Will Israel's New Ultra-Extremist Cabinet Spark World War III?

KEVIN BARRETT • JUNE 20, 2024

https://www.unz.com/kbarrett/will-israels-new-ultra-extremist-cabinet-spark-world-war-iii/

Will nuclear World War III happen this summer? The answer, we all hope, pray, and expect, is “no.” But the odds of what would be an unprecedented global disaster are at an all-time high. The Union of Concerned Scientists’ Doomsday Clock, stuck at a record-breaking 90 seconds to midnight since last year, should have moved a few ticks closer to Armageddon in late May, after Ukraine and its US backers began striking Russian early-warning radar sites tasked with detecting a US nuclear attack.

Russia announced that it would respond symmetrically by arming US adversaries with long-range weapons. Since then a Russian nuclear-capable fleet has visited Cuba, raising the prospect of another Cuban missile crisis, and Putin has embraced North Korea in such a way as to confirm rumors that Russia has indeed given North Korea Topol M missiles, as claimed by Theodore Postol. More such gifts to various US adversaries are undoubtedly in the pipeline.

The proximate trigger for World War III’s death-spiral of uncontrollable escalation could conceivably happen in Korea, on the Russia-Ukraine front, or in the South China Sea. But it seems likelier that Armageddon will erupt from somewhere in the general vicinity of its namesake, Megiddo Hill, in northern Occupied Palestine.

That prognosis is based on rational calculation, not scriptural prophecy. There is an obvious reason why the Holy Land is the leading candidate for triggering global nuclear war: It is occupied by a doomed, fanatical messianic-millenarian death cult armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons. Since global nuclear war will make the world so much worse for everyone (except vultures, jackals, rats, and other eaters of carrion) it will inevitably be the product of extreme rashness and recklessness. In Occupied Palestine, the level of maniacal heedlessness in high places is off the charts. Even the crazed neocons running the US seem like rational actors compared to Israel’s leaders.

As my recent podcast guest Oliver Boyd-Barrett wrote this morning:

Netanyahu, following the resignation of Bennie Gantz from the war cabinet a few days ago, has dissolved the cabinet, returning direct control of the war to the full security cabinet. This development, in an already febrile combustible climate, enhances the likelihood that its more fanatical wing will push for an Israeli invasion of Southern Lebanon, plans for which have already been confirmed.

There is a reason why the US put the kibosh on Netanyahu’s plans for a major war on Lebanon shortly after the October 7 Al-Aqsa Storm concentration camp breakout. And that reason is all-too-obvious: Israel has no hope of winning such a war without dragging in the US, which would in turn drag in Iran and Russia, ultimately backed by China. Nobody could afford to let their side lose such a war, so it would likely escalate uncontrollably.

But if the American leadership is sometimes minimally rational, the same can’t be said of its Israeli counterpart. Following the resignations of Benny Gantz and Gadi Eisenkot on June 13, the Zionist entity has been in the hands of certifiable lunatics like Smotrich and Ben Gvir. They have made no secret of their determination to avenge Hezbollah’s 2006 humiliation of Israel, at whatever cost. Netanyahu is on board, since the alternative is stepping down and going to prison. Now that the Israeli military has approved operational plans for an invasion of Lebanon, the likely trigger for World War III has been locked and loaded.

But if Israel invades Lebanon against US orders, might the American leadership finally decide to act in its own interests, rather than allowing itself to once again be hijacked by Israeli extremists?