The Global Soul Struggle: Why the War on Palestinians is Bigger

In a striking article by the most famous columnist in The New York Times, Thomas Friedman, titled “Why Ukraine and Gaza are Bigger Than You Think,” he attempted to provide an explanation for the two most important conflicts in the world today. This explanation, like any comprehensive interpretation in a complex and fragmented era, suffers from reductionism and oversimplification. Its importance lies in two things:

• Firstly, it is one of the ways in which our understanding of the world is framed after the Cold War.
• Secondly, it has already infiltrated some decision-makers and the intellectual elite in our Arab world. Therefore, it is used to rally and mobilize support behind political, intellectual, and media positions, with potentially serious future repercussions.

However, it remains ultimately a vision devoid of integrating people’s interests, reminding us of the phrase: “A land without a people for a people without a land.” It views the world as a void without diverse peoples with their aspirations, varied interests, and values that move them or aim to realize them.

One Iranian affairs expert says: “Iran’s top priority is Iran, and we should never forget that. Iran will not mobilize its forces unless it is directly hit.”

Mr. Friedman says: “There are many ways to interpret the two biggest conflicts in the world today, but my shorthand is that Ukraine wants to join the West, and Israel wants to join the Arab East. Russia, with the help of Iran, is trying to stop the first conflict, and Iran and Hamas are trying to stop the second.”

He places his statement in a broader strategic context to give it a powerful thrust; he says: “It reflects a tremendous geopolitical struggle between two conflicting networks of nation-states and non-state actors over their values and interests that will dominate the post-Cold War world – in the aftermath of the relatively stable American peace/globalization era heralded by the fall of Berlin.”

Friedman then moves on to talk about the region and the ongoing conflict within it, making it – as he says – a conflict between “the network of resistance, dedicated to preserving closed and authoritarian systems, where the past buries the future. On the other side, there is the network of inclusion, which tries to shape more open, interconnected, and pluralistic systems, where the future buries the past.” He continues: “Who wins in the conflicts between these two networks will determine much of the prevailing character in the post-Cold War era.”

America is, of course, the leader of the integration network, but China’s position between these two networks is important. It is important not to forget to define its role, as it sees: “China in the era of President Xi Jinping extends between the two networks, along with much of what is now called the Global South. Their hearts, and often their wallets, are with the resistors, but their heads are with the integrators.”

But what is the essential difference between the networks of resistance and inclusion or integration? The former – according to Friedman – is based on combating and uniting resistance fronts, and is based on opposing Israel and the West led by the United States.

As for the network of inclusion, it focuses on “weaving global and regional markets together – instead of battlefronts – and business conferences, news institutions, elites, hedging funds, technology incubators, and major trade routes.

He added: “It transcends traditional boundaries and creates a network of mutual economic and technological dependency that has the ability to redefine power structures and create new models of regional stability.”

Why is the War on Gaza Important?

This is the scene as presented to us by Friedman and the networks, relationships, and interests behind it. However, let us gather some other details to complete the complexity of the scene and its composition:

The First Detail

Namibia issued a statement supporting the case of genocide brought by South Africa against Israel in the International Court of Justice, including scathing criticisms of Germany’s intervention in defense of Israel.

Many countries in what is called the Global South see blatant hypocrisy in Europe and the United States condemning the illegal annexation in Ukraine while continuing to strongly support Israel despite the rising death toll in Gaza and the violence of the settlers in the West Bank, occupied by Israel.

South Africa brought a case of genocide, which the United States opposed fiercely. This position diminished the latter’s credibility among Africans and shattered the idea that Washington supports a system based on rules

Second Detail

The normalization agreements, known as “Abraham Accords,” brought together one of the world’s largest sources of spyware with countries that increasingly misuse cyber weapons and surveillance technologies.

This joint invasion in the field of cybersecurity is likely to lead to a new wave of technology-based transborder repression, which can be termed as national security.

The Third Detail

In a recent survey conducted by the Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies, which included 8,000 Arabs in 16 countries, 92% of the respondents said that the Palestinian issue concerns all Arabs.

People reject around 89% of the survey respondents do not recognize Israel, which is the highest percentage in the history of the Arab Indicators Survey. Only 13% of the Arabs included in the survey believe that peace with Israel is still possible.

What do these three details mean?

Firstly: Complexity and Composition versus Simplistic Dichotomies

Endorsing the Arab public’s view of the Palestinian issue does not necessarily mean supporting all the positions of what is called the Axis of Resistance – as evident in Syria, Iraq, and Yemen – nor does it mean the aspiration for a decent life – as expressed in some of the policies of the axis of inclusion – hinders the non-alignment with basic values, as reflected in the position on Palestine.

One Iranian affairs expert says: “Iran’s top priority is Iran, and we should never forget that. Iran will not mobilize its forces unless it is directly hit,” and stresses: “It is important not to exaggerate the promotion of Iran’s status in the region or its investments in the axis of resistance.”

The cohesion of the axis and its regional role is not just Iranian dictates; it is linked to each other through the shared loathing of US and Israeli colonization, but it is a hatred that extends to public opinion, as evidenced by the Arab Indicators survey.

This common hatred does not imply consent to Iran and its allies’ policies in Syria, Iraq, and Lebanon, nor does it mean the prevention of navigation in the Red Sea by the Houthis to support the Palestinians’ resistance.

We live in a selective world. While political leaders tend to view today’s world through the lens of competing ideological and political systems (phratry), where one is either with the West or against it, with democracy or against it, with the free world or against it, with the Axis of Resistance or the Axis of Inclusion… recent public opinion polls confirm that people around the world prefer, instead of these selective arrangements, the ability for themselves and their governments to pragmatically choose their partners based on the issue at hand.

We have entered a selective world, where you can mix and reconcile your partners on different issues, rather than subscribing to a specific list of allegiance to one side or the other.

Political action will not be effective if framed in conflicting dichotomies, the pole bipolar: whoever is not with us is against us.

Secondly: Is the conflict between the two axes despite overlapping areas and common interests between them, a struggle over values or is its basis a difference in interests?

Isn’t the essence of the two networks based on autocracy, and merged markets lead to an unfair distribution and inequality in income, wealth, and opportunities? Even the recent normalization agreements were built on the alliance of capitalist entities and major corporations and were at the expense of ordinary citizens in the Gulf and Israel.

The rallies supporting the Palestinians’ cause around the world were able to creatively and strongly link their self-interests – and sometimes local interests – to the Palestinian issue. One of the protesters in the West commented: “We came out for ourselves, to reclaim our human dignity.”

The collective public opinion in different parts of the world, including the Global South, and even the West, increasingly views the conflict as a result of a decades-long occupation and not a response to Islamic terrorism, as portrayed by Friedman.

The formation of the legal team in South Africa says it all; it is multi-racial, comprising men and women, Irish, British, and South Africans, with no official Palestinian present in the group, nor a single Arab. Yet, one day after the conclusion of the hearing session, massive demonstrations erupted in 45 countries, none of them from the Arab countries.

Does it signal a search for or exploration of common human values that could be distributed across the world in the future? Perhaps.

Palestine returns to the forefront as a global issue, just as it was in the struggle against apartheid in South Africa. Arabs and Muslims – peoples and governments – are less contributors to it. The relationship between the struggle for Palestinian rights and the internal battle in the region for democracy, fair distribution of wealth, income, and opportunities may gain momentum in the future.

The popular Arab stance imposes a cost on the Palestinians, leading to the deprivation of its people by governments of their freedom and the proliferation of repression among them, as they suffer from fatigue due to harsh neoliberal policies. Friedman and his like do not understand the complex relationship between Arab peoples and the Palestinian issue. It is still their central issue and not solely the issue of the Palestinians. It is an expression of their search for their dignity at home, in the region, and in the world around them. The resurgence of the Palestinian issue leads to isolating Israel and the United States and increasing global criticism of colonial settlement, and occupation, and racial segregation.

These ideas are gaining new importance, with additional emphasis on the rights of indigenous people, racial justice, environmental and distributive justice, etc. What is interesting about all this is that we are no longer facing the West, East, or the Axis of Resistance and the Axis of Inclusion, but distribution of forces according to the interests in these different geographical regions, and varying their positions according to each issue, hence the so-called fracturing of the polarization.

Thirdly: Searching for the Spirit of the World

After the Cold War, the United States heralded a post-war international system based on rules, bolstered by a number of international organizations that were established. The international system is now marked by chaos and dispersion, but with the war on Palestinians, it has become clear that the United States government is abandoning the rules and values represented by international institutions.

Global concern with the Palestinian issue has created two new axes: one that includes many countries and actors from non-nation states, biased toward common human values, and the second which includes a number of countries and non-nation state forces that see these values as an inherent right for a certain race, religion, or followers – the exclusion of others.

US Secretary of State, in a forum in Davos last month (January), emotionally responded to a question about whether the lives of Muslims and Christians are less valuable than those of Jews: “No, in my opinion, and for many of us, what we see every day in Gaza is painful. The suffering we see among the innocent men, women, and children tears my heart.” The question is: What needs to be done? Blinken deserves to be nominated for an Oscar for best actor on the international stage.

The international community needs to build global traditions of humane action and recognize that divine reverence for all human lives is at the same level and excludes no one. The global community must recognize and act on the fact that killing civilians is unacceptable wherever it occurs.

Friedman said in another article: “If you think about the three pillars that have led to stability in the world since I became a reporter in 1978 – a powerful America committed to protecting the liberal international order with the help of multilateral health institutions such as NATO, China that is steadily growing that is always there to support the global economy, and mostly stable boundaries in Europe and the developing world – these three pillars have been shaken by the big choices made by major players over the past decade.”

In conclusion, the conflict on the Palestinian issue is more than a local struggle; it has reverberations that touch on broader regional and international dynamics, reflecting the intersection of politics, interests, and values across the global stage.