Richard Medhurst is a British independent journalist who mainly discusses geopolitics in his personal YouTube channel. One of his latest videos had the title ‘Is the war in Gaza about gas’ and received widespread views. It created new spheres of discussions among netizens regarding the motives for the US latest decisions on building a port in Gaza to supposedly provide food and aid.
Mr. Medhurst also made a separate video on that, a must watch – as I would say – for those who are willing to investigate the deep geopolitical games at play behind the conflict in Gaza. Because as the war drags on, one thing is becoming more certain with the passing of days: this isn’t a conflict of religion, if it ever was. Apart from the very basic fact that the conflict is about the oppressed trying to take back their territories from their colonizing oppressors, there are huge economic incentives for the US and Europe behind wanting Israel to win.
The war in Ukraine: EU’s alternative approach
This leads me to put my own conclusion forward – based on the concepts of Mr. Medhurst’s analogies – that the two major wars of the world right now, Ukraine and Gaza, are very much closely related to each other. The war between Russia and Ukraine has been grinding on for the third year in a row, with no end anytime soon. Tens of thousands are dead on both sides, hundreds of thousands maimed and the infrastructures of both countries significantly damaged while Washington continues to supply Kyiv with weapons and money to keep fueling the former’s proxy war against Moscow.
Yet, for all Washington hoped for would be over in a short time, Moscow’s military has not been defeated on the front lines by any means. Neither has Russia’s economy been subdued. On the contrary, Moscow’s economy has in fact bloomed via its gas exports to India. After the Nord Stream 2 pipelines were blown up on 26 September 2022, the president of European Union Ursula von der Leyen made remarks on how it would be beneficial for Europe as a whole to reduce dependencies on Russian gas and fossil fuels and instead find alternative markets from Egypt and Israel.
The destruction of Nord Stream 2
Now many might not be familiar with Nord Stream. Well, it is basically a gas pipeline that extends from Russia to Germany and Western Europe via the Baltic Sea route. Due to Russia’s immense demographics, it still has the largest gas reserves in the world right now. Gas exports have always been the primary source of income for Russia, dating back to the Soviet days. Europe’s dependency on Russian gas was always perceived with a deep disapproval by many Washington neoconservatives, notably the incumbent president Joe Biden and former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice.
Hear from Biden’s own words even before the war started: “There will be no Nord Stream 2 if Russia invades Ukraine. We will bring an end to it.” And yet, after the 26 September incident, the United States denied any involvement in the attack and much later, laid the blame on Ukrainian saboteurs. Thus, Russia’s accessibility to the European market is cut off and in comes the United States. In addition, this also opened up a new opportunity for the Tel Aviv leaders in Israel.
Israel’s ambitions
With genuine enthusiasm displayed by European leaders, Israel was ready to implement its long term goal of building its own pipeline to Europe. Key detail to take note here is also Israel’s occupation and subsequent annexation of Golan Heights – Syria’s territory – that has an abundance of natural resources. Israel’s Haifa port – despite being targeted by the resistance fighters like Hezbollah and Iraqi militias – is still very much functional and effective enough to serve the purpose of being the source point of the said pipeline.
As Mr. Medhurst explains in his video, the US and Israel also made sure to deal a knocking blow to the would be competitors for fossil fuel exports. Yes, we are indeed talking about Iran, Syria and Lebanon. Iran is the second largest reserve for oil in the Middle East, right after Russia. Iran and the US brokered a nuclear deal in 2015, which was meant to release the crippling sanctions on the former in exchange of the Islamic Republic canceling its nuclear programme.
For Iran, this was indeed a bittersweet trajectory since the civilians would now get a respite from many of the economic blockades imposed by the United States but the nuclear scientists of the nation could no longer carry out their much invested experiments for building the bomb.
The elimination of competitions
When Donald Trump came to power in 2017, one of his commitments was to have to a very strong pro-Israeli stance – his speech at the 2016 AIPAC conference is a clear evidence. In 2018, the 45th president of the United States pulled off from the Iran nuclear deal and initiated re-imposing even stronger sanctions on the country. This – as Mr. Medhurst points out in his video – prevented Iran from selling its gas to the European market. With Russia and Iran – the two largest oil producing countries – cut off and sanctioned, the US scored a vital geopolitical victory and started selling its own liquefied natural gas to Europe at three times the higher price than what Russia used to sell.
This certainly brought huge revenues in billions of dollars to the US, so not only is their Military Industrial Complex profiting from weapons sales to Ukraine but their energy companies are reaping unprecedented rewards too. So while October 7 did take Israel by surprise, the incident also brought them and the US several new opportunities. Add to that the ‘mysterious’ Beirut explosion in 2020 which destroyed the main port of Lebanon and rendered it completely useless to this very day.
Moreover, the Latakia port in Syria is also regularly targeted by Israeli airstrikes and the country’s oil fields in the northeastern regions are all occupied by the US in the aftermath of the devastating Syrian Civil war. To summarize the events in a sequential manner:
1) Iran’s nuclear deal is put to an end by Donald Trump in 2018 and sanctions reinstated on Iran.
- The Beirut port gets mysteriously blown up in 2020, making it unusable to this day.
- Syria’s Latakia port is regularly targeted by Israel.
- Syria’s oil fields are occupied by the US, thereby preventing it from obtaining oil revenues.
- The Nord Stream 2 pipelines get blown up in 2022.
Mr. Medhurst explains that via the above steps, the US and Israel basically got rid of all their geopolitical rivals one by one from any possible economic competition in the European market. With the ports Haifa and Eliat being very much functional, Israel can complete the buildup of a major pipeline to Europe with financial support from America and Europe.
The Ben Gurion Canal
The upcoming invasion of Rafah can also serve Israel’s long term interests of taking over the entire Gaza strip and displacing the Palestinians into the Sinai Peninsula. Egyptian president Sisi has all this time refused to take in any Palestinians by tightening up the Egypt-Gaza border but may consent to do so after the recent loans delivered to him by IMF and EU in billions of dollars.
Once Gaza is secured enough, Israel and the US can take control of the gigantic gas field in and around the enclave called the ‘Levant Basin’. Therefore, again to summarize, the economic benefits for Israel and America from the success of the campaign would be:
- America and Israel can sell gas to Europe at a greater price than Russia.
- This would counter China’s ‘Belt and Road’ initiative.
- New job opportunities can be created for many jobless people in the States and Israel.
- Russia and Iran out of the competition, thereby weakening their economic situations.
Moreover, there are dual economic advantages for Israel too. Mr. Medhurst argues that Israel intends to build a canal of its own, similar to the Suez Canal of Egypt. This canal is to be known as the ‘Ben Gurion Canal’, named after the late founding father of Israel – David Ben Gurion. The plan for this canal is to go through the southern port of Eliat and via Gaza to Europe. This can be a possible replacement of the Suez Canal and a major economic loss for Egypt.
Sisi’s ‘strange’ moves
Why then, one must ask, is Sisi – the current Egyptian dictator who took power through a military coup – taking loans from the US and EU, knowing full well that the long term consequences of an Israeli takeover of the Strip will only hurt his own people? There could be several answers to this question. May be Sisi doesn’t want to antagonize the West for fear of another Arab Spring.
Or may be he desperately needs the money to invest in housing the to be displaced millions of Palestinians from Rafah after Israel invades that part of the enclave. Netanyahu himself confirmed that Israel will invade Rafah, there is no alternative to this approach from his point-of-view. So for him, buying off Sisi’s allegiance through the US and EU can be a good start to his long term plan of wiping Palestine off the world map. Hitherto, not just the gas pipeline from Haifa, but also the Ben Gurion Canal from Eliat could be future economic glories for Israel.
With Washington’s interests also perfectly in line with the strategy of ridding the Russian oil and instead sell US liquefied natural gas at three times the higher price, the two major wars in Gaza and Ukraine are indeed very much interconnected. Many wonder whether Netanyahu – despite getting prior warnings from Egypt and Mossad about a possible Hamas attack – deliberately allowed the assault to happen so that he could justify his genocide and ethnic cleansing in pursuit of greater geopolitical ambitions. One thing is clear though – as the Big Brothers of the world struggle for global dominance, the ordinary Palestinians and Ukrainians are paying the ultimate price by loosing their lives.