Kinda Big Picture Re Middle East

The first post today looked briefly at the continuing war of attrition and the ways in which it appears to be 1) maintaining its trajectory but also 2) gradually intensifying. Thinking a bit more about the UAE announcement that it would cut the “land bridge” to Israel if Israel doesn’t allow aid into Gaza, I came up with a few additional points.

Obviously—at least it seems obvious to me—the UAE and KSA have been providing Israel with a “land bridge” (land shipping from the Persian Gulf to Israel to avoid the Houthi blockade) at the strong behest of the American Empire. The question, of course, is this: How serious is the UAE? Is this just talk, or … what? My view is that this statement is intended seriously. Like most such policy switches, and especially when dealing with the notoriously cautious peninsular Arab regimes, multiple considerations are probably at play.

No doubt the Arabs have taken note of the changed tone of the public discussion coming out of the US. From top to bottom it has become pretty much required—certainly on the Dem side—for politicians to call for ceasefires, for humanitarian aid for Gaza, and to decry the sufferings of Palestinians. It doesn’t matter whether or not such expressions are sincere—the point is that they’re being made. The Arabs are as able as anyone else to put 2+2 together and come to the conclusion that the political tectonic plates in the US are shifting. What probably triggered the UAE statement was Netanyahu “greenlighting” a massacre in Rafah. The peninsular Arabs have been aware that they were bucking public opinion—the famous “Arab street”. The prospect of a further massacre in Rafah was probably judged to be a land bridge too far.

There are further developments. The region more generally appears to be preparing for war, more or less in the way that Doug Macgregor has been predicting. Macgregror has repeatedly stressed that the entire region is outraged by the Israeli genocide and will not stand by indefinitely. Unless the US steps in and forces a stop to the genocide, there will be a regional war—that is Macgregor’s informed view. So, now we read:

Megatron @Megatron_ron

NEW:

The Syrian Defence Minister has made a surprise visit to Iran. Iran's Defense Minister says necessary and urgent measures and plans are on the agenda to counter Israel's aggression on Syria Iran is prepared to utilize its full capabilities to assist Syria in enhancing its defense and deterrent power against the US and Israel. It is only a matter of time when Syria will receive advanced ballistic missiles and air-defense systems Via

@IranObserver0

http://t.me/megatron_ron

1:44 PM · Mar 16, 2024

Again, these developments are undoubtedly to be evaluated in the light of what’s happening in domestic US politics. Megatron makes these pretty incisive observations. However, in my view he gets things backwards. My view is that the rise of alternative information flows has brought the Israeli genocide to the attention of the American public to a degree that would have been inconceivable in the past, when the information flow was under tighter control by the ruling class. It was only then that Americans became more generally aware of the dominant role of The Israel Lobby in the US ruling establishment. With that qualification:

Megatron @Megatron_ron

What is quite interesting lately is that American politicians and Senators have shifted the propaganda defense of Israel from the global to the domestic level.

Before that, they routinely gave speeches and defended Israel's genocide, which massacred over 13,000 children, addressing a global audience.

But after the American public began to become widely aware that their country is controlled by Jewish billionaires through the organization AIPAC, which publicly finances almost 90% of American senators, governors, mayors, etc. especially after the attempt to ban Tiktok, now all these politicians are constantly in the media addressing the American audience and defending Israel.

Left, right, and middle are all in the pocket of AIPAC, there is no exception. The noose is tightening and Zionism in the United States is beginning to sway for the first time in 70 years.

Whenever politicians jointly start to defend something, then the resistance always grows sharply.

1:22 PM · Mar 16, 2024

David Sacks has made some equally incisive comments on this situation. He makes the further observation that the shifting politics in the US are a result of the genocidal response in Israel. Normal Americans, even in the MSM, are finding it increasingly difficult to treat the genocide as business as usual. The constant flood of propaganda from Jewish American and Neocon sites is no longer persuading people. They’re pushing on a string. So, excerpted from a longer article that focuses heavily on Ukraine, here is how Sacks sees the Palestinian situation:

Enjeti then asked Sacks: "How would you rate President Biden's handling of the Israel-Gaza conflict so far?"

Sacks responded: 

"In the wake of October 7th, the first thing I said this was a little bit of reminiscent of 9/11. And the purpose of an outrageous terrorist attack is usually provoking overreaction, yes, and I hope that the Israelis would react wisely and not in the 911 manner as the United States did. It's safe to say now that the Israeli reaction is exactly what Hamas wanted. 

"They'[the Israelis] have created this humanitarian crisis in Gaza, and it's basically turned the whole Middle East and most of the world against Israel. I'm shocked by some of the arguments I'm seeing now that this sort of decolonization narrative that used to really be in academic circles has now kind of gone mainstream. 

"I think Biden made a huge mistake of basically going to the Middle East initially and hugging Netanyahu and giving him carte blanch ... Israeli indiscriminately bombing a civilian population in Gaza is going to backfire horribly." 

Watch Sacks' full interview below:

Arguably the genie of public awareness of The Israel Lobby and the Zionist Neocolonial project is out of the bottle. One thing is certain—it’s in the nature of attritional wars to continue over the long term, and the longer this attritional war continues the less likely the genie can ever be returned to the bottle.

As I write this I’m listening to The Duran, with John Mearsheimer, who just said:

I don't think that most people--especially in the United States, but it's true in Europe as well--understand how much trouble we are in. We're not talking about the Middle East here, but you cannot underestimate [I think he actually means 'overestimate'] how much trouble the United States is in in the Middle East. And the same thing is true with regard to Ukraine.

Zhou may not have figured this out. He’s probably incapable of that at this point, and has spent a lifetime gaslighting the American people. But it’s clear that Dem party professionals are very much aware of this problem, and that damage control isn’t really working. It seems to me unlikely that we can avoid major foreign policy shocks between now and the election. The big question is whether the GOP has the intelligence to take advantage of the shift we’re seeing. Each party is in a bind with key elements of its base. Will either party be able to find the right formula to come out on top, or will we see a fight to the bottom?