politicised narrative when the presenter in the aforesaid interview continued to push for him to denounce and focus on Hamas for taking hostages. He said, “Do you know, Cathy, Israel has taken 2 million people [referring to the siege on Gaza] hostage for 16 years … yet there is no outcry … quite ironically it’s hostages taking hostages”.

Following the attack, UK’s The Guardian led with an editorial referring to “the murderous rampage carried out by Hamas” while The Economist referred to “the bloodthirsty attack by Hamas carried out by Hamas”. While such language may or may not be appropriate, the fact is that it would never be used by Western media outlets to describe Israeli crimes of a similar or even worse magnitude. These outlets would never describe Israel killing thousands of civilians in Gaza as a “murderous Israeli rampage” or a “bloodthirsty Israeli attack”. The skewed dynamic portrayed by the Western media is that when Israel is bombing houses, hospitals and schools in Gaza it has a “right to defend itself”, but any act of violence by a Palestinian is “terrorism”. 

The pro-Israel biases of the West and its Media are considered to be reflective of the wider political association of Israel with Western governments and are thus endemic. While it’s impossible to calculate the effects of these alleged biases, critics argue that they wittingly or unwittingly aid Israel in getting away with crimes that are not even recognised as crimes. The pro-Israel bias remains systematic, a feature, not a bug in mainstream Western media. Palestinians, even those not affiliated with Hamas, are asked to condemn alleged crimes carried out by other Palestinians, a while politician who is a member of the ruling party of Israel isn’t asked to condemn the alleged crimes carried out by Israel.

It is also interesting to note that calls for a humanitarian corridor or an escape route for Palestinians from Gaza as war on Gaza escalates have rightly drawn a blunt reaction from Arab neighbours. Both Egypt and Jordan have warned against Palestinians being forced off their land. It could spark a new wave of permanent displacement from land where Palestinians want to build a future state. It is important that the Gazan people remain steadfast and present on their land. For Palestinians, the idea of leaving or being driven out of land where they want to forge a state carries echoes of the “Nakba“, or “catastrophe”, when many Palestinians were forced from their homes during the 1948 war that accompanied Israel’s creation. This is an Israeli ruse and a prelude to ethnic cleansing, forced displacement, basically expulsion, where it would be expected then that they just never would go back.

In this context, the response of Arab governments in particular and Muslim world leaders in general to Israel’s war on Gaza, like their response to its previous four wars on the besieged Palestinian enclave, have been shameful – feeble and flimsy, to say the least. Meek words of condemnation will not stop the Israeli genocide of Palestinians in Gaza. Caught by surprise, Arab leaders sprung into action only after the Arab public made it clear it would not tolerate Israeli atrocities against Gaza’s 2.3 million Palestinians. Although Palestine has been and remains the foremost Arab issue, speaking up is all they have done, mostly in babble and cliches. Israel knows that the Arab states are too divided, impotent and indifferent to Palestinian suffering to respond adequately. Some are already cohabiting with the Zionist State both economically and diplomatically, including some Organization of Islaimic Cooperation (OIC) leadership states. There was as usual a condemnation of Israel by the OIC as well. Turkey has made some stronger noises, but it needs to be seen whether it will walk the talk. It is shameful that Arab and Muslim leaders not coming together more strongly to end the genocide in Gaza, come what may and use their resource power to force the super powers to deter Israeli aggression in Palestine. 

There is however optimism in the horizon. The world has however risen up, with tens of thousands of protesters rallying across the Middle East and in parts of Asia, Europe and the United States in support of Palestinians and condemnation of Israel as it intensified its strikes on Gaza in retaliation for Hamas attacks. The world need to understand that the likes of Hamas attacks on civilians, however abhorrent it was and needs to be condemned, is the result of accumulated fury and hatred over four decades, where the Palestinians had no hope to find a solution”. Equally, the continuous Israeli aggression over decades need to be condemned as well. The Israeli attack on Gaza has reached the level of a massacre bordering a genocide, and the silence of the international community on what is happening is a shame for humanity. As Mandela said there is no peace without peace in Palestine. Peace would “only be possible with the creation of an independent, sovereign and geographically integrated, Palestinian state, according to the 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as its capital”.

Palestine is a line in the sand. It is the critical test of global solidarity in this moment, in the same way that opposition to the war in Vietnam was for an earlier generation. Freedom for Palestine is bound up with the collective liberation of us all. It raises the prospect of a transformed world in which human lives and the planet on which we live become priorities, rather than the perpetuation of fossil capitalism and its imperial war machines. Until Palestine is free none of us are free.