“America is not going to stay in the Middle East. And I have to tell you, Israel won’t remain there either. That’s prophecy—but I got it from the Mouth of God; and I’ll tell you how it’s going to happen and show it to you in your scriptures.”
—The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, “What Does Allah The Great Mahdi And The Great Messiah Have To Say About The War In The Middle East?” February 25, 2024
Weeks from now will mark one year into Israel’s genocidal war on Palestinians under the guise of a war to end Hamas, the group it has been fighting since October 7, 2023. With more than 300 days of Israeli bombardment, and more than 40,000 mostly Palestinian civilians slain, “Ceasefire Now!” remains the global cry.
In 10 months of war, several ceasefire negotiations and international mediation efforts started, failed, restarted, and again floundered. In recent weeks talks mediated by the United States, Egypt, and Qatar resumed.
But with America at the table as Israel’s chief ally, the question is can she be an honest broker of peace? For many the answer is “absolutely not” because mediation requires impartiality, which America had not demonstrated in the Israeli-Palestinian crisis, said an analyst.
“It’s based on maintaining Israeli power,” said Phyllis Bennis, director of the New Internationalism Project at the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington D.C.
Ms. Bennis criticized the U.S. for historically not being an honest broker in Middle East peace negotiations, citing historical and current talks. She argues the U.S. has consistently sided with Israel, as evidenced by the Camp David and Oslo process.
She pointed out, after the Camp David conference in 2000 that former President Bill Clinton convened as a “last ditch effort” at the end of his presidency; “when it fell apart, he immediately blamed the Palestinians,” she said.
In the Oslo talks, quoting Aaron David Miller, “a long-time U.S. diplomat on all the various failed policy efforts over the last 25 years or so” Ms. Bennis said, the U.S. delegation acted as “Israel’s lawyer” throughout the process.
“I would say the claim that it’s a so-called honest broker, is similar to the kind of broker you would hire for a real estate deal,” Ms. Bennis explained. “You might hire an honest broker, but you’re hiring them to represent one side,” she said.
Particularly since 1967 Washington has involved itself in the decades-long crisis between the colonial settler state of Israel and the Palestinian people fighting for self-determination. But America used its power to give Israel diplomatic cover and military prowess in the Middle East.
At the United Nations where many member states advanced ceasefire votes and resolutions, the U.S. used its gravel power to veto them in the Security Council, arguing a ceasefire would jeopardize ceasefire talks.
Days ahead of the current talks in Cairo, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters in Qatar, that Israel was on board with a deal and called on Hamas to agree.
“Time is of the essence,” Mr. Blinken said.
“Our message is simple. It’s clear and it’s urgent,” he stated. “We need to get a ceasefire and hostage agreement over the finish line, and we need to do it now.”
However, things appear to be unraveling after Mr. Blinken’s announcement. The latest deal has various phases including a limited ceasefire in the first stage and the release of some captives taken during the October 7 Hamas-led incursion into illegally occupied settlements.
Mr. Blinken said, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agreed to a U.S.-written “bridging proposal” to close contentious issues between Israel and Hamas. One of the major disagreements is Israel’s demand to keep troops deployed along two strips.
One is the Netzarim Corridor, an East-West strip Israel cleared during the current war that averts Palestinians’ free movement between North and South Gaza; the other is a narrow strip between Gaza and Egypt known as the Philadelphi Corridor.
Mr. Blinken told reporters, the deal includes a clear “schedule and locations” of Israeli military withdrawals from Gaza. He said Mr. Netanyahu agreed to the bridging proposal as well as the detailed plan.
“And that plan, among other things, as I said, includes a very clear schedule and locations for withdrawals,” said Mr. Blinken, on Aug 20.
However, after Mr. Blinken’s announcement things began unraveling. By Aug 21 things changed, and Mr. Netanyahu made public remarks contradicting the statement.
Optimism sunk to pessimism going into the Cairo talks that restarted Aug. 22. If the politically embattled Netanyahu did agree, he back-pedaled on any withdrawal from the corridor Israel captured in late May. Hamas rejects the presence of Israeli occupier forces and demands a complete withdrawal from Gaza.
Although Mr. Blinken has reaffirmed a U.S. position to “not accept any long-term occupation of Gaza by Israel,” Mr. Netanyahu has stated otherwise.
“Israel’s conditions for ending the war have not changed: The destruction of Hamas military and governing capabilities, the freeing of all hostages and ensuring that Gaza no longer poses a threat to Israel,” said Mr. Netanyahu, must be attained.
“Israel will continue to insist these conditions are met before a permanent ceasefire is put in place. The notion that Israel will agree to a permanent ceasefire before these conditions are fulfilled is a non-starter,” he said at the time.
However, it’s more than Hamas and retrieving captives say observers, citing the disproportionate killing of over 40,000 Palestinians compared to the 1,200 Israelis and non-Israelis killed and 200 taken, in the Hamas-led attack on Israel’s illegal settlements on October 7.
With various unsuccessful ceasefire talks, whether the Cairo deal garners a temporary halt in fighting or a signed, sealed and delivered permanent ceasefire, Mr. Netanyahu consistently said, his aim is the total elimination of Hamas.
This translates to more carnage and not stopping until the Palestinians are removed from Gaza or annihilated.
Meanwhile on Aug 26, Israel conducted preemptive strikes on southern Lebanon in what Israeli officials said was an anticipated Hezbollah attack. Hezbollah countered with a sizable drone and rocket attack, saying the barrage was also in retaliation for the Israeli military’s killing of its commander Fuad Shukr in Beirut in July, reported Aljazeera.
In the Cairo talks, Reuters reported there were no signs of progress on critical issues, including Israel’s demand to retain control of the Philadelphi Corridor. Hamas has accused Israel of going back on details it had previously agreed to in the talks and said the U.S. is not mediating in good faith.
For America to remain “ironclad” with the Zionist State adds to its own troubles. Before the crisis reached this level of distress, there were years of warnings to the U.S. and Israel by the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad and his National Representative, the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan of the Nation of Islam.
Both of these Divine Servants of Allah (God) warned that America is under Divine Judgment for her errant foreign policies and own sordid domestic policies, namely toward the Black once-slaves and Indigenous Native Americans—which she has never corrected with justice.
America with her own heinous record, at the mediation table, with an “iron-clad” commitment to defend Israel is hypocritical. As the sides wrangle, ceasefire and peace eludes them.
In years of warning America and Israel, Minister Farrakhan said there will be no peace without justice and truth.
In remarks delivered February 25 of this year in a message titled “What Does Allah The Great Mahdi And The Great Messiah Have To Say About The War In The Middle East?” at the Nation of Islam’s Saviours’ Day Convention, the Minister revealed the sinister plan of genocide, and why Mr. Netanyahu will not end the war.
While he was being quiet, as instructed and directed by Almighty God Allah about the unfolding events in Gaza, Minister Farrakhan received a communication forewarning of a second Nakba on the Palestinians.
“The Honorable Elijah Muhammad did something,” Minister Farrakhan said.
“In the middle of the night, I received a picture of the prime minister of Israel. A big picture! And he wanted me to study that man. Down in the corner of the picture … he was there with some of the members of his war cabinet—but I didn’t know what they were talking about or whatnot.
So, a day passed, and he brought back the picture, but enlarged it that I could see the prime minister talking with members of his war cabinet. They had drinks in their hand, wine; they were toasting the Jews that live near Gaza who would die a few days later on October the 7th when Hamas broke through and a lot of killing started,” he recalled.
“Mr. Netanyahu knew all about it,” the Minister declared.
“He already knew what Hamas was going to do because he sanctioned it. I want you to pay me good attention! And they were proposing a toast to the Jews who lived outside of the walls of Gaza that separated the Gazans from the Israelis. … They were toasting the innocence of Jews that on the 7th of October would be martyred,” the Minister continued.
“And they were being martyred because he (Netanyahu) knew their plans and he used their plans to help Hamas do what it did because he had in his mind a second Nakba. The first Nakba or ‘catastrophe’ on the Palestinians was done in 1948 when Israel became a state and they exiled 700,000 Palestinians and made them like vagabonds in the earth.
But he had in mind, Netanyahu, he was going to use the pain of their loss to destroy the whole Palestinian community, not only in Gaza, but the West Bank, East Jerusalem,” he said in June, responding to the Biden plan that the current deal is built upon. This position has not changed.
“It was a genocidal attack that he knew preserved his place as a Jewish leader. People do strange things when their hatred is so great of the people that they are killing, that their intention was to cleanse Gaza from every Palestinian that lived there and cleanse the West Bank and East Jerusalem so that Israel would not be bothered with Palestinians anymore,” the Minister revealed.
To view the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan’s Saviours’ Day 2024 message in its entirety, visit media.noi.org.
