Dr. Fawaz Traboulsi
February 10, 2026
Arabic version
I would have liked to call my talk ‘Development in Times of Monsters’, but the Gramsci quote became suspicious since it was used in a tweet by an unexpected Gramscist, the Saudi ambassador in Lebanon (November 2021). With this goes the “pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will” and I will keep the rest for Gramsci for myself.
I have an ungrateful task to talk about two complex issues and relate them together. They are seemingly apart but they meet in a bizarre manner, as I will try to show. I am referring to the wars and major transformations, and trying at the same time to imagine a social future for the region.
In a lecture at the Medina Theater, Beirut in March 2024, I described October 7th, 2023, as the most successful guerrilla operation of national liberation since the Battle of Algiers, 1957. We know the rest.
Many thought that Operation would be over in a few months, myself among them, with a lot of loss of life and destruction, but ultimately some ceasefire will be imposed in a few months and an exchange of hostages, as had previously happened in Gaza wars. We met with two tragic surprises.
- 1-On the Israeli side was unleashed the full extreme right-wing program, though we rarely link together its components though ii is in fact a long-standing Likud and extreme right-wing program, which opposed three major developments concerning the Palestinian problem: the retreat from Gaza and from Lebanon, and the Oslo agreement. Now this unleashed what developed into a genocidal war with tens of thousands of civilians killed, mainly women and children, which not only renewed calls for reoccupation and ethnic cleansing, inspired calls to drop a nuclear bomb on Gaza, but led to the repeated transfers of hundreds of thousands across Gaza strip and a project to transfer at least half a million its Inhabitants of Gaza in a new Nakba, climaxing in the discussion of the occupation of all of the West Bank in the Knesset and the resurgence of calls for the creation of ‘Greater Israel’.
- The preparedness of the Palestine resistance to wage a multifaceted, extended struggle and the epic, and the heroic resistance of the Palestinian people of Gaza and the West Bank reaching the second year of the war.
What of the Arab and international positions? The most painful event, rarely talked about, is the division of the Palestinian people. Palestine National Authority President Mahmoud Abbas condemned the Gaza resistance, called upon Hamas to release the hostages and deliver its arms, and declared the PNA prepared to take over the administration of the Strip after the defeat of the resistance. Abbas's PNA sat silent while Israeli forces were demolished camps and neighborhoods of cities and emptied them of their occupants. Abbas was well rewarded for his positions. The Israeli forces carrying out military operations inside his capital city of Ramallah, and Donald Trump just barred him entry to attend the UN meeting in New York.
Egypt contributed to the blockade of Gaza all the while playing the role of mediator in the ceasefire and the release of hostages. Qatar played the mediation practice in more than one conflict. Both governments, Egyptian and Qatari, dealing with Netanyahu, were aware that the real authority, the final decisions on the outcome of the mediation, were not theirs, but lay in the hands of Donald Trump. Saudi Arabia, managed to hide its position with calls for a Palestinian state. The Syrian regime collapsed, during the war, and it was revealed that it had initially refused an Iran demand to join the Axis of Resistance and initiate military action in support for Gaza.
What to call the European position concerning the two-state solution, if not hypocritical, as the sabotage of the Oslo Accords, from its earliest phase, was the product of the joint policies where the United States was the very ‘interested’ U.S, mediator, and the European propping up the PNA bureaucracy, and funding NGOs, etc.
Now, two actors do beg discussion, Russia and China, who were notable for their absence. It is not enough to say that Russia was involved in the Ukraine war. The type of positions that were taken on Gaza and later on the war against Iran, did not require any military implications. And for all that we know, Mr. Putin is still very far from any deal with the United States.
One should look at the Chinese position from the perspective of the gas and oil of the Gulf states. But China initiated the unique initiative of bringing to Beijing the different Palestinian organizations in the hope of coming up with a common position vis-a-vis the war and a common position on the administration of Gaza. At least, conscious or not, the Chinese revealed the gravity of the Palestinian division.
Now comes a delicate question, where were the Arab masses?. The of empty streets and campuses in most of the Arab countries, compared to any Western countries, save a few exceptions in the Maghreb and Tunisia, some explanation. There are plenty of interesting one. Here are a few:
- First, the fear of repression. Not a simple matter, but it is one possible explanation, which can be answered easily that the Arab masses have an some time ago, dare to confront the army barehanded. Martyrs fell, prisons are full, and yet they were not afraid, at least. One of the slogans of the Arab Spring is "كسرنا الخوف" (We have broken fear).
- The second, the disillusion after the Arab Spring. Now, it could be said that disillusion is usually individual and It's difficult to talk about masses being disillusioned. People have to go on working, living, producing children, etc. Yet the term can be accepted, but cannot be taken as one basic cause.
- There is one which is more interesting and perhaps more relevant, is that people were sitting behind their screens and giving off their frustration and anger on the internet, on the social media. Which, by the way, played a very important role in more than fact that people did not act, but played an important role in demobilizing the people, large sectors of the youth, but also in a different presentation of what the war was about. We'll come to that.
- Now, I want to add another element: that Palestine and the Arab-Israeli conflict do not automatically translate into internal interests, demands, and aspirations. This is one lesson from the past, let's say, decades concerning whether Palestine in itself, is conclusive to anti-imperialism, to social change, to revolution, or whether the opposite? We'll come to that. But the important thing is that what was needed were people who translate Palestine into internal affairs, who translate Palestine into question of power and authority, who translate Palestine into issues of people's livelihood, who translate Palestine into rejection of internal oppression and internal exploitation. This process is not immediate. This process is not direct. At least what we know from experience is that the PLO managed to be active in two cases before Oslo, Lebanon and Jordan, and those were the two countries where you had strong local opposition that allied itself with the Palestine fida’is, that responded to the deeper meanings of the comprehensive message of Palestine is.
Now, one of the things that were revealed in these wars, and which do not necessarily need to be detailed, but also which need to be said, which is that Israel is a settler's colony in which a majority oppresses a minority, on the one hand, and a minority state in the region which is fueled by a vision, which is Zionism, which believes that minorities can never live with majorities. This is the whole philosophy of the Jewish state, and this is to be remembered.
Second, I think we don't need much to realize to what extent Israel is an organic part of not only the United States, but of what the Atlantic Alliance despite its fissions and present problems.
But I want to talk about something more immediate, which is the implication of the Trump administration’s participation in the war. It is not enough to speak about the organic links between Israel and the U.S. Imperialism, or reduce this influence to the influence of the Jewish lobby in Washington. And that's a very current interpretation.
It would be better to start from the beginning. Under Trump 1, the U.S. Administration had gone a long way in achieving its historical imperial task, that of joining together the two bases of its domination, the oil oligarchies of Saudi and the Gulf and Israel. On a more direct level, the Abraham Accords were designed to help the U.S. At that time, Trump 1, retreated forces from the Saudi Gulf region in order to mobilize more military power against China and deliver the security of that region and protection against Iran to Israel, as a regional sub-imperial power. The same is being tried under Trump 2, but by military means, especially after the discovery that Iran had gone a long way toward the production of nuclear weapons. The US administration was not dragged by Israel to its war against Iran's nuclear facilities, rather the strikes, the preemptive strikes of the Israeli Air Force against Iran's nuclear air defenses and military infrastructure paved the way for the final strikes of the B-2 bombers.
Now, I'd like to talk about what was called the War of Solidarity by the Axis of Resistance movements. As Syria did not participate in the military activities, we know after the regime collapse that the regime had no interest in participation in the war in support of Gaza. Now, the role of Iraq is a modest one. The exchange of rockets was symbolic and Iraq lost its main role in the traffic of arms to Lebanon when the Syrian regime fell. On the other hand, U.S. Military and political pressure succeeded in putting the disarmament of the "حشد الشعبي" (popular mobilization forces) and the different Shiite jihadi organizations on the agenda.
In Yemen, the Houthis are a peripheral movement that took over by force the leadership of northern Yemen, and by so doing, confirmed the division of Yemen into two zones. A northern zone, under Iranian influence, and a southern zone, led by a ‘legitimate’ government under the influence to Saudi Arabia and the Emirates. The Houthis managed to control large sections of the Red Sea shores, and are presently confining their activities to launching ballistic missiles to Ben Gourion airport and attacking Israeli ships in the Red Sea after an agreement with the United States administration, suffering a destructive Israeli air war. the big questions are concerning the fate of Yemen itself. To what extent would the Houthis, irrespective of their present strikes against Israel, can remain, would the situation in Yemen end up in a compromise between Saudi Arabia, the Emirates, and Iran? Or will there be a lot of pressure to get rid of this regime?
What we are left here is mainly Lebanon, where the major, which is of course a frontier country where you have tens of thousands of people who live a few kilometers away from the upper Galilee armed settlers. I want to propose that, had Hezbollah not started war on October the 8th, Israel would have attacked. The reason being, I don't imply that this is why Hezbollah took the decision to attack, but that is led to the fact, is related to the fact that political discussions concerning the borders had failed, the land borders. And now that we know, in hindsight, that Israel had been preparing for the past 12 years to attack Lebanon. So, my hunch is that on that day, it was difficult to assume that one can just say: "there's a stalemate, nobody moves." But that's not the most important part. In fact, we can add to this that Hezbollah was known to have declared a plan to infiltrate or to occupy a big section of Upper Galilee and the settlements and the villages there by the famous Radwan force. That was an open secret. And I think we know now to what extent that justified, this is not an accusation, but to the extent that was used by the Israelis, first to mobilize for a total war against Lebanon, and second to use it as a pretext for its war.
So, what we have here is an asymmetrical war between a small army, Hezbollah, launching missiles against military and security installations in the Haifa and Tel Aviv region, and a superior army, with a crushingly superior air force waging war all over Lebanese territory, in the South, the Southern Suburb and the Bekaa. This total war was soon accompanied by a land war that came to an end or to a stop when the Israeli army had actually taken over the better part of the south of the Litany river. A heavy toll was paid by the population of those region including massive destruction in some thirty frontline villages, where Israel still occupies five strategic points. all the while attacks continuedattacks of resistant leaders and cadres and Hezbollah lost its irreplaceable leader, dozens of its military leaders and acdres and hundreds of fighters, not to speak of wounded and victims pf the Pager attack infrastructure.
Now a new government of technocrats under American pressure and Saudi intervention took upon itself the role of a state within a few months and decreed the disarmament of Hezbollah under the guise of the famous monopoly of arms by the state, which was to be implemented within the end of this month. What is even more dangerous is the order to the army to draft a plan for the collection of arms. Now, this is translated into military terms, can only mean you go and find where the Hezbollah are and tell us how you're going to attack them. So, unless we're playing, this is an arm. And the implication that it had on many people is that this is coming. Now, one can stop here and realize that this faux pas was added to it, the fact that the Lebanese government read and discussed an American paper on the modalities of disarmament. What is bizarre is that the Lebanese government accepted the better part of it, whereas it was saved by the fact that the Israelis refused.
So, this is the situation we're in. In two days' time, the army is going to present its plan for the recuperation of Hezbollah. I'm talking about all this not only because we're in Lebanon, but because this is the only case of the four cases of solidarity, of the three cases of solidarity, where you have this very dangerous situation which touches the possibility of severe conflicts among the Lebanese. So at least one can stress the point that national unity should be priority, and the fact that there is scope for a negotiated solution where all the potentials of the army and the resistance are put together in an integral plan for national defense, especially at a time where it is obvious that Israel has plans to enlarge its security belt in Syria and Lebanon, and that implies more and more occupation, more and more military presence.
Now, there's something which is unsaid about the disarmament, which I find bizarre. Since Mr. Barrack even detailed the type of arms that should have been delivered from the grenade upwards. But he, at least we were not told that he talked about ballistic missiles. So, as far as I know, as far as everybody knows, After the 2006 war, with the help of Syria and Iran, there is a huge ballistic missile depot in the northern Bekaa, and the Syrian counterpart, the Lebanese Syrian region of Qusayr. Now, one should ask, what was the situation of those missiles during the war?
The Israelis used to talk about a few thousand. I was one of the naive people, or I'm not very naive, who believed that because Israeli armed reports said that those cannot be eliminated, except by land warfare. We lived from 2006 onwards under what was called a military balance between the two armed forces, Hezbollah and whatever the case. What we know is that those were destined as arms for use against the Dimona, Israeli nuclear reactor in the Niger, and that they still exist. The only theory that exists is that the launch chutes have been hit by Israeli planes, by Israeli fighters, and so they are dumped under the rubble. The idea is that there's some 30-40 meters underground.
I'm not just making military fireworks; I'm talking about the fact that first Iran is implicated. During that time, it was taken for granted that those missiles are under the responsibility of either the Syrian regime and later of Iran, which is not in the hands of Hezbollah. The other thing is that if you look at the World Bank map of the military operations in Lebanon, you'll find a red triangle in northeastern area of Lebanon and Syria, whereas all the different air strikes are in orange and disperse, at least to add to the complication of the armed controlled by the state, who's going to go there and take over?
I think that should lead us to talk and think about another issue, which is what happened, what is happening to the so-called resistance axis? After having said that, one should pose the question, at least, but at the same time comment on it in the following sense. When a number of resistance organizations have been helped by Iran, the assumption would be that the state not only delivers arms and help, but that state will contribute to a solution of that conflict, since those were supposed to be the hands of Iran. Significantly enough, when Iran responded to the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh in that declared war or declared attack on Israel, the Israelis responded. That ended the initiative. Then we moved to Iran as the victim of the Israeli-American war. During that time, It seems that American strategy and Israeli strategy was: let's weaken the front lines and all the possibility of them being an issue of negotiation.
So, this is what I think we are in. This does not mean that Iran has simply sold out on its allies, but weakened allies, priority given in Iran to the nuclear, and still is, and so this is where at least things stand.
One more thing before we move to the social future. A lot of talk about normalization. First, the bizarre thing is that it's called normalization, as if what we have lived under Israeli-American oppression and wars is the exception. Now is the abnormal: تطبيع. But it's interesting, it's not طبيعة (normal), it's تطبيع: Somebody is making you, is normalizing you.
Anyway, the real meaning of it for the peoples of the region, normalization is forcibly introducing Israel as a regional power to compete for influence with Iran and Turkey over the better part of the Arab world. Now, the attempt is to legitimize the fact that you have three regional powers filling the gaps in the Arab world, in the Arab East, in the Arab Gulf, whateve. It is still resisted, by the way, in Syria, Iraq, and Lebanon, not to forget the independent position of Kuwait. So, it hasn't happened yet. It has opened normalization has opened the competition between three oil oligarchies, Saudi Arabia, UAE, and Qatar, which are the three of them vying for regional power. Saudi Arabia has declared that it seeks privileged relations with the United States in the form of a defense agreement in addition to an atomic reactor. The defense agreement is not given even to Israel; Israel wants one.
I would add to this that there is a movement of resistance to normalization, but it requires that it should not be restricted to an act of solidarity with Palestine only, but to deal with it as an attack on Arab solidarity and the sovereignty of the countries concerned, in addition to the fact that many of the agreements in the relationship between the normalized countries and Israel contradict blatantly their national and economic interests, this latter form of resistance has started in Bahrain, for example, and I know it is also being prepared in Morocco.
Now I can stop here and move quickly to the social future. I think the best part I can provide is to talk about the social present, which we've been living for the past 40 years, at least, under globalization and neoliberalism.
And I want to make the point that social future and the social present should be compared to the two major trends, intellectual and forces in the region. The militarized Islamic parties of the axis of resistance, and the movement and NGOs of the liberal civil society. Both, one way or another, and I'm going to try and show,
- negate and marginalize what one would imagine would be "The social," if you want to use le social.
- They're not also without social affiliation. One can say largely that the liberal is more a concern of middle classes and that the Islamic radical or even terrorist is a lot of the poorer sections of the population.
I just want to say that nobody studies who are the real terrorists, the jihadists of Daesh. Those people have been demonized, they don't exist, etc. But who are they? Why would one Syrian, Lebanese, Iraqi, Palestinian, Tunisian, Algerian, on the borders, decide and accept to commit what can rightly be called terror. We don't know them. There are tens of thousands of them. Once I made the mistake on a Syrian opposition television, I said, those are our people, and they were scolded by the journalists. How do you call them our people? People have everything, but whatever, just on the side.
What should be said is attempt to characterize both and let me try. In the axis, you have a colonial vision of imperialism, which is very basic, and which lends itself easily to a culturalist interpretation of being against the West, Islam against the West. And it's coupled with a geostrategic approach that externalizes internal issues: as always, something being done to you. Haunted by projects come conspiracy, the latest being the famous Greater Middle East Project, which has been living with us since 2003, and we're waiting for the application of the Greater Middle East Project, which as far as I know, was the name given by the US Foreign Office to the region once it attacked Afghanistan. They called it the Greater Middle East. So now we transform that into a project, which when you ask, you're told that this is a project of domination. So, there is a project which doesn't stop dominating us. But let's continue.
One should say, and should talk about, the other side of the movement of the axis of resistance. In Yemen and Iraq, the movements have split the national army or replaced it. And you have a situation in which Syria now is practically an army. Iraq has the Hashd, which is bigger than the army. Lebanon coexists with difficulty with the Lebanese army, which I'd still maintain is weaker than the resistance. And finally, the Yemeni Houthis have broken the army, replaced it, etc.
I should Add a communitarian vision of the economic and the social. For example, the party, the Hezbollah Lebanon, presents itself as a provider of social services, health services, educational services, which is not its exclusivity. This is the Lebanese habit of the Lebanese sectarian structure. But added to it is a very strong social conservatism, which by the way blends very well with the uncritical acceptance of neoliberalism. At times the position would be against the IMF, as an external agency, to interfere in our affairs. Rarely would you find a real critique of what the IMF is proposing. I should say the first minister who decided to privatize the electricity in Lebanon, is a Hezbollah minister. I don't want to exaggerate, but in the three cases, or four cases, those arms are infeudated with the existing regime, with the structure of power. In Iraq and Lebanon, they stood against the popular movements of 2019. In Iraq, they committed assassinations, militants in Baghdad and Basra. In Lebanon, Hezbollah dealt a big blow to the popular movement and gave a great service to the capitalist sectarian oligarchy when its secretary general called upon its supporters to vacate the squares and streets, which sizably reduced the popular and geographic extension of the movement. And the call was, come to the sect, we will solve our problems.
Now, this is and necessary to talk about, and I can move, if I have some time, I can move quickly to the other side, which is the liberal side. Now, I want to emphasize that we are very little knowledgeable about 30 years of liberalism and neoliberalism. We know some economic But we don't know the political and social aspects. I would pretend that neoliberalism globally has created a new language, which is a negation, a reaction, and an opposition to a previous language, situation or phase, which is the phase of national liberation. So what you have, and I'll take Development, since we're talking about Development, has been renamed growth. In itself, a full socioeconomic program, ranging from state role in planification, welfare, and social distribution, to the miracle of the head and hand of the market, or better, to MacDougall and the iron fist of the Pentagon. Human rights in this liberal are presented as mainly individual and personal rights. Little interest in economic and social rights. Not to speak of silence concerning the rights of people to self-determination, which is at the heart of the question of Palestine, and which is a collective right. Anyone heard an NGO calling for the application in Palestine? Signs of the right to national self-determination? I haven't. Apartheid, racial discrimination, has been flattened into "فصل عنصري" which is racial separation. No hierarchy, separation, no exploitation, separation. And I called friends who are in the media and told them, please, use "تمييز عنصري" It's not "فصل": It's not that they're separating them. It doesn't work. I mean, translators don't like it. Of course, one can open a whole discussion saying, if it's not by BDS that South Africa was liberated, we can talk about that some other time.
The concept of change is a key word of the 2011 and 2019 revolutions, taken over by social and civil movements, set by political parties. So, you'll find it abundantly in IMF and World Bank literature. What is to be changed? By what means? What road plan? Who is going to do the change? All the real meanings of politics is banned here. Tactics, strategy, offensive, defensive, resistance, move to reform, radical change, or reform, revolution, and it mirrors another local slogan ("بلدي"), which is "يسقط", as always, somebody who should fall, especially the Nizam, which is an old, nice slogan from the 1920s against French and British imperialism, but you tell me what it means, unless it means the regime should fall, and just the same questions.
Radical change of meaning can be taken concerning social justice. During the Cold War, the term equality was struck with a taboo because it was seen to imply socialism or communism. It was replaced by equity. The term has long life. When I used to ask students in my social inequalities class at AUB, what's the opposite of inequality? I would generally receive the answer, equity. You tell me whenever you receive an answer which is equality. After the end of the Cold War, there was a return to social justice but with a facelift, generally used in view of equality and inspired by the welfare state. The term referred, in the old sense, to social and health security, generous state services, and fair distribution of resources and wealth. Here is the new social justice; a European Union grant for research on the question of promoting social justice in Lebanon would have the following subjects: Empowering women, Strengthening Parliament, protecting human rights, encouraging social dialogue, reinforcing drug prevention and treatment, and advocating for youth. You can apply, there's still grants.
Now, for the rest, the militant has been transformed into the activist. The first implied struggle and conflict, the one implies neutral activity. And the name of militant now has shifted to the jihadists and the terrorists. Solidarity has become advocacy. Not the same at all. The first was between people and movement fighting for a common cause. Now it's one group of people advocating the cause of another. Now I want to add to this what concerns directly the political and the social. Civil society does not correspond to society or to the social. It's the non-state part of society pitted against the state, and that includes the private sector and excludes political parties. In the neoliberal imagery, this society does not exist. There is the state and the individuals, the individuals versus the state in anti-authoritarianism, or the state is put in the service of the individuals. The only constitution in the world which has this is the Chilean constitution under Pinochet. It starts with the fact that the state serves individuals. No society, no collectivities. In Lebanon, by the way, one of the rare cases in which private property and private initiative exist in the constitution.
Now, last but not least, is all those variety of what is called political economy, but which is reading economy in political terms. For example, an AUB professor here had this idea to serve crony capitalism, which says that if a member of a family of bankers holds a political post, the whole family will become a political family. There is also a Syrian oppositionist who explains "What is the importance of economic poverty compared to political poverty? The first covers only 37% of the Syrian population, the latter 100% have lived under political poverty for long decades." And I'm quoting in both cases.
Now I want to conclude with the following. There is no social future in this present. The social future has to be invented, and the social question reclaimed by the conjugation of the defense and resistance to imperialism and Zionism in the struggle against neoliberalism on the road to social democracy.