A commentary on an extraordinary confession by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz
By Michael Pröbsting, Revolutionary Communist International Tendency (RCIT), 16 April 2024, www.thecommunists.net
A few days ago, Haaretz – one of the most influential Israeli newspapers – has published an extraordinary article. Under the telling title “Saying What Can’t Be Said: Israel Has Been Defeated – a Total Defeat”, the author presents an utterly pessimistic picture about Israel’s war in Gaza and its general state of affairs. As this is not an “opinion article” but written by the papers “Political Correspondent”, it is fair to say that this document represents the viewpoint of Haaretz. [1]
Let us first reproduce the most important parts of this remarkable article.
“We’ve lost. Truth must be told. The inability to admit it encapsulates everything you need to know about Israel’s individual and mass psychology. There’s a clear, sharp, predictable reality that we should begin to fathom, to process, to understand and to draw conclusions from for the future. It’s no fun to admit that we’ve lost, so we lie to ourselves.
[…] We can’t say it, but we’ve lost. People have an inclination to believe in the best and be optimistic, hoping that tomorrow will be okay, that we are in a process that in the end will be more successful. That’s the most fundamental failure of human thought: the notion that the direction we are taking is a good one, that we just need to get there already – that in just a little more time, with a little more effort, the hostages will be returned, Hamas will surrender and Yahya Sinwar will be killed. After all, we’re the good guys, and good will triumph.
It’s the same mentality that leads to the notion that “the Iranian regime will soon implode” and other notions that have more to do with Hollywood scripts than life itself. They’re not the truth and it relates to something that’s uncomfortable. After all, it’s uncomfortable telling the public the truth.
[…] No cabinet minister will restore our sense of personal security. Every Iranian threat will make us tremble. Our international standing was dealt a beating. Our leadership’s weakness was revealed to the outside. For years we managed to fool them into thinking we were a strong country, a wise people and a powerful army. In truth, we’re a shtetl with an air force, and that’s on the condition that its awakened in time.
[…] Rafah is the newest bluff that the mouthpieces are plying to fool us and make us think that victory is just moments away. By the time they enter Rafah, the actual event will have lost its significance. There may be an incursion, perhaps a tiny one, sometime – say in May. After that, they’ll peddle the next lie, that all we have to do is ________ (fill in the blank), and victory will be on its way. The reality is that the war’s aims will not be achieved. Hamas will not be eradicated. The hostages will not be returned through military pressure. Security will not be reestablished.
The more the mouthpieces shout that “we’re winning,” the clearer it is that we’re losing. Lying is their craft. We need to get used to that. Life is less secure than before October 7. The beating we took will sting for years to come. The international ostracism won’t go away. And, of course, the dead won’t be coming back. Nor will many of the hostages.
For some of us, life will get back on track, with the petrifying fear of an imminent repeat. And for some of us, life won’t get back on track. Those people will walk among us like the living dead. That’s what we voted for. That’s how it is. We need to get used to the sad reality in our homeland.”
So, basically, the articles recognizes that Israel has lost the war. Of course, Israel’s armies have not been eradicated. But in a war between the officially fourth-strongest army in the world against the guerilla forces of the Palestinian resistance in the small enclave of Gaza (with a population of 2.3 million people), the standards for success are different.
True, Israel has “succeeded” to commit a genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza, to slaughter tens of thousands of people, to destroy most houses and to displace most of the population. But despite all these horrible war crimes and despite the fact that Israel is waging the longest war in its history, it has not been able to defeat the Herculean Palestinians!
As a matter of fact, Israel’s all-powerful army – with total superiority in air, sea and land, with AI-powered killer programs, the most modern missiles and bombs, and with unlimited financial, political and military support by U.S. imperialism – has failed to conquer the strip, has failed to defeat the heroic resistance forces and has failed to bring back its hostages. What a remarkable achievement for the resistance forces, as my comrade Yossi Schwartz – a Anti-Zionist Jew in Israel and Trotskyist for six decades – pointed out already some time ago. [2]
Not only this, has never before has Israel been so isolated in international politics. It has become a country hated and despised by the popular masses all around the world. The Zionist’s genocidal war has provoked an unprecedented pro-Palestine solidarity movement which continues to mobilise ceaselessly against the Apartheid and Terror state. A number of trade unions have already taken active boycott actions against military and economic deliveries to Israel. Under the pressure of the masses, an increasing number of bourgeois governments feel obligated to criticize and to distance themselves from the Zionist entity. The same pressure has pushed the ICJ to open an investigation about Israel’s genocide in Gaza and even the UN Security Council felt obligated to vote for a ceasefire – against the furious resistance by Israel and their American masters.
This is not to deny all the difficulties and dangers ahead. The killers will continue to kill, and the traitors will continue to betray. Still, it is great to see the heroic Palestinian people dealing a political defeat to the Zionist state!
Unity – Struggle – Victory
Footnotes:
[1] Chaim Levinson: Saying What Can’t Be Said: Israel Has Been Defeated – a Total Defeat, Haaretz, Apr 11, 2024, https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2024-04-11/ty-article-magazine/.premium/saying-what-cant-be-said-israel-has-been-defeated-a-total-defeat/0000018e-cdab-dba9-a78e-efef6ba10000.
[2] See e.g. Yossi Schwartz: The delusion of the Zionist government and army, 23.01.2024, https://the-isleague.com/the-delusion-of-the-zionist-government-and-army/
We refer readers to a special page on our website where all RCIT documents on the 2023-24 Gaza War are compiled, https://www.thecommunists.net/worldwide/africa-and-middle-east/compilation-of-articles-on-the-gaza-uprising-2023/.