American Political Spectrum, Gaza, and the Transforming World Order

More than 100 days have passed since the first Israeli brutal onslaught on the civilian population of Palestine. Over 26,000 deaths have been reported in Gaza between October 8, 2023, and January 26, 2024, according to Al Jazeera news. The US, which proclaims to be a defender of human rights, is consistently and most stubbornly trying to sabotage every effort for a ceasefire in Gaza.

It is crucial to understand why the US is the staunch defender of Israel. For that, analyzing the American political spectrum, Gaza, and the transforming world order is necessary. Let’s begin with an overview of history. The US was the first country in the world to officially recognize Israel within 24 hours of its foundation in 1948. In all the Arab-Israel wars, the US has supported Israel with billions of dollars financially, provided advanced weaponry in the military domain, and diplomatic support at United Nations’ platforms. Almost every resolution presented in the UN Security Council against Israel’s atrocities and illegal annexation of Palestinian areas has been vetoed by the US in the past.

America believes the existence of the state of Israel in the center of the Middle Eastern land is a guarantee of its permanent dominance in the region. Thus, the US can go to any lengths to save the Israeli regime. In fact, it was the US that pushed Arab countries like Bahrain and the UAE to recognize Israel.

In the US, not only the government machinery but most of the public also seemed to back Israel. But now, for the first time in history, a major paradigm shift within American society has been observed and reported after the genocide by Israel in Gaza. The pro-Israeli consensus of Americans has broken for the first time.

According to Zahid Bukhari, executive director of the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) Council for Social Justice, “Youth in the US between the ages of 18 and 24 are the vocal proponents of the Palestinian voice. But the conservative population still backs the pro-Israeli agenda.”

In universities, demonstrations against Israeli oppression have been most prominent where the faculty itself has been supportive. The impact of activism against Israeli atrocities at academic institutions can be affected by the incidents of the removal of such university presidents on baseless accusations at the instigation of the Israeli lobby.

It is an undeniable fact that the Israeli lobby is powerful in the US. American thinkers like John Mearsheimer have tried to disclose the influence of the Israeli lobby in American politics. After reading his book The Israeli Lobby and US Foreign Policy, one can clearly comprehend that criticizing the Israeli lobby in a country that teaches every other country the ethics of freedom of speech is not free from threats and potential harm. Even the US president cannot remain insensitive to the Israeli lobby’s demands.

It is also important to understand the political position of Muslims in the US because they are connected to the Gaza issue wholeheartedly, spiritually, and emotionally. After the 9/11 attacks, Muslims have mostly been portrayed negatively on almost every platform in the West. For example, take the American entertainment industry. According to a report titled “Missing and Maligned: The Reality of Muslims in Popular Global Movies,” in 2021, 90.5% of 200 American movies did not feature even one Muslim speaking character.^* The next disturbing aspect seen in the study is that Muslim characters were mostly linked with radicalism and violence in the majority of American films.

There is a large population of Iraqis, Syrians, etc. in the US as a result of America’s engagement in war in these countries in the past. Now, the influx of Afghans into the US is at its peak. Additionally, the population of Bengali Muslims has increased in recent years. So, a sizeable number of Muslims are currently living and will come, in the future, to the US.

The Muslim diaspora in America is also actively engaged in Gaza-related public protests. In the beginning, Muslims in the US, like any other new diaspora community, were only concerned with the betterment of their lives and their overseas relatives. But now Muslims have realized that they must work at the grassroots level. They cannot bring any major shift in American foreign policy stance on Israel unless Muslim activism begins at the national level. Muslims have now comprehended that they cannot become any major political force unless they develop businesses and become influential in the corporate sector.

In this backdrop, now let us look at the present status of the US global order. America’s global hegemony has been stumbling since the rise of China. The Chinese landmark project, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), plans to connect China with more than 140 countries and institutions.

The countries that lead the world do not rule it only with their economic strength and military power; their moral standing also plays a significant part. American moral standing has been badly hit following the Gaza-Israel war. On December 8, in the UN Security Council, a resolution was proposed by the UAE for a ceasefire in Gaza that was vetoed by the US immediately. All other 13 members of the Security Council voted in favor of the brief resolution. The UK abstained because to vote against the ceasefire would have questioned its voice for liberal values. The US was the only country in favor of continuing the war.

What a letdown this has been. Before 9/11, hardly anyone could have imagined that American moral standing would fall to such lows when everyone was envisioning a unipolar world under the moral principles of the US.

Moaz Bashir has recently graduated in international relations from National Defence University, Islamabad.

Reference

^* Al-Baab Khan, Dr. Katherine Pieper, Dr. Stacy L. Smith, Marc Choueiti, Kevin Yao & Artur Tofan, Missing & Maligned: The Reality of Muslims in Popular Global Movies, USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative, June 2021, https://assets.uscannenberg.org/docs/aii-muslim-rep-global-film-2021-06-09.pdf