This article is part of a series from the New Anticapitalist Party-Revolutionaries (NPA-R) in France, looking back at the situation in the Middle East over the past year. Originally published Oct. 4, 2024.
The terrorist prowess of the Mossad, which has succeeded in booby-trapping the beepers of Hezbollah cadres, and the extension of the perimeter of Israel’s warlike operations in the region can only make us wonder: but how far will they go? Is it possible to stop them? The relentless support of the major powers for Israel’s bloodthirsty escalation even nourishes a sense of helplessness among many workers: with such support, they can do what they like anyway. But it is precisely the role of this support that is probably Israel’s greatest weakness.
Israel, a State Heavily Dependent on the Support of the Great Powers
Israel is not a great imperialist power comparable to the United States or even France: it is a police state at their service, whose establishment would have been impossible without their support. Financial, military and diplomatic support that has been unwavering since its birth in 1948.
Since then, the country has received $158 billion in military aid from the United States, making it the largest recipient in history, with a marked acceleration from the occupation of Gaza and the West Bank in 1967. In the 1950s and 1960s, France played a key role in Israel’s acquisition of nuclear weapons. More recently, the famous ultra-modern “Iron Dome” anti-missile system was put in place in 2011 thanks to the Israeli army’s close collaboration with the United States, which placed all its technological know-how at the service of the Zionist state. In 2016, Barack Obama signed a ten-year plan, increasing military aid to $3.8 billion by 2023. Biden had in any case announced that the United States would replenish the stock of munitions used by the Israeli army in the current war on Gaza.
Imagine for a moment that Israel were deprived of the financial and military support of the United States and other major powers: its firepower would be much less.
The Double Result of the Israeli Offensive
Israel’s genocidal and warlike offensive since October 2023 has not only sown blood and death, reinforcing the Zionist state’s domination of the region. It has also undermined Israel’s legitimacy among millions of young people and workers a r o u n d the world. Israel may be sawing off the branch it’s sitting on… The boundless hypocrisy of imperialist governments – on the one hand condemning Putin for invading Ukraine, throwing their weight behind Zelensky, and, on the other, unwavering support for Israel in its genocidal, colonial offensive – has left its mark on world public opinion. And for the first time, the younger generation in the United States is leaning towards supporting Palestine. for decades. Hence the relentless repression of the solidarity movement. We remember the international echo of the American college occupations.
The international solidarity movement with Palestine – with its demonstrations all over the world, and now also in Lebanon – plays an essential role, not only in breaking the Palestinians’ sense of isolation, but also in undermining one of the pillars of the Zionist state’s power, namely Western support.
The more massive the demonstrations in Cairo, Johannesburg, Casablanca, Madrid, New York, London or Paris, the more they will encourage each other, and the more they will give workers the confidence to t a k e solidarity into their own hands, using their own methods: support for Israel must be high on the list of reasons to oppose our governments, whether in the “Greater Middle East” or in Europe and America. A one
day strike was called by several trade unions in the Spanish state on September 27. It was a minority event, but it points the way forward: let’s imagine walkouts and strikes in support of the Palestinian and Lebanese peoples, not only among schoolchildren but also in the workplace, challenging the policies of American imperialism and the complicity of France. This is a form of class solidarity, an internationalism in action that would shake not only our political leaders, but also the employers of the many companies in the United States, Germany and France that supply the weapons that enable Israel’s rulers to carry out their atrocities.
Xavier Chiarelli
