Middle East Press On: Gaza Ceasefire, War, Zionist, Palestinian: New Age Islam's Selection, 25 October 2025
By New Age Islam Edit Desk
25 October 2025
Ceasefire In Name, War In Fact: The Greatest Deal Or The Oldest Trick?
Why Israel Never Intended To Respect The Gaza Ceasefire
Gaza And The Nakedness Of The Emperor: A Reflection On ‘Peace’
ICJ Ruling On Israel’s Conduct In Gaza Will Generate More Heat Against The Zionist Regime
Exodus From The Holy Land: Record Number Of Israelis Emigrate As Security Fears Rise
Ceasefire Not Enough: Israel Must Thoroughly Defeat Hamas Once And For All
Israel’s Long Road To Healing: How War And Political Failure Shape The Nation
Bolivia After The Elections: How The Rise Of The Right Could Reframe The Palestinian Cause
-------
Ceasefire In Name, War In Fact: The Greatest Deal Or The Oldest Trick?
by Muhammad Azhar Mohamad
October 24, 2025
In Gaza, the word “ceasefire” feels more like a loophole than a real promise. The 10 October truce, hailed by Washington as a “turning point” was never designed to stop the bloodshed. While in practice it functioned as a calculated break, a short interval that allowed Israel to regroup, re-arm and resume its mass killing campaign with the full backing of the US.
The playbook was all too familiar: announce a hiatus, collect the PR points and then pick up right where things left off with the same objectives and impunity. Only this time, it comes with the package of having played the “peace” card.
The deal was never about peace in the first place. It was literally a hostage swap disguised as diplomacy. President Trump might seem to help broker the deal but its main goal actually was the return of Israeli captives not the protection of Palestinian lives.
Even Trump made it clear that Israel would be “free to act” once the exchanges were complete, signalling that military operations could resume with zero consequences. Obviously, this was all part of a bigger game plan being played out between Washington and Tel Aviv.
And the game plan unfolded exactly as expected. Just days into the truce, explosions in Rafah shattered the pause. Israel as usual, immediately blamed Hamas for violating the agreement and resumed its strikes. Instead of re-assessing the situation, Trump insisted the ceasefire was still “in effect”—a rhetorical move that swept the renewed brutality under the rug and allowed Israel to continue its offensive, all while the US maintained the illusion of diplomacy.
This is the reality Palestinians face: a world where pauses are rebranded as progress and impunity is re-labelled as immunity. The ceasefire was never a commitment to peace; it was a strategic pause that allowed the violence to continue under a different name with a different justification.
The US was not just a silent bystander in this repackaging but rather a manager of the brand itself. While Israel again treated the ceasefire as a pit stop, Washington did nothing to challenge that view. If anything, it helped to sell the illusion of restraint while its “little brother” kept stretching the limits of what a truce is supposed to mean.
Under Trump, the priorities could not have been more transparent. At a summit after the initial hostage exchange, he applauded the Gaza ceasefire as “the greatest deal of them all,” celebrating the return of Israeli captives while ignoring the broader question of peace. His framing was not just tone-deaf but revealing.
Clearly, the primary concern here was solely Israeli lives, never about Palestinian survival and suffering. Trump’s message to his partner in crime, Netanyahu was loud and clear: as long as the hostages were returned, military aggression would face no serious pushback.
Moreover, the rhetoric must match the reality on the ground. Calling this fragile ceasefire just a “pause” between attacks is not being cynical—it is just stating the obvious. Saying Washington’s complicity is not a wild accusation either; when you cover for violations with diplomatic spin, you are part of the problem.
It is totally ridiculous to claim a ceasefire is still “in effect” when bombs keep dropping all over Gaza. What is more, blaming “rebels within Hamas” for every breach without any single shred of proof is just a cheap old trick played and recycled again and again to divert the world’s attention from Israel’s ongoing relentless genocidal campaign.
Trump must stop acting like ceasefires are just for show and start treating them as serious commitments. That means enforceable terms, independent monitoring and actual punishment that are not subject to political shielding. A ceasefire should not be a PR tool—it should be a binding agreement that protects civilians and holds the violator, none other than the Zionist regime to pay the price.
For Palestinians in Gaza, the truth could not be more obvious. That ceasefire? It was a mere gimmick—gone almost as soon as it began. What came next was more of the same or even worse: chaos, grief and the dream of self-determination pushed even further out of reach.
A ceasefire that jumps right back into war is not a ceasefire—it is a dirty tactic. This whole thing is not about finding peace but totally about keeping control. Unless the international community starts holding Tel Aviv and its powerful enabler, Washington, accountable, these so-called peace deals will keep being empty gestures.
Gaza does not need another “pause” dressed up as progress. It needs real, lasting peace—not another round of diplomatic theatre.
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20251024-ceasefire-in-name-war-in-fact-the-greatest-deal-or-the-oldest-trick/
-----
Why Israel Never Intended to Respect the Gaza Ceasefire
By Robert Inlakesh
October 24, 2025
Israel has been committing daily violations of the Gaza ceasefire and is currently hatching a scheme designed to achieve its various goals through different means. In reality, what has been imposed is not a cessation of the war, or even a ceasefire; instead, it is a clearly set agenda that is developing into something more pernicious by the day.
While countless analysts had fallen into the trap of believing that the “20-point plan” set forth by the US Trump administration and the subsequent imposition of a “ceasefire” were actually designed with the intention of ending the conflict in Gaza, we are already seeing this notion fall apart, piece by piece.
Understanding Israel’s Thinking
The issue here, in the mainstream discourse on Gaza and which also injects itself into the alternative media’s framing, is a fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of what is happening in Gaza. To some, this may seem trivial and elementary yet, if the foundation of one’s ability to comprehend the issue at hand is flawed, it will manifest itself in the broader conclusions drawn.
While it is now widely accepted that genocide is what Israel has inflicted on Gaza, it is important to consider the implications of this understanding. Genocide, in the case of Gaza, broadly speaking, means the extermination of the population in part or whole, which immediately does away with the notion that Israel is simply fighting Hamas. Although this concept is easily and widely understood, a thorough look at what is happening is largely absent.
If Israel is committing genocide, which it undoubtedly is, this conclusion begs a number of questions. The most obvious is: Why?
Some would argue that the Israelis have committed genocide in the Gaza Strip as an act of revenge, a desire for blood and that this was motivated by the acts carried out by Palestinian armed factions on October 7, 2023. Yet, this argument makes little sense.
It not only makes no sense from a post-October 7 perspective, but a historical one, too. If simply revenge was the motivating factor, this would completely discount the long history of Israeli persecution of, and indiscriminate violence visited upon, the Palestinian people. It also discounts the objectives of Zionism, which is to conquer all of what is deemed “Eretz Israel”.
In the years leading up to October 7, 2023, the death toll inside the West Bank was growing to the point that it reached levels not seen since the Second Intifada in the early 2000s. Israeli fanatical settlers continuously encroached upon Al-Aqsa Mosque, as Christian sites of worship also fell victim to State-backed violence and restrictions.
Communities across the West Bank were under the constant threat of ethnic cleansing, experiencing routine pogroms carried out under the watchful eye of the Israeli authorities, as the political echelon sought to impose its de jure annexation over at least Area C (60 percent) of the territory. Gaza’s population, meanwhile, living in a territory declared by UN experts to have been unlivable by 2020, was left to rot in a concentration camp.
Israel has visited various chapters of death and destruction on the Gaza Strip, whether that be through the inhuman siege over the past two decades, or the various bombardments that murdered hundreds and, in the worst cases, thousands, of civilians. This story dates all the way back to 1948, when the Gaza Strip was created out of the refugee population ethnically cleansed from their lands, which the Zionists now call Israel, where they have since experienced every hardship imaginable at the hands of their Israeli oppressors.
In 2014, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tried, through a 51-day war of aggression, to find an answer to what Israel has called its “Gaza question”, but failed to find any kind of military solution. When, for instance, the Israeli military attempted to go after the Hamas tunnel infrastructure and engaged directly with the Palestinian resistance, they suffered heavy casualties and four of their soldiers were seized as prisoners of war.
Come 2017, Hamas was both put under strain and also birthed a number of initiatives that sought to achieve political goals through compromise and non-violence. The movement issued a new Charter that accepted a long-term ceasefire settlement that would achieve a “Two-State” solution, additionally condemning anti-Semitism, amongst other things.
Hamas also began the process that year of signing a unity deal with the Palestinian Authority (PA), whereby the Ramallah-based authority was set to take over the governance of Gaza. To this effect, PA forces even began to be deployed to the Rafah border, amidst broad celebrations across the Gaza Strip. Yet, the US and Israel applied pressure that collapsed the agreement.
Later that year, the PA began reducing and slashing the salaries of its employees in Gaza, placing even greater strain on Hamas, eventually leading to Israel setting up its controversial Qatari aid delivery system, used to stop the situation from boiling over into a larger-scale conflict or tit-for-tat that would cause issues, particularly for the surrounding Israeli settlements.
In 2018, Hamas even threw its weight behind the Great March of Return. Many do not know this, but while Hamas used to respond to Israel’s routine airstrikes across Gaza, up until November 11, when Israel attempted and failed to kidnap a senior Hamas commander in Gaza, the movement did not even fire rockets in retaliation to Israeli aggression.
Ultimately, the doctrine of non-violence resulted in the murder of hundreds of civilians and a health system crisis where tens of thousands suffered injuries. The Western mainstream media lied for Israel, claiming that the protests were riots and that Israel was defending its “border”, neither of which was true.
Time and time again, Hamas had tried to find a solution to Gaza’s unlivable predicament, yet the Israelis were set on leaving the territory there as an unfixable problem, which could be contained through periodic massacres and assassinations of leaders, something that had been happening for decades, beyond just the major wars in 2008-9, 2012, 2014, and 2021.
Instead, the Israelis were chasing the expansion of the “Abraham Accords” to include Saudi Arabia and others, killing what was known as the “Arab Peace Initiative”, a plan set forth by Riyadh that set a Palestinian State based upon the 1967 borders as a pre-requisite for normalization.
By October 7, 2023, Israel was pushing forward with its West Bank annexation efforts, had been expanding its ethnic cleansing of East Jerusalem and had sidelined Gaza. When Hamas launched operation Al-Aqsa Flood, it collapsed Israel’s southern command, dealt the strongest military blow Israel had ever experienced and shook up the entire surrounding region also.
The Israelis saw it very clearly that two things had just occurred, leading to polar opposite paths. Israel now had its “re-birth” or disintegration moment to deal with. Exactly what Israel’s senior leadership asserted about their intentions for Gaza is precisely what they began pursuing, and still are, after two years.
In their eyes, the whole game changed. It was time to accelerate their plans that were designed to play out over a decade; now had come their opportunity to “solve the Gaza question” and “reshape the Middle East” through brute force.
This is why Israel has spent so much time demolishing Gaza as part of its genocide. Still, today, its military, along with private Israeli civilian contractors who are paid danger money for their work, are demolishing the remaining Palestinian civilian infrastructure that remains behind what Israel calls the “Yellow Line” (54-58 percent of Gaza).
Logically, if the Israelis have just committed genocide and are currently continuing to not only murder civilians daily, but demolish the remaining buildings in the Gaza Strip, does it make any sense that they have accepted an end to the conflict? Such a conclusion would be somewhat delusional.
What Israel is doing is sticking to its war goals, which it sought to achieve on October 7, 2023. Although some are able to see this clearly, they make another key mistake in their understanding of the current predicament, that is, that this plan is localized to Palestine, or even just Gaza.
This was the same mistake that many regional players, as part of the Iranian-led Axis of Resistance, made. Only upon the assassination of Hezbollah leader, Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah, did this element of Israel’s overarching scheme fully sink in, as many were misled to believe that Gaza was the only true target.
In the eyes of the Israelis, if the people of Gaza are still there, then eventually resistance will return, and the issue will go back to the start, once again. Logically, this also makes sense, given what the Israelis have done to the people there, the desire for revenge and resistance will only have grown, even if all the armed groups there are disarmed and the next wave of resistance takes decades to manifest itself.
Meanwhile, an even bigger threat lurks to the north, where Hezbollah still very much exists. Although propagandists claim that the group is over, the Israeli leadership understands this not to be the case.
As many argue that Hezbollah is “done”, consider the following: Hamas was not even a fraction of the military force that Hezbollah currently is – even in a weaker state – on October 7, 2023, yet still managed to collapse Israel’s southern command and its fighters were carrying out operations across the separation barrier for at least two days after the initial attack.
If Hezbollah so chose to, it could undoubtedly deliver severe blows against the Israelis. In fact, if Hezbollah’s fighters were to prove capable of penetrating the borders and entering the Galilee, such a military disaster for Israel would represent an undoing of the objectives it sought to achieve through its genocide in Gaza.
The Gaza genocide was a strategy, one to completely destroy the territory and inflict a defeat upon the Palestinian national resistance, through mass slaughter, to demoralize them, and make it impossible for the people to remain living inside Gaza. It was also a message to the regional resistance and the Arab world, in general, that if you challenge Israel militarily, you will suffer the same fate.
The Israelis are not about to sit around and wait for a resistance force to develop inside Syria, for the Lebanese resistance to strengthen itself to a degree where it will become a force capable of “deterrence”, or to allow for Iran to occupy the same counterweight to it regionally that it did prior to October 7, 2023. “Total victory” is what Benjamin Netanyahu constantly reiterates as his goal and, even after the ceasefire was imposed in Gaza, he openly stated that “the war is not over”.
The Impossible ‘Peace Plan’
Israel, for years, not only among its leading political parties but its Jewish population at large, has rejected the notion of even negotiating for a Palestinian State on a mere 22 percent of historic Palestine. The only major issue standing in Israel’s way was the Palestinian population still living there and the regional military alliance that stood for its cause and encouraged armed struggle.
In January of 2020, US President Donald Trump revealed what he called his “Deal of the Century” plan. If you look at the details of it, this aligns not only with previous proposals set forth by Israel’s Likud Party, that were not taken seriously by the Americans, at that point, but also with the so-called “Peace Deal” that is being proposed today.
It is to say that a divided series of cantons, or mini-concentration camps, be set up under a Palestinian Authority-led administration. A plan under which the Jordan Valley area and other portions of Area C in the West Bank will be annexed, occupied Jerusalem will be seized entirely by Israel, and Abu Dis, located East of Jerusalem behind Israel’s Wall of separation, will be the de facto Palestinian capital. Trump’s current proposal takes the “Deal of the Century” and strips it down even further.
While the Europeans and Arab nations propose a Palestinian “State”, with East Jerusalem as its capital, offering their so-called “New York Declaration” as a framework, the Trump administration has accepted this vision with two primary caveats, so far: No actual Palestinian State, no capital in occupied East Jerusalem.
The New York Declaration initiative, put together by Saudi Arabia and France, declares that so-called “non-State actors” will be drowned out of the picture and are to be barred from the political process; in other words, only their favored candidates from the mainstream branch of Fatah will be considered valid for elections. This means no democracy.
The Saudi-French vision also states that Palestine must be demilitarized, making it the only State on earth barred from having an army. There would be no repercussions for Israel’s genocide, of course; in fact, they will be rewarded under this vision. Palestine will also be a State whereby the leadership will have no say over its own education program, instead adopting a foreign-Israeli re-education program.
As laid out during French President Emmanuel Macron’s United Nations General Assembly speech, this initiative also demands the disarmament of Hamas and the introduction of an international force that would enter Gaza, only under the strict conditions and coordination of the Israelis.
It suffices to say that both proposals, from the US and its allies, are very similar, except that one seeks to please the corrupt Palestinian Authority officials who currently partially run the affairs of the West Bank.
Interestingly enough, the Palestinian Authority (PA) and its unelected President, Mahmoud Abbas, are only relevant today because of Hamas, despite their public statements blaming Hamas for almost everything that has happened since October 7, 2023. If it were not for Hamas, there would be no recognition of Palestine. No Arab, US, and European money on the table for the corrupted clique of elites based out of Ramallah, nothing.
While the PA buried the Palestinian cause, hijacked its leadership and turned it into an international money-grabbing laughing stock amongst serious political actors, the armed movements it opposes so virulently are the ones propelling the cause to the world.
Many may ask why the Palestinian national movement is incapable of seizing this moment, when the world collectively sides with their struggle; the answer is the corruption of the Palestinian Authority. It is that simple.
And this does not mean petty corruption, like nepotism or certain individuals benefiting financially from the system, but rather the complete selling out of the cause altogether. All major movements, governments and interim authorities have these sorts of issues to one extent or another; it is simply because human beings are fallible.
This critique is also starkly different from those historically made against the Fatah Party, from other members of the PLO and even some groups that operated outside of it. The PA of today does not hold a candle to the PLO of old. It is not just an administration with issues, like those associated with neo-partimonialism, political miscalculations or signing agreements that were designed to damage the Palestinian people; it is a corrupt regime that works as the occupiers’ subcontractor. It functions as a house-slave.
Back to the Israelis and the plan. The chances of them adhering to it are slim to nothing, unless the US were to somehow put its foot down and force them to, which is highly unlikely, as Washington is giving the green light to each of their violations, never daring to even challenge them.
If the Israelis were serious about reconstruction, then why have they created and continue to employ civilians from the private sector to demolish Palestinian infrastructure in Gaza every day? If they were serious about a “technocratic” Palestinian governing force in Gaza, then why are they continuing to back three major ISIS-linked proxy groups behind the Yellow Line?
According to Axios News, the US is giving a green light to an Israeli strategy whereby they will begin using reconstruction funds to build structures in the areas of Gaza they control. This plan would then offer civilians to live there under the occupation of the Israelis and their criminal proxy groups.
Meanwhile, Israel continues to prevent the bare necessities from entering the Gaza Strip. The so-called ceasefire agreement was supposed to allow 400 aid trucks to enter per day for the first five days, then 600 plus afterward. Israel even reportedly committed to 600 per day. So far, around 90 trucks have entered per day on average, as Gaza continues to suffer severe food shortages across the besieged territory.
If the Israelis cannot even help themselves from slaughtering over 100 civilians, so far, and blocking aid, what chance is there that they will allow a legitimate political entity to function, let alone permit reconstruction? They would not even allow the heavy equipment into Gaza that was needed to quickly and safely extract the bodies of its dead captives, which are buried under the rubble created by their own bombs.
If we turn back to 2014, the Israelis were also supposed to allow the reconstruction of Gaza, yet they also banned the entry of the desperately needed equipment and materials then, too. It took the ingenuity of the people to overcome this hurdle at the time.
This ceasefire agreement was never created to end the genocide or pave the way to peace. Prussian military theorist, Carl von Clausewitz, is often quoted as stating that “war is the continuation of politics by other means”, which can be applied here.
The Israelis have clear goals of conquering what they view as “Greater Israel”. As of now, they are pursuing, through political means, their schemes to de-fang the resistance and will proceed to war, when they deem necessary. Israel must be defeated by the regional resistance, or it will keep going until it achieves its “total victory”.
https://www.palestinechronicle.com/why-israel-never-intended-to-respect-the-gaza-ceasefire-analysis/
-------
Gaza and the Nakedness of the Emperor: A Reflection on ‘Peace’
By Jeremy Salt
October 24, 2025
The Emperor rides by in his carriage, stark naked, waving to the crowd. The crowd cheers and waves back. Everyone can see the Emperor is naked, but no one is going to say anything.
The Emperor lops the head off anyone who is brave or stupid enough to tell the truth, but a small child at the back, who is too young to know any better, calls out, “Look!! He’s not wearing any clothes.”
And so it is with the one-state and two-state solutions. They are the fantasies that clothe the Emperor’s nakedness.
Since 1967, Israel has deliberately packed the West Bank and East Jerusalem with 750,000-800,000 settlers to prevent the rise of a Palestinian State. One state as a Jewish supremacist is not a solution at all, but an invitation to more war. One state in which Jews, Muslims, Christians and others live on the basis of equal rights might arise one day in the distant future, but there is no hope of it right now.
A chunk of Gaza, set aside for Palestinian statehood under the joint control of Israel, outside governments and Palestinian collaborators, is sleight of hand. Remove the walnut shell and the pea is not there. More than 50 percent of Gaza is already under direct occupation and Israel intends to maintain permanent control over the territory.
Trump says he will not allow the annexation of the West Bank, even as the occupation ‘parliament’ votes for it. As Trump does nothing to stop the continuing settlement, annexation is becoming de facto, anyway.
The ‘peace plan’ the US President said would give the Middle East peace for the first time in 3000 years did not bring peace, even for a day. Does this mean that there is no solution? Right now, yes.
The Palestinians and the Israelis are stuck and the world is stuck with them because this is not just some minor regional wrangle that will go away, but has the potential to ignite a global war one day.
There is a solution, but only the small child is prepared to call it out. Israel has to go. It is not just that it should never have been established in Palestine, in the first place, and would not have been had not Britain wanted to plant an alien settler minority at the heart of the Middle East to further its imperial strategies.
The problem is that it does not want peace with the Palestinians. It wants their land, and the two are irreconcilable. The Zionists did not come to Palestine to live with the Palestinians but to live there instead of them. That is clear from the private writings of the settler establishment. They hid their true intentions behind the public face of wanting nothing more than to get along with the indigenous people. Their statements that nothing could be further from their minds than a Jewish state were bare-faced lies.
The primary tools in their seizure of Palestine were ethnic cleansing, occupation, mass murder, and assassination. Over the years, any group, state or individual who supported the Palestinians was subjected to the same treatment. To get what it wanted, Israel chose to live in permanent violation of international law. It was a necessity if it was to survive and expand. It has stuck to the program. The wars of 1948 and 1967 were necessities. Now, there is the necessity of the Gaza genocide, a flagrant, open, advertised, accelerated and compressed subset of the slow-motion genocide that began in 1948.
This is the reality behind the fantasies. There is clearly only one solution to this mess, which is that Israel as a Jewish supremacist state has to go. Preferably, Israelis themselves will one day dismantle it after concluding that their state, as constructed until now, is unworkable if peace is the objective. As Israel is determined to crush the Palestinians and impose its will on the Arab world, an explosive end seems far more likely.
No room can endlessly be allowed for a lawless genocidal state in the 21st century, any more than it could for the Nazi state in the 20th. Such states are a standing danger to world peace.
The parallels might be odious to the Israelis, but they are there. Two chosen peoples, two lebensraums, two racist ideologies, two sets of merciless cruelty to create a purified state. Two genocides, one bigger than the other (but a genocide is still a genocide).
Israel claims the ‘right’ to exist. In fact, states do not exist as of right and, for Israel to claim a right to exist is a bit rich, seeing that it has done its best for the past 80 years to make sure that Palestine does not exist.
States have risen and fallen throughout history. Even a few hundred years later, a dead state is mostly forgotten. Some states go into slow decline, and others are destroyed in war. Empires die. The British Empire was the empire on which the sun never set, but, eventually, it did set, for good.
The disappearance of the state does not mean the disappearance of the people. They can live on in a new state, as the Germans did after the destruction of the Nazi state and the construction of a new one in its place.
The Palestinian policy position in the 1950s was that Jews who lived in Palestine ‘before the invasion’ (the precise date not given) could stay. Implicitly, the others would have to go but, as later negotiations showed, that was negotiable.
Since then, attitudes have been hardened by Israel’s wars and atrocities. They might have gone too far for future co-existence. This is what dictated the Greek-Turkish population exchange of 1923, following the Greek invasion of 1919-1922, described by the historian Arnold Toynbee as a “war of extermination”.
Would Palestinians want to live with people who had set out to annihilate them? Would former Israeli Jews feel safe among the people they had tried to wipe out? If the state of Israel collapsed, many, if not most, would prefer to leave.
Their disappearance would create space for Palestinians to be able to return to their homeland and with Jews genuinely prepared to live with them as equals, perhaps they really could build something new together. Palestine could be returned to where it was before the advent of Zionism, a land where Muslims, Christians and Jews had lived amicably with each other for thousands of years.
Such a solution would be in line with the most basic common law. At no point does stolen property ever become the property of someone else. A settler population living on stolen Palestinian land has no moral or legal rights to stand on, but only force to back up its claims. Jews as Zionists deceive themselves. Jews, as Jews, are more capable of acknowledging the truth.
The last two years surely extinguish any hope that there can be any kind of just outcome with a Jewish supremacist Israel intent on acquiring more territory, not relinquishing any for the sake of peace.
The genocide is not just Netanyahu and his co-genocidalists in power, but the people. Polls over the past two years have shown that more than 80 percent of them support the genocide. Their social media is full of hatred, contempt and pleasure taken at the mass murder of Palestinians.
Israel’s crimes have been listed in hundreds of pages of documents published by the UN and other institutions. There is no deniability, plausible or otherwise. These crimes are among the worst in world history.
From individual murder to mass murder, nothing is missed out. Everything is there and has been fully documented. This is probably the most total genocide in history, because it is not just the people being destroyed, but everything that represents them and everything they represent, down to the last olive tree and blade of grass.
Jewishness is not the problem. Hamas is not the problem and neither is Fatah, the PFLP, PDFLP and all the resistance movements that preceded it. They were all abused the same way as Hamas has been and the next movements will be.
Zionism is the problem. It is a threat to Israelis as well, even if they cannot see it. Their minds have been poisoned, generation after generation, into an unholy mix of arrogance, aggression, insecurity, racism, hatred and contempt. Zionism is the coagulant that holds it all together.
Yet, even as they destroy Gaza, Israelis must know that, without the steroids of US weaponry and money, Israel cannot survive. The US will not always be there and no one else is likely to step in and fill the gap when the US decides enough is enough.
Israel’s bottom line now stated openly and more flagrantly than ever, is all or nothing: all for Israel and nothing for the Palestinians. Peace for one and burial for the other. Its future is based on the gamble that, with US support, it can win wars endlessly. It cannot, of course. Endless war is not going to work endlessly. Had not Sadat sold out the Syrian President, Hafez Al-Assad, in 1973, Israel would have been brought to the brink of defeat then.
Its army was sent running from Lebanon by Hezbollah on two occasions. It has failed to destroy Hamas and, in June this year, it launched a war on Iran that rebounded within twelve days. If the US had not been there to intervene, Israel could have been destroyed. These are the gusts of wind that signal a storm one day, but Israel takes no notice: it plans, not for a genuine peace, but the next war.
The Emperor’s nakedness needs to be admitted. Trump, Kushner and Witkoff are real estate developers. Their ‘peace plan’ is not for peace, but for international investors. That New York realtors should be in charge of a Middle Eastern ‘peace plan’ is completely grotesque.
There have been many genocidal states in history. The US is one of them, but the US is a global power. It is big in all respects, too big to be held accountable in a court for its actions. Israel is small in all respects except its aggression and has already been targeted by the ICJ and the ICC.
Seven million Jewish Israelis are surrounded by 500 million Arabs and a world population of two billion Muslims who Israel has stirred into fury for the past 80 years. It seems to think it can do whatever it wants and they will never awaken.
This comes out of the same racist mindset that believed the Egyptians could never run the Suez Canal by themselves, that they were not smart enough to work out how to cross the canal in the face of Israeli fortifications on the east bank in 1973 and that the Iranian Islamic State could be destroyed in a lightning strike.
The Israelis are not going to voluntarily dismantle their genocidal apartheid state for the sake of peace. It is equally improbable, in the medium term at least, that the US will cut the flow of money and weaponry that prevents Israel from being forced to come to terms with the harsh reality of life without the US. At the moment, there is no solution in sight, only the palliative care of yet another unworkable ‘peace plan.’
What seems inevitable is that Israel-Palestine will lurch onwards through crisis after crisis towards a very bitter end. There will be more peace plans, more betrayal, more lies, more deceptions, more delusions, more war, more assassinations and more collapsed negotiations until the region explodes. That is the most likely outcome.
Only then will the 100-year war end. Only then will it be possible to build something decent out of the ruins. There will be plenty of time to reflect on how this final catastrophe could have been avoided, ‘if only.’
https://www.palestinechronicle.com/gaza-and-the-nakedness-of-the-emperor-a-reflection-on-peace/
------
ICJ Ruling on Israel’s Conduct in Gaza Will Generate More Heat against the Zionist Regime
By Iqbal Jassat
October 24, 2025
In another fatal blow to its pariah status as a rogue regime, the settler colonial regime, Israel, has once again been found to be in grave violation of International Law.
Though belated, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) issued a strongly worded ruling, stating that Israel must allow the entry of urgently needed humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip and ensure the basic survival needs of its population are met.
“The Court considers that Israel is under an obligation to agree to and facilitate relief schemes provided by the United Nations and its entities, including UNRWA,” said ICJ President, Yuji Iwasawa.
The Court emphasized that, as an occupying power, Israel must guarantee essentials for civilians, including food, water, and other critical supplies.
“As an occupying power, Israel is obliged to ensure the basic needs of the local population, including the supplies essential for their survival,” Iwasawa added.
While the world looks on as a fragile ceasefire takes effect following two years of relentless bombings and devastating cruelty inflicted on the besieged population of Gaza, the Netanyahu regime has, yet again, been cornered and exposed as genocidaires.
None of the myriad of excuses used by the Zionist regime to justify its evil policies of weaponizing starvation and the inhumane denial of critical supplies has been entertained by the ICJ.
As expected, the genocidal regime led by war criminals has dismissed the ruling as politically motivated. Such kneejerk responses, including rejection of the ICJ, is entirely predictable and in line with what the international community has heard from Israel over the last 24 months of genocide.
However, rejection does not absolve the regime from the legal, moral and political implications that flow out of the ICJ ruling.
Equally damning is the finding that no evidence exists that members of UNRWA were affiliated with Hamas. This myth, as we know and have written about, was deliberately fabricated and widely promoted by the regime and its army of Hasbara agents, to justify the destruction of UNRWA facilities and the massacre of its members.
In its statement Hamas rebuked Israel, saying the ICJ ruling confirms that Israel commits acts of genocide by deliberately starving Palestinians and cannot legally enforce settlement policies in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
“The ICJ decision banning the use of starvation as a method of warfare confirms that the occupation, which deliberately starves Palestinians, is committing a form of genocide,” Hamas said.
It added that the ruling is a clear call for the International community to “act immediately to guarantee the entry of humanitarian aid and prevent its politicization or use as a tool of coercion by the occupation.”
According to a Guardian report, a crucial interpretation of the ruling means that Israel has violated the UN’s immunities as set out in the UN Charter, as well as ignored its humanitarian obligations as an occupying power under the Geneva Conventions.
It is, thus, bound to lead to further calls for Israel’s suspension from the UN. An additional consequence of the ruling makes it possible for member states of the United Nations to seek damages from Israel for breaching the immunities of UN staff premises.
Seeking accountability and compensation for bombing UN facilities and ending cooperation with UNRWA, is a right that needs to be invoked by member states.
The ICJ judges also found that the mass transfers or deportation of a population in an occupied territory is prohibited under the Geneva Conventions. It said that Israel had no right to block aid, or force hundreds of thousands of people into crowded areas or to restrict the presence of the UN “to a degree that creates conditions of life that would force the population to leave”.
“The occupying power may never invoke reasons of security to justify the general suspension of all humanitarian activities in occupied territory,” Judge Iwasawa Yuji said, while delivering the opinion, which also said Israel is obliged to ensure the basic needs of civilians in Gaza are met. “After examining the evidence, the Court finds that the local population in Gaza Strip has been inadequately supplied.”
Philippe Lazzarini, UNRWA Commissioner-General, welcomed the “unambiguous” legal opinion in a post on X and stated that the UN has the resources to “immediately scale up” the humanitarian response in the territory.
The ICJ process is separate from the investigation into Israel’s war crimes in Gaza being carried out by the International Criminal Court (ICC) – another international legal body based in The Hague, Netherlands.
Late last year, the ICC issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and former Defense Minister, Yoav Gallant.
In its summary of the ICJ ruling, Sky News said it was a verdict that came slowly, and with some of its barbs hidden in sub-clauses and legalese.
“But if you put the elements together, it was a highly critical attack on Israel’s conduct in the occupied territories. Not just in Gaza, but also in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.”
While Netanyahu has dismissed the ruling, neither he nor his gang of war criminals can deny that it is another nail in Zionism’s coffin and that the heat against the regime will intensify.
https://www.palestinechronicle.com/icj-ruling-on-israels-conduct-in-gaza-will-generate-more-heat-against-the-zionist-regime/
-------
Exodus From The Holy Land: Record Number Of Israelis Emigrate As Security Fears Rise
By Michael J Salamon, Louis Libin
October 25, 2025
The numbers are stark. The Central Bureau of Statistics reports that 82,000 Israelis emigrated in 2023, with similar figures expected this year, the highest since 2010.
Among those leaving are thousands of highly skilled professionals, including more than 8,000 from the hi-tech industry between October 2023 and mid-2024 alone.
Dr. Dalia Adler, a demographer at Hebrew University, puts it plainly: “This wave of emigration is unprecedented. Young, educated Israelis are leaving, and if we don’t act fast, it could seriously damage Israel’s innovation and growth.”
But the story isn’t that simple. As global antisemitism rises, Israel’s role as a refuge for Jews worldwide has never been more critical. Yet, paradoxically, many Israelis are deciding to leave, driven by security fears and uncertainty.
I recently spoke with an IT specialist who moved his family to the US right after the October 7 attacks but has since returned. His takeaway? The fear of being Israeli in America was just as intense as the fear of security threats back home.
Record number of Israelis emigrate abroad
Professor Yossi Klein Halevi captures this tension: “Security concerns, economic pressures, and social divisions are pushing Israelis to reconsider their future here. At the same time, Israel remains a vital refuge for Jews worldwide, creating a complex balancing act for the government.”
This migration trend shines a harsh light on deep anxieties about safety, economic opportunity, and quality of life. Israel continues to be a beacon for Jews around the globe, but it can’t afford to ignore why its own citizens are leaving.
The government faces a clear mandate: bolster security, improve the economy, and keep welcoming new immigrants who can help build the nation – an area that many new olim say has been neglected.
As former Immigration and Absorption Minister Ze’ev Elkin recently said, “We must not only encourage aliyah but also make Israel a place where Israelis want to stay, safe, prosperous, and full of opportunity.”
SOME EXPERTS suggest the initial spike in departures has “stabilized” since the immediate shock of war, with factors like political unrest, including contentious judicial reforms, cost of living, lifestyle choices, and career opportunities abroad playing a role.
If you tune into Arab media outlets, you’ll hear about a “migration crisis” in Israel.
But what counts as a crisis? For many Israeli officials and analysts, the steady outflow of skilled professionals during a time of war and internal unrest is definitely worrying for workforce stability, security, and resilience.
Yet, among Jewish communities worldwide, feelings about moving to Israel remain positive, especially as antisemitism worsens elsewhere. This is likely to lead to waves of immigration that could strain infrastructure and shift demographics, making Israel’s migration story a complicated mix of loss and gain.
Numbers can be spun to fit different narratives, and the data here is, as with most statistics, complex. Are those leaving gone for good, or just taking a break?
How do we define “permanent” emigration when many Israelis hold dual citizenship and often spend months overseas without severing ties? Data always lags, and the reality on the ground is fluid.
The war is just one piece of the puzzle. Domestic politics, from judicial reform protests to soaring housing costs, combined with global opportunities for skilled workers, all play their part.
Still, Israel’s population continues to grow, as births and immigration outpace departures in many measures. And if security worsens, it could either drive more people away or, paradoxically, draw more back.
This exodus since October 2023 isn’t just a statistic; it must become a wake-up call. Israel’s leaders and citizens need to face these challenges head-on if the country is to remain a vibrant, thriving home for all who live here and for Jews everywhere.
Looking at the data and the massive construction underway across the country, Israel is far from doomed. It will grow, adapt, and create new opportunities, especially in defense and technology. The future demands action, not anxiety.
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-871518
------
Israel’s Long Road To Healing: How War And Political Failure Shape The Nation
By Amotz Asa-El
October 24, 2025
I will cry over my dead,” wrote journalist Arnon Lapid after returning from the battlefields of the Yom Kippur War.
“I will cry over my dead – Avermale, Ilan, Dudu, Amitai, Uzi, Yair, Beni,” continued the kibbutznik from Givat Haim, listing the names of his fallen friends.
“I will cry over my dead and you will cry over yours,” and this way all will mourn all; “together we will decry the dreams from which we have awakened, the big things that became small, the gods that disappointed and the false prophets who rose to prominence; the futility, the lack of will, the lack of energy – the present, in which there isn’t even one ray of light… and we will pity ourselves… a lost generation of a tormented nation in a land that devours its dwellers” (“Invitation to cry,” Shdemot, January 1974).
It was a testament to a postwar feeling of trauma, bereavement, angst, and despair that Israelis who experienced those years will never forget. Now, as Israeli society reels from its longest war, once again bruised, embattled, and perplexed, a similar sense of loss, disillusionment, and wrath pervades much of the Jewish state.
The pessimism of 1974, as the subsequent peace with Egypt, mass immigration, and economic prosperity proved, was exaggerated. So is the pessimism of 2025.
The shock of our latest war was in some ways even worse than the Yom Kippur War’s.
The military failures to detect the attack’s approach and prepare for it were much the same in both wars. So is the politicians’ failure to acknowledge their moral responsibility for the era’s conceit.
The two wars’ tallies of Israeli fatalities were, on the face of it, much graver in 1973, when 3.1 million Israelis lost 2,656 soldiers, as opposed to the recent war, in which 10 million Israelis lost 1,984 lives. Psychologically, however, this war’s tally is in a league of its own, because 1,065 of its fallen were civilians, whereas in 1973, all of the fallen were soldiers.
This, to be sure, is the foremost cause of the perplexity that this war has caused. Worse, the civilian fatalities were killed in their homes – parents, children, and grandparents massacred against the backdrop of their burning towns.
'Our shtetl is burning'
“Our shtetl is burning,” thought millions of Israelis, recalling Yiddish poet Mordechai Gebirtig’s prophetic lines written shortly before the Holocaust.
Yes, when the fighting that the massacre triggered arrived, it turned out that the nation that was caught unprepared for this war was not unfit for it. On the contrary. The soldiers proved as motivated as previous wars’ troops, the IDF emerged with its deterrence restored and even redoubled, and Israeli society displayed a spirit of voluntarism and solidarity that many had thought it no longer possessed.
Still, it has been half a century since Israeli society has been this traumatized. What, then, are the elements of this trauma and how will it be healed?
The previous trauma was redoubled by the economy. The Yom Kippur War fanned inflation, multiplied deficits, pumped the national debt, and heralded more than two decades of dependency on American aid.
This war was different. Israel arrived at it with a population more than three times larger than 1973’s, and a modernized economy whose per-capita product is higher than most of the world’s industrial powers.
The Israeli stock market’s TASE 35 Index rose during this war by more than 70%, the shekel appreciated by 15%, and inflation was checked at 2.5%.
Unlike the Yom Kippur War, which spawned economic doom, the war that now ended is set to touch off an economic boom. However, the prospect of economic security and optimism will not heal the war’s political wounds, much less offset its psychological angst.
The war and the events that preceded it leave most Israelis feeling politically bankrupt.
It begins with what should be any Israeli government’s bread and butter: the ability, or at least the motivation, to defend Israel abroad. The academic, economic, and cultural assault on Israel, and the attacks throughout the world on Jewish symbols, institutions, and pedestrians – have left Israelis feeling abandoned.
The leaders who caused this war didn’t even show up for the battles it kindled abroad. This insight comes not from those leaders’ opponents, but from Gilad Erdan, until recently their own ambassador to Washington and the United Nations.
Why, Israelis wonder, is there no proper budgeting, planning, and leadership on this front? And the answer is the same one Israelis gave to similar questions after the Yom Kippur War: our leaders lost their way.
Self-absorbed and up to their nostrils in bickering, feather-nesting, and petty cockfights, they lost the ability to distinguish between adversary and enemy, between fair and unfair, between good and bad, and between evil and just.
humility, solidarity, and reconciliation
At the same time, the people who sacrificed in this war emerged from it with three great expectations from their leaders: humility, solidarity, and reconciliation.
Humility demands an impartial investigation of the policymaking that ended in catastrophe. Solidarity demands that all citizens share the burden of national service. And reconciliation demands that anything constitutional be done by consensus.
It took hardly a week for the relevant politicians to make plain that if it’s up to them, there will be no solidarity, no reconciliation, and no search for truth. The war that was supposed to humble them only fueled their acrimony and zeal.
Back in 1973, the political hegemon’s attitude was not much different. It took three years, but ultimately, the Israelis who fought that war removed the leadership that caused it. The same is ready to happen now.
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-871483
------
Bolivia After The Elections: How The Rise Of The Right Could Reframe The Palestinian Cause
by Dr Rassem Bisharat
October 24, 2025
A political shock with diplomatic ripples
In October 2025, Bolivia stunned observers at home and abroad by electing Rodrigo Paz, a centre-right candidate from the Christian Democratic Party of Bolivia (PDC), as its new president—ending nearly two decades of leftist rule under the Movement for Socialism (MAS).
Yet the shock was not merely domestic. Within hours of the official results, Israel congratulated Paz, calling his victory an opportunity to “open a new chapter” in bilateral relations.
This came less than two years after Bolivia cut diplomatic ties with Israel over its war in Gaza in 2023—a bold move that had positioned La Paz among Israel’s harshest critics in Latin America.
The swift Israeli outreach underscores a deeper geopolitical shift now unfolding across South America’s political map—where ideology, foreign policy, and moral posturing on Palestine are once again in flux.
From socialist solidarity to signs of pragmatism
For years, Bolivia stood at the forefront of Latin American solidarity with Palestine. Under leftist president Evo Morales, La Paz severed relations with Israel in 2009 in protest of Operation Cast Lead, and repeated the move in November 2023, accusing Israel of committing “crimes against humanity” in Gaza.
Bolivia also brought the Palestinian case to the International Court of Justice, describing Israel’s occupation as “illegal.”
Such moves cemented Bolivia’s reputation as a moral and ideological voice in defense of Palestinian rights, an embodiment of Latin America’s anti-imperialist, postcolonial left.
But the election of Rodrigo Paz signals that this era of ideological certainty may be giving way to economic realism and foreign-policy pragmatism.
Paz’s project: “Capitalism for all”
Rodrigo Paz is no ideologue. The 47-year-old leader of the PDC represents a Christian Democratic, market-friendly vision of governance, one that pledges to “bring Bolivia back to the world.”
His campaign prioritised economic reform, private-sector empowerment, and rebuilding global partnerships. Unlike his predecessors, Paz does not see foreign policy as a battlefield of revolutionary principles. Instead, he treats it as a strategic instrument to attract foreign investment and rebuild ties with Western economies including, crucially, Israel.
Israel’s quick congratulatory message, therefore, was not a diplomatic courtesy, it was a calculated signal. For Tel Aviv, Bolivia’s political realignment presents an opening to restore relations and to regain lost ground in a continent where leftist solidarity with Palestine has long shaped the discourse.
What might change under Paz?
ONE: A diplomatic repositioning
Under Paz, Bolivia is expected to soften its tone on Israel. The Christian Democrats do not carry the ideological hostility toward Tel Aviv that defined the MAS governments. Their focus lies squarely on economic growth, not on foreign ideological conflicts.
That could translate into a gradual re-engagement with Israel, possibly through technical, commercial, or agricultural cooperation—moves that may not be loudly announced but will be politically significant.
TWO: Israel’s strategic play
Israel has already made its intentions clear. Its foreign ministry’s statement about “strengthening cooperation” reflects a deliberate outreach strategy aimed at consolidating diplomatic and economic influence in Latin America.
Paz’s victory offers Israel both a symbolic and a strategic gain—a chance to reduce Bolivia’s role as a vocal pro-Palestinian player in the United Nations and other global forums.
THREE: Domestic pushback
Still, Paz faces a formidable challenge at home.
Bolivia’s public opinion remains deeply pro-Palestinian. Leftist movements, grassroots organizations, and representatives of indigenous communities all view Palestine’s struggle as part of Bolivia’s own historical narrative of resistance.
To navigate this tension, Paz may adopt a dual-track approach: maintaining symbolic solidarity with Palestine while pursuing quiet normalization with Israel to avoid alienating domestic constituencies.
FOUR: Regional implications
Bolivia’s potential shift could reshape Latin America’s pro-Palestine bloc.
If La Paz tones down its criticism, it could weaken the moral weight of the regional left that has championed Palestine—from Chile and Colombia to Brazil under Lula da Silva.
Such a change would tilt the regional diplomatic balance, giving Israel new room to maneuver and rebuild its image across the continent.
For Palestine: A quiet but significant loss
From the Palestinian perspective, Paz’s election marks a strategic inflection point.
Bolivia was one of the few countries that actively leveraged its voice at the United Nations and the International Court of Justice in defense of Palestinian rights.
Losing that voice – even partially – creates a diplomatic vacuum in Latin America, a region that has historically offered strong moral and political backing to Palestine.
Yet, a total rupture seems unlikely. Paz is too politically astute to risk alienating his domestic base overnight. His government is expected to proceed gradually, maintaining rhetorical support for Palestinian statehood while opening pragmatic channels of cooperation with Israel.
Between principles and interests
Bolivia today stands at a crossroads: between a leftist legacy of moral defiance, which made it a loud advocate for Palestine in global forums, and a new conservative pragmatism seeking reintegration with Western powers and reconciliation with Israel.
This shift in La Paz is more than a change in diplomatic tone, it reflects a reordering of national priorities: from ideology to interest, from moral solidarity to economic diplomacy.
For the Palestinians, the frontlines of advocacy are no longer limited to the Middle East. They now extend into Latin America’s shifting political landscape, where every election, every diplomatic gesture, can alter the contours of international support.
The question that remains: Will Bolivia hold on to its legacy of solidarity, or will its embrace of Israel signal the dawn of a new Latin American pragmatism, redefining what it means to “stand with Palestine.”
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20251024-bolivia-after-the-elections-how-the-rise-of-the-right-could-reframe-the-palestinian-cause/
------
URL: https://www.newageislam.com/middle-east-press/gaza-ceasefire-war-zionist-palestinian/d/137379
New Age Islam, Islam Online, Islamic Website, African Muslim News, Arab World News, South Asia News, Indian Muslim News, World Muslim News, Women in Islam, Islamic Feminism, Arab Women, Women In Arab, Islamophobia in America, Muslim Women in West, Islam Women and Feminism