Regarding the unity talks held in China, Baroud said that “Our unity now is critical. Because no one, not China, not Russia, not even the United States, will ever take us seriously if we remain divided.”
Palestinians need China, as they need other powerful players in the Global South, but it is not mediation that they desperately require.
Considering Washington’s unparalleled importance to Israel, on the one hand, and the Arab-Muslim world’s significance to China on the other, the future is easy to foresee.
While it is too early to determine, with any degree of certainty, the winners and losers of this new configuration, it is most certain that a US-western-dominated world is no longer possible.
France’s military and foreign policy shift in Africa, however, was not compelled by strategy or vision, but by changing realities over which France has little control.
It would be unfair – in fact, misguided – to suggest that large political entities like China and Arab countries combined are shaping their foreign policy agendas, thus staking their futures, on knee-jerk political reactions to the attitude of a single American President or administration.
What Palestinians need is not a new ‘powerful’ sponsor of the ‘peace process’ but a grassroots-based struggle for freedom and liberation starting at home.
They continue to speak of a ‘China threat’ and an ‘imminent’ Russian invasion of Ukraine and such, while the real threat is that of detached politicians who are amassing wealth, fighting for power and prestige while their countrymen and women continue to go hungry.
As the plot thickens in Eastern Europe, Russia’s move in South America promises to add a new component that would make a win-lose scenario in favor of the US and NATO nearly impossible.
Not only is China very much a political actor but one would contend that presently, it is the most important political actor in the world.
2022 can be a year of hope and promise. But that is only possible if we play our role as active citizens to bring about the coveted change that we would like to see in the world.
Such fluctuations will unlikely change the narrative of the determined Chinese rise as a global power, or that of the unmistakable western decline. The sooner we acknowledge this reality, the better.
Macron’s once ‘controversial’ view is now mainstream thinking in Europe, especially as many EU policy-makers feel disowned, if not betrayed, by the US in Afghanistan.
The British foreign policy shift is an unprecedented gamble for London as the nature of the new Cold War is fundamentally different from that of the previous one; this time around, the ‘West’ is divided, torn by politics and crises, while NATO is no longer the superpower it once was.
Certainly, the US-led ‘Quad’ meeting was neither historic nor a game-changer, as all indicators attest that China’s global leadership will continue unhindered, a consequential event that is already reordering the world’s geopolitical paradigms which have been in place for over a century.
Washington’s futile sanctions-based approach to Venezuela has proved not only immensely harmful to the welfare of the Venezuelan people but also to Washington’s own regional interests. Washington’s obstinacy allowed its global rivals, Russia and China, to unprecedentedly cement their economic and strategic interests in that country.
The ball is no longer in Washington’s court alone. The fact that the majority of Europeans believe in China’s impending global leadership in a matter of a few years means that the EU will have no patience for any American ultimatum to choose between Washington and Beijing.
The world is changing before our eyes. In the coming years, we are likely to, once more, speak of a bipolar – or, possibly, tri-polar – world, one in which Washington and its allies no longer shape the world for their benefit. In some way, China is well on its way to reclaim its new status.
Between Washington’s precise demands to Israel to keep Beijing at bay, and the latter’s aggressive ‘wolf warrior’ diplomacy, Israel is facing a stark choice: remaining loyal to a fading superpower or diving into the uncharted waters of an emerging one.
Without a people-propelled form of change, the status quo seems to constantly reinvent itself, restoring its dominance, cultural hegemony and undemocratic claim to power.
By Ramzy Baroud Although ties between Washington and Tel Aviv are stronger than ever, Israeli leaders are aware of a vastly changing political landscape. The US’ political turmoil and the global power realignment – which is on full display in the Middle East – indicate that a new era is, indeed, in the making. Unsurprisingly, […]