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When the guns fall silent, the bombs on Gaza stop and the massacres end, how will the West recover from this horror in which it is complicit, and which is enacted in front of our eyes, every single day, every single night, for over one hundred days, until we feel a sinister jadedness? And, more importantly, how will Western and non-Western populations still believe in the empty words on values and democracy that their leaders feed them ad nauseam? Western “moral leadership” died in Gaza, killed by Israel.
How has the West, this key geopolitical, civilizational and economic space of the world, been able to bear and still bears these images surging from all sides; of these screaming children ripped apart and still alive; of these parents disfigured by pain and sorrow, holding a piece of their child in their hand; of these doctors crying with rage at their powerlessness to save a young man still surprised to see he has lost both his legs; of this school director who stares fixedly at his demolished school under which, only a few minutes ago, were sheltered dozens of children, and whose bodies are still there, underneath the rubble; of these criminal soldiers who pierce the back of a tied-up prisoner with penknives; of these rapist soldiers who strip a woman of her ‘abaya for everyone to see…
How can these Western leaders, journalists, “intellectuals” still talk about the massacres of October 7th, when so many massacres have since then taken place, perpetrated by a regular army, that they persist on describing as the army of the “only democratic country in the region”? How can these leaders attach the word “democratic” to a State which has instituted and still practices Apartheid, which commits genocide, whose soldiers snipe women and children carrying a white flag… without, also, reducing the significance of their own democratic systems?
In Europe, France and the Netherlands especially, an Islamophobic ideology is growing, exploding, imposing itself against an entire population, even as religious extremism is oozing out of all the pores of Israeli decision-makers and as a genocidal Messianic discourse comes out of their mouths. But this doesn’t seem to bother anyone in Europe because Europe has aligned itself with the United States; a United States that recognizes only might and unconditional support to Israel; and an Israel that kills not only in complete impunity, but with a many-pronged Western complicity: through the supply of weapons, media coverage and political complacency. A criminal complicity.
Never has the world known such slaughter. In Dresden, in 1945, or during the Vietnam War, in the beginning of the 1970s, the bombings were massive and deadly but there was neither blockade nor famine; in Leningrad, in 1942, the city was under total blockade, but without massive, daily bombardments, and it was a city four times bigger than the Gaza Strip. In Gaza today, it’s all there: a severe blockade, a high wall, ceaseless bombing, restricted or banned weapons of war, gas, cluster munitions, the blocking of humanitarian aid, supplies, water and medication… 25,000 dead, of whom two thirds are women and children… 80,000 wounded, 40% of the Gaza Strip partially or entirely destroyed, tens of journalists and UN employees killed. In three and a half months. By comparison, the war in Ukraine, waged on a territory of 603.000 km², was responsible for the death of 25 to 35.000 civilians over the course of two years!
In Western Europe and the United States, voices are calling on the IDF to “finish the job”; and Israeli ministers, more like serial killers than politicians, are calling for the deportation of the Palestinian people to Egypt, Jordan, Europe and elsewhere… And they are all acting in complete impunity—criminals without any restraint left. Public figures, like Meyer Habib in France, are ready to kill, ready to commit any crime for Israel, ready to massacre, to “genocide,” if need be. The West would be well advised to think about the danger these extremist individuals pose to their own societies… For yes, this is indeed a genocide, and it is Luis Moreno Ocampo himself, former prosecutor to the International Court of Justice, who states and affirms it.
For centuries now, the West has lectured the world either on the usefulness of its “civilizing missions” or on the supremacy of international law and the centrality of the question of human rights. The height of this propaganda was reached during the conflict in Ukraine which, despite civilian deaths, remains predominantly a war between two armies. But this propaganda, put to the test in the ongoing genocide in Gaza, has reached its limits and revealed the profound, extraordinary hypocrisy of the Western leaders, led by Joe Biden, who tolerates everything, allows everything to Israel. The moral shipwreck of the West is underway; and, in its relations to the rest of the world, in its preachings on Human Rights, a step has been taken, a breaking point has been reached. Nothing will ever be the same.
In the United States, it’s possible to fire University Presidents; in France, to question high officials who refuse to bend to the dominant ideology, to muzzle the media through pressure and threats, to ostracize the voices, more and more numerous, who condemn the massacres in Gaza…the Western world is wavering and division threatens it.
In the Arab World, it will be more and more difficult for leaders to react to the events in Gaza with the usual empty promises and sporadic, indignant declarations. South Africa’s brave and yes, it must be said, historic action, forces Arab leaders to face their own contradictions. Realpolitik and geopolitics can’t justify everything and won’t hold long in front of this profound popular unrest and heartbreak experienced by all of humanity.
Meanwhile, Benjamin Netanyahu continues to claim that the war, in fact the massacres, will last for a long time. When will the Western world understand that it’s time to put a stop to this blood rage that has taken hold of Israel? When will it agree to heed the voices of reason calling for a reaction, if not action? Is it waiting for the conflict to spill over on its own soil? That could very well be the case. In the meantime, the West will lose, has already lost, and for good, its moral authority over the world.
Aziz Boucetta is a Moroccan journalist, political analyst and TV host based in Casablanca, Morocco. You can find his writings in: www.panorapost.com