Caught in the genocide of Gaza, the destruction of Lebanon and the cancellation of Iran as a rival in the Middle Eastthe Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahuignores international calls for a ceasefire, ignores its Defense Minister, Yoav Gallant, who calls for a truce to free the Israeli hostages, and opts for war as the only way to impose Israel’s hegemony in the region, without taking into account the suffering of Palestinians and Lebanese.
“What is happening in the Middle East indicates that we have lost humanity,” said this Monday the high representative of the European Union for Foreign Policy, Josep Borrellin an interview on Spanish public radio in which he acknowledged that it is taking place in Gaza “one of the most serious humanitarian crises” since World War II.
Borrell called for “coercive measures” on Israel to stop the “dangerous” situation in Gaza, but the United States and Tel Aviv’s European allies, with Germany at the forefront, continue to look aside in the face of the humanitarian catastrophe and, in their double standards, They tear their clothes, but they do not give in when it comes to arming the Jewish Army.
The American president, Joe Bidenagain insisted this Monday on the need to stop the race, by casting his early vote in the US presidential elections in Wilmington (Delaware).
“We need a ceasefire. We need to stop this war. It has to stop, it has to stop, it has to stop,” insisted Biden, to whom Netanyahu has long been making the right case, certain that, despite the Israeli massacres, will not stop providing weapons to Tel Aviv.
Hunger as a weapon
As an echo of Biden’s non-committal words, the United Nations Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Middle East (UNRWA) recalled that in Gaza hunger and food deprivation of the population “are being used as a weapon of war” .
And “nothing can justify starving an entire population,” although this does not end up “moving the consciences of the entire world,” added the UNRWA on the social network
Far-right Israeli ministers Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben Gvir They already defended the use of famine as a weapon of war. In August, Smotrich went so far as to say that it would be “moral” to starve Gaza’s 2.3 million residents until Hamas freed the Israeli hostages.
More than 43,000 Palestinians killed and 101,000 injured
Although malnutrition and hunger, especially among children, is growing day by day in Gaza, those who die from these causes or from infections are not included in the official figures of war deaths. There are already more than 43,000 Palestinians killed in Gaza by Israeli bombs since the war began on October 7 of last year and 101,000 injured.
That the dead officially recorded by the Gaza Ministry of Health (according to the UN itself there are at least 10,000 more under the rubble) are almost half the number of wounded says everything about the ferocity of the massacre carried out by Israel. That 69% of the fatalities are women and children underlines even more its genocidal character.
In the last 48 hours alone, Israeli bombs caused a hundred deaths in Gaza, especially in the north of the Strip, where Israel has been carrying out a new offensive for twenty days, especially on shelters, schools where displaced people are overcrowded, and hospitals.
Netanyahu ignores ceasefire calls
Despite the humanitarian catastrophe, Netanyahu insists on ignoring international calls, not even from his friend Biden, in favor of a truce to save the few dozen Israeli hostages still alive in the Gaza tunnels.
The latest ceasefire proposal has come from Egypt, mediator between Hamas and Israel. That request from the Egyptian president, Abdel Fattah al-Sisidemands a 48-hour truce so that Hamas can release four Israeli hostages, of the 60 that the Islamist group may have in captivity, in exchange for releasing Palestinian prisoners.
Last week, the US Secretary of State, Anthony Blinkentoured the Middle East to moderate the Israeli armed response to Iran for its bombings on October 1, which finally occurred this Saturday, but also to push the Israelis to negotiate the release of Hamas captives.
Although Blinken was relatively successful in preventing Israel from unleashing a disproportionate retaliation on Iran and limiting its attacks to war targets, so far his efforts to get Netanyahu’s envoys to negotiate again with him have not borne fruit. Hamas.
These militias launched a massive incursion from Gaza and into Israeli territory on October 7, 2023, where they murdered 1,200 people and kidnapped 251. In retaliation, Israel attacked and bombed Gaza. After the release of a hundred of those hostages last November, in a one-week truce, negotiations took place, but Netanyahu himself was in charge of blowing them up one by one.
Netanyahu does not contemplate the release of the hostages and Gallant protests
The Israeli prime minister has used the war in Gaza, the invasion of Lebanon and the hostage flag in the hands of Hamas to strengthen his grip on power and try to complete his Middle East road map, which includes the virtual annihilation of Gaza – and its possible annexation to Israel – the destruction of Hezbollah in Lebanese territory and the annulment of Iran as a regional rival.
To do this, Israel has eliminated the leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah, and their successors. The recent assassination of the new Hamas leader, Yahya Sinwar, who succeeded Ismail Haniyaexecuted by Israel in Tehran, had raised hopes that Netanyahu would stop his bloody ordeal and open himself to negotiating a truce. This has not been the case, despite pressure from his American allies and growing doubts in his government and military leadership, as happened with Gallant.
The Defense Minister had had disagreements with Netanyahu for months. In August, Gallant called the prime minister’s goal of achieving an “absolute victory” over Hamas “gibberish.” Netanyahu accused him of following “the anti-Israel narrative.”
The bombing of Lebanon and its invasion on October 1 strengthened Netanyahu, but the gap was not closed. Gallant once again doubts that all these war objectives can be achieved with military pressure alone.
On Sunday, the Israeli military officer warned that war will not conquer everything and that “painful compromises” will be necessary if the hostages and nearly forty bodies that would be in the hands of Hamas are to be returned alive. In a letter to the Government, Gallant stated that the war was being conducted “without a compass”.
According to Gallant, the blows dealt by Israel to the pro-Iran Hezbollah militias in the Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza have left Iran without two key allies in the region. In the case of the Palestinian formation, Gallant assured that Hamas no longer functions as a military network in Gaza and it was necessary to find a political alternative to this organization. In the case of Hezbollah, Israeli attacks have eliminated its military leadership and its ability to massively bomb Israel.
“They are no longer an effective tool” for Iran, said Gallant, who called for new objectives in Israel’s strategy.
Iran in the crosshairs
But Netanyahu does not give in in his unbridled commitment to war to remodel the security system in the Middle East and remembers that the open war front with Iran was not yet closed.
After stressing on Sunday that Saturday’s Israeli attack had damaged the missile production and defense capabilities of IranOn Monday, Netanyahu launched a veiled threat full of mysticism. “Our response to them, precisely in this place, is blunt and clear: light will conquer darkness, good will prevail over evil,” he said in a tribute to the fallen in the Israeli Parliament.
Just over a week before the US presidential elections, Netanyahu was indicating that Tel Aviv’s war objectives were not limited to the annihilation of Hamas, the weakening of Hezbollah or the return of the hostages held in Loop. For Netanyahu, Iran remains the enemy to defeat.
This obstinacy with Iran and the danger that the Middle East could burn into an unlimited conflict if Tehran hits back greatly worries the White House and will mark the foreign policy of the new American president.
That is why Netanyahu is now waiting for events in Washington to know the degree of support he may have in a future conflagration with Tehran. And for the same reason, it prefers to continue applying military pressure in Lebanon and Gaza, the back camps of the confrontation with Iran.
In the realm of the unthinkable
The Spanish Foreign Minister, Manuel Albaresdrew the picture this Monday with precision: a possible open confrontation between Israel and Iran “would take us to the realm of the unthinkable,” if things end up getting out of hand.
Because according to Albares, “nothing indicates that Netanyahu is going to give up his military efforts” or that the war will end soon, hence the need to influence a ceasefire.
Borrell expressed himself in the same way, for whom, although international pressures have moderated the Israeli response to Iran and possibly limit a possible new Iranian retaliation, “the story is not over.”
“As long as the war continues in Gaza and Lebanon, we will live on the brink of a spark that can cause a bigger fire,” said the head of European diplomacy.
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