Washington comes up with some ceasefire proposals and urges the Palestinians to accept them – or, more accurately, threatens to unleash an even greater hell on them if they don’t. Then, no sooner does the Palestinian delegation come to Qatar to discuss the proposals in good faith, than Israel tries to pick them off – in a residential neighbourhood, killing and wounding civilians in the process, as ever.
This was hardly the first time the US resorted to such deceit. It runs through American history since the early settlers lured representatives of the indigenous peoples into talks, only to ambush and massacre them. A more recent instance of this lay-the-bait-and-kill logic occurred during Trump’s first term when he dangled a fake olive branch to Iran, suggesting that Washington was open to discussions that would lead to easing sanctions. Then, as soon as Iranian negotiator Qassem Suleimani arrived at Baghdad Airport, the US assassinated him in a drone strike, violating the sovereignty of another state, Iraq. The same playbook replayed in Qatar.
One would have to be pretty gullible to swallow Washington’s claim that it had no advance knowledge of Israel’s Doha operation. No airborne object can even begin to approach Qatari airspace without US radars locking onto it from Al-Udeid, the largest US military base in the region. So obviously the US had to coordinate with Israel in advance. Clearly too, Israeli officials followed a US script that gave Washington room for deniability in exchange for this and future services. What was revealing was Trump’s lame protest that he did not approve the operation. It testifies to the unprecedented extent of Washington’s subordination to Israel. The crucial decisions are made in Tel Aviv and Washington can only comply, even if the president himself is opposed.
Israel’s missiles failed to hit their designated target, but they struck at America’s dignity and international prestige. They also laid bare Trump’s abject subservience to the psychopath at the helm of Israel and exposed the hollowness of his boast to Gulf leaders that the US is their protector.
* A version of this article appears in print in the 18 September, 2025 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly
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