Who’s the proxy?

This Monday (May 6, 2024) brought yet more confirmation of who exactly is in charge in the America-Israel ‘special relationship’. For weeks, the US has been aiming to negotiate a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas and seemingly stop its ally from attacking Rafah, a town in Gaza near the Egyptian border and the last refuge left for over a million Palestinians from Israel’s genocide. All along Israel has promised to expand its war into this area anyway and now Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu looks to be making good on his words as Israel’s occupying forces have told Palestinians to start evacuating some parts of Rafah. Already, the border town has been subject to airstrikes that have claimed the lives of around 22 people, including children and two infants. This is likely a small taste of what is to come. Some 100,000 people currently in Rafah are reportedly subject to these orders and are being asked to move to a nearby Israel-declared humanitarian zone known as Muwasi. This so-called humanitarian zone is little more than lots of makeshift tents bunched together and those Palestinians who have gone there are reportedly living in squalor. The secretary general of the Norwegian Refugee Council has confirmed that Muwasi is overstretched and devoid of vital services, condemning the evacuation order as forced and unlawful.

Forced and unlawful would be a kind way of summing up Israel’s actions towards the Palestinians. Overstretched and devoid of vital services also describes conditions in Rafah, which Palestinians are being asked to exchange for another hell on earth. The logic is that by doing so, innocent Palestinians will not be caught up in the upcoming assault on Rafah. That is until Muwasi also becomes a target. Everywhere the Palestinians go is seemingly a potential target. Because destitute, starving people who have lost their homes and families are somehow a threat to one of the most powerful armies in the world, which speaks volumes of the insecurity and fragility of the Zionist project.

Looking at the flow of money and arms, one would think that the Zionist state is a proxy and the US its indulgent patron. However, when we analyze who listens to whom or who is calling the shots, it is almost always the smaller party. The US follow’s Israel’s lead and when there is a disagreement the latter does what it wants anyway. Seeing the world’s biggest bully humiliated in this manner could even be empowering if it did not involve the perpetual slaughter, subjugation and forced displacement of the Palestinians. Such is the power of America’s pro-Israel bias that the majority of American youth sympathetic to the Palestinians have found themselves the target of unlawful crackdowns and violent arrests for having the temerity to protest Israel’s actions. But even as Israel pays no mind to the calls of its supposed ally, the US pulling the plug on the whole endeavour – which would be the quickest way of stopping further atrocities – remains unfathomable.