America and Israel: On the Convergence of Policy Between "There" and "Here"

In the last two years, we have become accustomed to reading and hearing news, reports, and analyses almost daily regarding the stance of the U.S. administration and decision-making circles there concerning the Israeli government's management of the genocide war. Tons of ink have been spilled, thousands of broadcast hours have been dedicated, and thousands of experts have been brought in to "unpack" the relationship, positions, communications, and intense visits of American officials to Tel Aviv. Perhaps it is the media's job, as seen by editors and those positioned on the lens valve, to analyze and reflect what is happening and mediate between the audience and the event.

We acknowledge that the phenomenon was particularly striking when American officials sat in sessions of the Israeli government, or its smaller staff, or the war management team. When they attended sessions discussing matters of the war on Gaza and its events. Alongside them were American military leaders who joined the command of operation rooms, especially in the first year of the war, during President Joe Biden's days. We still remember the arrival of the U.S. military to the Gaza coast and the establishment of a floating bridge that was portrayed as a bridge to provide humanitarian relief after Israel prevented it from entering through land crossings.

The arrival of Trump to the White House increased the intensity of American presence in the corridors of power in Israel, particularly in government hallways. Here, it seemed that Americans were decision-makers alongside Israeli officials, if not more so. The ceasefire was initiated by an American decision and implemented by Israel, indicating that the decision in Israel was one hundred percent American. This is evidenced by the fact that Israel did not gain anything additional in the ceasefire agreement and, fundamentally, came out as a loser compared to the goals it had set. Nevertheless, it fell under the mantle of the agreement as imposed by the Trump administration.

I admit that since the onset of the war on Gaza, I have not seen America and Israel as independent entities. Rather, I have not viewed Israel as an entity independent from the Western center that has rushed "from the bald to the rusty" to Tel Aviv. I do not say this because of the structural relationship between white-west and Israel, nor due to the European West's complex towards "the state of the Jews" and Holocaust survivors, nor because of the strategic relationship between the Torah and Protestantism, but because I believe that the transformations of globalization have weakened national states and governments in favor of centers of strategic interests, capital, and ideological alliances — especially the right-wing, the Torah belt, and the fundamentalists in North America. These centers of interest are more interconnected and entangled than ever before, and the borders between them are almost non-existent. It is what Bauman calls "liquidity"; liquidity in political entities, liquidity in politics itself, and in the functions of its elites, especially if they are following the same ideology, receive funding from the same capital, and speak what it wants. We should pay attention to the number of American officials who are funded from sources that finance Israeli officials and their electoral battles, here and there! We should take note of how many American officials claim to be Zionist and protectors of Israel! We should also pay attention to the fact that this phenomenon exists in Germany, Britain, and France as well.

I have become accustomed to referring to the interest in tracking the Palestinian flag and its bearers in many places around the world, and to the malicious pursuit in many parts of the Western world of political activists who criticized the war and its crimes. This is within my discussion of the centers that create the same policies in more than one country, to illustrate the liquidity of political projects across borders. This liquidity produces new phenomena and scenes that we have not been accustomed to in the past; like seeing a certain "center" stronger than the state determining its policies in the finest details, such as pursuing a child carrying the Palestinian flag in Alexanderplatz in Berlin, or witnessing the retreat of states and their rulers in the face of capital and its centers. It is not like the "accommodating" of Israel here or there and its diplomatic covering. The Americans are present here because they are here with their interests and considerations, and because the meaning of distance between there and here in current politics is no longer applicable. Netanyahu speaks before the Senate and Congress because he is there, and he and the right-wing thought he represents have a presence in American elections, in policies, and in decision-making positions. Those who finance Netanyahu are financing dozens of others in America, Britain, France, and Germany. This precisely adds another impetus to liquidity; capital is capable of "buying" politics — so to speak — politicians, decision-making centers, academic institutions, and media and journalists, in the framework of amassing power and the ability to influence and direct everything in service of its interests.

Capital — financial and corporate magnates and producers — seeks, within the framework of the state, to limit any government intervention in the market. This means abolishing oversight on goods and their quality and on commerce in them. Among what capital has succeeded in on a vast scale around the world is the abolishment of what was a fundamental economic marker in every national economy: the cancellation of national protection systems for local production. This movement against government intervention and imposing restrictions on the economic process within states has a parallel movement that seeks to limit the influence of "international centers" in the liquidity of the world; meaning reducing the effect of international law and the United Nations bodies supervising its application in monitoring policies around the world and relations between states or between prominent centers and other countries. Here, globalization has also outlined significant successes for itself, evidenced by some centers being stronger than international centers and their rulings. I refer to this to return to the issue of liquidity at the cosmic level, which allows us to see the overlap of governments and centers in managing regions of the world, in wars, crises, and projects and plans for dominance and acquisition. Hence comes the strong presence of Americans in decision-making in Israel to the extent of convergence. This means that the decision in Gaza is distinctly American and that the Israeli government has vanished into the folds of the American mantle, along with all the "terrifying promises" made by Netanyahu and his ministers for themselves and their electoral base. Along with it have disappeared all the arrogant Israeli statements claiming that Israel is an independent state and that its decision is independent, and similar statements that refer to an inflated self-perception that does not align with the reality on the ground.

My analysis here does not constitute an evaluation of the ceasefire agreement in Gaza. All I can say is that it was based on non-Palestinian fundamentals, primarily the interests and strategic considerations of the U.S. administration in the Middle East and the world, and out of fear that the war and its atrocities might become a catalyst for world societies to rise against the international system and its empires. Here, precisely, is where the convergence appeared between governments and administrations in the West and East, including Israel and the United States. The decision in "peak situations" is made in partnership or in the corridors of the strongest center after the borders between sites vanish, resulting in the U.S. Vice President stepping in for Netanyahu in determining this or that matter.