Whoever pays for the music can usually select what gets played. Whoever supplies the war planes and the military intelligence that allows targets to be selected, can stop the fighting. The power relationships are now clear for all to see. Donald Trump can call up Benjamin Netanyahu any time he likes and order him to turn his war planes round and accept a cease fire. So why hasn’t the call been made to stop the killing in Gaza?
The Israeli prime minister depends on the good will of the US president and the weapons that come with it. The second the supply of weapons is cut off, Israel stands vulnerable and isolated. With those weapons, Netanyahu can take whatever action he likes and face limited consequences.
Trump can stop the war in Gaza
That makes the line of responsibility for what has happened in Gaza very direct. Trump can stop the shooting of hungry Palestinians in bread queues any time he likes. He has chosen not to do so. Instead, he has made his stated intentions frighteningly clear. He wants the Gaza strip to become a piece of valuable beach front property owned by the United States. And he has little or no concern about what happens to the people who currently occupy that land and own the property.
There is a consistent thread that runs through the majority of Trump’s decisions. He is interested in making money and in stroking his own ego. He will do whatever best enables him to do that regardless of the consequences for others.
If the Gulf States make it more profitable for him to end the war in Gaza than allow it to continue, then it will end. If they don’t, the death toll will continue rising. What made him act to stop Israel escalating the conflict with Iran even further was not a selfless desire for peace on earth and good will to all men, women and children. It was fear of the economic and political consequences of carrying on.
Consequences of war in the Middle East
One of the most severe risks of launching attacks on Iran is that it is situated in a location which makes it extremely easy to interfere with shipping heading towards the Suez Canal. Even a credible threat of such action results in oil tankers diverting their valuable property around the bottom of Africa. That increases the price of oil and does much the same to the price of food and the cost of raw materials. Oil prices rose 20% in anticipation of Trump’s attacks and looked set to go significantly higher if he carried on.
Even countries like the US that produce a lot of oil within their own borders, are not immune to the impacts. Oil and agricultural products are traded globally and the domestic price is primarily driven by the global price.
Trump’s false promises
Trump promised many things whilst he was trying to get himself elected. He was going to end the war in Ukraine on day one, or even before day one of his term in office. He promised to resolve the situation in Gaza with equal ease. The complete failure to make real progress on delivering peace in either of these two major conflicts seems to have had limited impact on domestic public opinion in the States.
What does really matter to a lot of US voters is their cost of living. The one promise that really cut through to them and sealed his victory, is that he would put America first. To many poor working-class Americans it sounded pretty good to have a leader in office who would bring down the cost of their grocery bill, cut gasoline prices and bring jobs back to communities that had seen factories close and jobs go.
The true believers in the Trump project are unlikely to change what they feel about him whatever he does. The much more important group of US voters who gave him the benefit of the doubt and want to see payback are not likely to be impressed if their bills rise and their jobs are at risk as a result of a military adventure a long way from home that they were told was going to be solved with ease.
Consequences for Trump
That matters. Trump can survive many things with a knowing smile and an assurance that he is looking out for the interests of ordinary Americans and doesn’t care what the consequences are for anyone else. His popularity can’t easily survive an increase in the price of eggs and hard times for the average American. The second his policies start to hit people where it hurts the whole situation changes. Some of the cynical Republican politicians who have sold their soul in order to bask in the reflected glory of his election victories, would come under a lot of pressure to show a backbone and have to stand up to Trump if prices started to rise.
There are a range of factions in the modern Republican Party. Some are absolutely wedded to the idea that anything the prime minister of Israel wants to do must be supported and are excited by the opportunity to bomb a longstanding enemy so heavily that they believe it will be incapable of threatening US interests for decades. Others are fed up with seeing the US spend a lot of money on foreign wars that produce messy outcomes that US voters are expected to pay even more money to try and sort out. The second Iraq war didn’t exactly come cheap and putting America first means keeping out of expensive foreign adventures to a lot of Senators and Congressmen on the Republican side.
The risks to Trump of going to war with Iran for any length of time were therefore very real and are not easy to avoid. War may prove very good for producers of electronic equipment, planes and munitions and can produce a boost to jobs as factories run flat out to resupply equipment that has been blown up abroad. It almost always shifts resources away from meeting the needs of ordinary people and makes their lives harder.
The cost of increasing military spending
You can’t spend money twice and if 5% of everything that is produced in the whole country goes on the military budget then there are a lot of other things that fall by the wayside that people care about. Already in Britain we are seeing a Labour government talking about cutting disability benefits whilst enthusiastically increasing its expenditure on weapons of mass destruction.
A sensible British government would keep the country well clear of this dangerous US president and his policies. Keir Starmer’s policies are taking us far too close for comfort.
We are living in very dangerous times. The solution to those dangers is to recognise them for what they are and to stand firm against them. Do we really want our country to be lining up alongside a man who has chosen to supply the weapons which have allowed the death and destruction in Gaza to go on for so very long?
