The greater israel delusion may undo israel

The vision of "Greater Israel" draws on maximalist readings of biblical verses, especially Genesis 15:18–21, which some interpret as a promise of Jewish sovereignty from the "river of Egypt" to the Euphrates. In contemporary politics, this theology has produced two overlapping ambitions: unchallenged Israeli control of all land between the Mediterranean and the Jordan River, and influence or dominance across parts of modern Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq.

What was once an esoteric messianic fantasy has migrated into state policy. The current Netanyahu-led coalition has entrenched this vision through "annexation by a thousand cuts:" reclassifying a huge chunk of West Bank land as "state property," accelerating settlement expansion, constructing blocs that sever Palestinian contiguity, and extending Israeli military authority.

These are not isolated security measures but components of a coherent territorial project. The International Court of Justice has already found Israel's presence in the occupied Palestinian territories illegal, yet Israel's leadership continues to behave as though biblical promise overrides international obligation.

The Palestinian horizon

For Palestinians, the pursuit of Greater Israel does not mean a harsher occupation; it means the end of any political horizon. Rather than forming the basis of a future state, the West Bank is being reengineered into disconnected cantons surrounded by Israeli infrastructure, armed settlers, and military forces, while Gaza is treated as a disposable reservoir of unwanted people.

More insidiously, the Greater Israel project normalizes structural violence as the permanent organizing principle of Palestinian life: denial of building permits, arbitrary movement restrictions, criminalization of political expression, and routine settler violence carried out with impunity.

No Palestinian society will acquiesce indefinitely to this reality. To assume that five million people can be dispossessed, restricted, humiliated, and denied meaningful political representation without radicalization is to deny the basic lessons of history. As annexation hardens, armed resistance, localized insurgency, and mass civil disobedience will intensify, inevitably leading to a disastrous violent confrontation and regional instability.

Regional fallout

The Arab states that have a peace agreement with Israel have repeatedly condemned new settlements and creeping annexation, but most have stopped at rhetoric, balancing public anger against security, economic, and technological cooperation with Israel.

Jordan and Egypt, the two Arab states with the oldest peace treaties with Israel, are uniquely exposed. Their agreements were justified as steps toward a comprehensive peace that would eventually resolve the Palestinian question. If Israel openly discards that premise through annexation and engineered mass displacement, those treaties have already become politically toxic, even if not formally abrogated.

For the Gulf states that normalized relations under the Abraham Accords-the UAE, Bahrain, and Morocco-the contradiction is equally stark. They presented normalization as a way to gain leverage for Palestinians and advance regional stability and prosperity. A Greater Israel agenda exposes that narrative as hollow and recasts normalization as complicity in permanent occupation.

International order

Internationally, the advance of Greater Israel is accelerating Israel's transformation from a contested ally into a state whose conduct many increasingly regard as incompatible with a rules-based order. The relevant principles are clear: territory cannot be acquired by force, peoples possess a right to self-determination, and basic human rights are universal. Israeli annexationist policies violate each of these tenets in broad daylight.

This reality places Israel's Western allies, above all future US administrations, in a position of acute moral and strategic contradiction. Washington invokes these same principles, yet continues to arm, fund, and shield an Israeli government entrenching permanent domination over another people. If the US remains silent or permissive, it will further institutionalize the perception that international law is applied selectively for geopolitical convenience. That perception will weaken Western credibility and make cooperation on other international crises more difficult.

There is also a darker consequence: as Israel increasingly defines itself in ethno-religious terms and claims to speak for Jews worldwide, rage at Israeli policy will further intensify hostility toward Jewish communities abroad. In that sense, the Greater Israel project imperils not only Palestinians and regional stability but Jewish security far beyond Israel's borders, which defies Israel's reason for being.