How the war on Gaza is turning Israel into a pariah state

Earlier on in his premiership, Benjamin Netanyahu touted Israel’s diplomatic inroads across the Global South, especially throughout Africa, where countries have traditionally taken pro-Palestinian stances.

The Israeli prime minister’s visits to Argentina, Brazil, Chad, China, Colombia, India, Mexico, and Oman were important from this standpoint. So were visits to Jerusalem paid by leaders from countries such as Kenya, Nigeria, and South Sudan.

Although anti-Israel sentiments have long been present in the Global South, they have significantly intensified since the Gaza war began a year ago. At the same time, the past 12 months of carnage in Gaza and, more recently, in Lebanon, have perhaps done irreversible damage to the credibility of the US and other Western powers backing Tel Aviv.

“There has been a noted outpouring of sympathy for the Palestinians by the Global South in international forums, and on the streets of cities across the world, including in Africa, Latin America, and Asia. Very little public support has been shown for Israel by the Global South,” explained Steven Gruzd, an analyst at the South African Institute of International Affairs (SAIIA), in an interview with The New Arab.

An anti-colonial and human rights struggle

Large segments of populations across the Global South can relate to the Palestinian struggle. Their own histories of living under colonial rule help explain why.

“It is an important issue as the Global South sees analogies to their anti-colonial struggles in the situation in the Middle East. There have been decades of solidarity for the Palestinians from African countries that were getting rid of colonialism, and the conflict is also seen in human rights terms by the Global South,” commented Gruzd.

“The issue of Palestine is viewed, in many states of the Global South, as an issue of human rights and self-determination. The clear position and speeches of Nelson Mandela in support of the Palestinian cause have resonated positively in these states,” Massoud Maalouf, the former Lebanese ambassador to Canada, Chile, and Poland, told TNA.

All over the Global South, national discourse and popular ideologies are highly reflective of politicians and ordinary citizens who lived through colonial periods or were at least heavily impacted by the legacies of colonialism.

Indonesia is a case in point. The country’s constitution has a nationalist and anti-colonial nature to it and long ago Jakarta’s foreign policy embraced pro-Palestine stances.

“These anti-colonial perspectives are further strengthened by the ‘double standards’ that the US and the West more broadly have shown in regards to the conflict in Gaza,” said Pieter Pandie, a researcher in the International Relations department at CSIS Indonesia, in a TNA interview.

South Africa taking on Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) said much about Pretoria’s increasingly important role on the international stage as a champion of Global South causes.

Through its own historical experience with decades of apartheid, South Africa’s support for the Palestinians at the ICJ and its steadfastness in highlighting the crimes against humanity committed against the people of Gaza have done much to boost the legitimacy of South Africa as a legal defender of the Palestinian cause but also, to some extent, a voice of the Global South.

Something similar could also be said about Algeria’s role in the ICJ case, mindful of its history under French occupation and the North African nation’s long and bloody struggle for independence.

Religious dimensions

As most Muslim-majority countries are part of the Global South, Islamic solidarity is undeniably another factor in play. While support for the Palestinian cause is widespread throughout the Arab world, in other Muslim-majority countries, such as those in southeast Asia, pro-Palestine positions are widespread. Leaders in Malaysia and Indonesia have been particularly outspoken in denouncing Israel’s criminal conduct in Gaza.

By using strong language to blast Western states that back Israel and meeting with Hamas’ former leader Ismail Haniyeh, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim has established his country as a strong advocate on behalf of the Palestinians, even if at the expense of Kuala Lumpur’s relationship with Washington.

Indonesia’s then-president Joko Widodo also made headlines when he was meeting with his American counterpart in the White House a little more than one month after the Israeli war on Gaza began. While President Joe Biden was hailing a “new era” in Washington’s relationship with Jakarta, the head of state of the world’s most populous Muslim-majority country called on the US “to do more to stop the atrocities in Gaza and have a ceasefire for the sake of humanity”.

It's not only politicians and elites in these countries who are standing with Gaza. This solidarity exists throughout societies in Malaysia and Indonesia. A commitment to the Palestinian cause has prompted many Malaysians and Indonesians to boycott certain brands such as McDonald’s, Starbucks, and Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) because of their US or Israeli links.

“Inside the Suria KLCC shopping centre at the foot of the Petronas towers in Kuala Lumpur, Starbucks has closed its doors, replaced by a Chinese milk tea outlet. Berjaya Food, the franchise holder for Starbucks in Malaysia, reported a [USD 21.9 million] loss in the year to August. McDonald’s, meanwhile, earlier sought legal action against boycott organisers for 6 million ringgit in alleged damages,” reported the South China Morning Post.

The Indonesian Ulema Council, which is the southeast Asian country’s top body of Islamic scholars, encouraged citizens to carry on with such boycotts, pointing to “Palestinian independence” as something which Indonesians have a moral duty to support. “This is a matter of our common humanity, and we must not remain silent,” said Cholil Nafis, chairman of the Indonesian Council of Ulema.

Large-scale rallies in public and online activism have also been important to the solidarity that Malaysians and Indonesians have expressed with Palestinians. In these southeast Asian countries, there has also been a notable deterioration of the image of Western states as Israel’s war on Gaza has continued, with Palestine increasingly important to the identities of Malaysian and Indonesian Muslims.

“States such as Indonesia and Malaysia, who have no official relations with Israel and have historically taken a consistent stance in regard to the Israeli-Palestinian issue, have doubled down on their criticism against Israel since the conflict,” explained Pandie.

“Both have also engaged in sending humanitarian assistance for Palestinians in Gaza, while also expressing their readiness for sending peacekeepers if needed. The reason for this is rooted in their own pre-existing tradition of support for Palestine, as well as to be consistent with the perceptions of their own population, a significant majority of which are fervently pro-Palestine,” added the Indonesian researcher.

“In Indonesia, Islamic groups such as Nahdlatul Ulama and Muhammadiyah (the two biggest religious organisations in the country) have engaged in pro-Palestinian acts since before Indonesia’s independence, and have undoubtedly played a part in shaping local and national narratives regarding Palestine.”

Nonetheless, this outcry is obviously not just a religious matter, as demonstrated by all the non-Muslim-majority societies across the Global South that have been vocal in criticising and condemning Israeli war crimes against Palestinians.

Notably, in May 2024, Colombia followed in Belize and Bolivia’s footsteps in severing diplomatic relations with Israel over Tel Aviv’s “genocidal” actions. In other Latin American countries, such as Argentina and Chile, there are large Palestinian diaspora communities. Therefore, it is unsurprising that Palestine solidarity movements are strong there.

But there are many governments and societies throughout the whole region, not only in countries with large Palestinian diaspora communities, which have shown strong support for Palestine.

In Bolivia, there is no large segment of the population with roots in Palestine, but the struggle for indigenous rights is the prism through which the Palestinian question is frequently viewed in the landlocked South American nation. Bolivia’s support for this cause began long before October 2023 with then-President Evo Morales’ government recognising a Palestinian state in 2010.

“It is normal to see that the Arab and Islamic countries have a natural penchant and preference for the Palestinians. However, non-Arab and non-Islamic countries of the Global South have increasingly distanced themselves from Israel following the massive destruction by Israel of schools, hospitals, homes and infrastructure in Gaza and the killing of 41,000 Palestinians, most of which were civilians, including more than 10,000 children,” added Maalouf, who served as Lebanon’s ambassador to Chile from 1995-99.

American hegemony and the UN Security Council

As anger towards Israel intensifies across the Global South, there is an increasing perception in these non-Western countries of the US as a superpower in moral decline. This perception of Washington did not begin with the 2023/24 Gaza war, but it has significantly increased as a result of Israel’s crimes in the Palestinian enclave over these past 12 months.

Washington’s blind support for Israel’s conduct in Gaza has served to erode America’s credibility in the eyes of many people living in the Global South. A widespread view shared by large segments of the world’s countries is that the US and other Western powers are highly selective and inconsistent when it comes to applying international law, choosing to do so when their geopolitical interests are served rather than out of respect for any set of universal principles.

“The double standards in the US position toward the war in Ukraine and the ICC are clear examples of this double standard: the US took a clear anti-Russia position when Putin attacked Ukraine in February 2022, but it kept sending weapons and money to Israel despite its genocidal war on the Palestinians in Gaza,” noted Maalouf.

“It also gave Israel full support in the United Nations. When the ICC issued an arrest warrant for Putin, President Biden welcomed this decision. However, he harshly criticised the ICC when its prosecutor Mr Karim Khan asked the ICC judges to issue an arrest warrant for Netanyahu and his war minister Gallant,” the former Lebanese ambassador added.

“Following these contradictory US positions and the blind US support for Israel in its ethnic cleansing and war crimes, the image of the US has been clearly tarnished in the Global South. When Israeli officials mention the shared values and principles between Israel and the US without any official American criticism of Israel for what it is doing in Gaza, countries in the Global South don’t take seriously the US when they hear American advocacy for human rights around the world.”

Looking ahead, it is likely that statesmen throughout the Global South will increase their calls for reform of the UN Security Council. The world has witnessed the body’s inability to help resolve the war in Gaza, which has shed more light on the fact that the UN Security Council (UNSC) needs to be transformed.

As the UN organ responsible for maintaining global peace and security, the UNSC has a role play which, in its current form, is not possible with Washington using its veto in order to thwart Israel from facing any accountability. Similarly, Russia’s use of its veto has also ensured that no UNSC resolution containing language condemning Moscow’s actions in Ukraine ever passed.

“These examples show that the use of the veto is inextricably linked with the self-interests of each permanent member, which are often in opposition to the values laid out in the UN charter. As such, there is a need to seriously review and reform how the Council works, and whether or not it has effectively worked to maintain international peace or not,” Pandie told TNA.

Giorgio Cafiero is the CEO of Gulf State Analytics.

Follow him on Twitter: @GiorgioCafiero