Genocide in Palestine did not start in 2023, or when some in Western media, politicians, or even in Israel itself began to refer to Gaza using the genocide term. Zionism was living a triumphant era dating back to the issuing of the Balfour Declaration and culminating with the Abraham Accords and the move of the US embassy to Jerusalem. For Zionism, May 4th, 2022, was set as a major celebration and an arrival at the top of the mountain, Jerusalem, and a US affirmation of the “rightfulness” of settler colonialism. Who can argue with this momentous arrival, and on the anniversary of Israel’s independence, the Palestinian Nakba! From the Zionist vantage point, the moving of the US embassy brought the nationalist project into full circle completion and, with it, the claiming of the holy sites in the old city. In addition, Arab leaders sent congratulations messages to Israel while attacks on Muslims throughout the month of Ramadan in Al-Aqsa and Christian worshippers during Easter services in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem.
The Sacred Days in Jerusalem were met with the Zionist settler colonialism's use of live ammunition, tear gas, beatings, and roadblocks. “God”, or more precisely the gods of Zionist nationalism, have foreseen and prophesied this eventuality since by “fire and sword,” Jerusalem was brought into existence, expansion, and constant protection.
Before the current war, Israel, Zionism, and the new Middle East project were flying high and had no limits on the horizon. Precisely, Israel’s triumphant moment with full support of Western and Middle Eastern powers brought the genocide and Zionism into the current moment.
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Now, why do I say that Zionism suddenly ceases with this past triumphant moment of successful nationalism and the “claiming” of Jerusalem through the use of force, attacking worshippers, calling for more ethnic cleansing, and thousands of new settlement units? Indeed, one would think that the opposite would be true, that Zionism and Israel have at last achieved the desired outcome, Jerusalem being the capital of the state and total domination of the Palestinians, including control of all historical Palestine.
The answer to this question has many elements, and each must be understood by taking into account what Zionism hoped to accomplish by creating the state and the complex and contested outcomes that it produced. From its inception, Zionism sought to enter the modern era through a nationalist project that united a diasporic people with the land of Palestine through a settler colonial epistemic that would displace the indigenous population and forge a new society in its place. More than anything, the “return” to Palestine and Jerusalem is imagined to be the prerequisite for birthing the modern, assertive, and influential Zionist Jewish person. Building a Zionist nation meant the destruction of both the Palestinian and Jewish pre-modern people and societies, replacing them with a European-inspired modern nationalist project rooted in a distorted and highly racialized secularism and beholden to power and violence.
Don’t let the distraction of the messages from Israel and the Zionists confuse you. Violence, dispossession, and “redeeming” the land by expelling the indigenous Palestinian population are constitutive and productive of Zionism and not in reaction or incidental to the project. Gaza’s genocide is not an aberration of Zionism, and claiming Jerusalem serves as the material evidence for the veracity of Zionism. This project upended traditional and classical Judaism, for it delivered a “return” from exile by the power of the sword, not the book or the expected prophet. Gaza’s Genocide is the power of the sword needed to birth the modern Zionist Jewish person, and the Palestinians (all of them) are the collateral damage needed for this project to succeed.
Zionism was gradually unmasked, despite all its efforts and obfuscations, despite all diversions and blaming the Palestinians, for unfolding the utter ugliness of militant and nationalist modernity that was maliciously cloaked from the beginning with a religious purpose. Here, one can say that moving the US embassy by Trump should not be viewed as a mere diplomatic decision by a foreign power, but rather as cementing the nationalist claims to the holiest of the holy. Indeed, without the Zionist matrimony between the born-again influential Zionist Jewish person and the land, Zionism would stand as an orphaned idea or, worse, a stillborn project. Jerusalem is the affirmation and material evidence needed to provide completeness for the project.
According to Zionism, the creation of Israel is not similar and cannot be compared to any other emergence of a modern nation-state; it is different from conception to actualization. Ideologically speaking, Zionism had to birth a secular people, transport them to a distant land utilizing an ancient connection through religious text, then rationalize the ethnic cleansing of the indigenous population inhabiting the land. Throughout the way towards achieving the modern state, Zionism has cast the Palestinians as an archetypal anti-Semitic population that opposed Zionism because of its Jewishness rather than its settler colonialism. The weaponization of antisemitism is a way to shield Zionism and Israel from criticism and accountability for committing a genocide against the Palestinian population, starting from the inception of the “Judenstaat” project by Herzl.
Consequently, the Palestinians standing in the way of modern and secular Zionism were cruelly and self-servingly compared to the European inherent and historical anti-Semitism, which was helpful as a way to negate their rights to the land. The calls for emptying or cleansing Gaza is not new and Herzl called for the transfer of the Palestinians out of Palestine once the exploration mission reported that the country is heavily populated. A direct line is present from Herzl’s Zionism to Netanyahu’s Genocide in Gaza and the current pogroms in the West Bank.
As a settler-colonial project, Zionism sought the land but not the people who inhabited it, the Palestinians. The preconceived plan for the Palestinians was set in motion before the Zionist movement arrived in Palestine, with Herzl himself theorizing the need to “spirit the penniless Arab population” across the borders while making sure to strike an alliance with the property owners. Settler colonial projects pursue either the genocide or the transfer of the indigenous population, so Zionism is not unique nor is it an exception to the norm. Indeed, the property owners of the past are not much different from the Arab world leaders who struck an alliance with Zionism and Israel for their limited benefits.
The gradual journey towards Zionist dispossession of Palestine’s indigenous population culminated with the move of the US embassy, which denotes the last physical site of meaning that provides Palestinians with a sense of being and belonging despite the never-ending occupation. In addition, the signing of the Abraham Accords, which brought the UAE, Morocco, and Bahrain into full recognition of Zionism and Israel, is celebrated as an arrival on Jerusalem’s mountain top. Zionism, as a settler-colonial project, is not content with only the devouring of the land and the expulsion of the people; it must also remove all vestiges of meaning, religious or otherwise, from the Palestinians. Indeed, for Zionism, Jerusalem is the nationalist and ultra-nationalist trophy that makes the birth of a modern nation complete and the erasure of Palestine and Palestinians irreversible in their mind.
Precisely, the moment of ultimate triumph for Zionism also represents the utmost defeat, for it signals the utter and total dependence of Israel and Zionism on an external agent to affirm its possession of Jerusalem. More importantly, the gradual Zionist project, while successful in birthing the powerful and modern Zionist Jewish person, has nevertheless not been able to remove the Palestinians from their homeland, something that gnaws daily at Israel’s highly militarized and racist society, and more so the settler segment of it.
The regional relations with Arab and Muslim countries are being used as a ploy to fleece Palestinians anew and force them into accepting the “deal of the century”, Abraham Accords, and Western “peace efforts” that boil down to certifying the “justness” of the Zionist dispossession of the land and expulsion of the people. More critically, the alignment of Israel with Western governments just crystallizes the vacuous nature of Zionism and its settler-colonial project, rooted in an end-justifies-the-means epistemology. Gaza’s genocide demonstrated that Zionism and the Israel project are weak and need all or most Western powers, the regional Arab states, and a host of “private contractors, not to forget a weapon shipment every 14 hours, to try to push the Palestinians out of Gaza.
A global shift on Israel is underway, and Zionism hitching its wagon to Western powers and the right-wing in Europe is accelerating the negative standing of the Zionist brand. The move of the embassy and the Abraham Accords have cemented the extreme right-wing nature of Israel’s political landscape and its refusal to adhere to human rights and international law norms or treat the Palestinians fairly. Israel’s friends extended unconditional support, which made Zionist ideology take the “logical” genocidal steps to eliminate the Palestinians and speak of a greater Israel project.
Leaving settler colonialism to function by exception to global norms is very precarious and not sustainable, no matter the power or might behind it. Israel’s gradual loss of standing and diminishment of the Teflon brand is no longer reversible, and the efforts to demonize and defame the pro-Palestine forces will not change the trajectory. Still, they will only offer a momentary delay. I can’t say when the gradual-to-sudden turn is going to happen, but I am sure it is very much on the way, and the writings are already visible on the Apartheid Wall! Western leaders, media outlets, and many in civil society are beginning to jump ship, and the Zionist genocidal titanic is sinking while Israel’s propaganda band is still playing
