There are moments in history when the mask of legitimacy slips and a government shows its true face. In the case of Israel, that mask has long been cracking, revealing a ruthless apparatus that thrives on occupation, dispossession and systemic dehumanization. Gaza, once a strip of land barely surviving under blockade, is now in the crosshairs of an aggressive project that has been years in the making. At the center of it stands Benjamin Netanyahu, a man accused of war crimes, whose ambitions reach far beyond security and politics. His goal, and the goal of the Zionist establishment he represents, is nothing less than the realization of Greater Israel.

For decades, Israel has cloaked its expansionist agenda in the language of defense, survival and historical necessity. Yet the unfolding events in Gaza lay bare the reality. This is not about security. This is not about peace. This is about erasure, conquest and the cynical reshaping of demography to ensure Jewish supremacy across the land. Gaza City, a place that has already endured years of siege, is now being threatened with annexation through mass displacement. The brutality and criminality of the Israeli government knows no bounds, and the world is witnessing the culmination of a long-term strategy designed to push Palestinians off their land and scatter them into the winds of exile.

The long war against a people

Zionist ideology has never hidden its central tenet: the land of Israel, as imagined by its early architects, was not confined to the borders drawn in 1948 or 1967. Instead, it was a dream of expansion, stretching from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean, from the Sinai to parts of Lebanon and Syria. This vision of Greater Israel was not a fringe fantasy, but a guiding principle for successive governments, disguised under shifting policies of settlement, military occupation and political manipulation.

The strategy has been painfully consistent. First comes the demonization of Palestinians as obstacles to peace. Then comes the creation of facts on the ground: settlements that carve up the West Bank, checkpoints that suffocate mobility, blockades that strangle Gaza. Once the population is weakened, demoralized and cornered, the state steps in to “secure” territory in the name of national survival. Gaza is simply the latest and most dramatic example of this playbook in action.

Palestinians have lived under decades of trauma, forced removals and violence. Entire generations have grown up knowing nothing but occupation. And while international law, human rights conventions and countless U.N. resolutions condemn the behavior of Israel, those words have done nothing to alter the trajectory of Zionist expansion. The settlers move forward. The bulldozers roll. The military fires. The government smiles.

Netanyahu’s calculated window

Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister, has always understood the importance of timing. His political genius lies not in statesmanship but in survival and opportunism. Now, as Gaza burns, he has found the perfect storm. Domestic challenges, corruption charges and waning political credibility have all pushed him to seize a new opportunity to rally his base and strengthen his legacy.

The window for annexing Gaza City, or at the very least pushing its population into permanent exile, has been flung wide open. With international attention fractured, with Western governments paralyzed by their own complicity, Netanyahu is pressing forward with the same cold calculation that has defined his career. His rhetoric, saturated with claims of defense and anti-terrorism, conceals an unspoken truth: the goal is to empty Gaza of Palestinians, to make it uninhabitable and to fold its ruins into the expanding borders of Israel.

This is not an accident of history. It is not the product of chaos. It is a deliberate outcome, crafted through decades of strategy, waiting for the right leader to carry it forward. Netanyahu has always aspired to that role, and the current moment is his opportunity to write himself into Zionist history as the man who broke Gaza once and for all.

The silence of the Muslim world

What makes the unfolding tragedy in Gaza all the more painful is the silence of the Muslim world. Nations with the wealth, armies and influence to shift the course of history remain paralyzed, caught between political convenience and moral cowardice. Statements of condemnation ring hollow when they are not matched by action. Diplomacy without consequences is nothing more than complicity dressed in polite words.

For decades, the Muslim world has watched as Palestine has been carved, fenced and bombed into pieces. Each atrocity was met with outrage, but outrage without resolve only fuels the aggressor. Gaza today is not merely a Palestinian issue. It is a test of conscience for the entire Muslim world. To remain silent is to sanction the Zionist project. To remain passive is to surrender the sacred duty of protecting the oppressed.

The calls for unity, justice and decisive action are not just about politics. They are about survival. If Gaza falls, the dream of Palestine as a homeland for its people will be extinguished. And with it, the moral credibility of those who claim to defend the rights of Muslims across the globe will be shattered.

A project of erasure

To understand the current brutality, one must trace the arc of Zionist expansion. This has always been about more than borders. It has been about identity. The erasure of Palestinian culture, history, and existence is not a byproduct but a cornerstone of Israeli policy. Textbooks erase Palestinian presence. Maps present the land as empty. Military actions reduce villages to rubble.

The displacement of Palestinians from Gaza City would not simply be a humanitarian catastrophe. It would be the realization of a project of erasure that has been ongoing for decades. Once the population is gone, Israel will move to rewrite history, to present Gaza as always destined for absorption, always meant to be part of Israel’s eternal boundaries.

The duty of resistance

Resistance in this context is not simply about arms or confrontation. It is about refusing to accept the narrative of inevitability. It is about ensuring that the voices of Palestinians are not silenced by bombs, that their history is not erased by bulldozers and that their rights are not abandoned by those who claim to stand with them.

The Muslim world has a duty to rise, but that rising must take many forms. It must be political, economic, diplomatic and cultural. It must include boycotts, sanctions and the severing of ties with those who fund and arm Israel’s aggression. It must also include a rededication to Palestinian voices, ensuring that their suffering and resilience echo across every platform, every mosque, every gathering.

True resistance means breaking the chains of complicity and holding Israel accountable. It means reminding the world that war crimes do not become legal through repetition, that crimes against humanity do not lose their weight simply because they are carried out with Western approval.

The future at stake

If Gaza is lost, the consequences will reverberate far beyond its borders. The annexation of Gaza City would embolden Israel to accelerate its plans for the West Bank, to intensify its stranglehold on Jerusalem and to expand its territorial ambitions toward Greater Israel. This is not speculation. It is the logical progression of a strategy that has been decades in the making.

The brutality of the present is only a prelude to the dispossession of the future. Palestinians are not simply fighting for their homes. They are fighting for the survival of their identity, their culture, their very right to exist as a people. The Muslim world, by extension, is fighting for its honor, for its credibility and for its place in history as a defender of justice.

Conclusion: A call to conscience

The story of Gaza is the story of a people who refuse to be erased and a government that refuses to stop erasing. The brutality and criminality of Israel are not aberrations, but deliberate strategies. Netanyahu is not a rogue leader, but the embodiment of a Zionist dream that stretches back generations. The silence of the Muslim world is not just tragic, but dangerous, for it paves the way for the completion of Greater Israel.

The question that now hangs over this moment is simple: will the world allow Gaza to become a tomb for Palestinian identity, or will it finally act to stop the advance of an ideology built on dispossession and supremacy?

History will judge not only Israel but also those who stood by and watched. The brutality unfolding before our eyes demands more than sympathy. It demands action. The Muslim world, and indeed all of humanity, must decide whether to be complicit in the erasure of a people or to rise in defense of justice.

For in the ruins of Gaza, the conscience of the world is being tested.

– Amjad Khan is a contributing writer for The Arab American News. He is an educator, author and academic researcher with a deep commitment to addressing the challenges facing the Muslim world. Through his work, he seeks to inspire meaningful dialogue and help chart a path toward unity, justice and peace.