One and Seventy-Six Years

• Special to The Caravan by Omar Auf, Editor-at-large Cairo Review of Global Affairs and Assistant Lecturer of Political Science at the British Univer- sity in Egypt (BUE).

When the genocide of the Palestinian people is allowed to continue unhindered for a year despite the widespread protests, indignation, and civic action of people from all around the world, then it seems that we have reached the end of words. What more is there to say?

In this stubbornly state-centric system dominated by interests and real- politik, the words and actions of individuals appear to fall short of achieving any real change in the system—least of all forcing Israel to stop committing atrocities justified to the performatively guilty conscience of an oxymoronic West by past atrocities.

Though this may be a prevalent feeling among observers, there is also little other option but to keep speaking, keep writing, and keep taking action.

To do otherwise is to give up, not just on the Palestinians—braver and more stead- fast than we will ever be—but on those essential qualities that embody what many of us uphold as the finest found among the ranks of humanity: empathy, solidarity, and the unwavering pursuit of justice.

We are living through a period in history defined in many ways by the long plight of the Palestinian people. Since the end of World War II, no other issue has permeated the fora of policymakers, the writings of political thinkers, or the consciousness of global publics for as long as and as deeply asthe Palestinian cause.

It was the first truly contentious issue a young United Nations had to reckon with, and today, significantly expanded and with calls for reform echoing around it, the UN is still trying to find a solution to a deliberately overcomplicated issue that ultimately boils down to colonialism.

What history tells its students is that the tragic failings of the international system to prevent genocide, other atrocities, and war in Gaza throughout this past year is the culmination of 76 years of failure of the UN, the international system, and the international community to fulfill its self-appointed duties of maintaining international peace and security and to uphold its legal obligations. We have all failed. However, the nature of this failure must be correctly understood to be reckoned with.

It is important to note that when we speak of the United Nations, we speak of, to paraphrase Kofi Annan, two different things: the first is the collection of nations that set the agenda and control the UN’s main bodies, and the second is the secretariat that tries to implement member states’ decisions; historically speaking and continuing until this day, the Secretary-General’s calls for action, however tempered by his balancing acts between major power and international interests, have usually been far ahead of the members’ willingness to act.

It is also worth adding that within the UN structure, there is the hierarchical Security Council which holds most of the hard power in the organization, but there are also more democratic bodies that hold less hard power but still have tools at their disposal, in ad- dition to carrying important symbolic value.

For instance, it was the General Assembly which referred the issue of longstanding Israeli annexation of the occupied Palestinian territories (oPt) to the International Court of Justice for an advisory opinion, and it is the Human Rights Council that appoints independent UN experts such as the UN Special Rapporteur for the human rights situation in the oPt Francesca Albanese—an important figure raising awareness about Israel’s violations. Her report, issued last March, describing Israel’s actions in Gaza as genocide, has been instrumental in advancing this legal framing.

The inaction ultimately stems from the UN of the nation-states, the members; the U.S. vetoed three ceasefire resolutions before having one of their own vetoed by Russia and China. By the time a ceasefire resolution was finally passed in June, Israel had been assaulting Gaza for eight months and more than 37,000 reported killed. Those 37,000, a study published in the Lancet in July explained, indicate that, by conservative estimate, 186,000 more Palestinians were actually indirectly killed as a result of conflict.

In any case, the ceasefire resolution was not respected or enforced, unlike, for example, the U.S., with the support of the Soviet Union, forcing a ceasefire on Britain, France, and Israel during the Suez Crisis of 1956.

The difference between then and now is that such a course of action was deemed by U.S. leadership as politically necessary and U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower had the political will to follow through. In addition, the power dynamics between superpowers and fading great powers lent itself to such an outcome.

Interestingly, the Suez Crisis was the first instance where General Assembly Resolution 377 (V) was used. The resolution, known as ‘Uniting for Peace’, authorized the GA to discuss security issues and make recommendations on matters already being discussed by the Security Council—typically not allowed by the UN Charter—when the latter fails to take action because of a veto by one or more of the parties. The recommen- dations made by the General Assembly are of a heightened political stature than typical GA resolutions as they highlight the international community’s stand for peace and justice and against the self-interested use of the veto.

Uniting for Peace was also invoked to call for a ceasefire in Gaza, and the General Assembly made its recommendations, but the U.S. continues to allow Israel to not only continue committing atrocities in Gaza, but also widen the war and risk plunging the region into a violent abyss.

The different outcomes boil down to political will and personal and national interests. The 1956 ceasefire was not the international system doing its job, it was the attainment of a positive outcome despite the system failing to prevent and then stop conflict.

Israel’s longstanding strategy of imposing faits accomplis on the ground has been designed to play on the weaknesses of the international system—the fact is, due to the predominant legal view that states cannot commit criminal acts, it is much easier to ask for forgiveness than permission.

And Israel has never asked for forgiveness. Now that its strategy has gone too far, and it is overwhelmingly deemed as too extreme for the violence tolerance of policymakers around the world, it has shunned the UN as a biased, antisemitic institution and banned SG Antonio Guterres from entering Israel.

At this juncture, the international community has had to work to sup- port Palestinians in dismantling Is- raeli domination despite the system’s state-centrism that ultimately favors the powerful. This has been attempted through several avenues, including by bringing Palestine into the ranks of nation-states as embodied in the two-state solution and the Oslo Accords.

This has not achieved the expected results. And it must be noted that, just like there are two UNs, there are two international communities: there is the inter- national community of nation-states, and there is the wider international community that includes international organizations, civil society, media, and individuals.

The majority of the international community of states has sought to move against the actions of a powerful minority by recognizing a Palestinian state, recommending sanctions in the General Assembly, and working through the Human Rights Council, including by expanding the Office of theUnited High Commissioner for Human Rights and its independent experts. It is trying to go around the system designed by the powerful.

The wider international community has, naturally, diverse views and courses of action. Among the depressing scenes of duplicity or moral bankruptcy, such as Congress giving Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu a standing ovation, and among the images of destruction and despair coming out of Gaza, the West Bank, and now Southern Lebanon, the brave actions of movements and individuals has stood as an island-lighthouse in a sea of darkness to which those who are moved by the unfathomable injustice of it all can anchor.

The global student movement around the world, especially in the U.S., and all those brave students who stood for an end to suffering despite police brutality and the threat of suspension, embody the speaking of truth to power in our generation. AUC’s own students rallied in support of Palestine and called for the university to divest from AXA. You were right to do so.

Many at the very top of the policy-making world quit their prestigious jobs to call for justice. Josh Paul, long- time Director in the Bureau of Politi-calMilitary Affairs at the U.S. State Department, resigned in protest of the Biden Administration’s decision to send weapons to Israel. It was a pivotal moment in questioning the Administration’s policies and Paul has since been speaking out against his former employer and shedding light on other U.S. officials who did the same.

Similarly, in a powerful symbolic act, international lawyer Craig Mokhiber quit as the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights’ New York office’s director. It was symbolic in that it was days before he was scheduled to retire, but Mokhiber has been a sig- nificant and consistent voice calling for Palestinian rights and an end to suffering.

The Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement has continued to prove to the world that boycotts work, that collective action is effective, and that there is real power that lies with the people. In Egypt, I’m proud to say that the boycott has gone beyond BDS targets and includes all non-essential products whose revenues, even a small fraction thereof, go to a country who supplies Israel with weapons. And it has shown the everyday Egyptian that there is power in their wallet, no matter how small and shrinking. It has also achieved what the government has been trying to do for years, if not decades: encourage local industry and shatter ‘the foreigner complex’.

This shows that Palestine does define this age in many ways. The Palestinian struggle is not theirs alone, it is all of ours. Our freedom and prosperity are contingent upon theirs’ and those of all the oppressed peoples of the world.

Since the Nakba, the international community of states has failed for one and seventy-six years to uphold Palestinian rights. It is time for us in the wider international community to draw strength from each other and continue speaking out and taking action until Palestine and the Palestinians and all oppressed peoples are truly free, and then, maybe, we will be too.