Could Palestine be the catalyst for an Islamic Renaissance?

It’s impossible to count on corrupt Arab regimes – the weak link – to stop the Gaza genocide, Pepe Escobar writes.

ISTANBUL – Of all the countless analyses across the lands of Islam about the profound significance of fateful Al-Toofan (Al-Aqsa Flood) on October 7, 2023, this one stands out: a cycle of conferences in Istanbul earlier this week, including October 7, titled Palestine: the Lynchpin of Civilizational Renaissance, linked to the Kuala Lumpur Forum for Thought and Civilization.

Call it a Malaysia-Turkiye partnership: Southeast Asia meets West Asia, a graphic illustration of the multi-nodal world that will be congregating in less than two weeks in Kazan, capital of Muslim Russia, for the long -awaited BRICS summit under the Russian presidency. Significantly, the centrality of Gaza was not debated in Doha, Riyadh, or Abu Dhabi, all of which would have unlimited funds to host such discussions.

Istanbul was a unique opportunity to compare insights by Osama Hamdan, representing the whole Palestinian Resistance; Numan Kurtulmus, the speaker of the Turkish Parliament; Hamas top diplomat Khaled Meshaal, speaking from Doha on the “strategic victory” of the Resistance. And all that compounded by a strong message by Dr. Mahathir Mohammad, former Malaysian Prime Minister and president of the Kuala Lumpur Forum.

Dr. Mahathir emphasized that a sound solution would be “a UN peace-keeping force in Gaza protecting them”. The main problem is the Ummah “not having an alternative to UN veto powers”. Hence “Muslim countries must team up – as there are no means of applying pressure to Israel.”

Illustrating Mahathir’s call, Muslim-majority nations are responsible for only 6% of global GDP and 6% of investments, while harboring 25% of the world’s population.

Mahathir boldly proposed, “we can deny our oil to the rest of the world” and “take back funds invested in dollar bonds, thus forcing the West to take action” in Gaza. Now try to convince MbS in Riyadh and MbZ in Abu Dhabi about it.

“Focus on popular organizations. Forget about governments”

The redoubtable Sami al-Arian, Kuwaiti-born Palestinian, director of the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA) at the Sabahattin Zaim University in Istanbul, and whose astonishing life story includes being persecuted and thrown in solitary confinement in the U.S. as a “suspected terrorist” summed up the impotence of Arab political elites when it comes to Palestine: after all the Arab world “is the weakest link on global terms” – with 63 military bases only in West Asia controlled by CENTCOM. And still, “what other cause can galvanize the whole world apart from Palestine?”

Al-Arian stressed that Al-Aqsa Flood “exposed the Arab world”, as the destruction of Palestine was “imposed to make Israel the regional hegemon”. There is a glimmer of hope though: “Look at all those things that divide us. We should focus on popular organizations. Forget about governments.”

Al-Arian, who lives and works in Istanbul, tackled head on one of the key running themes of the conference: the complex relationship between Turkiye and the West: “Turkiye is with the West, basically. There is no 100% support for Palestinians. Many are still subject to notions of Orientalism.” He also evoked how 35 then future nations lived in peace within the borders of the Ottoman Empire, which spanned 35 million square kilometers.

In Palestine, Al-Arian sees three possible scenarios ahead:

1.The continuity of “Netanyahu’s delusions”. There is “no evidence” that the U.S. is opposing any of them. There is “no deterrence apart from the Axis of Resistance.”

2. Denying these delusions is hard as “Israel has [Arab] regimes on its side. Yet Israel must be engaged on all fronts.” Palestine “is the symbol of all that is just”, and “not a symbol only for Palestinians.” It is imperative to “dismantle the Zionist structure, and Palestine cannot do it on its own.”

3.The third scenario is not so far-fetched anymore – considering the looming U.S. presidential elections: “The U.S. may opt to remove Netanyahu”, as in the Democrats terrified of losing because of the Netanyahu cabinet’s war spiral.

A State of Judea out of control

A measure of consensus emerged out of several conversations with scholars and researchers from Egypt, Sudan, Pakistan, Malaysia, Mauritania, Bosnia.

-When Israel sees others as “amalek” or inferior, there are no other possible borderlines.

-If Israel goes down, that will be good for everyone in West Asia: no more instrument to Divide and Rule.

And then there’s Israel’s internal divisions. UK-based Israeli historian Ilan Pappé, author of the seminal The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, offered a startling concise analysis of the clash between the State of Judea and the State of Israel, as Palestinians are seen as being in the way of a neo-Zionist messianic coalition taking a settler colonial ideology to the extreme.

Pappé argues that what came out of the success of the State of Judea in the November 2022 elections, as they aligned with Netanyahu, shattered the myth of Israel as “progressive occupiers” and “liberal” ethnic cleansers. It’s impossible to reconcile all that with genocide.

Pappé stressed how “they want to implement their idea quickly, removing any charade of legality”, including the creation of a “new ministry for the West Bank to intensify the ethnic cleansing.”

And it’s bound to get much worse. Cue to dangerous lunatic and Minister of Finance Bezalel Smotrich, stating on the Franco-German network ARTE that, “I want a Jewish state that includes Jordan, Lebanon, and parts of Egypt, Syria, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia. According to our greatest sages, Jerusalem is destined to extend all the way to Damascus.”

The bottom line, adds Pappé, is that in the Israeli society after al-Aqsa, “the state of Judea is taking over – army, security services, the police.” Their electoral base supports a regional war. Pappé is adamant: “The State of Israel is already gone. And the State of Judea is a suicidal state. More than 500,000 Israelis have already left, and that could be 700,000. Genocide and ethnic cleansing are now established facts.”

The “lack of social cohesion” in a “deeply divided society” ultimately is pointing to the “violent disintegration” of Israel.

Confronting Atrocity Inc.

Prof. Mohammad Marandi of the University of Tehran, in his intervention at the conference and several private conversations, offered the essential synthesis of all that’s in play linking Palestine, Lebanon and Iran. These are arguably his key insights.

On resistance and personal responsibility:

“In a sense the greatest heroes are the Lebanese, who willingly put themselves at risk. Then of course we have Ansarallah in Yemen, who shut the doors of trade to the Israeli regime, and did it at an enormous price. Yemen, Hezbollah were offered extraordinary concessions by the Americans, but they refused (…) The Israeli regime simultaneously bombs Syria, regularly, because they support the Resistance. Is it capable of doing all this on its own? Of course not. It has the support of the collective West. Whether it’s intelligence gathering, technology aid, political cover, weapons. Without the West, the Israeli regime would fail. I’ve encouraged people, as individuals, to stop purchasing any goods produced in Western countries. As individuals, we also have a responsibility.”

On Iran’s strategic patience:

“We are waiting in Tehran for the Israeli regime to strike. And Iran will strike back harder. When the regime bombed the Iranian consulate in Damascus, we knew that without Syria, support for Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah would be very difficult. And the aftermath of October 7 would be much more serious than what we see today. After the bombing in Damascus, Iran struck back. Some people said this was insufficient. Now we all know that the objective of the Iranians was to gather intelligence about anti-aircraft and missile defense capabilities. And we saw the result of that last week. If the regime strikes Tehran, it will see something far worse. I am optimistic about the future although the days ahead, months ahead, will be painful.”

On the assassination of Sayyed Nasrallah:

“I went to Lebanon as soon as the Shock and Awe bombings began. And I was there before Hassan Nasrallah, the great martyr of the Resistance, was assassinated. I was literally a thousand meters away when they struck. They killed hundreds of people and brought down six apartment towers to murder Sayyed Hassan. This is what the Israeli regime is willing to do. It is brutal, it is illegitimate, we cannot have dealings with an illegitimate regime. The Western media gives a story that is so unbelievable, and dishonest.”

Several of the incandescent themes discussed in the conference were channeled at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA) at Zaim University, when The Grayzone’s Max Blumenthal presented his new documentary

Atrocity Inc: How Israel Sells the Destruction of Gaza: an extended reportage that eviscerates the leading Israeli-American narrative of post-October 7, the “beheaded babies” hoax that was essential to manufacture consent in the West for the Gaza genocide.

The cycle of conferences in Istanbul made a few things quite clear. It’s impossible to count on corrupt Arab regimes – the weak link – to stop the Gaza genocide, now being extended to serial bombings of Lebanon. It’s impossible to have the Talmudic psychopathological extremists in Tel Aviv to engage in diplomacy – except by military force.

Yet it may be possible for a groundswell of public opinion across the Global Majority to drive the imposition of severe, practical constraints on Atrocity Inc. – for instance, economic strangulation – and thus ultimately contribute to shape the advent of a sovereign Palestine into a viable lynchpin of Islamic civilizational renaissance.

Could Palestine be the catalyst for an Islamic Renaissance?