Loading ...Hegemony is Not the Answer to Israel’s National Security
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By: Ghassan Rubeiz / Arab America Contributing Writer
Regardless of how technologically advanced Israel has become, it will not be able to act as the superpower of the Middle East. And no matter how long the United States taxpayer can support Israel’s military adventures, the Zionist state cannot forever sustain its appetite for annexing Palestinian territory and capturing neighboring Arab land. By exaggerating the local threats they face, Israeli generals have managed to rationalize the creation of so-called “buffer zones”, whether in Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon or Syria. It is no longer taboo for Israeli leaders to air their intention of illegally expanding their national borders.
Former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett triumphantly declares that Syria’s current upheaval offers Israel a historic opportunity, asserting that the Arabs and Iranians are now weak and that this is the time to grab more land, preemptively destroy military capabilities, and watch Syrian factions destroy each other. He calls for more invasions: “Creating a proper buffer zone is thus a defense necessity to protect Israeli communities from a spillover of Syria’s instability.” With the same hegemonic mentality, Israel occupied additional territories in south Lebanon after overpowering Hezbollah forces, destroyed and reoccupied Gaza after defeating Hamas, and advanced the process of annexation of the West Bank after overpowering fighters in the refugee camps.
Bennett announces that the next move to “protect” Israel is to attack Iran and induce regime change. He calls for action: “That is also why Israel must seize its greatest strategic opportunity in memory to strike Iran’s nuclear facilities, substantially setting back a nuclear weapon and perhaps hastening the end of the regime that calls for our destruction.” Bennett may not accurately represent the views of the entire Israeli cabinet on matters dealing with Iran. However, on issues dealing with Syria, Lebanon, and Palestine, he advocates the same intentions and policies.
Before deciding whether to attack Iran directly or urge the US president-elect Trump to apply “maximum pressure” through additional sanctions, the Israeli Defense Forces are already engaged in a deadly exchange of fire with the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels of Yemen. Israel assumes that all its enemies are already neutralized or about to be. In fact, neither Hamas nor Hezbollah have been decimated; and they may never be eliminated through the sheer use of force. And the Palestinians in the West Bank do not, and will not, accept a permanent Israeli occupation.
In Syria, it is unjustified, or too early, for Israel’s leaders to assume that the new regime is doomed to fail simply for having a past link to vanquished Islamists. Israel’s hawks are predisposed to perceive overwhelming danger anytime change occurs in their neighborhood. The current regime in Tel Aviv may well prefer an isolated Islamist state on its border to a reborn Syria with the potential of reviving the Arab Spring.
This militant approach to resolving political problems with force is not sustainable. Both Israel, which receives massive and unconditional foreign aid from Washington and the US are overstretched militarily and financially as a result of their flawed approach to national security. Once US foreign aid to Israel becomes noticed as an unjustifiable item in the national budget, Israel might suddenly find itself to be a burden to the US taxpayer. Washington cannot afford to continue to finance Israel’s aggression forever.
Even if money never becomes an issue in financing senseless wars, sound ideology may sooner or later become a critical factor to sober Israelis in defining threats. Many in Israel have opposed the permanent occupation of Palestinians and the endless war that it entails. Former Israeli diplomat and peace activist Gideon Levy explains: “This fear-mongering, some of which is well-founded, and some of it baseless, has a variety of roles – forging Israeli society, mobilizing it, unifying it in the face of a common danger, distracting attention from other important topics and extracting support for the importance of the security establishment and for huge sums to fund it.” There are better and less costly ways to achieve national security and remain loyal to Jewish ideals: making peace with immediate neighbors.
Ghassan Rubeiz is the former Middle East Secretary of the World Council of Churches. Earlier, he taught psychology and social work in his country of birth, Lebanon, and later in the United States, where he currently lives. For the past twenty years, he has contributed to political commentary and delivered occasional public talks on subjects related to peace, justice, and interfaith. You can reach him at rubeizg@gmail.com
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of Arab America. The reproduction of this article is permissible with proper credit to Arab America and the author.
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