By Barry Sheppard and Malik Miah

U.S. intelligence agencies have now openly recognized that the war Israel is ostensibly waging to eliminate Hamas in Gaza cannot be won. This is a recognition of what the pro-Palestinian demonstrators have been saying, and most of the world knows, that the war is against the Palestinian people as a whole — a genocidal war.

On CNN 12 May, pro-war Democratic Senator Chris Murphy, a member of the Senate foreign relations committee, which is regularly briefed by these agencies, said, “I want Hamas gone. I don’t want them to ever have the ability to hit Israel again. [But] I worry that the number of civilians that are dying are ultimately going to provide permanent recruiting material to Hamas, and it will be a threat for years to come.” He added, it is “the conclusion of intelligence agencies that it would be all but impossible to totally eradicate Hamas.”

The pro-war and pro-Zionist newspapers, the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times, who are well informed by these agencies, echo this assessment.

On May 12 Wall Street Journal wrote,“Taking Rafah is unlikely [to be] a decisive tactical blow to Hamas, analysts say. The resumed fighting in Gaza City and other areas of the north shows that Hamas has retained the ability to fight and is trying to reconstitute its capabilities in areas vacated by the military, they say.”

In an article on the Hamas leader Yahoo Sinwar, the Times wrote, “After Hamas attacked Israel in October, igniting the war in Gaza, Israeli leaders described the group’s most senior official in the territory, Yahoo Sinwar, as a ‘dead man walking.’ Considering him an architect of the raid, Israel has portrayed Mr. Sinwar’s assassination as a major goal of its devastating counterattack.

“Seven months later, Mr. Sinwar’s survival is emblematic of the failures of Israeli’s war, which has ravaged much of Gaza but left Hamas’s top leadership largely intact and failed to free most of the captives taken during the October attack.”

Given this assessment, known by Israel’s leadership, the other explanation of Israel’s continuing war, deepened by its full-blown invasion of Rafah, is that its objective is the crushing of the Palestinian people of Gaza so they will accept Israel’s total indefinite military domination. The Israeli state has a long-held objective to ethnically cleanse the territory “from the river to the sea” – and beyond – of Palestinians.

All the Israeli war measures working in that direction, including mass killing by bombs, artillery, tanks, machine guns, etc. and mass starvation are being stepped up. Forced displacement of people is another weapon. Most of the 1.9 million people in Rafah have been moved from their homes. Many have been forced to move up to 10 times and are again being told to move.

Israel will fail to crush the Palestinians

Israel will fail in its objective in the long run because of the resistance of the people which buttressed by the growing antiwar movement in the U.S. and the condemnation of the world’s majority. Israel is becoming a pariah country. South Africa has now expanded its case brought before the International Court of Justice against Israel’s genocidal war. It is asking the ICJ to demand Israel stop its invasion of Rafah and call for a cease fire. A recent vote in the U.N. General Assembly was held to propose the UN Security Council recognise Palestine as a State.

The U.S. says it will veto such a proposal to the UN Security Council, giving the lie to Biden’s phony proposal for a two-state solution. Biden says his proposed “State” for Palestinians would have no army. The U.S. and Israel have long said that any Palestinian “state” would also have its borders and foreign policy controlled by Israel. The Israeli ruling class rejects even that. The U.S. is intent on continuing full support to Israel’s war. Biden’s “red line” warning to Israel to not invade Rafah has been exposed as so much hot air. As the invasion of Rafah began, Biden announced another billion dollars’ worth of arms to Israel.

The American capitalist ruling class backs Israel (whatever tactical differences that may emerge), because Israel is key to the U.S. imperialist objective to dominate the Middle East. Biden is leading the charge for his class. Concerning Israel’s war, he is not the “lesser evil” but the greater evil.

That is a lesson pro-Palestinian U.S. students and other sectors are learning – along with gaining a greater understanding of the role of the police and mainstream media.

Historic Student Movement in the U.S.

The pro-Palestine university encampments in the U.S. have helped spark a broader antiwar movement that has spread to Europe, Australia and other areas of the world. This is a new development of historic importance, affecting international politics.

The students’ struggle was galvanised by the destruction of much of Gaza’a infrastructure – including including hospitals, schools and universities. These young people have rejected the mainstream media’s pro-Israel stance and its lack of coverage of what’s happening in Gaza. Outlets like CNN and MSNBC only report from inside Israel. They do not tell their viewers that Israel refuses to allow their reporters to go to Gaza.

A May 12 article in the New York Times, which interviewed many of these students, reported they are looking especially to Al Jazeera, based in Qatar,which gives graphic depictions and news about the reality of Israel’s war. “Israel’s recent ban on the local operations of Al Jazeera has only elevated the network’s status among many student protesters. They prize coverage of reporters on the ground and Al Jazeera has more extensive operation in Gaza than any other publication. Students also noted the sacrifices it has made to tell the story there. Two Al Jazeera journalists have died since the start of the war,” the Times said.

Students are turning to other media alternatives, according to the Times, including: “Jewish Currents, The Intercept, Mondoweiss and independent Palestinians on social media…” Consortium News and Counterpunch should also be added. This alternative reportage then gets spread far and wide on social media.

Over 2,800 students have been arrested at the behest of campus administrations and some city governments. However, protests continue, including at commencement events. Students have noted a class differentiation where police tend to be more violent towards attendees of less wealthy institutions. Eric Adams, the Black Democratic mayor and retired police captain unleashed a brutal attack at the City College of New York. Police were less violent at the Columbia University encampment – also in New York City – which has many students from wealthier families.

At University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) Zionists attacked a peaceful encampment with clubs and other weapons on April 30, while police stood by. They were joined by far rightists, including the anti-Semitic Proud Boys. There are similar reports elsewhere.

Other forces on the campuses have joined the pro-Palestinian protests including professors, and also graduate students who have teaching duties.

UAW and Jewish academics support the movement

Many student academic teachers are unionised. The United Auto Workers (UAW) represents 48,000 graduate student workers in the University of California system (including UCLA), and who are holding a strike authorisation vote in response to how these universities have cracked down on student protests for Gaza. An announcement of the strike vote by UAW Local 4811 reads, “The use and sanction of violent force to curtail peaceful protest is an attack on free speech and the right to demand change, and the university must sit down with students, unions, and campus organizations to negotiate, rather than escalate.”

Earlier this year the national UAW, which is on a drive to organize the foreign auto companies in the anti-union South, following a victorious strike against the American auto companies, adopted a resolution calling for a cease fire in Gaza.

Biden leads the smear campaign that the campus protests – which include a large segment of Jewish students – are “anti-Semitic”. However, the Jewish Voice for Peace Academic Advisory Council issued an “Open Call to Fellow Jewish Academics”:

“As Jewish academics, researchers, and higher education professionals, we are appalled by, and refuse to accept, the deliberate mischaracterization, and weaponization of persisting fears about Jewish safety and well-being on campuses across the United States as the singular excuse for a series of misguided and dangerous policies by university administrators. These include attempts to destroy one of the largest and most significant student and social movements of the last half century, efforts to crush academic freedom and freedom of expression, encouragement for brutal invasions of peaceful student-led encampments, attacks and arrests by police forces, and facilitating the wholesale takeover of universities by the most illiberal and revanchist forces in the United States today….

“We unequivocally reject the cynical and mendacious claim that the violent suppression of student activism serves the cause of Jewish safety.”

The expanding mass movement for justice for Palestine and against the US-backed war by Israel is putting pressure on the imperialist rulers of the U.S. and Israel to end the war.