Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza has laid bare the moral poverty of the so–called ‘rules-based order’. The Western response to the genocide of Palestinians has been in stark contrast to their concerted reaction to the ongoing invasion of Ukraine by Russia. While Russia has been sanctioned and even individual Russian athletes banned from sporting events, Israel has been provided both material and moral support while it commits the murder of innocents at an unprecedented scale. Sporting events have banned the Palestinian flag, support for Israel, and Ukraine is encouraged.
This has led to two battles which should shape the future of international politics. Firstly, there is a standoff between Western governments and those in the Global South, excluding those which are proxies or puppets of the West, such as the Gulf States and Pakistan. On June 6, Spain became the 13th country to officially back South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the ICJ (International Court of Justice).
According to Al-Jazeera, ‘several other countries and organisations have welcomed South Africa’s case amid a global chorus for a ceasefire in Gaza’. The US has voiced its opposition to the case from the start, with Germany being its loudest ally in this regard. The US House even passed a bill that seeks to sanction the International Criminal Court (ICC) for issuing arrest warrants for PM Netanhayu and Defence Minister Yoav Gallant. The US has blocked multiple UN resolutions aimed at fostering peace and continues to supply Israel with the weapons and political support to conduct their genocide, even as the rest of the world turns against it. The US Congress has also invited Benjamin Netanyahu, the chief perpetrator of the genocide and subject of ICC arrest warrants, to address them.
The second battle is between the governments that are backing Israel and the populations who have turned out against the genocide. There have been widespread protests in all Western countries. Recently, encampments were set up at universities across the western world. In the US, they were violently broken up by police and backed by the violent rhetoric of both major parties. Germany and France have banned pro-Palestine protests. In defence of Israel’s genocide the Western governments have brutalised their own populations and trampled on their basic democratic rights. This should have lasting implications for politics inside those countries as the myths of ‘rule of law’ and democratic principles have been violently shattered at a time when they were already wearing thin, albeit gradually.
This divide has been partly facilitated by social media, especially TikTok. On the other hand, traditional media has been exposed for the role they play in maintaining an oppressive status quo. Social media feeds around the world are not just filled with the appalling images of genocide, but the dishonest way Western media has reported it. The most common observation is how the murder of innocent Palestinians is reported in a passive language. Palestinians are not killed, they merely die in a vague manner. The perpetrator is not reported as Israeli but unnamed bullets and explosions. Barack Obama’s recent tweet exemplified this dehumanisation of Palestinians. Despite his attempts at both-sidesing a genocide, he wrote that Israelis were ‘butchered’ while Palestinains were vaguely ‘shattered’.
US media concocted countless stories about supposed Palestinian savagery, a classic tactic right out of the colonial playbook. These included tall tales of 40 beheaded babies, which Joe Biden repeated, babies baked in ovens and all sports of sadistic stories. These were all used as justification for genocide. New York Times was exposed for abandoning all journalistic practices by letting an Israeli from Israel Defence Forces (IDF) write ‘Screams Without Words’, about how Hamas committed mass rape on Israeli women. There were no reliable sources, not a shred of forensic evidence and the story was made almost entirely out of thin air. Subsequent investigations into the issue have debunked the notion that Hamas committed mass rape on October 7.
As more and more of Israel’s crimes against humanity have come to light, there has been a shift from denying atrocities to justifying them. There have increasingly been some instances of objective reporting as well, but they are drowned out by the oceans of propaganda. Opinion pages in the major US publications have published some of the most harrowing pro-genocide views, but the recent piece in The Atlantic took it to new levels. The author argued that children could indeed be killed legally and thus Israel should not be held culpable. He outright advocated for the murder of Palestinian children. Only a week or so later the UN placed Israel on the black list of countries that kill children.
It is little wonder then that public opinion has turned against Israel and the governments which support it. As these pro-genocide narratives floundered, the contrast between the actual images on social media and the dishonest propaganda of governments and traditional media has radicalised citizens into coming out in large numbers against the genocide.
At a policy level, not much has changed. The only serious material outcome has been the US government seeking to ban TikTok. This resembles the Pakistani military’s ban of Twitter (now X). The blame is placed not on policies that any decent human would balk at, but on nefarious outside forces corrupting young minds. Pakistan has found out, traditional media is not the force it used to be, especially with the younger population, who are able to circumvent censorship and propaganda through the use of social media and the wider internet. This has brought most of the population in direct opposition to the government.
At the moment, it is the oppressive governments who still hold power and govern against the wishes of the vast majority. However, things have come to a head and something is likely to give way soon. And it will most likely and unfortunately be very violent.
The writer is a historian.
