How Israel is imploding

The Israeli airforce has a new scandal. Future fighter pilots, on the verge of graduating from two years of training, underwent a week-long "imprisonment simulation", generally considered to be the most difficult part of their training. They were sent to a hotel in a secret location in order to recuperate. The cadets revealed the location of the hotel to their families, who visited their sons over a weekend. Their commanding officer, a major, even encouraged them to imbibe (!). They will all be brought before a disciplinary panel, said IAF commander, Tomer Bar. He doesn't care if he has to throw all lf them out of flight school!

This is what I mean when I write about implosion. Israel is losing, or it has already lost, on all the fronts on which it practices its murderous solipsism. Gaza has been stripped away from Israel. Israeli media reports "attempts" to "countermand" the Turkish-Qatari plans for Gaza. The same media reports "concerns and fears" among Israeli leaders that the future of Gaza is "fait accompli". Hamas negotiates while Israel stalls, so Hamas will be the early bird that gets the worm. What can this mean? Basically, that Hamas' main demand for a Palestinian force that will disarm it and rule Gaza may very well be realized. Qatar has already said it will support the Palestinians but will not rebuild what someone else (who is that someone?) has destroyed. Will Israel have to actually pay for its genocide? At this point, who knows?

Israel is being pushed out of Syria. Trump has said as much. Israel will obstruct and obfuscate but its presence in Syria does not serve any security-oriented purpose, even according to Israel's own solipsistic logic. Notions of Syrian Druze flocking to Israel's banner are as realistic as Israel's grand designs for the Lebanese Falanges in the early 1980s. In Lebanon, Israel continues to bomb and kill, violating Israeli sovereignty on a daily basis. That said, Israel is also forced to negotiate with the Lebanese government, despite declaring it will not do so until "Hizballah is disarmed". Hizballah will not be disarmed.

Israel also lost its war with Iran. While it managed to take out most of Iran's air defenses, Israel did no lasting damage to Iran's missile production capacity and little damage to Iran's enrichable nuclear stockpile. The decision to go nuclear is, in any case, a political decision. Israel, taking quite a beating in the June war, only facilitated a potential turn towards hostility on Tehran (although it doesn't seem likely at all that a second war is in the offing).

But perhaps more importantly, Israel is losing its internal coherence. Unvaccinated children are dying of the measles and the flu. Roving gangs of teenagers attack Palestinians who drive a bus or clean streets. Palestinian Israelis are murdered in criminal gang shootouts. Veterans of the Gaza "war" are committing suicide in unprecedented numbers. The public mental health system has already collapsed inder the burden.

Israeli state institutions are eroding. There is a dearth of judges because the minister of justice isn't speaking to the chief justice of the supreme court. Two government ministers hold nine ministerial portfolios because the coalition is awaiting the return of the ultra-orthodox who are on the sidelines, waiting to see if the government they formed will approve their compulsory drafting into the IDF (Israel needs more soldiers for its forever war). In Tel Aviv, municipal employees have been encouraged to volunteer at city kindergartens and nursery schools because there are no qualified personnel to be found.

While all this is happening, the IAF has time for "values". Implosion is felt everywhere, but perhaps most accutely on the symbolic front. The pilots are the main arm of the genocide, but what matters is unauthorized alcohol consumption. There is nothing but a hollowed-out shell. The Israel that emerges is bound for institutional, financial and cultural poverty. Implosion.