Israel's Role in Suppressing Indigenous Movements
Israel is known for its ability to subjugate and massacre Indigenous people. Over the course of my career, I have done extensive work on Bolivia, which has significant links to the Palestine issue. Bolivia has an Indigenous majority that has been persecuted for 500 years—first by the Spanish colonizers, and then by the Americans. The country experienced a historic shift when it elected its first Indigenous president in 2005. However, he was deposed in a coup in 2019. What is striking about that moment is that reports emerged showing the new Bolivian dictatorship—a white supremacist regime that had taken power—immediately called upon Israel to help deal with Indigenous dissidents. This reveals something fundamental: Israel has become a lodestar, a center of expertise in surveying, massacring, and suppressing Indigenous resistance to colonial projects and colonial classes.
Counter-Insurgency Expertise and Historical Precedent
Israel possesses significant expertise in these areas of control and repression. Historically, the British played a similar role. Britain was often called upon by other powers because of its experience in Ireland, and was widely regarded as the great counter-insurgency power—a go-to authority on suppressing resistance movements. The Israelis have cultivated relationships with fascist regimes and movements around the world because they recognize that fascism is on the rise globally. The Zionist lobby, in some respects, operates without rigid ideology; instead, it moves with the political currents. It attempts to penetrate, infiltrate, and influence any group it believes will soon hold power and potentially support Israeli interests.
Israel's Position Within Global Fascism
There are many reasons why Israel has become central to global fascism in the present moment. Yet there is a profound historical irony in this phenomenon. When you consider the history of fascism itself—and particularly fascism's brutal treatment of Jewish people—it seems paradoxical that this situation has emerged. However, this contradiction exists because Israel presents itself as a Jewish state, when in reality it is not. Israel is a settler colonial movement, a nationalist project that employs whatever tools and mechanisms it deems necessary or useful for its survival. Its identity as an ethnic or religious state masks its fundamental character as a colonial enterprise.