A War Without an End: Fighting Against the Phoenix Army
Glauco Ortolano on the never-ending cycle of violence gripping the Middle-East.
Israel has been able to successfully eliminate many of her foes, as well as some of her own friends, while pursuing her military objective during the campaign in Gaza. While many call it a “genocide,” others prefer to call it a “legitimate war on terrorism.” The fact, however, is that Benjamin Netanyahu must come out victorious to remain in power, for good or evil. He seems very determined to do so at any cost, including by dragging the United States, Israel’s closest ally, into his personal vendetta. On the other hand, his enemies seem to be equally determined to continue the war forever.
The most paradoxical aspect when fighting the so-called Iranian “axis of evil,” is the curse one must face of what I call the “Phoenix syndrome”, which is the quasi-irrational objective of a people who does not wish to win the war but only to prolong it forever. They seem to mirror their struggle on the lifecycle of the Phoenix. Winning the war is not as important as remaining alive and fighting forever.
As it is well known, the Phoenix is a mythological and immortal bird that cyclically regenerates or is born again. Although the most well-known Phoenix is the one associated with Greek mythology, there are other versions. In one such version, the Phoenix completes its journey from Paradise to Arabia and then Phoenicia (ironically, the coastal strip of modern-day Levant), and then dies with the rising of the sun the next morning only to be born again. Such powerful imagery could be applied to the concept of martyrdom, which is widely spread across the mujahideen ranks (or terrorists, if you will.)
When a mujahideen dies, it is believed that he becomes a martyr, which is to say that metaphorically, from his ashes, many others are born to carry out his battles in the pursuit of their ideological objectives. It has been an endless cycle for many decades or, perhaps, even centuries. One emblematic image that remains in my memory is the one that shows late Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar holding the child of an Al-Qassam Brigade fighter who, like Sinwar himself, was killed in fighting with the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). The father of the child, as well as Sinwar, may have become a new phoenix through their martyrdom, and the child, the symbol of their rebirth in the cyclical war, as to remain fighting, except not “until the end,” but forever and ever.
As it has been well documented, since the Hamas invasion of Israel on October 7, 2023, when more than 1,000 Israeli civilians were murdered, and more than 200 were taken as hostages to Gaza, the IDF has engaged in a vehement war against Iranian proxies, namely Hamas, Hezbollah and Houthis, and killed tens of thousands of their fighters, wives and children in Gaza and Lebanon. But as the endless war dictates, eventually, the fallen will be turned into “martyrs,” and new fighters will be born from the ashes as a new and vigorous generation to occupy their ranks. However, the objective is never to just to kill the enemy, but to die as a martyr, so that the following generation may proudly emulate them.
The implications of this war further complicate the fragile current political scenario in the Middle East. While some insist on calling them “terrorists,” others prefer to refrain from doing so, including Turkey’s President Erdogan who says Hamas are not terrorists but 'mujahideen defending their lands’. Such statements have further deteriorated the diplomatic relations between Turkey and Israel, and raised some eyebrows among NATO allies, while being praised by the Syrian, Iranian and Russian regimes that are earnestly forming a new anti-West coalition.
Regardless of how one views this Phoenix Army, the fact of the matter is that new alliances have been formed as leaders from around the world have not been shy in demonstrating their true feelings about the conflict. Many have condemned the senseless Hamas attack, but many others have also condemned Israel for her show of strength in Gaza and Lebanon, due to the high number of civilian casualties. But Israel has not taken heed to criticism and has continued to attack with evermore strength provoking an uproar in the UN. As reported by The New York Times on the intricate relations between Israel and the UN, which was once instrumental in the creation of the new state of Israel in 1948, in the article Israel Bars UN Chief António Guterres From Entering the Country, what seemed in the beginning as a regional conflict, has escalated beyond the Middle East borders as the Palestinian Phoenix stretches its wings affecting the entire globe.
The international community seem to have decided to ostracize Israel to an unprecedented level. Some world leaders, have gone as far as falsely comparing Israel today with the German Nazi regime that carried out a clear act of genocide against the Jewish people. As reported by AP News in the article, Brazil’s president unwelcome until he apologizes for comparing Gaza war to Holocaust, Israel says, we can easily see how the Phoenix is succeeding in forcing the entire world to focus on a war that neither side seem to have any intention to end. It truly a lose-lose situation.
The irony of all this, is that Yahya Sinwar, who allegedly masterminded the infamous Hamas attack on Israel, was once operated on and saved by an Israeli surgeon, after developing a brain tumor while incarcerated in Israel’s Eshel Prison in 2008, wanted to die a martyr. The star-Palestinian Phoenix has once again risen from the ashes to perpetrate the cruelest attack against the Jewish people since World War II. And although Sinwar was killed by a bullet lodged in the same spot where he was once operated on, from his ashes score of Palestinian youth will be born to emulate the “great” Phoenix master.
Such is the curse of the Phoenix syndrome that Israel will have to face for years to come. No nation can win a war against someone who does not wish to win or lose a war, but has for a victory, only the perpetuation of the spirit of an immortal fighting Phoenix.
Glauco Ortolano is an Associate Professor at the Defense Critical Language and Culture Program of the Mansfield Center, University of Montana. He has taught at the Lauder Institute of the University of Pennsylvania, and more recently courses in Geopolitics to officers of the US Armed Forces. He was also appointed Peace Ambassador by Le Cercle Universel des Ambassadeurs de la Paix.
The views in this post do not represent those of this publication, nor do they represent those of the author's employer.
Photo by Tomer Dahari
