The State of the Enemy: From Shock and Denial to Failure and Defeat
Khaled Barakat
Tuesday, July 2, 2024
Republished from the Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar
Despite the differences in positions and visions within the Zionist enemy entity and among its allies, they all agree on describing October 7, 2023 as a “great shock” and “the most dangerous security failure” in the history of their colonial settler project in occupied Palestine. There has been much talk about the “necessity of close cooperation between allies” to save their colony – from itself and from its enemies – as there is a consensus in Tel Aviv and Washington that “war is the solution” and that the axis of resistance constitutes the “greatest existential threat”, while the disagreement within the enemy camp remains over their methods and tactics and not their strategic goal. They declare their position in private and in public, saying: We all hate Iran, Sinwar, Nasrallah and al-Houthi, but in a time of uncertainty and precision missiles, who can guarantee the results of the war?! With every American shell that the Israeli occupation army drops on Gaza, the West Bank, southern Lebanon and Syria, and with every response of the resistance, the Zionist-U.S. failure only grows. The empire is bleeding away its advantage in the balance of power and its strategic position in a world where multiple international powers are advancing and where these changes are taking place at the speed of a missile, while the oil sheikhs, the Camp David regime, the Kingdom of Wadi Araba, and the Oslo mafia all await the good news of “Israeli victory over Hamas!” Because Israel’s defeat and failure also means a disastrous failure for all the poles that make up this enemy camp.
Destructive wars, economic exploitation and political domination are inherent to imperialism and colonialism. These forces have been plundering the planet for 500 years and engineered the largest armed robbery in history. They not only stole Palestine, and the wealth and dreams of Arabs and Muslims, but they also colonized continents, crushed peoples and annihilated tribes. Through war and the imposition of “agreements” of surrender and defeat, the United States wishes to reproduce the “new world order” to its own liking. Total war is a tried and tested recipe, and those whom the United States cannot defeat with bombs, it imposes sanctions, siege and wars of starvation upon them. And despite all of this, the U.S. is shocked and confused as it confronts the facts of today’s reality.
The balance of power in our region changed at the beginning of the new century. The point of this transformation can be identified with the historic victory of the Lebanese resistance in May 2000 when it succeeded in liberating the South through armed force and without political concessions. It presented a novel revolutionary model through which it proved that armed struggle (jihad and resistance) remains possible in the most difficult circumstances. We now have a tried and tested recipe that is also effective. The resistance is now able to say to the enemy and its partners: Do not test our patience. If you embark on aggression and war, your cries may reach Cyprus!
The clear victory achieved by the resistance in Lebanon in 2000, forcing Ehud Barak to the swallow defeat, was repeated by the Palestinian resistance when it forced Sharon to withdraw and dismantle his settlements in 2005. The monster Sharon was forced to make his decisions under fire, calling them “painful decisions” and “difficult choices” and providing a ready-made justification: “I did this for the survival of Israel!”
The Zionist entity suffered successive shocks when the resistance and its popular cradle were able to withstand and overcome the aggression after the goals of the occupier were thwarted. Rebuilding what the war machine destroyed is also a second victory, because the resistance possesses — in addition to the political vision, weapons and clear goals– the ability to organize and plan. It is no coincidence that its strength grows stronger after every battle. This is because it is no longer a spontaneous and improvised condition, a momentary “outrage”, “panic” or “venting of anger” as was all too often the case with the official Palestine Liberation Organization and the arrogant reactionary Arab regimes!
It is not the quantity or type of weapons that makes for steadfastness and victory. Weapons can rust and turn into worthless scrap if there is no ability to organize, renew a movement, exercise political will, and formulate an alternative revolutionary project. Pakistan is currently the largest Muslim nuclear state, with a population exceeding 245 million people, and Egypt is the largest Arab country, with an army and security apparatus exceeding 2 million soldiers! The enemy does not see them nor take them into account, while the Zionists fear an armed Palestinian cell in a refugee camp in the occupied West Bank. What frightens the enemy and its apparatus is the goal and vision of those who bear the weapons and the ideology that leads them, not the weapon alone.
The Lebanese people did not achieve their victory in 2000 because Hezbollah possessed “weapons that could break the impasse,” but because the resistance pushed the enemy into a continuous state of failure and shock that over time turned into a state of denial and then into the enemy’s readiness to accept defeat. If the resistance today possesses deep knowledge of the enemy’s conditions and knows its weaknesses and strengths, and possesses deterrent weapons and the ability to manufacture and develop their weapons, we have advanced in a qualitative manner, and the possibility of inflicting defeat on the enemy’s army and eliminating the illegitimate entity has become only a matter of time. The goal of liberating Palestine has moved from the realm of historical possibility to the realm of realistic, achievable possibility.
The Yemeni people and their valiant armed forces present us with a new and unique revolutionary model in confronting the fleets of U.S. and British imperialism in the region and the world. With the presence of solid, reliable leadership in Sana’a, and a strategic reading of the reality of the struggle, we have seen how Yemen was able to bring the Pentagon into a circle of shock and denial. This reality did not arise suddenly. It was achieved through the accumulation of patience and sacrifice, and it is inseparable from the steadfastness of the Yemeni people confronting siege and aggression since 2015, the achievements of the Yemeni revolution led by Ansar Allah in terms of battlefield, political and military experience, and an amazing ability to handle, utilize and develop weaponry.
The Zionist entity in the Gaza Strip and the region is experiencing the worst phase in its history since 1948 and is helpless in the face of the steadfastness of the Palestinian people and their courageous resistance that has worked miracles above and below the ground. The failure of the Zionist “elite units” is evident in their confrontations with the armed, organized Palestinian battalions that have been inoculated with fire since the Al-Aqsa Intifada of September 2000, and have fought through multiple wars and battles, laying the foundations for the Flood and the period following the Flood.
Yes, the Zionist entity is a criminal and powerful enemy, like every colonizer, possessing enormous capabilities, but it has become more like a raging monster whose eyes (and vision) were gouged out by the resistance, which plunged it into a cycle of shock and confusion. Like such a monster, the Zionist project is subject to defeat, paralysis, and even extinction.