THE FATE OF THE WORLD WILL BE MARKED BY THE OUTCOME OF THE CONFLICT AT THE CENTER OF THE DECLINING US EMPIRE

by MARKO MARINČIČ

It is not easy, in times when the world seems to have gone beyond the cornerstones of that minimum of international law affirmed after the Second World War with the establishment of the United Nations and a series of conventions between states, aimed at preventing genocide and the most atrocious war crimes, to find a thread of rationality with which to interpret the evolution of international relations now in the grip of absolute barbarization. It is difficult to discern how much of the explosion of violence in recent years, from Ukraine to Palestine, from Venezuela to Iran and the strangulation of the Cuban people, there is geostrategic logic and how much of murderous madness. As cynical and ruthless as Vladimir Putin is, he even appears balanced when compared to the delusion of omnipotence of the leaders of the two most aggressive Western nuclear powers of different ranks, global the United States, regional Israel, which are endangering the stability not only of the Middle East but of the entire world.

Dario Fabbri, director of Domino, has long insisted that history is made by peoples with their own aspirations and long-term interests and not by individual statesmen. As influential as they are, they are the product of the societies that generated them. While sharing this basic thesis, according to which Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are not the cause but the product of the barbarization of the USA and Israel, it must be said, however, that each of the two is putting his own spin on it.

Until October 7, 2023, Netanyahu appeared politically finished, pressed by judges for corruption and by the popular opposition who for 40 weeks have been calling for his resignation with increasing force. The Hamas attack was therefore a godsend – perhaps we will never know how knowingly allowed if not even propitiated by the Israeli government – the opportunity to get out of the corner and relaunch itself into an endless series of wars that are devastating the Middle East: the genocide of the Palestinians in Gaza, the resurgence of violent colonization of the West Bank and the apartheid regime in Jerusalem and in Israel itself, the occupation of a further portion of Syria at the foot of the Golan Heights and that of southern Lebanon up to the Litani River, an unfulfilled dream of the Zionists since the dawn of the occupation of Palestine. Finally, after having struck the Shiites in Lebanon itself, in Syria, Iraq and Yemen with his overwhelming military power, the attempt to obtain the en-plein with the destruction of Iran. From Israel’s point of view, the premeditated aggression against Tehran was certainly not aimed at ousting the regime, an objective that could not be achieved manu militari, but at causing a destruction of the country on such a scale that Iran would not be able to recover for a few decades.

Less understandable, on the surface, is why Donald Trump threw himself into this adventure. Delirium of omnipotence after the easy seizure of Venezuela and its rich energy resources? An opportunity to cause sudden fluctuations in the prices of raw materials and in the stock market lists? As had already happened with the announcements and denials relating to tariffs, the continuous alternation of bombastic threats and announcements of negotiations has also allowed the small circle of family members and billionaires, with whom Trump surrounds himself, to make huge and illicit profits thanks to insider trading, i.e. the availability of exclusive information on the decisions of the boss that will move the stock markets.

Or more trivially is Trump blackmailed by Israel for the murky affairs with Jeffrey Epstein, whose evident ties with the Mossad make it easy to assume that Netanyahu has in his hands documents so compromising as to force Trump to go along with his criminal designs even at the cost of sacrificing the American ones?

There is probably some truth in all the elements listed as it also seems true that religious fundamentalism both in Israel and in the United States has clouded the minds of large sections of the population. In Israel, Jewish supremacism with its corollaries of violent racism and predatory colonialism seems to have infected a large majority of the population that supports Netanyahu and his endless wars. Less widespread but no less dangerous is the mystical-religious delirium that pervades tens of millions of Americans, from the traditionally Zionist one of evangelical televangelists and in particular Baptists, to the propitiatory rites celebrated at the White House by Paula White, shamanic spiritual advisor to Donald Trump. If it is true that this delirium, given the collapse of consensus for Trump in the polls, does not seem to have infected the majority of the population, it is also true that having installed a fanatical Christian nationalist like Pete Hegseth, tattooed with the crusader motto “Deus vult”, fiercely Islamophobic to the point of considering the possibility of using nuclear weapons in its tactical version, has been installed at the Ministry of War. it cannot reassure the world.

Is there still any glimmer of rationality in all this? We want to hope there is. The United States is, although in evident decline, an economic and financial power that goes far beyond the interests of the gangster clique that has taken office in the White House with Trump. The warlords at the head of the powerful military industrial apparatus, the oilmen and even the oligarchs of the new techno-feudalism have settled on the Trumpian policies that currently benefit them but remain short-lived. Larry Fink, head of the very powerful Blackrock fund, and the other custodians of the real safes of Yankee financial capitalism, are already showing signs of impatience, fearing that the collapse of the empire could be more sudden and ruinous than could have been expected.

The clash of conflicting interests is likely to take place during the midterm elections in November. Will we see a downsized Trump come out of it? Will this gang of gangsters, once they have tasted the immense opportunities for profits guaranteed by owning the White House, be willing to take a step back by accepting the rules of the democratic game? An open question and certainly not reassuring. What is certain is that the fate of the world in the near future depends on this clash of titans in the economic heart of the empire. Should America get rid of Trump and we will inevitably fall, however strong the Zionist lobby may still be, with a probable showdown in Israel as well.

We want to hope so, even in the knowledge that getting to this point will be neither easy nor painless.