Netanyahu's Stalingrad on Sea.
We live in a time of chaos where nothing can be believed because much of what we are told by politicians, journalists and the 1% is untrue or at best wishful thinking on their part. They either can't face the facts or need to obscure the truth from us. I think they are afraid that once we comprehend that neoliberalism is as unsinkable as the Titanic, there will be riots at the lifeboat stations.
It wasn't on my end of the world Bingo card. But in many ways, the war against Gaza under the guise of a battle against terror conducted by Netanyahu's government is at best going to be the final nail in the coffin for democracy in the West. And at worst it will propel the region and then the world into an unwinnable war of savage proportions.
Letting Netanyahu conduct this war against Gaza is beyond folly and a recipe for the greatest disaster to ever befall Israel and its western allies. Netanyahu is a fascists, an opportunist, a liar, a coward and his corruption has no bottom. His policies knowingly allowed Hamas to gain greater power because Netanyahu's ultra right-wing politics wanted a proscribed "terrorist" organisation in charge of Palestinians to delegitimise any claims for their nationhood in perpetuity or until the settlers had absorbed the entire West Bank and Gaza was nothing more than a source of under wage labour for Israel.
Netanyahu's war is controversial and divisive because the moment you begin to collectively punish civilians indiscriminately under the guise of a nation's right to self-defence, our rules-based international system of order collapses. That no Western government has condemned Netanyahu's action or demanded a cease-fire makes our government as morally culpable as the current Israeli government conducting this war. There is no escape route for us because we have doubled down on Netanyahu's right to bomb refugee camps under the premise there were "evil-doers" amongst them.
Polite neoliberal society prefers we don't draw parallels to 20th-century wars unless it is to say our side is the light and the other side Nazis. Gaza has become Stalingrad on Sea with conflicting claims of who is the Wehrmacht and who the Red Army. Moreover there are accusations of genocide from human rights organisations and aid agencies that are as credible as the ones levelled at Putin in his war against Ukraine. Despite the carnage, the USA, UK and Canada have no moral courage to call for a ceasefire. There are even attempts to manufacture a consent that Israel is in a war as dire as their war for independence. That is s hard circle to square considering Israel is a nuclear power with the best army in the Mid East unlike in 1948 when they were a a rag tag collection of militias with Lee Enfield’s and Bren Guns.
Neither the news media nor politicians feel comfortable letting us in on the well-known secret that before October 7th, Netanyahu was in a limbo competition with Donald Trump for who is the most corrupt or fascist ultra-right-wing leader in the world. No war can be called just if you your PM is a thug and a fascist.
Netanyahu should have been removed as a leader by his cabinet or the unity government in the same way Neville Chamberlain was dumped as Britain's PM in 1940 by the conservatives after he fucked up the Norwegian campaign. Instead, Israel and our leaders in the Western World doubled down on Netanyahu's vision for both war and peace- ensuring that unimaginable crimes against humanity are being committed in Gaza and the West Bank.
It's an open killing zone where no distinction is made by Israel between civilians and combatants. Medical services are in a state of free fall where amputations are done without the benefit of anaesthetic like it was in the Crimean War. The generators that power incubators and ICU machines that keep the critically ill alive in the Hospitals of Gaza have run or are running out of fuel. Water and food are rationed and starvation looms. If this was Putin's army doing this to Kyiv, Joe Biden would have threatened World War Three. Biden's message to Netanyahu, however, isn't a warning but encouragement as he increased military funding for Israel which will prolong and expand the slaughter.
We are told this war is about justice for October 7th and the release of the hostages held by Hamas which is perfectly legitimate if done under the rules of modern warfare. But this war has not been conducted by Israel’s government with any measure of humanity. Their enemies have been called, "dogs, "animals," less than human. IT is a policy to make all Palestinians Hamas and Hamas all Palestinians. It's deliberate and nefarious because once the fighting stops the blame will be placed on the dead who refused to get out of harm's way. The best case scenario for how this war concludes is eternal generational trauma where innocent people are killed in violent acts on both sides. But we aren’t even going to get to that horrible end because the worst is yet to come.
The end game for Netanyahu is ethnic cleansing. This week the news media reported on a secret plan authored by Netanyahu’s government that was leaked to them. That document purports that Israel’s government sees this war as an opportunity to displace much, if not all the inhabitants of Gaza to Egypt or elsewhere. This is starting to stink like Serbia's War against the Bosnians in the 1990s. Except this won't be a regional tragedy but a global one of unimaginable horror.
Each day this war continues is another day that it stumbles closer to a worldwide conflict. 2024 is going to prove to be more earth-shattering for the lives of ordinary people than 1914. That we are being lead to this path of death like lambs to the slaughter by neoliberal politics and much of the corporate news is horrifying. Our post World War Two democratic/liberal consensus is over. Now the only thing before us is barbarism and the treacle words of wealthy politicians who will try to console us with patriotism and hate as we bury our dead.
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Ot has changed the way I look at peopleI know and the general population forever. I've known how dangerous the mob can become in a flash, most of my life, but the last few years and now this, have been Satan's kiss. I made my feelings about the horrid history and Netinyahu very clear to those close to me right from day one. It embarrasses me to remember when that psychopath fooled me for awhile, but it reenforced to me that we're all vulnerable. I know none of them will raise the issue now. As for those not that close, I've avoided looking to see if they've made their feelings known. I'm a descendant of Jews who barely escaped torturous deaths in pogroms in Ukraine and described too much to me when I was very young. They wanted to warn me. We had neighbors with tatoos from Auschwitz and vacant stares. That and living in the South Bronx, as it was being burned down and violent crime was prolific, gave me PTSD. There was a time I thought humanity had a chance. Now I realize the cycle of too many, too-easily manipulated, inherently amygdala controlled brains, the psychopaths among us gain control over, turbo-charged by the tech and technocrats, Carl Sagan warned us most would be overwhelmed by (if they are even aware of) makes that the slimest of possibilites. And we'll take a lot of other DNA iterations along with us. I have to focus on what aid to existential needs I can offer and attempting to inspire more. I see no impediment to the cycle, beyond the fact our abilities to deal destruction at the push of a button, the release of a virus or the ravaging of the environment has now advanced to very likely be the last one for us.
PS Apologies for the deletes to edit. They need an edit function and quite frankly, this has shaken me enough disrupt my concentration.
I've just written that this so-called war has changed me. In ways I don't even know yet, but I do know I will never look upon western Democracy the same again. This was needed to be said John. Fucking politicians wearing poppies while supporting genocide.