A new war begins

Many of us who have lived through the turbulence of major upheavals in recent decades now feel that there has never been a time like this. And I am not referring to what they call the ‘present’ — some kind of a continuum. You have to respond emotionally to what is happening now, today — and it may all change during the night, before you wake up to live, hopefully, another day.

It is hard to make sense of what is happening. But all that has suddenly receded into the background. A new volcanic eruption has taken place in our neighbourhood, with Israel’s attack on Iran’s nuclear sites and targeting its top military officials and nuclear scientists.

We were shaken by this phenomenal development when we woke up on Friday morning. Israeli attacks continued during the day on Friday. Netanyahu said that Operation ‘Rising Lion’ would last for many days. For Iran, it was a ‘declaration of war’. Vowing revenge, Iran said that it would write ‘the end of the story’.

Late on Friday night, Iran launched its retaliatory strikes. Iran said it had fired hundreds of ballistic missiles at Israel. The Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) said that a wave of missiles was launched by Iran. Injuries were also reported in Israel. Meanwhile, multiple blasts were heard in Tehran. Strange it is that Israel has now said that Iran has crossed red lines.

Could this, then, be the beginning of the all-out war that everyone is afraid of? This escalation, in any case, seems a natural outcome of the high winds of anxiety, uncertainty and deep-rooted animosities that have been blowing in the Middle East for such a long time. We ought to believe them not but astrologers and soothsayers and psychics have promised a disastrous month of June — and a lot more is coming, they say.

On Thursday, we were totally involved in the human tragedy of the Air India crash in Ahmedabad. It was said to be the world’s worst aviation disaster in a decade. Though one person, named Vishwash, miraculously survived, the plane bound for London had 242 people on board. Here was a story that touched everyone’s heart.

Before that, the world’s attention was fixed on Los Angeles in southern California, where protests against US President Donald Trump’s campaign to arrest and deport illegal immigrants was seen to have become a new chapter in the history of the United States. Trump’s deployment of the National Guard has bred a lot of political tension and it has now become an issue for the courts.

I can add to this list. For instance, the war between Russia and Ukraine is continuing to rage, with consequences that would affect the entire continent. But let us not ignore the gruesome fact that all this is happening against the flaming backdrop of Gaza — an apocalyptic episode that would stand out in the history of mankind. In fact, Gaza alone is a testimony to the fact that it had never been like this in living memory. Why is it possible at all, after the world had supposedly learnt the lessons of the Second World War?

Throughout this week, the scope for my choice of a subject, Pakistan has been preoccupied with the business of the federal budget, which is an extensive drill and raises familiar assessments of taxes and the travails of the poor and the underprivileged. But this annual ritual does provide some fresh analyses of how scarce resources are distributed, with the IMF holding many strings.

Writing on the budget would be a ritualistic exercise, amounting to the chewing of the cud. There is always a sense of déjà vu in what the budget entails and how our leading political economists interpret it. I had a mind to use the huge increase in the salaries of the chairman of the Senate and the speaker of the National Assembly, along with the salaries of their deputies, as an emblem of the privileges that are bestowed upon the elite.

This time, though, Defence Minister Khwaja Asif, despite being a leading figure of the ruling arrangement, called these raises as ‘mali fahashi’ — a financial obscenity. But such quips, made as an aside, can hardly prick the conscience of those who sit on the high table of authority.

Anyhow, as I suggested at the outset, our minds are totally distracted by the global disarray that has suddenly gained fearsome momentum. There is a lot of mystification about Iran’s capability to match the might of Israel and we may have clues about it in a few days.

Israel, of course, is backed by the US. To that extent, President Trump’s role is crucial. Interestingly, Trump, when campaigning for the office of the most powerful man in the world, had vowed to bring peace to the world and end all wars. The Russia-Ukraine war, he had promised, would end within 24 hours of his assumption of power.

The irony is that while the old wars continue, Trump's efforts to strike a nuclear deal with Iran have prompted Israel to start a new war – and this could be the mother of all wars that are being fought at this time. One may say that Trump does have a medal in this respect for stopping the war between India and Pakistan, a claim that he has repeatedly made.

We have some evidence as to where Trump belongs in this conflict. His post on Truth Social, his first public comment on Israel’s action, is eloquent and forthright. I wanted to quote it in its entirety but it is quite long. He has warned Iran to agree to a nuclear deal “before there is nothing left”.

He wrote: “I gave Iran chance after chance to make a deal. I told them, in the strongest of words, to just do it, but no matter how hard they tried, no matter how close they got, they just couldn’t get it done”. He noted that Iranian leaders “didn’t know what was about to happen. They are all DEAD now, and it will only get worse”.

Strong words, and very scary.

The writer is a senior journalist. He can be reached at: [email protected]

Disclaimer: The viewpoints expressed in this piece are the writer's own and don't necessarily reflect Geo.tv's editorial policy.

Originally published in The News