Zionist colonisation must either stop, or else proceed regardless of the native population. Which means that it can proceed and develop only under the protection of a power that is independent of the native population – behind an iron wall, which the native population cannot breach.
Hi. I haven’t written an article since “White supremacy is a hurricane” at the end of January. Dozens of you have subscribed to this email newsletter since then, and I thank you for doing so… because there’s no way I’m putting today’s article on LinkedIn. At the risk of being terse, let me skip the pleasantries and get to the point.
The two sentences in the top quote are from the English translation of “The Iron Wall,” written by Ze’ev Jabotinsky in 1923. The italic emphasis is his, not mine. Many of you may be familiar with those two sentences, but the immediate next sentences are what really send me:
That is our Arab policy; not what we should be, but what it actually is, whether we admit it or not. What need, otherwise, of the Balfour Declaration? Or of the Mandate? Their value to us is that outside Power has undertaken to create in the country such conditions of administration and security that if the native population should desire to hinder our work, they will find it impossible.
And we are all of us ,without any exception, demanding day after day that this outside Power, should carry out this task vigorously and with determination.
No “outside Power,” no Zionism, according to Jabotinsky. And again: the italic emphasis is his, not mine.
By the mid-2000s, circumstances in West Asia appeared to show that Jabotinsky’s wish for an outside Power had thoroughly come true. Former United States of America (USA) Secretary of State Alexander Haig was quoted as saying:
I am pro-Israel because Israel constitutes the largest US aircraft carrier that cannot be sunk, does not carry even one US soldier, and is located in a most critical region for US national security.
The article containing that quote from Haig was written on May 11, 2005 by Yoram Ettinger, who served a number of diplomatic roles connecting the USA and Israel over the 20th century. Ettinger went on to say the following:
On Israel’s 57th Independence Day, Israel enjoys a two-way Win-Win relationship with the US. Israel is equivalent of a high-return generous investment (by the US) made at a low price.
The bold emphasis is his, not mine. Yet only 20 years later, it’s clear that Israel in its current form is much more of a liability than an asset to the USA. And by “in its current form,” I’m talking about Israel’s current genocidal, expansionist, apartheid ethnostate form.
Normally I don’t pretend to analyze geopolitics, but I’d like to believe I’m only pointing out the obvious. Forget today’s news headlines (just browse the Times of Israel website if you want to get the vibe), because I’ve already talked about the bigger picture before. In “Why they’re recognizing a Palestinian state” from September of last year, I wrote the following:
We are watching Israel get fired from Western empire, in real time, so that the leaders of empire can absolve themselves. That is the performance. The same logic that led to Israel’s creation is now leading to its demise. Ironic? No, not at all. It’s exactly how empire operates.
Imperialism is just capitalism expressed politically. And the same short-term capitalist thinking that produced Israel will lead to its collapse: when an asset becomes a liability, you toss it and move on. It’s just business… nothing personal!
Current Israeli leaders are keenly aware of short-term thinking’s true cost. The proof is in their own world’s-worst-Poker-face behavior: Israel-aligned USA political groups like AIPAC are ready to spend $100 million USD trying to influence elections this year, while Netanyahu said with his own mouth that social media is “the most important weapon … to secure our base in the US.” A little late, mate… don’t you think?
That’s why I stridently concluded my article “Why they’re recognizing a Palestinian state” last year with the following sentence:
Now let’s start imagining a post-Israel future.
Only 9 months later, much has changed in West Asia. If you haven’t turned on your imagination yet, you’re running behind.
Because listen: The supposed Memorandum of Understanding between the USA and Iran (a plan to make a plan, if you will) may yet collapse, and destruction may yet continue. Israel’s investment to influence USA politics and culture may yet still pay returns… tomorrow, next year, and in the year 2030.
But the year 2050?
There are pro-Palestine college students graduating now who will be Heads of State in 2050.
The year 2100?
The children today’s college students give birth to in 2050 will be Heads of State in the year 2100.
There might still be a place called “Israel” then, but I refuse to believe it will be a genocidal, apartheid, expansionist ethnostate. May my 4-year-old niece-in-law’s grandchildren record the truth.
In my article “Be Patient” from June of last year, I urged readers to think on timescales way longer than the next quarter. I talked about how when White-supremacist Sierra Club founder John Muir came to Yosemite, he encountered a people who had been living there for 8,000 years. In the face of 8,000 years of collective memory, what’s a mere 500 years of European colonization? Indeed, what’s a mere 80 years of a nation-state called “Israel?”
Now allow me to conclude with a short personal story: I was in high school in the USA when the movie Titanic was released in 1997. This movie went on to gain 126 awards and over $2 billion USD in ticket sales. The movie became a sensation where I went to school — people bragged about seeing it in the theater 10 times, 14 times, even 17 times! I can’t imagine how much money they spent, even though movie tickets were cheap in North Texas back then.
Finally, a friend of mine became thoroughly sick of the hullabaloo. He came to school one day wearing a black T-shirt with the following words in big white text on the front:
“THE BOAT SANK. GET OVER IT”
The unsinkable is going down. Stop gawking and start imagining what’s next.
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My position
My name is Chris Musei-Sequeira, and I use he/him pronouns. My mother was born in Trinidad and Tobago as a descendant of enslaved Africans brought to the Caribbean during the time of European colonization. She came to the United States of America (USA) at the age of 10. My father is Goan and was born in India, in Mumbai, and raised Catholic and English-speaking. He came to the USA for his graduate studies, where he met my mother.
My sister and I were born in the USA and lived a middle-class life in the suburbs of multiple American cities. I studied aeronautical engineering and technology policy in university, then worked at the Federal Aviation Administration and as an aviation consultant. I've lived in cities up and down the USA East Coast since the age of 18, until very recently. Now I live in Eastern Europe with my wife and our cat.
I thank Heather Luna and Lavinia Muth for showing me the importance of publicly expressing our positions. Because of our positions, all of us are very familiar with some aspects of the world while having no idea of other aspects. Positionality expresses how our individual positions affect our relationships with other people and with the world as a whole.
Image source: Commander, U.S. 7th Fleet. (May 28, 2024). 140528-N-IP531-035. Flickr. https://www.flickr.com/photos/36614130@N06/15547107842
