“They Sow the Wind and Reap the Whirlwind”
It has become a popular proverb, originally taken from the Old Testament, the Book of Hosea. Such has always been — and will forever remain — the fate of every system built on tyranny and illusion. It is the curse time cannot cure: the endless cycle of mythmaking that defines the Middle East. Wars lay down their arms time and again, and yet the region’s rulers die a thousand symbolic deaths without ever perishing. They wander aimlessly, blinded by their own legends, unable to find the door whose key their myths have concealed.
We, the region’s people, remain a locked gate — behind whose panels lie the secrets of lost ages and those yet to come. They triumph only through their repeated defeats. They dwell at the crossroads of the world, learning nothing from the passing travelers except how to export hatred. They still blow into the horns of beasts long devoured, and still turn to sorcerers and charlatans whenever fortune turns against them. They crawl on their bellies to provoke their enemies’ contempt, attributing every calamity to God. Masters of fermenting their own crises, they adore deceivers, crown them as heroes, and then lament — whispering, in their mourning, the name of the next disaster that has yet to arrive.
Benjamin Netanyahu loves to tease the imagination of the simple-minded with his claim that he can reshape the face of the Middle East. This time he added that his people, too, have changed — now needing a massive army, extended service, and readiness for open-ended wars. In that, he told the truth. But what he didn’t say is whether this “change” serves the strategic survival of the state he governs. The answer came swiftly, through a series of meaningful events: from the resignation of the military prosecutor Yorushelmi to the head of the Histadrut, to the newly revived death penalty law — all milestones marking the coming transformation he has unleashed at home before abroad.
And the rope goes on — from one crisis to the next. Not long after Donald Trump announced his intent to intervene on Netanyahu’s behalf to halt his criminal prosecution, it became clear even to his own citizens that Israel has become a full-fledged protectorate state, whether they admit it or not.
Trump, his partner in the theater of illusions, responds with even greater absurdity: “We have just ended a 3,000-year-old conflict,” he declares, to thunderous applause from those who know he speaks nonsense. He imagines that swapping prisoners and corpses, or brokering a temporary ceasefire, constitutes an end to the world’s most enduring struggle — a struggle he knows nothing about, except what his sycophantic advisors whisper into his ear.
Envoys of every rank flock to stabilize his illusion — or more precisely, to prevent Netanyahu from turning against him. For Trump, no one but Israel is capable of fulfilling his “five conditions” for victory. He believes triumph is within reach, that a hundred thousand dead are just numbers — dry twigs cut from a forest — unaware that each one leaves roots behind, sowing an eternal vengeance. He understands nothing of how new wars begin, no more than a man dozing beside a powder keg before October 7th.
As for the people of the flood — they are no better. They still believe they can resurrect a rule long dead, parading their farce beneath the Red Cross flag over a handful of corpses Netanyahu knows more about than they do. They watch as the great demolition workshop unfolds across Gaza, yet need the world’s mediation just to retrieve two hundred stranded fighters. So the cycle continues — from sowing the wind to harvesting whirlwinds — until fate decides otherwise.
This is the reality of those managing the conflict according to Trump’s “first-phase plan.” Between Trump’s stick-and-carrot delusion, life drags heavily for two million Palestinians — trapped in endless war, and in debates circling a single haunting question: what next? On one side, a camp seeks to preserve the legacy of tyranny, occupation, and absolute control; on the other, the remnants of a fallen theocratic regime fighting to survive. Above them all looms a web of mediators dominated by the patron of illusions himself — Donald Trump.
Even the “humanitarian initiative,” stripped to its bones, promises nothing beyond a mere exchange of bodies. And even that remains stuck in the bottleneck of bad faith. Netanyahu races against time to reignite his “Gideon’s Chariots” — perhaps for their third act — delaying only to present the world with another corpse or two. Meanwhile, debates rage over an international force and trusteeship plan mired in disputes from start to finish, as events march steadily into deeper uncertainty.
Across the other half of the homeland, another battle unfolds — fierce with the hunger of settlers’ expansionism. “Hilltop Youth” torch, seize, and ravage — peaking during the olive harvest, the great Palestinian season of endurance. Recorded assaults have multiplied manyfold, a direct product of Israel’s myth-driven coalition. Anyone believing these acts are detached from Netanyahu’s ruling parties should think again. The heavy Israeli military presence across the West Bank makes it impossible for such organized assaults to occur without official knowledge or tolerance.
As for the northern front — the drums of war beat endlessly under the pretext of Hezbollah’s weapons. It takes but one stray rocket, one rogue idea, to set the region ablaze again. The party’s arms, which once failed to safeguard Lebanon in its prime, now serve as pretext for Israel’s return to destruction and death.
And at the head of this axis stands Iran — still central in Israel’s strategic calculus. Between Washington’s impossible demands and Tel Aviv’s warnings about Iran’s nuclear revival, one thing is clear: that front remains on the verge of eruption. Only time will tell when the next spark ignites it.
Netanyahu hasn’t forgotten the Houthis either — describing them as a threat noticed by none but himself, despite the lull following Gaza’s ceasefire. He reminds them, and the world, that the reckoning is not over, that another chapter will inevitably come — perhaps with the next march of Gideon’s Chariots, perhaps sooner.
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