The key tenet of Israeli policy is that the genocidal war that started more than two years ago is not over, and will not be over any time soon. That can never be a formula for a stable, let alone a permanent peace, whether for the first time in 3,000 years, as US President Donald Trump insists, or in two.
This policy of open-ended war is nothing new for Israel, nor for Netanyahu in particular. Since the signing of the 1993 Oslo Peace Accords between Palestine and Israel, successive Israeli governments carved out slogans such as “there are no sacred dates”, claiming that any alleged violation by the Palestinian side would justify delaying if not annulling any agreements reached, all with the aim of depriving Palestinians of their right to self-determination and an independent state on their own land.
Meanwhile, illegal Israeli actions continue in Occupied Palestinian Territories, namely the expansion of settlements in the West Bank, confiscation of Palestinian lands, attacks on and desecration of Islamic holy sites topped by Al-Aqsa Mosque in Occupied East Jerusalem, and imposing a suffocating siege on Gaza which entitled to the title of the “largest open prison in the world.”
However, after an unprecedentedly devastating war on Gaza over the past two years, which left over 70,000 people killed, mostly women and children, leading to a worldwide outcry, and the intervention of US President Trump, to end the fighting and prevent Israel from “getting out of control,” according to Jared Kushner, the star US Middle East envoy, there was a slim chance that the bloodshed would seriously stop.
Yet the state of constant war has always been an asset for Netanyahu, especially after the developments that took place over the past two years following the attacks carried out by Hamas on 7 October, 2023. Resuming military action on several fronts, Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen and Iran, would sell Netanyahu to the Israeli public as the leader who is changing the map of the Middle East and creating new realities, making up for his failure to prevent the 7 October attacks. Yet the key reality that Netanyahu insists on denying is that he has not actually achieved a decisive victory on any of those fronts, meaning that he will always be at war.
This is certainly not sustainable, whether for domestic or international reasons. This time it was Trump who reminded Israel of the reality that, despite all its military victories, it cannot stand up to the entire world, and remains a small country on the world’s map. Trump’s “America First” mantra and his keenness to attract investments from oil-rich Arab Gulf countries worth trillions of dollars will collide with Netanyahu’s stated policy of indefinite war.
Since the ceasefire agreement in Gaza came into effect on 12 October, there has hardly been a day without Israeli violations, topped with the continued killing of Palestinians as well using food and medicine as weapons of war by denying the entry of urgently needed humanitarian supplies into Gaza and refusing to open the Rafah crossing. On at least three occasions, Israel responded to alleged security threats by Hamas fighters by killing Palestinians on a massive scale as a reminder of the daily horror they endured over the past two years.
On 28 October, when Israel said Hamas fighters in Rafah killed an Israeli soldier, the occupation army retaliated by killing 104 Palestinians, including 46 children. This, despite Rafah being under total Israeli occupation and outside the so-called “yellow line” that currently divides Gaza, squeezing more than two million people into less than half of the Strip.
The same scenario was repeated twice this month, the latest on Saturday after Israel claimed a Hamas fighter attempted to cross the dividing line and threaten Israeli soldiers. At least 33 people were killed in the first attack on 19 November, and 24 on Saturday, including 11 children.
According to the Gaza Government Media Office, Israel has violated the United States-brokered ceasefire at least 497 times since it came into effect on 10 October. Some 342 civilians have been killed in the attacks, with children, women and the elderly accounting for the majority of the victims.
This is the same policy Netanyahu and his extremist government have applied in Lebanon since reaching a ceasefire agreement with Hizbullah a year ago. On a nearly daily basis, Israel has been attacking Lebanon and killing alleged members of the Iran-backed militia. Last week, they expanded the target list further, attacking a Palestinian refugee camp and killing 13 mostly young Palestinians who were playing football on the pretext that they were taking part in a training camp run by Hamas. Palestinian armed groups in Lebanon were among the first to hand over their weapons to the Lebanese army after the ceasefire agreement was reached, and there was never any known Hamas military presence there.
Yet, on Sunday, the Israeli army took its escalation campaign against Hizbullah to a new level, attacking and killing its military leader and second in command. This was an obvious provocation aimed at dragging the Lebanese group into retaliating, and giving the Israeli army a pretext not just to launch another expanded military campaign in Lebanon but strike against Iran too. Netanyahu and several fanatical members of his cabinet have stated that the question of launching a new war against Iran is not a matter of if, but when.
Such reckless Israeli behaviour, which only results in more bloodshed and devastation in the region, should not be allowed to continue. The prime responsibility in this respect falls, no doubt, on Trump, who put his own credibility at stake after taking the lead in working to achieve a peaceful settlement that goes beyond Gaza, as he personally stated.
What is urgently needed at this point is to proceed with the Trump plan for Gaza, which world leaders approved during the Sharm El-Sheikh Summit last month, and was enshrined in a new Security Council resolution last week. No Board of Peace, International Stabilisation Force or new Palestinian government will ever materialise if Netanyahu continues to have a limitless licence to kill in Gaza, Lebanon and Syria.
Meanwhile, the new Lebanese president and government will remain unable to rebuild their country and military if Israel continues to bomb Lebanon daily, weakening the case for placing all weapons under the army’s control and pushing Lebanon into a civil war. Trump, and the entire world must immediately restrain Netanyahu and his appetite for forever war.
* A version of this article appears in print in the 27 November, 2025 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly
Short link: