Watan-The British writer David Hearst affirmed in an article published on the “Middle East Eye” website, of which he is the editor-in-chief, that the Israeli occupation is facing a strategic defeat in Gaza and confronting countless obstacles, ranging from losing Western public opinion to straining its major supporters.
Hearst stated that the war forces Western supporters of the occupation to see the full Israeli atrocities committed in a campaign they had previously described as just five months ago, with their positions shifting somewhat and now calling for its cessation.
Among these supporters is one well-known advocate for Israel, American Senator Bernie Sanders, who five months ago stated that the war against Hamas was just, but later spoke about the necessity of stopping the bloodshed in the region and backtracked on his statements regarding the importance of the Israeli military campaign against Gaza.
Israel Among the Elite of Outcast Criminals
David Hearst adds in his article that after all these crimes, Israel has entered the ranks of the elite among the rejected entities. It is now one of the ugliest parties in the region, and the world will neither forgive nor justify what it does in Gaza after more than 5 months of massacres.
Israel has lost its influence in Western power centers at a faster rate than in years past, during which it committed crimes and massacres, and Hearst described how “support for the occupation over the years has led, after the Gaza war, to undermining its attempts to explain to people its claims that Israel is a moral force that stood for good in the world.”
Bad Ending for the Palestinian Authority
For Palestinians, what has happened will be a huge political change and will mean a bad ending for the Palestinian Authority collaborating with the occupation.
The weakness of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu deeply affects Western political elites who supported Israel and armed it, and after all this period of war, the disagreement between US President Joe Biden and Netanyahu has become open, according to Hearst.
Radical Change in Western Stance
In the eyes of the public, the American leader who loudly declared Israel’s right to self-defense five months ago is now saying that Israel cannot kill another 30,000 Palestinians in the name of self-defense.
But David Hearst points out an important matter: “I do not think Biden has witnessed a radical change in his opinion or that the scales have fallen from his eyes… US government officials are fully aware of what is happening on the ground in Gaza at every stage of this operation.”
The Israeli occupation faces the repercussions of losing public opinion in the West, the ongoing genocide case before the International Court of Justice, the erosion of Jewish consensus on the state of occupation, and the tension among Israel’s supporters, all indicating a strategic defeat for Israel.
Even if the war were to stop now, the price Israel has paid for reoccupying Gaza would be higher than it could have imagined five months ago. However, it has not realized this yet, as David Hearst affirmed on the Middle East Eye website.