How October 7 May Have Triggered Israel’s Ultimate Demise From Within

-OpEd-

CAIRO — One day, when I was shooting a documentary in 2006, I took a taxi in Haifa driven by a man of Russian origin, who immigrated to Israel after the fall of the Soviet Union. We got into an argument, both of us speaking in broken English, about Palestine and Israel. He asked me where I came from and what I was doing “here”? And I told him that “here” belongs to me more than it belongs to him.

As I was leaving the taxi, he said: “Mister, Israel is a very small country, but it is a very strong country — stronger than you.”

I never understood what he meant by “you.” It is unlikely that he meant me as an individual; no individual is stronger than a state. Did he mean Arab countries, or everyone who rejects the existence of Israel?

A crack in the wall

The Oct. 7 attack must have created a deep rift in the confidence of that taxi driver — and in all Israeli citizens — in their country’s security, military and intelligence. This crack in Israel’s “wall” of confidence will grow deeper, creating new cracks, because after eight months of war, it has been unable to achieve a decisive — or important — military and political victory. Total destruction and extermination does not constitute a political — or military — victory.

And these cracks deepen with each new operation carried out by Hamas or other resistance factions, and each time rockets are launched from inside Gaza toward Israel.

The term “wall” is borrowed from Israeli historian Ilan Pappé; I noted in a previous article that he compared Israel to a wall that has begun to crack and will suddenly collapse. Pappé believes the practice of genocide itself is the fundamental crack, and that Israel is living the last chapter of its existence.

This project shares the idea of building a new Europe outside of Europe.

Pappé points to researchers of the Beirut-based Institute for Palestine Studies, who have, since the 1960s compared the Zionist project and the destructive nature of other traditional colonial projects. The Zionist project in Palestine reproduces the previous colonial settlement models in Australia, North America, South Africa and South Vietnam, and adopts its essential features, beginning with ethnic cleansing and the complete elimination of indigenous peoples.

This project shares the idea of building a new Europe outside of Europe. Even if the construction involved colliding with the European motherland and its hegemony, before returning to build close alliances with it. The settlement state then became an extension of Europe (the West), and belongs to it culturally.

Ethnic cleansing

It is this settler characteristic that pushed Pappé to say what many academics dared not — even if they side with the Palestinian right — that the indigenous peoples are not only fighting for freedom, but for their life. It is in this context that we must view the Oct. 7 attack, and other Palestinian resistance attacks since the 1948 Expulsion — even though some attacks raised moral questions. In Pappé’s words, the resistance to genocide and ethnic cleansing is not always impressive, but it must be understood from this angle, related to — sometimes desperate — attempts to escape the genocide.

To be successful, ethnic cleansing requires the removal of human characteristics from the people who are to be exterminated. This condition is well noted by those familiar with European or American media. Removing human characteristics, and bringing these people closer to the animal/savage nature, facilitates extermination; The settler, thus, is not exterminating human beings.

Genocide is the basis, or the backbone, of the Zionist state.

Pappé is clear in raising a fundamental point: throughout its history, the Zionist state’s aim has been to remove the human characteristics both of present day Palestinians and of historical Palestine; genocide is the basis, or the backbone, of the state.

In his lecture in February and in his interview with the Arabi TV in April, Pappé said that to be successful, ethnic cleansing must not be made public. And if it is revealed, it is justified as self-defense or as a reaction to an attack by the other party to deny the intention of ethnic cleansing.

The ethnic cleansing currently underway in Gaza — with an unprecedented degree of brutality in front of the whole world — is one of the indicators that lead Pappé to predict the collapse of the Zionist state. While in his February lecture, he spoke of a period of two years, he later avoided a time prediction.

Israeli citizens have been turned into a tool for the practice of genocide, using self-defense to justify their participation in the genocide, according to Pappé. How will that be impacted by the cracks in their confidence?

Completing the project

Today’s unprecedented destruction and death will break the basic illusion that Israel propagated in the West — and which has formed one of the foundations of their alliance: the illusion that Israel is Europe outside Europe; that it is the only democracy in the Middle East among the savages; and that it belongs morally to civilized world.

We are observing the beginning of Israel’s loss of its position as the West’s pampered child who enjoys immunity. Israel has become a subject to accountability, criticism and rebuke. Even some have taken the step of downgrading or cutting ties with Israel.

The United Nations has condemned Israel, which has been brought before international courts over allegations of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. Some politicians and governments have also described its campaign in Gaza as a genocide.

Pappé offers a logical explanation for Israel’s publicizing of the current genocide — unlike its previous massacres. Israel used the Oct. 7 attack to accomplish what it could not accomplish completely in 1948 — without risking the collapse of its project. This project includes the extermination of the Palestinian people.

Despite all the massacres and the destruction of most of the Palestinian towns and cities in 1948, Israel only succeeded in expelling half of the original population. That expulsion did not stop the Palestinian resistance to genocide — in all its forms, military and peaceful, both inside and outside Israel.

Israel’s weaknesses

Pappé goes further to say that Israel discovered its structural weakness before Oct. 7 and is now trying to fix it. This weakness was represented by a major economic crisis, a large wealth gap and new Israeli sectors falling below the poverty line.

There are also social divisions; two forces that were fighting in the streets of Tel Aviv until Oct. 6. The first force, mostly of European origin, call themselves secularists. The second group, religious settlers, reject the modern forms of Western democracy, and they think they are immune and can be a state within a state.

What currently brings both groups together is their agreement on the necessity of genocide. But this temporary agreement is fundamentally unsuitable for coexistence in the medium and long terms, and cannot be acceptable to the external parties that Israel cannot live without their support.

Will stopping the slaughter in Gaza lead to civil war in Israel?

This raises a new question, to which there is no answer: Will stopping the slaughter in Gaza will lead to civil war in Israel, ending the project as we know it?

The genocide of Palestinians in Gaza has changed the balance of power not only in Israel, but also at the regional and international levels. It may be time to question the regime’s legitimacy — it’s a question that no regime can continue without answering when it faces major challenges.

Several other questions, such as the extent of the European and American interest in the survival of Israel. Perhaps the answer to the question of Israeli legitimacy is directed exclusively to its new allies, the European and American far and racist right, who were anti-Semitic in the past, and now are anti-Arabs and Muslims.