On May 5 this year, the Israeli cabinet approved a new plan for Gaza, it provides for the mobilization of tens of thousands of new reservists, the army should occupy most of the enclave, demolishing some buildings along the way.
Israel’s war in Gaza has been going on for 19 months, with nearly two hundred thousand Palestinians killed and wounded. The actions of Netanyahu’s government are causing growing discontent in the world.
Even the American channel CNN recognized that the new occupation of Gaza is unlikely to “fundamentally change the dynamics of the conflict,” but it will change the fate of more than two million Palestinians. The U.N. Special Committee on Israeli Practices in the Occupied Territories said May 9 that Israel’s priority is “broader colonial expansion.” The committee accused Israel of ethnic cleansing, emphasizing that it was causing “unimaginable suffering to the Palestinians.”
The usually restrained English “Economist” wrote on May 8 that “the war in Gaza must end”: more Gazans will die from shelling and starvation, hostages will die in captivity, endless war will deepen the divisions in Israel and further undermine its standing in the world: Israel is making a strategic mistake and a moral outrage.
The Netanyahu government’s actions are met with growing opposition within the country: according to a poll by a TV station (Channel 12) 69% of Israelis support a deal to end the war in exchange for the release of all remaining hostages.
The May 10, 2025 Jerusalem Post claims that Netanyahu’s coalition is down to 48 seats in Parliament, while the opposition has increased its presence in polls to 62 seats, which may allow it to form a government without relying on Arab parties.
The other day, former Israeli Ambassador to the US Michael Herzog said that after the worst security crisis in the country’s history… the state of Israel is plunging into an unprecedented spiral of internal division. The Forum on Hostages and Missing Families warned Israel risks total diplomatic, moral and military collapse, calling it “the missed opportunity of the century.”
Support for Israel in the West is dwindling
There has been a steady trend of increasing criticism of Israel in the West: for example, only 36% of Germans expressed a favorable view of the state of Israel in a new poll conducted by Germany’s independent Bertelsmann Foundation – in a 2021 poll by the same foundation, 46% of Germans had a positive view of the Jewish state. Even in the United States, there has been a noticeable increase in pro-Palestinian protests at major American universities.
In early May, six European states – Spain, Iceland, Ireland, Luxembourg, Norway, Slovenia and Iceland – issued a statement from their foreign ministers “strongly rejecting any demographic and territorial changes in the Gaza Strip.” The statement came after Israel announced an expansion of its military offensive in the Palestinian territory.
A definite reflection of the discontent in many quarters in the West with the extremist aspirations of the Netanyahu government was a May 9 New York Times article titled “This Israeli Government Is Not Our Ally,” which asserted that its policies “threaten core U.S. interests in the region.” Emphasizing that Netanyahu is no friend of America because his goal is “to annex the West Bank, expel Palestinians from Gaza and re-establish Israeli settlements there,” the Israeli prime minister’s line undermines American interests; the Israeli cabinet’s stated strategy would not only invite new accusations of war crimes, but also jeopardize the security of Jordan and Egypt. Officially, the number of Palestinians killed in Gaza exceeds 52,000, including 18,000 children, so it is time to say loudly: Stop the war!
Russia has consistently advocated an early and just solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. This idea was emphasized by President V.V. Putin, receiving Palestinian President M. Abbas in the Kremlin on May 10, noting that this can be done only on the basis of the UN two-state solution.
The Russian leader said: we are following with concern and empathy the tragic events in the zone of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, especially the humanitarian disaster in the Gaza Strip: we regularly provide assistance to the Palestinians – recently Moscow sent 30 thousand tons of wheat to Gaza.
Many observers expect the new Arab summit, scheduled to open in Baghdad on May 17, to come up with solutions that will help resolve the Palestinian problem.
The Al Jazeera website on May 6 emphasized that the U.S. is trying hard to increase efforts to isolate the Israeli state economically and politically, since it is Washington that “needs settler-colonial Israel to prevent its own decline.”
Vladimir Mashin, PhD in history, political observer
