Trump’s Wars
Published in El País
(Spain) on 27 January 2018
by Sami Naïr (link to original)
Israel does not need to raise a finger; the president of the United States is its best soldier
No sooner had Donald Trump arrived in Davos than he spit out his poison about the Palestinians. It was not enough to violate international law by declaring Jerusalem the "capital" of Israel, but he now demands total capitulation on the part of the Palestinians, erasing in one stroke more than 60 years of resistance against the occupation and exile of half the Palestinian population. The American real estate magnate, who is currently the world's most powerful man, requires that victims kneel down before the politics of Benjamin Netanyahu in exchange for preserving the Trump administration's aid to the Palestinian Authority.
Not since its creation in 1948 has Israel found such a fervent ally in the White House. The policy implemented after the 1967 war – which turned the U.S. into Israel's main supporter, but at the same time, into an element that could mediate the warrior zeal of the main characters, and even act as safeguard for a balanced peace – has been destroyed in a matter of a few months by Trump’s support of the most hard-line strategy of Israeli fundamentalists. Trump has made the U.S. a direct adversary of the Palestinians. It is an extremely dangerous development that will almost certainly push a new generation of Palestinians into the arms of the fanatics on the Muslim side. More than ever, Trump is firing up hate speech against the U.S. in the Middle East.
His firm beliefs regarding the Arab-Muslim world crisis are the same as that of Benjamin Netanyahu. Both believe these Arab-Muslim countries are excluded from the global technological and political system from every standpoint, severely weakened by the combination of religious regression and military dictatorships and threatened by internal disintegration, both ethnic and confessional; in short, unable to face combined Israeli-American power. Iran, the single country that could speak up, is in the midst of a very harsh geopolitical, economic and denominational conflict with Saudi Arabia, which could escalate into a bloody regional confrontation. From this view arises the cynical and brutal politics of absolute force, which Trump is carrying out in the Middle East. Israel does not need to raise a finger anymore. Gulf oil powers are its allies and Trump is its best soldier.
The outcome is easy to foresee: This will generate a wave of resistance and violence, while confining Israel to a politics that goes completely against its long-term interests. It can be assumed that this country wants to live in peace, and not the kind of peace that can be momentarily imposed by its armed forces, but true peace, the kind through which Israel will be accepted as a legitimate and respectable neighbor because it itself respects the rights of its former enemies. A great Israeli leader like Yitzhak Rabin understood this, as did an astute Egyptian like Anwar Sadat, although both paid the price with their lives, as scapegoats for fanaticism. Undoubtedly, a foolish man like Trump is incapable of such simple and human wisdom. He would rather foster new wars. Once more, we see a cruel demonstration, as in the 1930s, that democracies can also produce monsters.
No sooner had Donald Trump arrived in Davos than he spit out his poison about the Palestinians. It was not enough to violate international law by declaring Jerusalem the "capital" of Israel, but he now demands total capitulation on the part of the Palestinians, erasing in one stroke more than 60 years of resistance against the occupation and exile of half the Palestinian population. The American real estate magnate, who is currently the world's most powerful man, requires that victims kneel down before the politics of Benjamin Netanyahu in exchange for preserving the Trump administration's aid to the Palestinian Authority.
Not since its creation in 1948 has Israel found such a fervent ally in the White House. The policy implemented after the 1967 war – which turned the U.S. into Israel's main supporter, but at the same time, into an element that could mediate the warrior zeal of the main characters, and even act as safeguard for a balanced peace – has been destroyed in a matter of a few months by Trump’s support of the most hard-line strategy of Israeli fundamentalists. Trump has made the U.S. a direct adversary of the Palestinians. It is an extremely dangerous development that will almost certainly push a new generation of Palestinians into the arms of the fanatics on the Muslim side. More than ever, Trump is firing up hate speech against the U.S. in the Middle East.
His firm beliefs regarding the Arab-Muslim world crisis are the same as that of Benjamin Netanyahu. Both believe these Arab-Muslim countries are excluded from the global technological and political system from every standpoint, severely weakened by the combination of religious regression and military dictatorships and threatened by internal disintegration, both ethnic and confessional; in short, unable to face combined Israeli-American power. Iran, the single country that could speak up, is in the midst of a very harsh geopolitical, economic and denominational conflict with Saudi Arabia, which could escalate into a bloody regional confrontation. From this view arises the cynical and brutal politics of absolute force, which Trump is carrying out in the Middle East. Israel does not need to raise a finger anymore. Gulf oil powers are its allies and Trump is its best soldier.
The outcome is easy to foresee: This will generate a wave of resistance and violence, while confining Israel to a politics that goes completely against its long-term interests. It can be assumed that this country wants to live in peace, and not the kind of peace that can be momentarily imposed by its armed forces, but true peace, the kind through which Israel will be accepted as a legitimate and respectable neighbor because it itself respects the rights of its former enemies. A great Israeli leader like Yitzhak Rabin understood this, as did an astute Egyptian like Anwar Sadat, although both paid the price with their lives, as scapegoats for fanaticism. Undoubtedly, a foolish man like Trump is incapable of such simple and human wisdom. He would rather foster new wars. Once more, we see a cruel demonstration, as in the 1930s, that democracies can also produce monsters.
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