Each Palestinian generation inherits trauma deeper than the last. So, I’ve been wondering: How many more blows before the pummeled body can’t rise? I’ve concluded, “indefinitely.”

Here is how I came to this conclusion: For several months now, I’ve blocked the details of the news on the genocide in Gaza. But today, I steeled myself to tune back in and felt like the character in the film Groundhog Day reliving the same day repeatedly: ceasefires break, Israeli massacres resume, international condemnation rises and fades, and the root causes — Palestinian dispossession, occupation, repression and injustice remain unaddressed.

Recurrent Israeli brutality against Gaza (2008, 2012, 2014, 2021, and now 2023–2025) has followed the same trajectory: Israeli assassinations, rocket fire from Gaza (or not), airstrikes by Israel, mass Palestinian civilian casualties, international outcry, and eventual ceasefire — only for the pattern to repeat.

With Iran too, there are years of shadow conflict (cyberattacks, sabotage, assassinations) that escalate into open strikes, and then retreat again. Each new flare-up, especially this ongoing one, feels like déjà vu.

As with Gaza, Israel has demonstrated overwhelming tactical dominance over Iran, but strategic victory remains elusive.

Iran is bloodied but not broken, and the region is bracing for what comes next. American warplanes dropped bombs on three nuclear sites in Iran, bringing the U.S. military directly into the war after days of uncertainty about whether Trump would intervene. Israel has already killed Iranian generals and nuclear scientists. If that doesn’t harden Iran’s resolve to pursue a nuclear bomb, I don’t know what will.

The fate of Palestine resonates with every person who has ever been in an unfair fight, anyone who has faced overwhelming odds, whether physical, emotional, or existential, and refuses to stay down.

When diplomacy fails and oppression and injustice continue, Palestinian pain is weaponized into collective memory and armed resistance becomes a form of self-affirmation, a means to create one’s own values rather than be passive victims of circumstance. As Rocky Balboa put it: It ain’t about how hard you hit… It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. (Yemen too, though I am focusing only on Palestine and Iran here!)

Continued resistance means denying defeat its finality in the same way that people endure hardships like illness, loss, or oppression — not because they know they’ll triumph, but because surrender is a kind of death. Palestinian resistance fighters are like a classic tragic hero, exiled from homeland but unbowed, defiant in the face of erasure, brandishing a physical key for a door that no longer exists.

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The above images are captures from an Al‑Qassam Brigades six‑minute video clip released on Friday evening (June 20, 2025). It captures action from June 14 in Al‑Zana neighborhood of Khan Yunis. The video shows Qassam’s command-and-control structure firmly in place, with fighters planning an operation in a room equipped with a monitor, a secure communication device and other paraphernalia. This is remarkable in that over the past 20 months, Israel has killed nearly all the top leadership of resistance groups and likely thousands of fighters as well. And yet they have continued to resist.

The situation in the Middle East will not change without a fundamental shift in Israel’s genocidal leadership and the Israeli public’s collective mindset, which is shaped by narcissism, the belief that Jewish suffering is unique and therefore justifies extraordinary atrocities. A fundamental shift would mean acknowledging the humanity of Arabs and Muslims.

If we must wait until the Israeli public, particularly the dominant Jewish Israeli mainstream, is moved to empathy, we are likely to wait forever; they are entrenched in supremacy and morally numb to the suffering of “the other.” The shift that needs to take place in the mindset of Israelis to break away from Groundhog Day is monumental.

On the other hand, Palestinian strategies have, in fact, evolved. The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement began in 2005 as a civil society-led, nonviolent campaign to pressure Israel to comply with international law. It called for an end to the occupation, equal rights for Palestinian citizens of Israel and the right of return for Palestinian refugees. It helped mainstream pro-Palestine dissent on US campuses and reframed the issue as one of rights and justice, though many governments actively opposing BDS; some banned it.

In 2017, Hamas released a new political document that marked a notable shift from its 1988 founding charter. It adjusted its rhetoric by dropping antisemitic language and distinguishing Jews from Zionists; it reframed the struggle as a resistance movement, not a religious war. It signaled flexibility by accepting a Palestinian state based on 1967 borders as an interim measure.

The question is, if BDS has been constrained by legal crackdowns and if armed resistance has brought devastation without liberation, then what remains?

What remains is political will and the conscience, indeed the self-interest, of the world. The following concrete steps can and must be taken to dismantle Israeli intransigence and colonialism to avoid disruptions in oil markets and more polarization in US domestic politics. Most importantly, we need to avoid a global order in the making in which the dominant ideology is raw power competition:

1. Impose an International Arms Embargo: Countries supplying weapons to Israel — especially the U.S., Germany, and the U.K. — could suspend military aid and arms sales until Israel complies with international law.

2. Targeted Sanctions on Israeli Officials: Sanctioning individuals responsible for war crimes, settlement expansion, and apartheid policies — similar to sanctions used against Russian or Syrian officials — would send a clear message of accountability.

3. Suspend Bilateral Agreements: States could review and suspend trade, research, and diplomatic agreements with Israel, especially those that benefit institutions complicit in occupation and settlement activity.

4. Enforce International Criminal Court (ICC) Warrants: Arrest warrants have already been issued for Israeli leaders. Enforcing them would be a seismic shift in ending Israel’s impunity.

5. Ban Trade with Illegal Settlements: Prohibiting imports and exports from Israeli settlements in the West Bank would undercut the economic engine of annexation.

6. Recognize and Name the System: Many legal experts now classify Israel’s policies as apartheid and persecution — crimes against humanity. Official recognition of this by states and institutions is a necessary step toward dismantling it.

Palestinian liberation also means internal unity, political renewal and continuing to assert our presence both physical and cultural. When borders close and bombs fall, the imagination remains unoccupied. We continue to visualize a future rooted in justice, dignity, and shared humanity.

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Rima Najjar is a Palestinian whose father’s side of the family comes from the forcibly depopulated village of Lifta on the western outskirts of Jerusalem and whose mother’s side of the family is from Ijzim, south of Haifa. She is an activist, researcher, and retired professor of English literature, Al-Quds University, occupied West Bank. She writes on Medium.

She is a regular contributor to Global Research.

Featured image: Renowned Iranian artist Mansoureh Alikhani killed in Israeli strikes on residential areas in Tehran, June 14, 2025 (Source)

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