Israel: Displacement Versus Regional Expansion

Dr. Maysaa Al-Masry

It’s a war game between an isolated leader and an accused leader, a leader fleeing corruption and the courts, and a leader selling homelands like real estate on the pavement of the White House. How can they make peace? With the blessing of pseudo-leaders, once described as Arab Muslims, they have forgotten that history disowns false heroism, no matter how long it lasts. Indeed, it’s a stain that history will never erase, for conspiracies have an expiration date.

The game is aggressive and contradictory, with diminished rights and usurped land, and it is being exaggerated to create new heroes, expose traitors, and burn paper heroes. Announcing radical change is more Trumpian than it is a way to achieve the goal. The goal is geopolitical whose stakes are greater than those in the ruins of Gaza, or for the people of the West Bank.

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What we perceive now on the ground is the result as actually being implemented in the region of Palestine, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Egypt, and elsewhere. This is far removed from the American political legacy, which has come to present itself as an unfair mediator with its possibility of implementing peace by force!

A Zionist base

We are faced with an occupying state that wields American power, a Zionist base in the heart of America and entity. America studies the state of politics firsthand. It is the largest country to explore the concept of state with military, geographical, and geopolitical capabilities. Geopolitical power is the most important element of its strength, exploited on the basis of geographical expansion.  

States are considered human communities that grow and expand, weaken and shrink. The plan, my dear friends, is a trial balloon the size of the Middle East, with its peoples remaining stagnant and helpless. But the question is: Where does its success lie?

Let’s address this point by point. Reality shocks us, while history never forgets the amount of public discussion about settlement and the forcible preparation of political conditions to weaken the position of the international community and Europe in the ongoing conflict to subjugate the Arab situation to the point of fragmentation, division, and subservience.

Yes, Netanyahu continues his war to preserve his government with Smotrich, and Ben-Gvir, to pump billions of dollars into the government budget, to evade prosecution, and to realize the agenda of the Likud and religious Zionism to control the levers of the occupying state in its extremist Jewish nationalist form. But to what extent can Netanyahu can he continue to be evasive?

Netanyahu is now using the concept of force through traditional methods of exterminating civilians and then displacing the largest possible number of Gazans. He is also seeking to change the map of the region, annexing lands in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Judaizing Al-Aqsa Mosque and Jerusalem, reshaping security to suit Israeli interests, and impose normalization. The region is in turmoil and change whilst undergoing a process of formation and renewal. The Syrian model is a prime example.

Regional expansion

The imposition of further conditions of humiliation on the Arab environment, the multi-front military campaign, as is happening in Syria and southern Lebanon, to reshape and strengthen Israeli security and regional influence in the long term. These developments will impose new facts on the ground to prevent any future political solution, as Israel seeks to expand settlements, forcibly displace Palestinians, and annex the remaining land.

Recognizing the Jewishness of the state and following the provisions of the Nation-State Law stipulates that Jews have the right to settle in the Arab region wherever they wish, and that the Israeli state must provide protection and care for every Jew. Declaring the Jewish state from the sea to the river is a form of soft displacement by all means, both covert and overt. Israel’s ambitions span the entire Arab region, as the Nation-State Law does not define the borders of the Jewish state posing great dangers to the delusional states that normalize relations with Israel, whilst believing that Israel will be an ally against an imaginary, fabricated enemy.

We should not overlook the fact that some Zionist political and military leaders believe that Israel should not consider the “alternative homeland” concept of displacement as a strategic and ultimate goal because it poses a constant danger and threat to its existence based on its assumption of a neighboring state(s) hosting the displaced Palestinian people within its vicinity as an occupier of their land and homeland.

Additional questions that must be raised is: To what extent should the goal be security-related? How large is the required area for expansion? Is this a fundamental and permanent requirement for Israel’s security, as has been stated? How does the area of ​​land, whether in Syria, southern Lebanon, or elsewhere, fit into a general Zionist plan to serve as Israel’s eastern flank? To what extent should the region be expansionist, to what extent should it be aligned with Zionist expansion into the Gulf states?

Another issue is: Will there be a push to conclude an agreement with Israel that is more important than Wadi Araba and be in Israel’s favor? What about the four-party negotiations or more, and to whom will the invitation be addressed? And what would be the price that would follow? Perhaps the Palestinian Authority itself? The contradiction in the statements is clear and deliberate, and Israel is the ruling authority there! The most important question remains: What leverage do the countries of the region possess and use to prevent its negative influence?

Greater Israel

What is of certain is that Israel is pursuing of what is beyond for the greater Zionist entity reach. While discussing the Jewishness of the state, we cannot overlook other aspects of Zionist lore, the most important of which is the construction of the pagan Third Temple on the ruins of the Dome of the Rock. Are we concerned about that?

Unfortunately, the entity of Israel as a whole is illegitimate, but the world offers nothing but rejection of our Arab and Islamic identity.

They continue with the Zionist entity’s plan for the Middle East under the guise of the Sharon-Eitan strategic regime, the “spit of the century,” and other labels, provided there is Arab and Islamic division, an increasing imbalance of power, and the absence of genuine Arab peoples calling for the freedom of their homelands…not to provide for their livelihood, whose voices will be silenced by the provision of aid and debt forgiveness, or such some.

The writer is a researcher specializing in Middle Eastern affairs and the above article was edited from Arabic that appeared in Alrai Alyoum website.

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S. African Ambassador Gets Huge Welcome After Expulsion by Trump

The South African ambassador, expelled and declared persona non grata by the Trump administration, received a hero’s welcome upon his return to Cape Town on Sunday, with hundreds of supporters waving Palestinian flags and chanting “Free Palestine.”

The crowds at Cape Town International Airport surrounded Ebrahim Rasool and his wife as they emerged in the arrivals terminal in their hometown.

“A declaration of persona non grata is meant to humiliate you,” Rasool told the supporters as he addressed them with a megaphone. “But when you return to crowds like this, and with warmth… like this, then I will wear my persona non grata as a badge of dignity.”

“It was not our choice to come home, but we come home with no regrets.”

Rasool also said it was important for South Africa to fix its relationship with the US after President Donald Trump punished the country and accused it of taking an anti-American stance even before the decision to expel Rasool.

Rasool was previously declared persona non grata. His return comes as US President Donald Trump has cut all funding to South Africa, a move widely seen as retaliation for Pretoria’s case at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), where it has accused Israel of genocide in Gaza.

They were the ex-ambassador’s first public comments since he was declared persona non grata, removed his diplomatic immunities and privileges, and gave him until this Friday to leave the US. It is highly unusual for the US to expel a foreign ambassador.

Rasool was declared persona non grata by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio in a post on X on March 14. Rubio said Rasool was a “race-baiting politician” who hates the US and Trump.

Rubio’s post linked to a story by the conservative Breitbart news site that reported on a talk Rasool gave on a webinar organized by a South African think tank. In his talk, Rasool spoke in academic language of the Trump administration’s crackdowns on diversity and equity programs and immigration and mentioned the possibility of a US where white people soon would no longer be in the majority.

“The supremacist assault on incumbency, we see it in the domestic politics of the USA, the MAGA movement, the Make America Great Again movement, as a response not simply to a supremacist instinct, but to very clear data that shows great demographic shifts in the USA in which the voting electorate in the USA is projected to become 48% white,” Rasool said in the talk.

On his return home Sunday, he said he stood by those comments, and characterized them as merely alerting intellectuals and political leaders in South Africa that the US and its politics had changed.

“It is not the US of Obama, it is not the US of Clinton, it is a different US and therefore our language must change,” Rasool said. “I would stand by my analysis because we were analyzing a political phenomenon, not a personality, not a nation, and not even a government.”

He also said that South Africa would resist pressure from the US — and anyone else — to drop its case at the ICJ accusing Israel of genocide. The Trump administration has cited that case against US ally Israel as one of the reasons it alleges South Africa is anti-American.

South Africa filed a case at the ICJ in December 2023, which accuses Israel of violating its obligations under the Genocide Convention in its war on the Gaza Strip. More than 10 countries have since joined South Africa in the genocide case.

Some of the supporters welcoming Rasool, who is Muslim, waved Palestinian flags and chanted “free Palestine.”

“As we stand here, the bombing (in Gaza) has continued and the shooting has continued, and if South Africa was not in the (International Court of Justice), Israel would not be exposed, and the Palestinians would have no hope,” Rasool said.

“We cannot sacrifice the Palestinians… but we will also not give up with our relationship with the United States. We must fight for it, but we must keep our dignity,” according to the Quds News Network.

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Saudis Say No to Israeli Displacement Agency

Saudi Arabia on Monday condemned Israel’s announcement of establishing an agency aimed at displacing Palestinians from the Gaza Strip.

In a statement, the Saudi Foreign Ministry also denounced “the approval of the separation of 13 illegal settler neighborhoods in the West Bank, paving the way for their legitimization as colonial settlements.”

Saudi Arabia reiterated its “unwavering rejection of Israel’s continuous violations of international law and international humanitarian law.”

The Kingdom further stressed that “lasting and just peace cannot be achieved without the Palestinian people obtaining their legitimate rights in accordance with international legitimacy resolutions, and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state on the 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as its capital.”

Israel’s Security Cabinet has approved the formation of a directorate to encourage what it called the “voluntary departure” of Palestinians from the war-ravaged Gaza Strip.

Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a statement late Saturday that the new directorate will work to “prepare for and enable safe and controlled passage of Gaza residents for their voluntary departure to third countries.”

Katz’s office said the new administration will be responsible for establishing movement routes, checking pedestrians at designated crossings in Gaza, and coordinating the provision of infrastructure that will enable passage by land, sea, and air to the destination countries.

Trump has repeatedly called to “take over” Gaza and resettle its population to develop it into a tourist destination. His plan was rejected by the Arab world and many other nations, who say it amounts to ethnic cleansing according to Anadolu.

The Israeli army launched a surprise aerial campaign on the Gaza Strip on March 18, killing at least 730 people and injuring nearly 1,200 others despite a ceasefire and prisoner exchange agreement that took hold in January.

Over 50,000 Palestinians have been killed, mostly women and children, and more than 113,000 injured in a brutal Israeli military onslaught on Gaza since October 2023.

The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants last November for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.​​​​​​​

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.

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Gaza Deaths Top 50,000 as Israeli Army Continues Bloody Onslaught

At least 61 more Palestinians were killed in Israeli airstrikes in the Gaza Strip, raising the death toll since October 2023 to 50,082, the Health Ministry said on Monday.

A ministry statement said that the toll included four bodies retrieved from the rubble in the last 24 hours.

The ministry said 134 more injured people were transferred to hospitals, taking the number of injuries to 113,408 in the Israeli onslaught.

“Many victims are still trapped under the rubble and on the roads as rescuers are unable to reach them,” it added.

The Israeli army launched a surprise aerial campaign on the Gaza Strip on March 18, killing at least 730 people and injuring nearly 1,200 others despite a ceasefire and prisoner exchange agreement that took hold in January.

Last November, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.

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