Ori Goldberg, an independent analyst and specialist in Middle Eastern Studies, analyses the profound militarisation within his country, Israel, that involves the “desensitivisation as to the very existence of Palestinians as human beings” such that Israelis themselves know nothing about Palestinians, resulting in the only permissible history of Israel being that of the Jewish narrative. Covering the deeply ideological and historical “zero-sum game” whereby Israelis are uniquely allowed access to the narrative of victimisation, Goldberg explains the refusal of Israelis to see the humanity of Palestinians, remarking, “If they are acknowledged as full-fledged humans, then there is something wrong with us, there is something that undermines our right to live here.” Observing how the desensitisation of Israelis to Palestinians functions, Goldberg claims that Israelis do not possess the language to describe Palestinians “except as a threat” in the second order; however, Israeli’s first order of understanding the Palestinian is that of “nothingness” where Palestinian deaths “don’t even register.” Assessing the greatest weakness of Israel—that it does not register the reality of Palestinians—Goldberg describes how a member of Knesset stated that the only health risk facing Gazans is “obesity,” noting, “That is not how you want to talk about a people who actively, consciously want to vanquish—it’s how you talk about a people whose existence seems like a fantasy to you to begin with.” The fact that Israel attacks at will and kills indiscriminately, Goldberg asserts, is not significant in terms of its strategic power. To the contrary, Goldberg suggests that Israel’s main weakness, despite its aggression, is that it has alienated even its closest allies while also coming very close to being a failed state. Suggesting that Israel can only be saved through a “strategic implosion” that will ultimately shape its “response and its willingness to accept externally imposed positions,” Goldberg confirms that the light on the horizon is that vast majority of the world’s population no longer cares about Israelis’ feelings or their sense of victimhood, noting that Israel can blame itself for the position in which it has created for itself.
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