'God gave us Canaan' and other justifications for Israel's bloody attacks

There paradoxically are countries that are ‘free’ to attack others and to break international law with impunity. These include the United States and Israel, countries that are immune to criticism for their warlike activities. Israel justifies its aggressiveness in four ways. First, it claims that God authorised the Israelites to invade and grab ‘Canaan’ from those residing there. Second, it claims the right of self-defence against many hostile Arab and Islamic forces. Third, it is a virtual extension of the Christian Conceptual West in the Middle East. Fourth, there is the sense of guilt that the Conceptual West feels for having persecuted the Jews for centuries.

The divine argument appeals to almost three billion ‘Christians’ who accept the Hebrew weeding out story in the ‘Old Testament’. It starts with God promising to give Abraham, who had three wives and eight sons, a great nation. Seven of the sons, however, ‘disappear’ in favour of Isaac, Sarah’s son. Isaac had two sons and the younger one, Jacob also known as ‘Israel’, edged his big brother Esau out of the ‘nation’.

The descendants of Israel, led by Joshua, started a never-ending feud with other descendants of Abraham over Canaan, the disputed land. Since Christians sentimentally side with Israel and tend to regard other claimants of Canaan as intruders into the ‘Promised Land’, Israel has virtual licence to do as it wishes.

The self-defence argument started in 1948 with the establishment of Israel, with US and Soviet support, and the eviction of the ‘Arabs’ who essentially became the Palestinians. Israel defeated combined Arab forces, ganged up with England and France in the Suez Crisis, and expanded its territory in the 1967 Six-Day War at the expense of Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, and Jordan. It again defeated Egypt in the 1973 Yom Kippur War which adversely altered world economies and empowered OPEC countries to play in the world geopolitical stage. The war encouraged rapprochement between Arab states and Israel and led to a few peace deals which left the Palestinians hanging.

Entire Holy Land

The third is that Israel is a virtual implant of the Conceptual West in the Middle East to deal with ‘them Arabs’. As part of the Conceptual West, Israel cannot do wrong and is therefore always to be supported. This encourages Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to dream of absorbing the entire Holy Land or biblical lands into Israel and use Hamas as an excuse. He seemingly has two things going for him.

First is the support of US President Donald Trump in doing whatever he wants and second is the docility of the rest of the Conceptual West in challenging Israeli wrongdoing. Netanyahu used to support and finance Hamas in his effort to undermine the Palestinian Authority and he reportedly knew of the intended Hamas attack on October 7, 2023.

Netanyahu seemingly welcomed the attack because it gave him leverage and diverted attention from challenges. His personal court cases slid to the background, thereby letting him to deal with Hamas and actualise his expansionist dreams which involve dominating the Middle East by attacking several countries.

Among the countries attacked was Qatar probably because it is the home of the worldwide Al Jazeerah TV network that exposes Israel, which was surprising mainly because the US has a large military base in Qatar. Instead of protecting Qatar despite Qatar pandering to Trump’s whims, the US struggled to assure Israel that it had American backing. The seeming Israeli freedom to attack is thus unlimited.

The Conceptual West is docile due to its sense of guilt for past horrors. This is wearing out due to Israeli atrocities in Gaza which tend to free European countries from the guilt of the past. Their guilt, however, still ties them down. Nothing prevents Israel from doing what it wants. The implied Israeli ‘freedom to attack’ permits it to attack others at will and nothing happens.