Israel's founding was a ruthless campaign to displace Palestinians and draw defensible borders, but the world has changed, and Israel and its Western allies refuse to understand that this kind of violence will have enormous costs for them. They will either be forced to comply with the international law they claim to embody, or they may end up denying this right, and in both cases the results will be disastrous for their legitimacy and for their interests as well.

This paragraph almost sums up the findings of researcher Peter Harling, founder of the Synaps Research Center in Beirut, through his discussion in an interview with the “Media Part” website about the dangers of the Israeli war on Gaza spreading to other borders, and the dire consequences that will result from that on the legitimacy of Israel and its supporters. .

The interview, conducted by Joseph Confafro, began with the question: What do you call what is happening before our eyes in Gaza? The researcher - who has worked for a long time in the Arab world - responded that the whole problem with this war is that it mixes different records. It is the war against terrorism, it is collective revenge, it is the war of civilizations, the humanitarian crisis and the temptations of genocide. This means that everyone can interpret it in their own private way, allowing all excesses.

What is strange - as the researcher says - is that we are facing an old, familiar and relatively easy-to-define conflict. It is a conflict on the ground between two parties with unequal powers, and its many “rounds” have changed little, which has helped bury the peace process, so that the search for a viable solution becomes less. Importance.

Gaza precedent

The writer agrees that this ancient conflict has been reshaped through the perspective of the war on terrorism as the easy way out, especially since “terrorism” can describe acts of violence that aim primarily to intimidate the opponent, weaken his morale, or push him to commit crimes in return, but in this way the concept applies to many military actions that are not limited to “terrorist groups.”

When asked: Have we entered the closing stage? The expert responds that Gaza is about to remain a gaping wound in the middle of the Mediterranean, because it is very difficult to imagine how the humanitarian crisis can be resolved without rebuilding this now largely destroyed area, because any reconstruction process already includes a governance formula acceptable to Israel, otherwise We expect permanent forms of occupation and thus guerrilla warfare, security measures, endless negotiations, and perhaps the return of settlement.

Gaza is also about to set a precedent that Israel will likely reproduce one day in Lebanon and the West Bank, depending on the international consequences of this comprehensive bombing strategy. If it remains inexpensive for Israel, it will repeat the same scenario.

Regarding the extension of the war to the Middle East, Harling believes that the possibilities of a “regional conflagration” are exaggerated, noting that the main risk of escalation at this stage relates to Lebanon, where Hezbollah has long been preparing for a decisive war with Israel, but does not want to launch it. In the current context.

The positions of the Arabs and the West

As for the position of the Arab governments, the researcher summarizes it in that they are not interested in the Palestinian issue like the majority of governments in the West, because for them it is a lost cause, a remnant of the past, and a distraction from other, more realistic and positive priorities. On this position, the American administration is betting on resuming the normalization process between Israel and Saudi Arabia when the Gaza war ends.

As long as the suffering of the Palestinians mobilizes Arab public opinion only during crises, Arab governments can be content with rhetorical positions while waiting for feelings to subside. But the real question for the researcher is, “Will Israel’s position in this war change?”, which is not impossible if the movement towards more atrocities.

When asked about US President Joe Biden’s support for Israel and that it could lead to his loss in the upcoming elections, the researcher placed the matter in a broader context of hysterical behavior, as he described it, such as Britain’s deportation of immigrants to Rwanda, the European Union’s funding of Libyan militias that torture and blackmail the population, and Europe’s weariness of war. In Ukraine, German institutions denounce Jews who criticize some Israeli policies. This is due to the absence of political structure, such as ideology, real political parties, and respect for institutions, morals, and culture.

In his lecture, Harling considered that the Middle East is “our immediate neighborhood in the Mediterranean region, which represents the true crucible of our identity, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict forms an integral part of our European history, and therefore its path cannot help but resonate strongly in our societies.”

But the Middle East is also - according to the researcher - a region that Western governments would like to see as a foreign region, and they also tend to understand it through two contradictory perceptions that obscure its reality. The first perception is bleak, depicting it as regions suffering from conflicts that cannot be resolved or overcome, but rather must be contained or ignored. .

The other vision is very optimistic: they are places of hope where we can talk about progress, innovation, finance, investments, profits, youth, sports, energy, and ideal integration into globalization as in Dubai and Saudi Arabia, solar infrastructure projects in Tunisia, and avocado fields in Morocco.

As for the Middle East that truly concerns us - according to the researcher’s expression - it is the East in which half a billion of our helpless neighbors live, and in which we must explore what connects us and what unites us with them, especially since the Arab world is full of dynamics that we also know in Europe, and the ambitions of its societies. These are our ambitions.

Source: Mediapart