Israel’s Threat to Global Stability – Nuclear Theocracy, Impunity & Propaganda Exposed
Executive Summary

Israel’s geopolitical role is often framed as that of a small nation fighting for survival in a hostile region. But a closer examination reveals a far more troubling picture: Israel has evolved into a uniquely destabilizing global actor, wielding outsized military power with near-total impunity and a narrative armor that deflects accountability. This analysis argues that Israel’s fusion of theocratic politics, undeclared nuclear might, perpetual regional warfare, and a sophisticated propaganda machine has made it a nexus of collapsing international norms. It is not Israel’s existence or even its military strength per se that threaten world stability – it’s the immunity it enjoys and the impunity with which it operates. From the export of authoritarian surveillance tech to the invocation of Holocaust memory as a shield against criticism, Israel’s conduct undermines the very “rules-based international order” it professes to uphold. The following sections will delve deep into seven critical dimensions of this argument:

• Theocratic Militarism and Political Power – How religious extremism and supremacist ideologies shape Israeli policy.
• Nuclear Opacity and Strategic Violence – Israel’s secret nuclear arsenal and doctrine of preemptive and collective punishment.
• Regional and Global Destabilization – A chronicle of wars in Gaza, Lebanon, and beyond, with their humanitarian toll and legal implications.
• The Propaganda Engine: Hasbara and Tachles – The dual strategy of external justification and internal ruthlessness.
• Weaponized Antisemitism Accusations – How legitimate criticism of Israel is reframed as bigotry, silencing dissent (even Jewish dissent).
• International Impunity and Western Sponsorship – U.S. and allied protection enabling Israel’s violations without consequence.
• Surveillance Exports and Authoritarian Alignment – Israel’s role in arming the world’s dictators with tools of repression.

By connecting these dots, we will see why Israel’s current trajectory represents not just a regional crisis, but a global one. In a world increasingly anxious about norm-shattering behavior by powerful states, Israel stands out as an actor whose strategic impunity and weaponized narratives pose a direct challenge to global stability and justice.

Theocratic Militarism: A Nuclear-Armed Theocracy in the Making

Modern Israel is frequently touted as the “Middle East’s only democracy.” Yet half of its ruling coalition and much of its legislation reflect theocratic militarism rather than liberal democracy. The influence of Orthodox Judaism is deeply embedded in state structures governing family law, education, and citizenship. There is no civil marriage in Israel; all marriages (and conversions) are controlled by rabbinical courts, effectively giving Orthodox authorities a monopoly over personal status. Religion and state are so entwined that a 2016 Pew survey found majorities of religious Jewish Israelis believe Jewish law (Halacha) should trump democratic principles if the two conflict, a stance comparable to Islamists favoring Sharia over secular law. In the words of one scholar, Israel’s ascendant religious-nationalist movement amounts to a “Jewish version of political Islam,” with rabbis preaching that “the Torah is our constitution” and the nation in its land must be governed by “divine precepts This is not a fringe view but one that now has powerful political backing.

Since late 2022, Israel has been governed by the most far-right, religiously driven coalition in its history. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government depends on ultra-nationalist, Orthodox factions whose leaders explicitly espouse supremacist and messianic ideologies. Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, for instance, is a self-declared “messianic settler” who believes Jews have a “divine right” to all land in Greater Israel and has called for annexing the occupied West Bank outright. He has proudly labeled himself a “fascist homophobe” and advocated segregating Jewish and Arab mothers in maternity wards. Smotrich once organized an anti-gay “Beast Parade” and endorses violent retribution against Palestinians. Meanwhile Itamar Ben-Gvir, the National Security Minister, was deemed too extremist to serve in the IDF as a youth; he has multiple convictions for racist incitement and for years hung a portrait in his home of Baruch Goldstein – the Jewish terrorist who massacred 29 Palestinians in Hebron. Ben-Gvir venerates the late Rabbi Meir Kahane, whose Jewish supremacist ideology (Kahanism) was long considered beyond the pale even in Israel. Today, the once-marginal Kahanist ethos sits at the heart of government policy.

These ideological currents are not benign. They are translating into policy “reforms” that entrench theocracy and apartheid. Upon taking office, the Netanyahu-Smotrich-Ben Gvir coalition wasted no time pushing Israel toward an openly ethnocratic state. They amended Basic Laws (Israel’s quasi-constitution) to weaken judicial oversight and enable more unilateral actions in the occupied territories. One change placed the West Bank’s Civil Administration under Smotrich’s control, effecting a de facto annexation of Area C (60% of the West Bank) and clearing the path for a massive expansion of Jewish settlements on land where hundreds of thousands of Palestinians live. Another move put the Border Police – notorious for its heavy-handed role in East Jerusalem and the West Bank – directly under Ben-Gvir’s command. Ben-Gvir has openly agitated to upend the status quo at Jerusalem’s Temple Mount/Al-Aqsa compound, advocating unrestricted Jewish prayer at the flashpoint holy site in a bid to assert Jewish supremacy. This kind of religious provocation in a powder-keg holy site threatens to inflame the Muslim world, yet it is pursued as official policy.

Crucially, this theocratic lurch is backed by Israel’s security establishment. Religious nationalists are deeply embedded in the military and police. Over the past two decades, elite pre-military yeshiva programs have groomed thousands of soldiers and officers steeped in the idea that “the Torah is our constitution.” One such academy’s founder, a celebrated rabbi, openly preaches that Israel should “conduct its life on the basis of divine precepts The result is an armed forces where a significant contingent sees state violence as sanctified by God – a frightening prospect when that state wields advanced weaponry. In 2019, Israel’s Chief Rabbi even suggested the Army’s chief rabbi should have veto power over military orders deemed contrary to Jewish law, illustrating how far the fusion of religion and militarism has gone.

In essence, Israel is fast becoming a nuclear-armed theocracy. It remains formally a democracy for its Jewish citizens, but even that is undermined by leaders who reject liberal norms. The Knesset’s speaker in 2023 declared the new government’s mission is to restore “Jewishness” to the state and rid it of “Western impurities.” Laws passed in recent years – such as the Nation-State Basic Law of 2018 – codify Jewish supremacy by proclaiming that only Jews have the right of self-determination in Israel, and downgrading Arabic from an official language. Imagine an ostensibly Western-aligned state where half the ruling coalition says God’s law outranks human law, and where ministers call human rights activists “traitors” and Arab citizens “enemies.” This is today’s Israel. It is a polity where ultra-religious doctrines and ethnonationalism guide a modern military machine – a volatile combination with global ramifications.

Nuclear Opacity and Strategic Violence: The Samson Option Unbound

One of the gravest aspects of Israel’s power – and one of the least publicly acknowledged – is its nuclear arsenal. Israel is the world’s only nuclear-armed state that has never declared its stockpile nor signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Since the late 1960s, Israel has maintained a policy of “nuclear opacity,” signalling to friends and foes alike that it possesses nuclear weapons while refusing any transparency. By conservative estimates, Israel has built roughly 80 to 200 nuclear warheads over the decades, including city-shattering thermonuclear bombs. This arsenal, developed at the secret Dimona reactor (the Negev Nuclear Research Center, pictured below) in defiance of U.S. pressure and international norms, gives Israel an effective regional nuclear monopoly. Surrounded by adversaries with no such deterrent, Israel wields what one scholar called “the Sword of Damocles in the Middle East.” It is ostensibly a defensive deterrent – yet Israel’s posture has often been one of nuclear coercion rather than mere deterrence.

Israel’s “Samson Option” is the oft-mentioned doctrine that it would unleash its nuclear weapons as a last resort if the state’s survival were in peril – akin to Samson bringing down the temple upon himself and his enemies. Less discussed is how Israeli leaders have leveraged their nuclear capability even in conventional conflicts. During the 1973 Yom Kippur War, with Arab armies initially gaining ground, Defense Minister Moshe Dayan urged Prime Minister Golda Meir to arm nuclear warheads, effectively putting the world on notice. It is alleged that U.S. President Nixon’s decision to airlift massive aid to Israel in that war was influenced by an Israeli nuclear alert – a subtle blackmail that forced Washington’s hand. Fast forward to October 2023: amid a new Gaza war and fears of a wider conflict with Hezbollah or Iran, a far-right Israeli lawmaker publicly urged the government to use “doomsday” weapons – i.e. nuclear bombs – to annihilate Hamas. Such a statement by an elected official is no idle bluster; it reflects a strain of thought within Israeli political culture that sees the ultimate sanction as thinkable, even against a stateless militia. The global nuclear taboo that has held since 1945 depends on responsible custodianship. In Israel, that taboo is guarded by a leadership that includes zealots and by a Prime Minister, Netanyahu, who in recent years has been accused by his own nuclear experts of treating Israel’s “sacred” nuclear legacy recklessly. For example, Netanyahu appointed an unqualified loyalist as minister in charge of the Atomic Energy Commission, and considered allowing Saudi Arabia to develop nuclear enrichment (a proliferation risk) in exchange for diplomatic favors. Such behavior would be alarming in any nuclear state; in one with no external oversight, it’s downright dangerous.

Compounding the risk is Israel’s military doctrine of preemptive and disproportionate force. Decades before “preemption” became a Bush-era buzzword, Israel pioneered it. It has bombed nuclear reactors in other countries (Iraq in 1981, Syria in 2007) under the Begin Doctrine – asserting a unilateral right to strike any foe nearing a nuclear capability. Israeli intelligence carries out targeted assassinations far beyond its borders as routine policy, without claiming responsibility. Iranian nuclear scientists have been murdered one after another – shot by motorcycle hitmen or blown up by magnetized bombs – in a covert campaign widely attributed to Mossad. In 2020, Iran’s top nuclear physicist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh was ambushed and killed in broad daylight near Tehran; Iran immediately pointed to Israel, which tellingly did not deny it. These extrajudicial killings and acts of sabotage (like the Stuxnet cyberattack that crippled Iran’s enrichment centrifuges) are overt violations of international law – imagine Iranian agents assassinating Israeli scientists in Tel Aviv and consider the global uproar that would ensue. Yet Israel conducts such operations with tacit Western assent, normalizing a world where states settle disputes via covert murder. Even high-profile military leaders have been targets: in 2019, Israeli missiles killed a senior Iranian general (Qasem Suleimani) via a U.S. drone strike coordination, again crossing a threshold that other nations fear to cross.

This escalation dominance – the idea that Israel can always ratchet up the force further than its enemies – extends to conventional warfare as well. Israel’s response to perceived threats often entails collective punishment of entire populations, a strategy banned by the Geneva Conventions. When Palestinian militants capture or kill Israeli soldiers, Israel has besieged and bombarded whole towns and refugee camps in retaliation. Nowhere is this more evident than in Gaza, effectively the world’s largest open-air prison. Israeli doctrine for Gaza and south Lebanon has been described by its own officers as “mowing the grass” – a chilling metaphor for periodic operations to cut down militant groups, knowing they will regrow. In practice, “mowing the grass” means massive firepower in densely populated areas to degrade militant capabilities at enormous civilian cost. During the 2008–09 Gaza war (Operation Cast Lead), some 1,400 Palestinians were killed (including hundreds of children) vs. 13 Israelis. In the 2014 Gaza war, over 2,200 Palestinians died (around 500 children) vs. 73 Israelis. These lopsided death tolls are routinely dismissed by Israeli officials as unfortunate but “self-inflicted” by Hamas using “human shields” – as if women and children in their own homes are to blame for being bombed. The principle of distinction in war – that civilians must not be targeted – has been repeatedly violated. Entire neighborhoods like Shujaiya in Gaza City or the Dahiya district of Beirut (in the 2006 Lebanon war) have been flattened in deliberate policy. An Israeli general once described the “Dahiya Doctrine”: the idea that Israel would apply disproportionate force to destroy civilian infrastructure in any community that hosts enemy fighters, to “send a message”. Such tactics meet the definition of war crimes, as numerous human rights reports have documented. Indeed, Israeli forces’ razing of civilian areas, use of heavy artillery and white phosphorus in populated zones, and enforcement of blockades have been condemned as war crimes and crimes against humanity by UN inquiries and NGOs. The United Nations Goldstone Report on the 2008–09 Gaza conflict found evidence of deliberate attacks on civilians by Israel. In 2021 and 2022, both Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International issued landmark reports labeling Israel’s entire system of rule as an apartheid crime – a systematic domination of one group over another with intent to maintain that regime. Israel’s response was not to reflect on its policies but to smear these organizations (including Israel’s own human rights group B’Tselem) as “antisemitic” for daring to use the word apartheid.

The frightening reality is that Israel’s nuclear backing enables its conventional aggressions. Because it holds the ultimate weapon, Israel does not fear existential consequences from regional wars. Unlike other nuclear states that exercise some restraint to avoid escalation – for example, India and Pakistan have avoided full-scale war since going nuclear – Israel feels free to wage intensive campaigns regularly. Its opaque nuclear status also exempts it from the kind of arms control and inspections that other nuclear powers (even India-Pakistan) undergo, further eroding global nonproliferation norms. With no IAEA inspectors in Dimona, Israel has likely produced enough plutonium for dozens more warheads and advanced its delivery systems (including submarine-launched missiles), all beyond scrutiny. This secrecy and double standard (as Iran is strangled by sanctions for merely enriching uranium under inspection) undermines the credibility of the international nuclear order. It signals that might makes right: if you’re a favored ally like Israel, you can secretly build nukes; if you’re an adversary, even a civilian nuclear program is a casus belli.

In summary, Israel’s strategic doctrine can be characterized by a willingness to strike first, strike hard, and bend laws – all under a nuclear shadow that forces the world to tiptoe. Israeli officials have openly contemplated “preventive” wars and even the Samson Option of last resort, creating a situation where one country’s perceived desperation could endanger us all. This hair-trigger posture, combined with Messianic impulses in the leadership, is a recipe for global crisis. The world was starkly reminded of this in October 2023: as Israel’s war in Gaza risked spilling into a regional conflagration, U.S. President Biden rushed two aircraft carrier groups to the Eastern Mediterranean partly “to make sure that taboo (against nuclear use) is not shattered/” It is sobering that the U.S. felt compelled to militarily chaperone a nuclear-armed ally to restrain its possible reactions. In no other alliance would such a scenario be imaginable.

Regional Destabilization: Endless Wars, Occupation, and Humanitarian Catastrophe

No nation has been involved in as many protracted armed conflicts in the post-Cold War era as Israel. Far from being a status-quo power, Israel has repeatedly used force in neighboring states and territories, often in defiance of UN resolutions and international mediation. The toll of these actions on regional stability – and on innocent lives – has been devastating. A brief chronology of Israel’s modern military interventions underscores the point:

• Lebanon (1978, 1982, 2006, and beyond): Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982 under the pretext of expelling the PLO, but stayed for 18 years, fostering a proxy militia and ravaging the country. The 1982 siege of Beirut and the Sabra-Shatila massacre (where Israeli-allied militias slaughtered thousands of Palestinian refugees under IDF’s watch) remain indelible stains. Israel’s bombardment killed an estimated 20,000 Lebanese and Palestinians in 1982 alone. In 2006, Israel fought Hezbollah in a war that leveled entire villages in southern Lebanon and parts of Beirut. Over 1,100 Lebanese, mostly civilians, were killed, and a million were displaced in one month. Israel fired cluster munitions across civilian areas in the war’s final hours (munitions that continue to maim civilians years later), an act UN humanitarian chief Jan Egeland called “shocking and immoral.” Hezbollah, for its part, rained rockets on Israeli cities, killing around 40 Israeli civilians in addition to 120 IDF soldiers. The conflict ended in stalemate but radicalized a generation and set the stage for Iran’s deeper entrenchment in Lebanon as Hezbollah’s sponsor. To this day, Israeli and Hezbollah forces remain in a hair-trigger standoff that could erupt into a wider war (as nearly happened again during the Gaza fighting of 2023–24).
• Palestinian Territories – Gaza and West Bank (continuous since 1967): The occupation of Palestinian lands is the core destabilizer in the Middle East. In Gaza, which Israel blockaded after withdrawing settlers in 2005, there have been major wars in 2008–09, 2012, 2014, 2021, and the apocalyptic assault of 2023–25. Each round grew more ferocious. In Operation Protective Edge (2014), Israeli forces pulverized entire residential blocks on the rationale that Hamas fighters were operating nearby. The UN inquiry into that war found credible evidence of war crimes, noting Israel’s attacks were often “disproportionate to the military advantage pursued”. Gazan civilians have nowhere to escape in the tiny enclave – borders sealed, coastal waters patrolled by the Israeli navy, and even hospitals and UN shelters have been struck. During the 2023–24 war, Israel declared northern Gaza a free-fire zone, relentlessly shelling even as over a million people fled south at Israel’s order. By late 2023, in just seven weeks of bombing following Hamas’s heinous October 7 terror attack, Israeli strikes had killed over 8,000 Palestinians including more than 3,500 children. A senior UN official reported 3,200 children killed in three weeks – a pace of carnage that “should stain our moral conscience,” as the UAE’s ambassador to the UN told the Security Council. Entire families were wiped out, with some children literally bombed to pieces every five minutes. The head of UNICEF somberly noted that “420 children are being killed or injured in Gaza each day … a number that should shake each of us to our core.” The systematic destruction of infrastructure – homes, schools, markets, water and power facilities – was so extensive that by early 2024 the UN estimated 35% of all buildings in Gaza were destroyed or damaged, a level of ruin rarely seen in modern conflict. International legal experts, including a former ICC chief prosecutor, began warning that Israel’s actions “appear intent on the destruction of the Palestinian people in Gaza,” raising the specter of genocidal intent. Indeed, Amnesty International stated that the ongoing “cruel and inhumane siege” is evidence of genocidal intent by Israeli authorities towards Gazans, given the deliberate deprivation of food, water, and medicine to an entire civilian population for months.

In the occupied West Bank, meanwhile, Israel’s expanding settlements and entrenched military rule have fueled continuous low-intensity conflict. Palestinian communities face daily raids, land seizures, and settler violence. Since 2022, settler attacks on Palestinian villagers (often backed by soldiers) have surged, described by one Israeli commander as “a manifest pattern of organized terror.” In 2023, as the Gaza war raged, West Bank violence also spiked – over 200 Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire that year in the West Bank, the highest in decades, including during a massive raid on Jenin refugee camp. Israeli ministers like Smotrich have explicitly called for erasing Palestinian villages (he infamously said a Palestinian town should be “wiped out” after a Palestinian killed two settlers there). Such rhetoric, shockingly, is backed by actions: whole communities like Khan al-Ahmar have been slated for demolition to make way for Jews-only settlements. The West Bank’s fragmentation into bantustans policed by checkpoints, walls, and facial-recognition cameras (more on the surveillance state later) has made everyday life for Palestinians a maze of humiliation and precarity. The situation meets the legal definition of apartheid as described by B’Tselem, HRW, and Amnesty, wherein one ethnic group systematically dominates and oppresses another. As B’Tselem stated in its milestone 2021 report, Israel operates “a regime of Jewish supremacy from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea: this is apartheid.”Under this regime, Palestinians are not just second-class citizens; millions have no citizenship at all, no political rights, and live under separate military law. They are confined to ever-shrinking enclaves, their movement restricted by permits, and their resistance met with lethal force.

• Syria (2007–present): Israel has carried out hundreds of airstrikes in Syria over the past decade, mostly targeting Iranian or Hezbollah personnel and arms shipments during the Syrian Civil War. These strikes, rarely acknowledged officially, risk sparking a larger confrontation with Iran on Syrian soil. In 2018, Syrian air defenses responding to an Israeli raid inadvertently shot down a Russian military plane, briefly causing a diplomatic crisis. Israel has assassinated Syrian military scientists (e.g., a key rocket engineer in 2018) and bombed sites deep inside sovereign Syrian territory. Each such strike may be tactically calculated, but collectively they violate the UN Charter’s prohibition on the use of force and further destabilize a war-torn country. Beyond Syria, Israel is suspected in operations in Iraq and Sudan against alleged arms convoys, expanding a shadow war across borders.
• Iran (covert war and now open war): Iran and Israel are locked in a conflict that spans assassinations (as noted), cyber warfare, espionage, and threats of outright attack. Israel has lobbied and plotted for years to strike Iran’s nuclear facilities, and only unprecedented U.S. pressure (and the lack of a clear path to success) had restrained it – until two days ago. Prior to the onset of current hostilities, the shadow war was well underway: explosions at Iranian missile bases, mysterious fires at nuclear sites, and killings of IRGC officers have all been attributed to Israel. This tit-for-tat has global implications; consider that in 2020, Israeli actions in Iran (the Fakhrizadeh assassination) nearly torpedoed diplomatic efforts to revive the Iran nuclear deal, keeping the Middle East on the brink of a new war. With Israel’s leadership deciding to launch a unilateral strike on Iran, the retaliation could engulf the entire Gulf region and disrupt the world economy (through attacks on oil infrastructure and a closure of the Strait of Hormuz). It is no exaggeration that Israeli aggression towards Iran could spark World War III-level scenarios involving the U.S., Russia (an Iranian ally in Syria), and others.

Through all these episodes, a pattern emerges: Israel feels entitled to use military force whenever and wherever it sees fit, often disregarding UN Security Council calls or international mediation efforts. This behavior undermines global norms that were painstakingly established to prevent exactly the kind of might-makes-right chaos that Israel repeatedly invites. The humanitarian toll has been staggering. For Palestinians alone, decades of dispossession and violence have created one of the world’s longest-running refugee crises (over 7 million Palestinian refugees worldwide). Generations have grown up under occupation or in blockaded Gaza with profound trauma: children who have survived multiple wars, constant drone buzz in the sky, relatives killed or maimed, homes reduced to rubble. As of mid-2025, after the latest Gaza onslaught, over 54,000 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed according to local authorities, a number so high it defies comprehension – that is roughly the toll of the entire Yugoslav wars of the 1990s, but concentrated in a tiny strip in just a year and a half of war. No conflict since World War II has seen such a death toll in such a short time frame in a single territory. If any other state were responsible for even a fraction of this carnage, global outrage would be deafening; sanctions and tribunals would ensue. With Israel, the carnage is perversely normalized as just part of a vexing “conflict” we supposedly cannot solve.

Legally, Israel’s actions have eroded the authority of international law. It has ignored binding UN Security Council resolutions (such as Resolution 242 calling for withdrawal from 1967-occupied territories, or Resolution 497 rejecting the annexation of Syria’s Golan Heights). It has thumbed its nose at the International Court of Justice, which ruled in 2004 that the West Bank separation wall and settlement policy violate international law. Israeli officials and military personnel have enjoyed de facto immunity from prosecution; efforts to investigate them through the International Criminal Court are met with Western obstruction. This glaring impunity sends a message to other would-be violators: if you have powerful backers, you too can get away with war crimes. When Russia cites Kosovo or Iraq to justify its actions in Ukraine, Western diplomats bristle – yet Israel’s routine defiance of law is arguably a more egregious precedent undermining the very idea of a rules-based order. As one veteran observer put it, “Israel doesn’t just violate international law; it makes a mockery of it, by showing that ‘law’ will bend to power.”

In sum, Israel’s regional conduct is that of an agent of chaos and confrontation. It keeps multiple conflict theaters simmering (Gaza, West Bank, Lebanon, Syria) and could ignite a larger war at any moment (with Iran or a multi-front escalation). The humanitarian consequences have already been catastrophic, and the moral authority of global institutions has been shredded by their inability to hold Israel to the same standards as others. This is not only a Middle Eastern problem – it is a global one, because peace and stability in our interconnected world depend on upholding certain universal norms. Israel today stands as the prime exception to those norms, an exception that threatens to swallow the rule.

The Propaganda Machine: Hasbara Abroad, Tachles at Home

How does Israel continue to carry out such policies without facing pariah status or mass diplomatic isolation? A significant part of the answer lies in its sophisticated propaganda and narrative-management machine, which operates on two levels – externally through Hasbara (Hebrew for “explanation,” effectively state PR) and internally through what might be called Tachles (Hebrew/Yiddish slang for “cutting to the chase,” i.e. blunt pragmatism). These dual mechanisms allow Israel to project a polished image of a beleaguered democracy defending itself, even as it embraces an unvarnished realpolitik of domination on the ground.

Hasbara, in the Israeli lexicon, refers to the orchestrated effort to explain and justify Israeli actions to the world. It is public diplomacy at its core, but with a distinctly propagandistic bent – a direct descendant of early Zionist “propaganda” campaigns (Theodor Herzl himself urged fellow Zionists in 1899 “to engage in propaganda” for their cause). Modern Hasbara took shape especially after the 1967 Six-Day War, when Israel seized territories and needed to defend its image as an occupier. Today, Hasbara is a multimillion-dollar enterprise spanning government agencies, foreign embassies, pro-Israel advocacy groups, media networks, and an army of unofficial volunteers (sometimes nicknamed “Hasbarists”). The Israeli Foreign Ministry and Prime Minister’s Office coordinate a lot of these efforts, often working hand-in-glove with American and European pro-Israel organizations. Tactics range from message discipline – ensuring that Israeli officials and supporters worldwide echo the same talking points – to social media campaigns that flood platforms with the Israeli narrative, to academic and cultural programs aimed at shaping discourse. For example, there are Hasbara Fellowships that bring foreign students (especially North American Jews) to Israel for training on how to advocate for Israel on college campuses. Israeli embassies organize lectures, trips, and briefings to influence journalists and politicians. Well-funded lobby groups in the West (like AIPAC in the U.S. or CFI in the UK) complement this by pressuring lawmakers to adopt pro-Israel positions, often equating Israel’s interests with their own nation’s interests.

The content of Hasbara messaging is fairly predictable, but effective. It emphasizes Israel’s democratic institutions, technological innovations, and liberal social scene (e.g. LGBTQ+ rights) to contrast with its illiberal neighbors. It reframes Israeli military actions as reluctant self-defense against terrorism – every war is Israel “responding” to rockets or kidnappings, never initiating. Civilian casualties on the Palestinian side are “regrettable tragedies” caused by terrorists hiding among their own people. By contrast, Israeli casualties (though far fewer) are highlighted as intolerable outrages that any country would respond to. A core theme is Israel’s victimhood and legitimacy: that Jews have an eternal connection to the land and have survived the Holocaust, so criticism of their nation is suspect (we’ll examine that weaponization of victimhood in the next section). Another key Hasbara strategy is demonizing the adversary – presenting Palestinians (and by extension their supporters) as inherently violent, hateful, even part of a global radical Islamist threat akin to ISIS. Indeed, in recent conflicts Israeli spokespeople incessantly repeated “Hamas = ISIS”, trying to frame the Gaza war as part of the war on terror, so Western audiences would instinctively side with Israel. This kind of messaging often borrows the language of the very liberal order Israel is violating – talking about “democracy vs terror” and “our shared Western values” – to paper over the daily reality of apartheid and occupation. In essence, Hasbara sells an illusion: that Israel is a normal Western democracy just trying to keep safe, and that its military actions are therefore normal and justified responses to abnormal foes.

These narratives are pushed forcefully across all media. Israel has an extremely active presence on social media, with the IDF and Foreign Ministry running slick English-language Twitter accounts, YouTube videos, and infographics. During wars, they flood feeds with selective footage – like clips of Hamas rockets or tunnels – to justify bombarding Gaza, while downplaying or outright denying the scale of Palestinian suffering. They are savvy in the digital age: a leaked account showed Israel even coordinated covert campaigns on platforms like Facebook to boost pro-Israel content and smear critics. Additionally, Israel’s defenders (state-sponsored or grassroots) are quick to attack and discredit reports that expose Israeli abuses, labeling them “fake” or biased. For instance, when an image of a dead Palestinian child circulates, Israeli officials often claim it’s a “staged” photo or from Syria – even when evidence shows otherwise. This injection of doubt is meant to muddy the waters, akin to tactics authoritarian regimes use to dodge culpability.

But while Hasbara sugarcoats things for the outside world, within Israeli society there is a counterpart that might be termed “Tachles” thinking. Tachles implies a hard-nosed, no-nonsense pragmatism – “let’s talk tachles” means let’s speak frankly about the bottom line. In the context of Israeli policy, it refers to the cynical realpolitik that justifies violence and dispossession as necessary and inevitable. Internally, Israeli leaders and much of the Jewish public often dispense with the liberal euphemisms and moral pretense. There’s an understanding (seldom admitted openly to foreigners) that of course Israel maintains control by force and fear – “that’s the way the Middle East works.” This manifests in several ways:

• Dehumanizing language for Palestinians: In candid moments, Israeli officials have referred to Palestinian attackers as “animals” and “bloodthirsty beasts.” Even Palestinian children killed are sometimes implicitly blamed for their own deaths (as noted at the UN, Knesset members have grotesquely said “Gaza’s children brought this upon themselves”). The tachles view is that Palestinians understand only force, so mercy or nuance is foolish.
• Open discussion of ethnic cleansing as “transfer”: While Hasbara to the West insists Israel seeks peace and two states, internally many Israeli politicians over the years – from the late Rabbi Kahane to far-right figures today – talk of “transferring” Arabs out of Greater Israel. Ben-Gvir and others have floated incentives for emigration or outright stripping of citizenship from “disloyal” Arab citizens. This idea, essentially a population purge, is heinous under international norms, but tachles logic frames it as “solving the demographic problem once and for all.”
• “Mowing the grass” and Dahiya doctrines: As mentioned, Israeli military jargon itself betrays a cold acceptance of perpetual violence. The fact that phrases like “mowing the lawn” (cutting down Palestinians periodically) are used internally by defense strategists indicates an attitude that “there is no solution, only management of the conflict through regular force.” Likewise, the late IDF Chief of Staff Rafael Eitan infamously said in the 1980s that Israel must “hoist the Palestinians up by the beard” and “smash their hope” so that “they will be ground into dust and scream for a tiny piece of bread.” Such brutal candor, while not voiced publicly these days, underlies much Israeli policy – whether it’s the 15-year blockade of Gaza intended to keep its people on the brink of humanitarian collapse, or the chokehold on the West Bank economy. In Israeli strategic circles, there is remarkably frank talk (in Hebrew) about ensuring Palestinians remain weak, divided, and despairing enough to never rise up effectively.
• Double standards in law and morality: Internally, Israelis often acknowledge a truth that Hasbara would never admit: that there is indeed one regime for Jews and another for Arabs. Former Prime Minister Ehud Barak once called Israel “a villa in the jungle,” betraying the mindset of a civilized people surrounded by savages. Tachles reasoning says: “Yes, we give preference to Jews. Yes, we take the land we need. Yes, we hit Gaza hard to keep them quiet. The world may not like it, but we’ll do what we must for our survival.” This is often couched in a fatalistic shrug – as if the moral high ground is a luxury Israel cannot afford. In private, many Israelis will concede the occupation is unjust or that Gaza civilians suffer horribly, but “tachles, we have no choice; if we lift our boot even slightly, we’ll be slaughtered.” This siege mentality, constantly reinforced by leaders, serves as a blanket moral exemption.

In combination, Hasbara and Tachles create a powerful one-two punch: externally, Israel wears the mask of the liberal democracy, playing by global rules; internally, it operates a regimented, militarized control system utterly at odds with those rules, justified by a survival narrative. One could say Israel speaks the language of universal values in its press releases but the language of might makes right in its cabinet meetings.

There is also a concept of “Tachles diplomacy” in Israeli parlance – meaning dealing with the world in a purely transactional, interest-driven way. For example, Israel cultivates alliances with unsavory regimes (more on that later) by offering intelligence or technology, asking in return for their UN votes or relocation of embassies to Jerusalem. Morality is not part of the equation; it’s all business. This is how Israel, for instance, befriended apartheid South Africa in the 1970s–80s (swapping weapons and nuclear know-how for votes and diamonds), or more recently wooed authoritarian leaders like Hungary’s Viktor Orbán and Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro by appealing to right-wing populist solidarity. In each case, Israel’s message is “we’ll help you if you help us, and we won’t lecture you on human rights if you don’t lecture us.” It’s cynically effective.

Finally, tachles finds its ugliest expression in the treatment of dissent within Israel. When Israelis themselves try to hold a moral mirror up to their society, they face vilification and repression. Consider Breaking the Silence, a group of Israeli ex-soldiers who publish testimonies about occupation abuses. Rather than engage with these whistleblowers, Israeli officials brand them as “traitors”. A former Defense Minister, Avigdor Liberman, explicitly said Breaking the Silence and B’Tselem (a human rights NGO) “are not exercising free speech, they’re traitors”, even comparing them to people convicted of treason for spying. He pushed a law to force such NGOs to register as foreign agents, and lawmakers (including Smotrich) introduced bills to outlaw Breaking the Silence entirely. The group’s members have been harassed, their events disrupted, and they’re banned from speaking to army units or schools by order of the Education Minister. This illustrates how, in Israel’s internal calculus, exposing the truth is subversive – because it could weaken the resolve to continue on the present course. The only “loyal” discourse is that which perpetuates the status quo or moves further right. Journalists, activists, even former generals who criticize government policy harshly are tarred as giving ammunition to Israel’s enemies. Thus, many Israelis who privately despair at their country’s direction stay silent, and those brave enough to speak (like the veteran group Peace Now, or human rights orgs) are increasingly marginalized as disloyal.

Israel’s propaganda success, then, lies in controlling the narrative externally while controlling the dissent internally. Through Hasbara, many in the West truly believe Israel is “trying hard for peace” and “values human rights, but security must come first.” Through internal tachles-style conditioning, many Israelis (even if uncomfortable) accept that brutality and discrimination are necessary. This disconnect between image and reality is not just morally problematic; it fuels the conflict by removing pressures that could compel change. As long as Israel can hide behind a Hasbara shield and silence internal critics, it has little incentive to alter its course. That’s why cracking the propaganda facade is crucial – which leads us to the next factor: how Israel uses accusations of antisemitism to guard that facade with an electric fence.

Weaponized Antisemitism: Silencing Critique by Equating It with Hate

No discussion of Israel’s immunity is complete without examining the way antisemitism is wielded as a political weapon to insulate Israel from criticism. This is perhaps the most emotionally charged aspect of the issue, because it involves the legacy of the Holocaust and the genuine scourge of anti-Jewish bigotry – both of which are very real and very serious. However, Israel’s defenders have systematically blurred the line between criticism of the Israeli state and hatred of Jewish people, to the point that in many circles, calling Israel an apartheid or accusing it of war crimes elicits swift condemnation as an act of prejudice. This conflation is not accidental; it is a deliberate strategy to stifle debate and intimidate would-be critics into self-censorship.

Over the past decade, there has been a concerted push, often led by pro-Israel lobby groups, to enshrine a particular definition of antisemitism (the IHRA working definition) into law and institutional policy around the world. The IHRA definition includes, among its examples of antisemitism, things like “claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor” or applying double standards to Israel not demanded of other nations. While the intent may have been to identify when anti-Israel rhetoric veers into antisemitism, in practice these examples have been widely misused to label legitimate critiques of Israel as anti-Jewish hate. More than 100 civil society organizations – including Jewish groups and Israeli NGOs – warned the UN in 2023 that the IHRA definition was being “misused to protect Israel from legitimate criticism” and thus should not be adopted wholesale. They noted that even major human rights groups like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch were accused of antisemitism under IHRA’s rubric simply for publishing reports concluding that Israel practices apartheid. Indeed, when Amnesty released its 2022 apartheid report, Israeli officials and some Jewish organizations blasted it as fueling antisemitism – as if documenting systematic discrimination and human rights violations is an act of hate.

The effect of these accusations is chilling. Journalists, academics, and politicians have lost jobs or been ostracized after being tarred as antisemitic for their stance on Israel. In the UK, the campaign against Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn largely revolved around exaggerated claims that he tolerated antisemitism, when in reality much of it was conflated with his pro-Palestinian views. The scandal (which Corbyn denies) led to his resignation, showing how politically lethal the antisemitism charge can be. In the US, elected officials like Congresswoman Ilhan Omar have faced censure and media firestorms for criticizing the Israel lobby or Israeli policies – her pointed tweet that U.S. support for Israel is “all about the Benjamins” (i.e., money) was castigated as antisemitic, forcing an apology. While Omar’s phrasing played into stereotypes inadvertently, the swift branding of her, a Black Muslim woman, as an antisemite served to derail a needed conversation about lobbying influence. On campuses, students and professors who advocate for Palestinian rights or support BDS (boycott, divestment, sanctions) have been subjected to investigations and sometimes sanctions under broad “anti-discrimination” rules that treat pro-Palestinian speech as anti-Jewish hate. For example, in 2022 the University of Toronto initially rescinded a job offer to a scholar, Valentina Azarova, due to her work on Israel’s occupation (amid pressure from a donor citing antisemitism concerns). Legal groups in the U.S. have sued university chapters of Students for Justice in Palestine, absurdly accusing them of “material support for terrorism” simply for rallying for Gaza. The message to advocates is clear: speak up against Israel, and you may be branded a bigot and suffer career or reputational damage.

This weaponization has even been codified by governments. Under the Trump administration, the U.S. State Department adopted the IHRA definition and declared that “anti-Zionism is antisemitism” in many cases. Dozens of U.S. states passed laws or executive orders restricting boycotts of Israel on the grounds that BDS is antisemitic discrimination (several of these laws have been struck down by courts as unconstitutional, but the chilling intent was there). In Germany, the Bundestag absurdly declared BDS antisemitic, making it state policy to deny public spaces or funds to any group that supports boycotting Israel – a stance so broad it even ensnared a Holocaust survivor, Hajo Meyer, whose event was canceled. Under the guise of fighting hate, states are suppressing political speech about Israel. The irony is bitter: Germany, out of Holocaust guilt, now stifles peaceful protest against Israel’s oppression of Palestinians – a moral contortion that serves Israeli impunity.

Perhaps most insidiously, pro-Israel advocates have managed to equate even the term “apartheid” with antisemitism, despite it being a legal term describing a system of institutionalized racial domination. The Guardian noted how the IHRA definition’s example about calling Israel a “racist endeavor” has been used to allege antisemitism against those who argue Israel’s laws and practices meet the definition of apartheid. Thus, when B’Tselem (an Israeli NGO led by Jews of conscience) declared Israel an apartheid regime in 2021, some Israeli officials accused it of betraying the Jewish people. When Human Rights Watch and Amnesty echoed that assessment, they too were smeared. The intended lesson: don’t you dare use the A-word about Israel, or you will be cast out of polite society. It’s telling that the same Western liberals who freely labeled South Africa an apartheid state and rallied for its boycott in the 1980s now shrink from applying the term to Israel – not because the facts differ (if anything, Israel’s system is more entrenched and longer-lasting), but because Israel has successfully sanctified itself against such labels.

This “sanctification” relies heavily on the memory of the Holocaust and the historical persecution of Jews. Israel presents itself as the safeguard of Jewish survival after the Holocaust, a place of refuge for an eternally threatened people. It’s a powerful narrative grounded in truth – Jews were nearly exterminated in Europe and have faced millennia of antisemitism. But the Israeli government and its supporters often leverage this collective trauma as a political get-out-of-jail-free card. Any comparison of Israel’s actions to those of other oppressive regimes is met with outrage: How dare you mention Israel in the same breath as Nazis? That itself is antisemitic! This happens even when no one is comparing anyone to Nazis – merely pointing out, for instance, that laws privileging one ethnicity (Jews) over others (Arabs) within one state echo practices of past racist regimes. As one Palestinian commentator wryly observed, “The Western world kept Israel safe from criticism by wrapping it in Holocaust guilt.” European countries, in particular, have been reluctant to pressure Israel because of their shame over the Holocaust. Israeli diplomats skillfully exploit this, hinting that any too-harsh scrutiny of Israel is a sign of latent antisemitism or lack of penitence for past sins. Thus, memory is turned from a warning (“Never again” genocide or racial hatred) into a weapon (“Don’t criticize our apartheid or you insult the memory of the six million”). This inversion is profoundly unethical. It abuses the real suffering of Jews in history to excuse the suffering Israel now inflicts on Palestinians. As the prompt’s concluding quote poignantly notes: “They’ve turned memory into a weapon, not a warning.”

Meanwhile, actual Jewish dissenting voices are sidelined or smeared to maintain the illusion of a unanimous Jewish support for Israel. Organizations like Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) in the U.S., comprised of Jews who vehemently oppose Israeli policies, are dismissed by mainstream Jewish institutions as marginal or “self-hating.” Israeli human rights activists and soldiers (Breaking the Silence, B’Tselem staff) are denounced as traitors or as puppets of foreign anti-Israel interests. Even Holocaust survivors who speak out for Palestinian rights are often ignored or attacked. In 2014, during Israel’s war in Gaza, a group of 327 Jewish Holocaust survivors and descendants published an open letter condemning the “massacre of Palestinians in Gaza” and rejecting the idea that Israel speaks for all Jews. They declared “Never Again for Anyone” – but their voices got a fraction of the attention that a pro-Israel lobby press release would get. The pro-Israel establishment either pretends such Jews don’t exist or labels them extreme. This effectively erases Jewish moral opposition to the Israeli occupation from the narrative, reinforcing the notion that criticizing Israel is inherently anti-Jewish because “all good Jews support Israel.” It is a cynical strategy that, sadly, often succeeds in the media.

The consequences of weaponizing antisemitism in this way are dire and far-reaching:

• Legitimate debate is stifled: Policymakers and journalists tip-toe around Israeli issues, leading to muted coverage of Palestinian suffering or quick about-faces if Israel objections arise. This results in a skewed public understanding. For example, American media often practice both-sides-ism or overemphasize Israeli perspectives to avoid seeming biased, even when reporting on clear-cut Israeli abuses. An aggressor vs victim scenario gets painted as a “clash” or “cycle of violence,” obscuring reality.
• Antisemitism itself is cheapened: By crying wolf – labeling human rights advocacy as antisemitism – the term starts to lose meaning. Real antisemites (like neo-Nazis) can then claim that accusations against them are just political smears, analogizing to how Israel critics are treated. It muddles society’s ability to identify genuine hate. Ken Stern, the author of the IHRA definition, warned that its misuse as a blunt tool to silence Israel’s critics “actually harms the fight against antisemitism.” He has opposed writing it into law for that reason.
• Israelis are further insulated in a bubble: If any external criticism is reflexively dismissed as antisemitic, Israelis are deprived of feedback that could help them course-correct. It feeds a siege mentality – “the goyim are all against us no matter what we do, so let’s just do what we want” – which only reinforces hawkish policies.
• Palestinians are delegitimized: Perhaps worst, conflating their struggle with bigotry against Jews is a profound injustice. Palestinians resist Israeli domination not because their Jewish oppressors are Jewish, but because they are oppressors. By saying anti-Zionism is antisemitism, Israel’s apologists essentially claim all Palestinian resistance or grievance is Jew-hatred in disguise. This delegitimizes a colonized people’s narrative and paints their desire for freedom as racist. It’s a calumny that adds moral insult to material injury.

Despite these efforts, there are signs the taboo is breaking. Major human rights organizations and even some politicians are becoming more forthright in criticizing Israel despite the risk. When Israel’s abuses reach such grotesque levels – e.g. killing thousands of children in Gaza – the antisemitism smear loses some power simply because the moral outrage is too widespread to contain. In 2023, we saw unprecedented protests in Western cities led by Jewish groups (like JVP’s “Not In Our Name” actions) condemning Israel’s actions in Gaza and explicitly rejecting the idea that this is about Jewish safety. The more Jewish voices loudly assert that defending Israeli apartheid is not a prerequisite of fighting antisemitism, the harder it becomes to conflate the two. Nonetheless, the machinery of suppression remains formidable, and many are still “too scared to say so,” as the concluding quote says, even if “the world knows” the truth.

International Impunity and Western Sponsorship: The World’s Enabler

If Israel is the most dangerous threat to world stability, it is not solely by its own doing. It has been enabled, shielded, and emboldened by world powers, chiefly the United States but also key European allies and others. Israel’s ability to defy international norms rests on the assurance that the U.S. will veto any binding UN action, provide lavish military aid, and treat Israel as exempt from the consequences that other states face for similar behavior. This strategic impunity is at the crux of why Israel is uniquely destabilizing – because it undermines the credibility of the entire international system.

Consider the record at the United Nations Security Council. Since the 1970s, the United States has used its veto power at the UNSC dozens of times (at least 53 vetoes since 1972) to quash resolutions critical of Israel. In fact, over half of all U.S. vetoes in the UN ever cast have been on Israel’s behalf. These resolutions ranged from condemning illegal settlement construction, to calling for ceasefires in Gaza, to urging respect for international law. For example, in 2018 the U.S. vetoed a resolution expressing “grave concern” at Israeli forces killing unarmed Palestinian protesters in Gaza (during the Great March of Return). In that instance, over 60 Palestinians were shot dead in one day, including medics and a child – and yet a mild rebuke could not pass because Nikki Haley, then U.S. ambassador, found it “one-sided.” More recently, in late 2023 and 2024, as global outrage mounted over Gaza, the U.S. vetoed no fewer than four Security Council resolutions calling for a humanitarian truce or ceasefire in Gaza. In one vote in June 2025, the U.S. stood alone – 14 council members for a ceasefire, the U.S. solely against – effectively greenlighting Israel’s continued onslaught, despite famine warnings and tens of thousands of deaths. The image of the U.S. (or occasionally Britain) repeatedly blocking the collective will of the world to shield Israel erodes the UN’s authority and sends an unmistakable signal: Some countries are above the law. This encourages not only Israeli intransigence, but also other global bad actors who see the hypocrisy. (Russia, for instance, cites Western double standards on Israel to deflect criticism of its own actions, with some effect.)

Then there is the matter of military and economic aid. Israel is the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. foreign aid since WWII – over $150 billion in direct aid, the vast majority for its military. Currently, the U.S. gives Israel $3.8 billion per year in military financing (per a 10-year MOU), amounting to roughly $10 million every single day. This aid underwrites the very weaponry – fighter jets, precision bombs, artillery shells – used in operations like the leveling of Gaza. During the 2023 Gaza war, as Israeli stockpiles ran low from intense bombardment, the U.S. quickly replenished them, even drawing from its own reserves. President Biden sought supplemental aid packages for Israel (in the tens of billions) as if Israel were the victim in need of succor, while offering only token humanitarian funds for Gaza’s actual victims. European states, while not as generous, also trade arms with Israel and often upgrade relations instead of sanctioning it. Germany, for instance, provides subsidized submarines that become part of Israel’s nuclear second-strike capability. In 2023, EU officials renewed a scientific cooperation deal with Israel that essentially funds Israeli high-tech (some of which has military dual use), even as Israeli bombs cratered EU-funded schools in Gaza.

This material and diplomatic backing fosters in Israeli leadership a sense of absolute impunity. As a former IDF commander once quipped, “When America sneezes, Israel says ‘bless you.’” The closeness is such that Israel often doesn’t even need to ask for indulgence; it’s preemptively given. For example, when the International Criminal Court opened an investigation in 2021 into alleged war crimes in the occupied territories, the U.S. and European allies didn’t pledge to respect the legal process – instead they attacked the ICC. The Trump administration went so far as to sanction the ICC prosecutor personally (initially due to a parallel Afghanistan probe, but also to deter the Israel probe). Though Biden lifted those sanctions, the message remained that Washington would not permit its ally to be hauled before any court. Contrast this with how quickly Western powers refer other nations to tribunals (like the calls to investigate Russian officials for Ukraine).

Western sponsorship also manifests in political cover and normalization of Israeli narratives. The U.S. Congress is famously pro-Israel; resolutions supporting Israeli military actions pass with near-unanimity. Critiques of Israel are met with swift condemnations (the House even passed a bizarre 2019 resolution condemning BDS and equating it with antisemitism). This political climate means Israel can do almost anything and still be referred to by U.S. leaders as a “close friend” and “vibrant democracy”. In October 2023, even as Israeli bombs killed over 30 members of a single family sheltering in a UN school, President Biden went before cameras to say “I have never known a greater democracy than Israel,” effectively endorsing whatever Israel does as righteous. European governments, for their part, talk a bit tougher at times (issuing statements “deploring” settlement expansion or Gaza brutality), but do little of substance. The EU has never sanctioned Israel; it hasn’t even suspended Israel’s special trade status under the EU-Israel Association Agreement, despite clear clauses linking it to human rights. By contrast, the EU swiftly sanctioned Russia for Crimea’s annexation and war in Ukraine. So when the Global South sees Europe wringing its hands but taking no action on Israel, it smacks of double standards and erodes Western moral authority.

This asymmetry has been noted even by officials. In 2022, a UN human rights rapporteur remarked the West’s robust response to Ukraine contrasted with total inaction on Palestine, saying “We are told loud and clear: international law applies only selectively.” A South African minister quipped that if one swapped Israel with another country, “we’d see sanctions overnight.” The erosion of the “rules-based order” is thus partly self-inflicted by its supposed champions. The more Israel is coddled, the more China and Russia can gleefully point out western hypocrisy when criticized for their own deeds. This dynamic seriously destabilizes global governance, because respect for rules depends on their consistent application. If might and influence can buy exemption (as Israel has bought with U.S. backing), others will either seek the same or simply flout the rules outright.

The strategic fallout is visible: initiatives to resolve conflicts or enforce norms falter when Israel is in the mix. The UN Security Council is often paralyzed on Middle East issues due to the predictable U.S. veto. This paralysis bleeds over into cynicism about the UN’s effectiveness elsewhere. How to convince countries to abide by UNSC resolutions on other crises when dozens of binding resolutions on Israel/Palestine (e.g. demanding withdrawal from occupied lands, right of refugee return) are ignored with no consequence? The credibility of international law took a hit when in 2018 the U.S. recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, defying UNSC resolutions that treated East Jerusalem as occupied territory whose status must be negotiated. When other countries followed suit (Hungary, a few others) or talked of moving embassies, it signaled a break from the global consensus and reward for Israel’s unilateralism.

Furthermore, U.S. patronage emboldens Israeli extremism. Israeli voters see that no matter who they elect – even outright fascists – the money and weapons keep flowing. Thus, they are less incentivized to curb their own worst tendencies. After the far-right took power in 2022, one might have expected Washington to distance itself; instead the Biden administration continued normal military aid and largely insulated Israel from serious backlash. Only when the Israeli government’s judicial coup attempt in 2023 threatened Israel’s own internal democratic facade did some in the U.S. speak up – and even then, mildly, and purely out of concern for Israel’s stability, not Palestinian rights. Israel learned it could even thumb its nose at a sitting U.S. president (Netanyahu repeatedly did so with Obama, expanding settlements despite U.S. objections) and suffer few repercussions. This lack of leverage usage by the U.S. – despite providing the lifeblood of Israel’s security – is perhaps one of the greatest foreign policy failures and causes of instability. Just imagine: If the U.S. tomorrow said “no more $$ and no more UN vetoes until you agree to a fair peace deal with Palestinians,” Israel would have no choice but to compromise. But that doesn’t happen, because of a combination of domestic U.S. politics (the influence of the Israel lobby and evangelical Christian Zionists) and strategic calculus (Israel seen as a valuable ally against Iran, a source of intelligence, etc.).

It’s important to also note the role of other powers. Russia historically kept ties with Israel (despite Israel aligning with the West, Russia valued its million-plus Russian-speaking immigrants in Israel and the freedom for its military to operate in Syria without Israeli interference). China has built quiet trade and tech relations with Israel (seeing it as a hub of innovation). These relationships mean that even outside the Western bloc, Israel avoids isolation. Arab states, too, have moved toward normalization (UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, and even Saudi Arabia flirted with it) as part of a geopolitical realignment against Iran or to curry favor with Washington. Such normalization – exchanging open ties with Israel for economic or security perks – further dilutes any unified front to hold Israel accountable for occupation or war crimes. It signaled to Israel that the old notion of “no peace without justice for Palestinians” was fading, replaced by brute realpolitik: Arab regimes will deal with Israel for their own interests, Palestinian cause be damned. This trend, spearheaded by the Trump administration’s Abraham Accords, essentially undermines the primary leverage Arab states had (ostracism of Israel) without getting any concessions for Palestinians in return. The result: Israel pockets normalization and arms deals, continues occupation unabated, and is actually more emboldened (as seen by the rapid settlement growth and raids after those accords).

In total, Israel’s international impunity is a linchpin of why it’s so dangerous. A country with advanced weaponry (including nuclear arms), aggressive policies, and expansionist goals is far more threatening when it operates under an umbrella of diplomatic protection. It becomes like a confident repeat offender who knows the judge will always dismiss the case. The erosion of global stability due to Israel’s unchecked behavior can be summarized simply:

• Destabilizing norms: When chemical weapons were used in Syria, the world reacted strongly to uphold a norm. But Israel’s routine violations (collective punishment, annexation, etc.) get special passes, destabilizing the idea that norms are universal.
• Fueling radicalization: Injustice that is unaddressed breeds extremism. Many analysts note that groups like Al Qaeda or ISIS have exploited anger over Palestine in their recruitment propaganda. Certainly, Iran’s hardliners gain clout from opposing Israel’s unchecked aggression. The longer Palestinian despair festers under impunity, the more violent backlashes (like the Hamas 10/7 attack) we will see, with ripple effects on global terrorism and unrest.
• Straining alliances and East-West divides: The West’s support for Israel, even as it alienates the Global South (which largely sympathizes with Palestinians), contributes to a divide in international forums. In late 2023, 121 countries voted in the UN General Assembly for a Gaza ceasefire, with only 14 opposed (mostly Western). This stark split weakens Western moral authority and drives non-Western states toward alternative power centers like BRICS, seeing Western rhetoric of human rights as hollow.
• The risk of great-power escalation: If Israel’s actions sparked a wider war (say a miscalculation leading to war with Iran involving U.S. intervention), it could directly draw in great powers or at least set off chain reactions affecting global security (imagine oil crises, refugee crises, cyberattacks crossing borders). The U.S. and Russia narrowly avoided direct clash in Syria partly through deconfliction with Israel in the mix; one shudders at the prospect of a misfire.

In conclusion of this section, Israel as it stands is not just an ordinary ally with some flaws, it has become a sort of untouchable state – one that flouts the norms others are held to. The blame for that lies not only in Tel Aviv (or Jerusalem) but in Washington and other capitals. Until this enabling is reversed – until Israel faces meaningful consequences for transgressions – it will continue on its current path, dragging the world toward more conflict and disarray. The “rules-based order” cannot survive if one of its members is allowed to burn the rulebook whenever convenient. As Brazil’s UN ambassador scathingly put it during a Security Council debate, the Council’s repeated failure on Palestine is “shameless”, and “the eyes of the world are on us and will not move away from our distressing inability to act.” Every veto and indulgence is another blow to the world’s faith in collective security.

Techno-Authoritarian Exports: Surveillance, Cyber Warfare, and the Global Police State

Beyond military might and diplomacy, Israel’s impact on global stability extends into the digital and technological realm. Over the past two decades, Israel has leveraged its high-tech sector and counterinsurgency experience to become a leading exporter of surveillance tools, cyber weapons, and repressive technologies. This has made Israel a central player in the spread of authoritarian practices worldwide – what some have dubbed the “export of occupation.” In effect, techniques honed in controlling Palestinians are packaged and sold to other governments, enabling human rights abuses far from Israel’s shores and undermining privacy and dissent globally.

The most infamous example is the NSO Group’s Pegasus spyware, a military-grade cyber weapon developed in Israel. Pegasus can silently infiltrate a target’s smartphone, turning it into a 24/7 surveillance device – accessing messages, eavesdropping through the microphone, and tracking location, all without the user’s knowledge. Classified as a weapon by Israel, NSO could only sell it with Israeli Defense Ministry approval. And sell it they did – to dozens of countries. Investigations by Amnesty International and media partners (the Pegasus Project) revealed that Pegasus was used against journalists, opposition figures, human rights activists, diplomats, and even heads of state in at least 24 countries across Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas. Saudi Arabia used Pegasus to spy on confidants of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi in the months leading to his murder, effectively facilitating his assassination. Mexico used it against journalists investigating cartel violence. Hungary’s authoritarian government used it against investigative reporters and civil society. The list goes on – India, UAE, Morocco, Rwanda, Azerbaijan – all clients of NSO who deployed Pegasus to cement authoritarian control, leading to arrests, intimidation or worse for those surveilled. In the wrong hands (which were most of NSO’s paying customers), Pegasus became a tool of tyranny. As Amnesty’s Secretary-General put it, this spyware facilitated “human rights violations around the world on a massive scale.”

Israel’s government was not an idle bystander in this. It approved these sales and even used them as diplomatic currency. Reports emerged that Israel offered Pegasus to certain countries as part of diplomatic overtures (for example, to encourage Arab states to sign the Abraham Accords, Israel sweetened the deal with access to cyber tools). This means the Israeli state knowingly armed repressive regimes with the means to crush dissent and spy on citizens, as the price of friendship. Such conduct makes a mockery of claims to uphold democratic values. It also boomeranged: by 2021, the abuse was so egregious that the U.S. Commerce Department blacklisted NSO Group, an unprecedented rebuke to an Israeli firm by its ally. Big Tech companies like Apple and Meta sued NSO, calling them “cyber mercenaries/” Yet even after global scandal, NSO and similar Israeli companies persist (Pegasus was reportedly offered to Ukraine in 2022 to use against Russia). The Israeli government, while sometimes reining in specific sales under U.S. pressure, has largely faced no penalty for being the HQ of the global spyware industry.

And NSO is just one actor in Israel’s burgeoning surveillance-industrial complex. There are at least 27 Israeli companies specializing in various forms of spying tech – from phone hacking to facial recognition to internet monitoring – giving Israel one of the biggest clusters of such firms in the world. Many founders are alumni of elite military intelligence units (like Unit 8200) who turned their know-how into business. The synergy between the private sector and military is tight: technologies are often battle-tested on Palestinians first, refined in the West Bank or Gaza, then marketed abroad as “field-proven” solutions. In the West Bank, for instance, Israel has built a pervasive surveillance regime: at checkpoints and city streets, cameras and scanners feed databases like “Wolf Pack” that hold extensive info on every Palestinian. One system, “Red Wolf,” uses facial recognition at Hebron checkpoints to automatically permit or deny Palestinians passage; if it scans someone not yet in the database, it simply denies entry and adds them – effectively automating apartheid controls. Another, “Blue Wolf,” is a mobile app for soldiers to snap photos of Palestinians and immediately pull up their profiles or flag them for detention. In fact, Israeli soldiers competed in 2020 to photograph Palestinians for Blue Wolf, with units awarded prizes for the most entries – turning oppression into a game. This gamified surveillance, described by Amnesty, shows the dystopian level of control Israel exerts over Palestinians: a whole population catalogued biometrically, watched constantly, and controlled by algorithms deciding their fate at checkpointa.

These Orwellian systems are not staying in Israel. Authoritarian regimes around the world are importing Israeli surveillance tech to bolster their own control. For example, China (a surveillance superpower itself) reportedly benefited from Israeli spyware or techniques in some instances, and Israel for years sold China dual-use technologies until the U.S. pressured it to stop certain deals. Countries like Myanmar (before 2017) bought Israeli telecom intercept tools; Uganda and other African states have used Israeli hacking tools against dissidents. Even Western democracies haven’t been immune: some European states’ police and intel units purchased Pegasus or its ilk (Spain admitted its national intelligence agency had Pegasus, which in a twist was used to spy both on Catalan separatists and on Spanish officials, presumably by Morocco). The proliferation of these tools, many originating in Israel’s tech labs, accelerates the rise of a global police state mentality – where governments feel emboldened to spy on every critic, and activists around the world must assume their phones are compromised. The chilling effect on journalism, free speech, and privacy is hard to overstate. If you’re an environmental activist in Latin America or a human rights lawyer in the Gulf, the knowledge that your phone could be reporting your every word to a hostile government is deeply intimidating. Thus, Israeli tech has empowered the worst instincts of regimes, making the world more authoritarian. As Jacobin magazine bluntly put it, “Israel’s spy-tech industry is a global threat to democracy”, serving both profit and Israel’s diplomatic interests.

Israel also exports more conventional weaponry and training that props up authoritarian rulers. It has been documented that Israel provided arms or training to regimes like Apartheid South Africa (nuclear cooperation and arms during the embargo), Central American dictatorships in the 1980s (Guatemala’s genocidal regime got Israeli arms), Myanmar’s military junta (arms sales persisted into the late 2010s despite the Rohingya ethnic cleansing), and South Sudan during its brutal civil war. Often these sales fly under the radar, but they reflect Israel’s tachles approach to business: no moral strings, a willingness to do business where even other nations won’t. In doing so, Israel sometimes helps countries evade international sanctions or arms embargoes, further weakening global efforts to uphold human rights. For instance, when Western countries embargoed weapons to Myanmar, Israeli firms were still allegedly caught providing surveillance gear to the Myanmar military – illustrating a tendency to exploit grey zones for profit and influence.

The logic behind these exports isn’t only profit; it’s also building alliances with fellow illiberal actors. Authoritarian governments see Israel as a pioneer in “domestic security” (read: suppressing a subject people) and are eager to learn from it. Thus we have situations like U.S. police departments training with Israeli police or military trainers – a practice that has drawn criticism from civil rights groups who say it promotes a militarized mindset in policing (treating communities as enemy populations). Police from St. Louis to Atlanta have gone on trips to Israel for “counterterrorism” seminars that often end up teaching aggressive tactics used in the West Bank. This cross-pollination means the occupation’s ethos quietly permeates policing culture beyond Israel. It arguably contributed to militarized crackdowns on protests (like Ferguson’s – activists there noted the parallel to how Israeli forces treat Palestinian protesters). So, the methods of subjugation perfected by Israel echo abroad in both obvious and subtle ways.

On the cyber front, Israel is a leading player in state-sponsored hacking. It is one of the few nations (alongside the U.S., Russia, China) capable of top-tier cyber warfare. The Stuxnet virus that sabotaged Iran’s centrifuges around 2010 was reportedly a joint U.S.-Israel creation. Israeli hackers have been implicated in strikes on Iranian infrastructure (like a blast at the Natanz nuclear facility via cyber means in 2020). Cyber warfare is dangerous to global stability – these acts invite retaliation and potentially uncontrolled escalation (imagine if Iran responded by hacking an Israeli or American power grid causing civilian disasters). By pioneering offensive cyber operations without transparency, Israel again sets precedents that others follow. We now have a global cyber arms race in part because early actors like Israel showed how effective (and deniable) it could be to use malware instead of missiles. Now countries worldwide are rushing to acquire similar capabilities, making every critical infrastructure system from hospitals to water plants a potential battlefield.

In summary, Israel’s export of surveillance and military tech has globalized the tools of oppression. It has made it easier for authoritarians to surveil and crush dissent, for states to commit extrajudicial attacks (via cyber or hit teams) beyond their borders, and for security establishments to adopt a mentality of treating civilians as potential enemies. This underbelly of the “Start-Up Nation” might not grab headlines like wars do, but its effect is pervasive. It undermines democracy and human rights in quiet ways, everywhere from Riyadh to Washington. Just as an illustrative fact: an Israeli firm’s facial recognition tech is reportedly used by Chinese authorities in Xinjiang to track Uyghur Muslims (though Israel denies direct complicity, Chinese-Israeli tech ties have been reported). If true, that means the surveillance tech enabling cultural genocide in Xinjiang has Israeli DNA.

Israel often touts that it shares security innovations to help the world (like airport security or water tech). But in reality, many of its “innovations” are about control and domination. And in sharing those, it is exporting a piece of the occupation to the globe. The world should be concerned that a nation which runs a lab of high-tech repression in the West Bank is selling those lab results worldwide. It makes Israeli apartheid not just a moral problem for Israelis and Palestinians, but a technological template creeping into policing and governance everywhere. To confront this, some activists call for a ban on trade in such intrusive tech (similar to arms control). Until that happens, Israel will remain at the center of a booming authoritarian tech market that is corroding freedoms globally – another facet of its threat to world stability.

Conclusion: The Nexus of Collapse – Speaking Truth Before the Censorship

Across all these dimensions – theocracy and militarism, nuclear opacity, perpetual war, propaganda, silencing of dissent, geopolitical impunity, and authoritarian tech export – Israel emerges as a singular nexus of collapsing norms. It is not the only bad actor on the world stage, to be sure. But it is the one most protected from consequences, which makes its harmful actions all the more dangerous. Israel’s unique status – as a nuclear-armed power claiming Western democratic credentials yet behaving as an ethnosupremacist occupier – is eroding the principles that keep our world from chaos. It shows that an apartheid state can thrive in the 21st century under the right patronage; that a state can disregard international law and still enjoy alliances and trade; that a state can construct an Orwellian surveillance regime and even profit from spreading it.

All of this said, a fierce backlash is usually unleashed on anyone who makes these observations plainly. There is a predictable machine ready to hurl epithets and sow doubt about the messenger’s motives. The final hurdle to clear is the fear of that backlash – the Hasbara-fueled, weaponized-antisemitism onslaught that brands critics as antisemites or traitors. Yet, as global awareness grows, more people are daring to speak truth to power regarding Israel. We must reclaim moral clarity and not be intimidated by cynical smears.

In that spirit, I’ll conclude on a personal note – the kind of frank, human statement that cuts through the fog of propaganda:

Of course they’ll call me an antisemite. That’s the machine – that’s Hasbara. But they don’t care that my great-uncle was one of the first 12,000 people pulled from the Vienna Ghetto and didn’t even live to see 1940. That history doesn’t protect me from slander, because I’m not Jewish – and because they’ve turned memory into a weapon, not a warning. They will scream that condemning Israel’s actions “demonizes Jews,” when in fact it’s defending basic human rights. This isn’t about defending Jews. It’s about defending a nuclear theocracy that assassinates scientists, flattens cities, and then teaches your government how to spy on you. That – that is the real threat to world stability. And deep down, the world knows it – even if it’s been too scared to say so.

It’s time to speak up, clearly and unapologetically. The stakes – for Israelis and Palestinians, for regional peace, and for the integrity of a global order – could not be higher. Facing this reality is not antisemitism; it is humanism and a necessary step toward justice. The world must finally hold Israel to the same standards as any other nation. Anything less is a betrayal of the very lessons of history we vowed never to forget.