The Zionist Project in the Balance of History: Is Israel the Root of Crises in the Middle East?

Since the end of World War II, the West Asian region has not known peace from the burden of armed conflicts in which Israel has been a constant party. Since the Nakba of 1948, wars have followed, shaping a tragic reality, where the common denominator in most of these confrontations is direct or indirect Israeli involvement to strengthen the occupation's influence in the region.

In 1956, this aggression manifested in the Tripartite Aggression on Egypt, where Israel allied with Britain and France in response to the nationalization of the Suez Canal. Although international intervention halted the campaign, Israeli intentions to change Arab regimes and weaken rising regional powers had revealed their early face.

1967 marked a strategic turning point when Israel invaded the remaining Palestinian territories and occupied vast areas of Egypt, Jordan, and Syria. This war, which lasted only a few days, doubled the area of occupation and established a new colonial reality from which the region still suffers today.

Military ambitions did not stop there. In 1968, Israel launched an attack on Jordan in the Battle of Karameh with the aim of eliminating Palestinian resistance camps. Despite the military failure of the attack, it reflected Israeli determination to pursue the resisting Palestinian presence even outside the borders of the occupied land.

During the 1970s and 1980s, the occupation unleashed its wrath on Lebanon, culminating in the invasion of the capital Beirut in 1982. This invasion led to the establishment of a security belt in the south and the creation of a client authority under the name 'South Lebanon Army,' before the Lebanese resistance succeeded in liberating the land and repelling the occupation and its agents.

Historical readings indicate that Israel was the biggest beneficiary of the first Gulf War between Iraq and Iran in the 1980s. The war, which drained the resources of two powerful countries, contributed to neutralizing two potential threats to the Zionist entity and ignited sectarian tensions that continue to tear apart the fabric of the region.

In the 1990s, with Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, a new chapter of interventions serving Israeli interests began to emerge. Decision-making circles in Tel Aviv considered that Iraq, despite its exhaustion, still posed an existential threat to their project, which led them to continuous incitement against Saddam Hussein's regime.

Israeli incitement reached its peak by pushing the neoconservative administration in the United States to invade Iraq in 2003. That war was based on flimsy pretexts about weapons of mass destruction, but the real goal was to dismantle Iraqi power and ensure Israel's qualitative superiority in the region.

In parallel with these regional wars, the systematic Israeli war against the Palestinian people continued through policies of displacement and arrest. Since the Nakba, land confiscation and settlement construction have not stopped, in an attempt to erase Palestinian identity and replace the original inhabitants with settlers.

The Iranian Revolution of 1979 represents the most prominent challenge to the Zionist project, as Tehran transformed from a strategic ally of the Shah to a key supporter of the resistance. This shift changed the balance of power, especially with Iran's support for resistance movements in Lebanon and Palestine, which disrupted Israeli and Western calculations.

After neutralizing most Arab countries through peace agreements or secret understandings, Iran remained the only steadfast regional adversary. With the failure of internal sabotage attempts, Israel began pushing for a direct military confrontation, exploiting the presence of American administrations that fully align with Zionist demands.

Sources reported that the Israeli Mossad played a pivotal role in convincing the White House of the feasibility of an attack on Iran, claiming that targeting the leadership would lead to a popular revolution. However, the reality after two months of the outbreak of the confrontation shows a complex global crisis with no end in sight.

Today, questions are increasing in Western societies about the nature of Zionism and the roles governments play in supporting Israel. Many have come to realize that the 'Palestinian problem' is merely a symptom of a larger disease, which is the settler-colonial project that seeks absolute hegemony.

Israeli vision does not stop at the borders of Palestine but extends to include the ambitions of 'Greater Israel' from the Nile to the Euphrates. The extremist statements of some Israeli politicians reveal expansionist intentions that may target countries such as Turkey and Pakistan, making Israel the central problem threatening global peace.

The real problem lies in the Zionist idea, which has been translated into a state with a racist colonial project whose goal is to dominate the entire region.