Israel was able to restart its genocidal attacks on Gaza because the US allowed it. The permission is related to the US wish to bring down Iran’s oppositional regime, argues Chris Bambery  

Israel is on the rampage in the Middle East, cheered on by Donald Trump. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu clearly wants a war with Iran, fighting alongside the Americans. 

Meanwhile, Israel has returned to its genocidal war in Gaza, shattering a ceasefire that saw the exchange of captives being held by Hamas for Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails. The ceasefire brought a respite to the ruins of the enclave; destroyed by Israeli war planes and artillery. 

The number of people killed by the Israelis in Gaza has now surpassed 50,000, killed since 7 October 2023, according to the Health Ministry in the occupied territory. A third of these were children. This is, of course, an underestimate as no one knows how many thousands are buried in the rubble of the world’s biggest concentration camp. 

The US administration has told relatives of those hostages held by Hamas that talks between two sides have ended and the US will not pursue these talks any further. In other words, Trump has given the green light for Benjamin Netanyahu to ravage Gaza still further. 

Not content with that, Netanyahu ordered attacks on southern Lebanon, in breach of the ceasefire there with Hezbollah. In the occupied West Bank, the killings and destruction of Palestinian homes and property continues, as does the Israeli occupation of Syrian territory. 

Into this awful mix the United States, which funds the genocide in Gaza and supplies the weapons and munitions which make it possible, launched what President Donald Trump called a ‘decisive and powerful’ wave of air strikes on Houthi rebels in Yemen. Trump said these were in retaliation for the group’s attacks on shipping in the Red Sea as the reason. ‘Funded by Iran, the Houthi thugs have fired missiles at US aircraft, and targeted our Troops and Allies,’ Trump said on social media, adding that their ‘piracy, violence, and terrorism’ had cost ‘billions’ and put lives at risk. Trump further wrote: ‘Hell will rain down upon you like nothing you have ever seen before.’ 

Threats to Iran 

US Defense Secretary, Pete Hegseth, also said the airstrikes were meant as a warning to Iran, stating: 

‘The message is clear to Iran … Your support of the Houthis needs to end immediately. We will hold you accountable as the sponsor of this proxy, and I echo [the president’s] statement [that] we will not be nice about it.’ 

Britain did not take part in the bombing but did provide refuelling support for the US attack. The Houthis had stopped all attacks on shipping when the ceasefire came into effect in Gaza. The Houthi-run health ministry said at least 31 people were killed and 101 others were injured in the strikes. 

After the bombings, the Houthis said they would resume attacks on Israeli vessels in the Red Sea until Israel lifted its blockade of Gaza. They also warned that they would respond to the US strikes. 

The Trump administration paints the Houthis as being puppets of Iran. US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, told Fox News Radio: ‘Well, the Houthis don’t exist – I mean, first of all, the Houthis don’t have the ability to do this without Iran helping them, okay? They don’t – I mean, they’ve learned how to make them, these drones and these sophisticated anti-ship drones, but this technology is coming from somewhere. Iran is helping them. Iran is helping them make these things, Iran is providing them the money to do these things, Iran is providing them with targeting information that they can use against us… 

‘So, Iran owns this problem. I mean, they created this Frankenstein monster, and now they got to own it. And I think we should hold them responsible. And as the President has said, if these guys keep doing this, we owe [sic] Iran responsible for having created it.’ 

The Houthis are the effective government in Yemen and are an independent force which has built its own weaponry. That is not going to get in the way of Washington targeting Iran. 

On 7 March, Trump said he had written to Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, urging negotiations with Tehran over its nuclear programme and warning of potential military action if it refused. In his previous term in office, it was Trump who ripped up an international agreement with Iran which agreed it would not develop nuclear weapons. Khamenei has consistently said Iran will not do this for religious reasons. The threats of military action by both Trump and Netanyahu against Iran is what could well drive Tehran to reverse that policy. 

The USS Harry S. Truman carrier strike group, which includes the carrier, three Navy destroyers and one cruiser, is in the Red Sea. The USS Georgia cruise-missile submarine has also been operating in the region. 

Alliances and motivations 

What has changed, as a consequence of the proxy war in Ukraine, is that Iran and Russia have now signed a wide-ranging treaty, including military co-operation. On Friday in Moscow, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Iran, ‘like all other countries, has the right to develop the peaceful atomic sector, peaceful nuclear energy, and is taking important steps in this direction. 

‘We are convinced that the problem of Iran’s nuclear program should be resolved exclusively by peaceful political and diplomatic means, and we believe that everything necessary is available for this,’ Peskov said, adding ‘all that is needed is political will.’ 

Iran is also close to China. U.S. and Israeli officials are expected to meet this week to discuss Iran’s nuclear programme. Meanwhile, US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, has ordered two further aircraft carriers to the Red Sea. Rubio and other neo-con hawks like Hegseth within the US administration do not just give unconditional support to Israel’s every action but share with Netanyahu the desire for a war on Iran. 

There are four issues behind US policy towards Iran. First, they do want to stop Iran developing nuclear warheads, and they could do so quickly. Trump is offering talks but threatening Iran at the same time. That does not work well in a country with long memories of US imperialist interventions. Secondly, the US tried to topple the Islamic Republic before and failed. Trump might hope to pull it away from Russia and China through negotiation. The question is why would Iran trust the US? 

Thirdly, Washington hates the Islamic Republic because the 1979 revolution from which it stemmed toppled the Shah’s despotic regime. He was America’s greatest ally in the region next to Israel. The subsequent occupation of the US embassy in Tehran and the taking hostage of the staff was a humiliation for which America has not gained revenge. Fourthly, Iran, whatever its many faults, is an independent sovereign country outside the US international rules-based order. It’s the last man standing from the list the George W. Bush administration drew up quarter of a century ago. The neo-cons want completion. 

The calculations over confronting Iran only serve to solidify the US commitment to supporting Israel. The US needs Israel as its ally against Iran in the Middle East, so is prepared to allow it free rein in its genocidal war, and its attacks on Lebanon and Syria, to ensure it remains willing and able to support the US agenda. 

Israel’s internal strains 

Meanwhile, Saturday and Sunday saw mass protests in Israel sparked by the government’s move to fire Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar and Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara, coupled with the resumption of fighting in Gaza. Bar has been leading an investigation into corruption, involving bribes by Qatar, within Netanyahu’s prime-ministerial office and into who bears responsibility for the failure to prevent Hamas’s 7 October attack into southern Israel. Bar said in a letter that his removal was designed to halt the ‘pursuit of truth’. Israel’s Supreme Court issued an injunction on Friday, temporarily freezing the dismissal. Netanyahu then tried to launch impeachment charges against Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara. 

On Saturday at a rally in Tel Aviv, protesters held up placards reading, ‘No more bloodshed’, ‘How much more blood must be shed?’ and ‘Stop the war, now!’ to ensure the return of 59 captives still being held in the Gaza Strip. Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid called for a general strike if Netanyahu refuses to heed the Supreme Court’s ruling freezing Bar’s firing. 

The protests reflect a fundamental shift within Israel. From most of its history the country has been run be an elite of largely secular Ashkenazi Jews, who originate in Europe. In contrast, the right wing have secured the support of Sephardi voters, who originate from the Middle East and North Africa, and who were historically largely excluded from positions of power, religious voters and settlers. These all want a ‘Greater Israel’ and a theocratic state that would, for instance, abolish LGBT rights. 

Netanyahu leads a government of right-wing and religious parties which includes Bezalel Smotrich, a religious hardliner and leader of the West Bank settlers, and Itamar Ben-Gvir, a settler in the occupied West Bank, who champions the expulsion of Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza. Smotrich believes that the West Bank, which Israel seized in a war with Jordan in 1967, was promised to Jews by God in the Bible. As Finance Minister, he controls the purse strings of the Palestinian Authority and champions illegal settlements in the West Bank. 

Earlier this month at meeting in the Knesset (the Israeli parliament) Smotrich said hostages’ families are heard ‘too much’. The far-right Finance Minister argued with the daughter-in-law of a slain hostage, ordering her to ‘get out’ of committee room, and calling guards to eject protesters. Earlier this month too, Smotrich was a welcome guest of the Trump administration, after years in which he was not welcome because of his extremism. His efforts to cripple the Palestinian Authority and support Jewish settlers frustrated Biden officials, but Trump has now elevated several figures who share Smotrich’s views. 

The right, including the settlers and the religious zealots, have been gaining ground within the Israeli Defence Force and the state. On a wider societal level, that will be strengthened by the emigration from the country of over half a million Israelis, many young and highly educated. 

It must be said the internal differences within Israel are between different versions of Zionism. One side gives lip service to a two-state solution, but that’s all. Even that’s off the table for Netanyahu and his crew. They want a Greater Israel, an apartheid one-state solution. Neither side offer the Palestinians anything. Nevertheless, the internal in-fighting, which extends to the security services, further weakens a state which has not achieved a military victory it desires and needs. This could give the Palestinians some room for manoeuvre. 

Netanyahu may be happy with the Trump administration, but it will be interesting to see how the actions of this ‘man of peace’ (as Trump described himself in his inaugural address) in the Middle East impact on his support at home. Many believed his promise of no more foreign wars. A war with Iran would be a major conflict that the Americans know they are not guaranteed to win. 

Israel feels able to on the rampage because it knows it does not need to fear any response from the Arab states or that other regional power, Turkey. Erdogan has problems of his own but over Gaza he talked a good fight but never stopped the supply of oil on which Israel depends. 

What, however, has changed globally is that only a handful of states, including the USA and UK, give unconditional support to Israel. Internationally, it is increasingly isolated. That reflects the worldwide movement which has emerged in solidarity with the Palestinians.