By starting yet another war, with the unilateral bombing of Iran, with demonstrably false allegations that Tehran was developing nuclear weapons, Israel reveals a perverse pattern: the use of conflict as an instrument of internal domination and geopolitical coercion.
The trajectory of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reveals a recurring strategy: to provoke crises in order to polarize societies, attract external support from the far right and remain in power. It was this same logic that led to the genocide in Gaza – where children, women and humanitarian workers are systematically targeted – and to failed interventions in Lebanon and Syria, which failed to hide strategic defeats.
Meanwhile, the world watches in silence as Iran suffers. The same passivity that normalized the massacre in Gaza now covers up the escalation against Tehran, which has become even more serious after the attack by the United States government, led by Donald Trump, on Iran’s nuclear facilities. This complicity in the face of violence is an open moral wound: this is not just another regional conflict, but through it a frontal attack on the foundations of humanity.
The United States and its regional instrument, Israel, act as if they were above any international legal order. Assassinations of leaders, attacks on the sovereignty of other states and systematic violations of war conventions are committed with impunity, under the guise of the"law of the strongest". Ambiguous reports from international agencies, not recognized by Israel or the United States, are distorted to legitimize unilateral actions, while Israel keeps its own nuclear arsenal untouched and unchecked.
In this scenario, Brazil's role becomes crucial. The firmness of the Brazilian government, under the leadership of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, in denouncing the genocide in Gaza – repeatedly using the word that the West fears to pronounce – and in demanding concrete peace negotiations was a beacon in times of obscurantism. But we need to go further. Brazil must lead the way in breaking the global silence, articulating a front of States committed to containing this escalation of violence promoted by Washington and Tel Aviv.
Brazilian society and the international community cannot remain hostage to a dual tyranny: that of unbridled military power and that of cowardly inaction. The incendiary rhetoric of figures like Donald Trump, threatening to “raise hell” in Iran, reveals a deliberate political project: to keep the entire international community of countries under permanent blackmail by demonizing Iran. It is hoped that the voice of President Lula, together with that of other leaders from the Global South, will impose the necessary common sense to halt this spiral of barbarity.
History will judge not only the perpetrators of violence, but also those who chose to remain silent. This moment demands more than speeches. It demands action, in the name of a much-needed moral standard. Concrete, multilateral and urgent action to rescue international law from ruin and protect defenseless populations from the wrath of governments that have transformed subjugation through war into a political project.
