Children and women are being torn to pieces and burnt in Gaza, an endless horror dismissed by Netanyahu as accidents, but it’s another war crime for which he will be held accountable. This genocide, grotesquely sold as self-defense, is fueled by Western-made weapons. Western leaders hide behind empty words, doing nothing to stop the horror, making them complicit. The only solution is to block all supplies to Netanyahu’s government with an economic and military embargo. The upcoming US and UK elections could lead to significant political changes due to leaders’ failures to address the crisis.
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Children and women torn to pieces and burnt. An endless horror. Netanyahu dismisses it all as an accident, but it’s yet another war crime for which he will be held accountable. A genocide is being grotesquely sold as a right to self-defense. This genocide is being carried out with weapons produced and sold by us Westerners, champions of human rights and democracy. Western leaders hide behind empty words but are doing nothing to stop the horror. They too will be held accountable, at least at the ballot box.
The Israeli government’s murderous fury won’t stop until it runs out of weapons and money. And this is the only thing to do: block all supplies to Netanyahu’s government, impose an economic and military embargo to force them to yield. It’s useless to appeal to moral values they have always ignored or to institutions or international laws they have always trampled on, and it’s equally futile to hope they will heed the pleas of politicians they have always bought. A militarized regime understands only the language of war; they must be left without supplies, without means to both offend and defend. Only when their security is at risk will they relent.
A genocide is happening, in fact. For months now. A horror occurring with weapons produced and sold by us Westerners. Yes, we are all accomplices. Citizens who don’t care as well as those who cheer, but especially those who have the power to do something and don’t, the politicians who hide behind senseless platitudes, who downplay, who talk about other things. An epochal disgrace that could be the prelude to profound changes.
Fate has indeed willed that in the midst of a genocide, there are elections in the United States and England, the two countries most responsible for the Israeli-Palestinian disaster besides Europe. Biden is a dead man walking politically, and with him, an entire generation of Democratic technocrats will be buried for his cowardice on Gaza. In England, Labour leader Keir Starmer seemed to be galloping towards triumph after the disaster of the Indian billionaire, but instead, due to his ambiguity, he is limping noticeably.
Even for the European elections, the spectacle is disgraceful. The distinguished candidates would have preferred to talk about the usual nonsense in anticipation of yet another seat, but instead, they are forced to scramble to cover their own complicit omissions. In Brussels, there is talk of investigations and indictments for complicity of Von der Leyen, rather than confirming her. As soon as she gets on a pulpit, she is contested for her slimy inaction. The European Parliament is deeply divided and the capitals of the most advanced democracies are in turmoil.
On one side Gaza, where endless horror is taking place, on the other a new global consciousness that no longer wants to witness such atrocities or be complicit in them, and in the middle, a hypocritical and completely inadequate political class, a political class at the mercy of lobbies and careerism that blathers on about nothing while children and women end up torn to pieces and burnt under Israeli bombs made in the West. An epochal disgrace that could be the prelude to profound changes.
Tommaso Merlo
