Did Israel defeat us?!

In his recent meetings, Netanyahu tried to convince his audience, the region, and the world that Israel has regained everything it lost after October 7 of last year. He issued threats, sent angry and harsh messages, and painted for himself the image of a victorious, capable hero, and perhaps a spiritual leader, not just a political one.

The question is: Does Israel think it has triumphed over the entire region?! Has it triumphed over its resistance and moderates, its neutrals and its accomplices, its far and near, its poor and rich?!

Does Israel believe that with the killing, assassination, bulldozing, starvation, emptying and destruction it has done, it has ended its crisis and dilemma?! And that with the surplus power it possesses and the surplus support, silence and solidarity from allies and friends, it has obtained the security, stability and peace it wanted?!

Does Israel really believe that with this stupidity, stubbornness and brutality, it will reserve a quiet place and a remote corner where it can obtain free recognition and normalization because of the recent image it has painted as an usurping, crazy and resentful entity?!

The question is: After about a year since the start of this violent wave of killing, displacement and aggression, and after Israel clashed with all parties in the world, its international bodies and civil organizations, and violated all norms and laws, can it be said that Israel is about to impose a security settlement on the Palestinian and Lebanese people and the rest of the Arab and Islamic region?!

Do you really think that it can do that by reoccupying the Gaza Strip in some way?! And do you really think that it can extract recognition from the region and the world of its control over the Strip, partial or complete control?!

What is being said about the generals’ plan of emptying, starving and besieging the northern Gaza Strip is nothing but the hateful occupation in its worst form, and remaining in the Netzarim and Philadelphi axes and the Rafah crossing is nothing but a reproduction of the occupation and the besiegement once again.

Not only that. Israel truly believes that it can get rid of two major strategic threats forever: Hezbollah in the north and Hamas in the south. It also believes that it can implicate Iran, weaken it, besiege it, strip it of its nuclear project, or stir up unrest and strife within it, thus threatening its ruling regime. Israel believes that through the image of anger, madness, and killing, it can regain everything it has lost. Not only that, but it also believes that it can impose its security settlement, as we said, and the security settlement is a prelude to changing the Middle East, as Netanyahu says. The new Middle East that Israel wants or is working to establish includes not the establishment of a Palestinian state but rather reoccupation, and includes increasing the area of Israel in the north and south if it can, and includes demographic displacements, and includes a network of roads and transportation including railways, ports and long roads that cut across geography to create a new phase, and the new Middle East also includes Iran without influence, parties without weapons, people without ambition, domesticated groups, and a free peace that does not include rights or aspirations, and the new Middle East that Israel seeks is to be a base and protector of the region and to represent the colonial West in preserving interests and controlling behavior. In short, an unpopular but frightening policeman, a corrupt policeman but he does the job.

By the way, the idea of the New Middle East is not Netanyahu’s brainchild, but rather an old, new idea, of American origin, implemented by the Israelis with success once and failure many times. This vision, for which the region is paying the blood of its sons to prevent or achieve, is a corrupt and invalid vision, characterized by simplification, ignorance and arrogance. It is a gift awarded to an adventurous, obsessive contractor who could not, and will not, be able to accomplish the mission, because the idea of the New Middle East that we dream of is an East in which all its peoples enjoy security, dignity and independence.