On Tuesday, 8 October 2024, the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS) held a seminar as part of the monthly activities of Salon Ibn Rushd, titled ‘The future of Lebanon and Palestine one year after the October 7 operation’, coinciding with the first anniversary of operation Al-Aqsa Flood and the war of extermination on Gaza, amid Israeli expansion of attacks to Lebanon and Syria. The seminar hosted Dr. Hassan Nafaa, Egyptian academic and professor of political science at Cairo University, and Dr. Hazem Nahar, Syrian intellectual, researcher, and editor-in-chief of the magazine (Rowaq Maysaloon) for cultural studies. The discussion was moderated by human rights activist Messaoud Romdhani.
Dr. Hassan Nafaa began the discussion by addressing the root causes of the war, underscoring that it is inconceivable that Israel’s crimes against the Palestinians began only after 7 October, but rather are an extension of nearly a century of conflict, during which Israel has committed the most egregious crimes and violations of international law and agreements. The current Israeli government, which is the most extremist yet and supported by the extremist right-wing movement, has increasingly intensified its provocations against the Palestinians; tightening the siege, expanding the construction of settlements, and contravening all treaties. These provocations ignited Palestinian resistance, a right guaranteed by law to any occupied people. The Israeli government, Nafaa continued, is now engaging in genocide – not fighting, war, or self-defense – but rather, deliberate killing with the aim of displacing an entire people from their land.
Dr. Hazem Nahar acknowledged the legitimacy of resistance as a right in confronting the occupation. Nahar focused on three basic aspects, including forms of resistance, conditions of resistance, and the surrounding context. Nahar emphasized that resistance does not come in a singular form, that one of the important aspects of resistance movements ‘is their ability to be flexible and encompass multiple forms of struggle’. These forms include political, civil, and media activism, and influencing international public opinion, which Maher noted, is “perhaps they are often more effective than weapons.” As for the conditions of resistance, Maher added, independence comes at the top, meaning that resistance serves national consensus, not the interests of other countries. Nahar continued that the independence of the resistance’s decision is not a guarantee that it will be in the interests of the people and the interests of the national state. He gave the example that Hamas’ choices are not necessarily an expression at all times of the choices of the Palestinian national state. He added likewise, ‘Was Hezbollah’s entry into Syria a choice of resistance? Was it a reflection of a Lebanese national consensus? Or was it an Iranian choice implemented by the arms of the resistance?’
Nahar continued regarding the Palestinian cause, asserting that no progress can be made except in an Arab context and a global context that pushes such progress. He explained that a rising Arab context would enhance the reconstruction of Arab countries, at least those in confrontation with Israel, to be strong democratic national states. Nahar added that likewise, a global context with different balances of power, in which the United States does not have the sole role in decision-making, and in which Arab countries represent a center of gravity or tools of pressure in the face of Israel.
Nafaa commented on this, saying that Israel does not respect or honor any agreements or pledges. If Israel wanted a sound settlement to the conflict, it would have at least implemented the Oslo Accords, despite its flaws and our many reservations on it. He continued that the actual indicators on the ground confirmed that Israel has broader goals than all these agreements, to retain all its settlements, annex new lands, and not hide its aspirations to establish a major state that may even exceed the geographical borders we know now. He added, “International law cannot be respected unless there is an international authority capable of imposing respect for this law, and unfortunately the highest international authority capable of protecting this law (the UN Security Council) is completely restricted as a result of the excessive American use of the veto to protect Israel’s criminality.” He continued, “Unfortunately, according to the logic of the balance of power, the resistance will always be the weaker party, and all historical experiences say that colonialism will not leave unless it is convinced that the price of continuing the occupation is greater than its gains.”
Nahar explained that the balance of power here does not only mean the balance of military power, but other political balances of power, at the levels of international relations and regional relations, and before them at the level of Palestinian consensus (national political representation). He pointed out that the existence of a Palestinian national democratic project is a step towards building a Palestinian state with a national will and regional and international weight. He added that a viable Arab project, outside the “triad of tyranny, occupation and extremism” in the Arab countries, may create countries with significant political weight. He added that this triad, which has ruled the Arab region for half a century until today, has exhausted the region and destroyed the will of its people. Nahar said that we should not differentiate between occupation and tyranny; we should fight extremism in all its forms and manifestations, and produce a national project in every country to liberate it from tyranny or subordination, whether to an occupying state or a tyrannical state that only serves its interests. He concluded, “The truth is that the Arab Levant is now between two monsters, the monster of Israel on the one hand and the monster of Iran on the other. And in reality, as it proves every day the brutality of Israel, further proves that wherever Iran enters, the national state evaporates, chaos prevails and militias spread, and then the entire region gradually turns into an arena for conflict and every dream of building independent national Arab states disappears.”
- Watch the full seminar here:
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