By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, September 8, 2025
Making demands for basic moral actions of governments unlikely to do most of them anytime soon can be a useful educational and long-term activity.
Here are some demands for governments of the world that many of us have been making, with some variations, but only the beginnings of success, for years now.
- Arrest Israeli or any other officials facing arrest warrants from the International Criminal Court.
- Prosecute Israeli criminals under universal jurisdiction.
- Establish a complete embargo on weapons or weapons parts to or from Israel and to or from any nation not upholding such an arms embargo on Israel.
- End diplomatic relations with Israel.
- End financial transactions, trade, and travel to and from Israel.
- Train and send unarmed civilian defense teams, food, medicine, doctors, and aid workers to Palestine.
- Develop a major public educational campaign about the genocide in Gaza and the propaganda that has facilitated it.
- Support a Uniting for Peace action through the UN General Assembly to implement worldwide numbers 3-7 above and to do steps 9-12 below:
- Economically sanction Israeli war criminals.
- Expel Israel from the United Nations.
- Recognize the nation of Palestine.
- Move UN meetings and headquarters out of the United States.
- Break off military relations with and expel from your nation troops belonging to any government that is not upholding an arms embargo on Israel.
- Halt membership or support for weapons-dealing institutions that do not uphold an arms embargo on Israel: the Abraham Accords, NATO, etc.
Now here’s an even less likely demand than any of those to be met anytime soon by any government, much less by two-thirds of a UN General Assembly:
- Send armed ships and troops to Gaza.
The unlikelihood of its happening does not provide a license for demanding it. Such a demand could be remembered on other occasions. And what would happen if this demand were met? How would the Israeli and U.S. militaries respond? And how might other militaries respond to that response? If you cannot answer that question, let’s stick with increasing the pressure for numbers 1-14.
8 Responses
This is a bad demand unless you demand that the USA use military force against Israel.
The USA could establish a no-fly zone over Israel, as we did over Iraq.
We could do a blockade to keep ships from docking at Israeli ports.
We perhaps *ought to* sink Israeli submarines, particularly the nuclear-armed ones. They are a threat to the world.
It makes no sense to fight the US military while the US military protects Israel. It makes a lot of sense to persuade the USA not to have our military protect Israel. It might make sense to attempt to persuade the USA to threaten Israel. Killing Israelis would mostly be counterproductive. They generally believe the whole world is against them and if they are about to lose a war they should use their nukes to kill the world back. Certainly killing civilians is bad. It persuades them that we have no mercy and they should fight harder.
But things like blockade and no-fly zones are not as bad. They could be a “slippery slope”. Maybe it’s bad to advocate them. But that isn’t clearly certainly wrong.
You lost all but three guys and a dog at “as we did over Iraq.”
Arms embargo could be effective. Now rather than later.
Demand Israel withdraw from Gaza
Allow unlimited aid be allowed into Palestine
YES. See point #3 above.
Leaving aside the “as we did in Iraq” part, would a no-fly zone be a useful tactic, especially if it was done by the UN, some or all European countries applying sanctions, or some other body?
Was there something wrong with the no-fly zone applied in Iraq beside its one-sidedness?
We raise the issue of WAR TAX RESISTANCE as a non-violent response that has been around for years. Check out nwtrcc.org and see how many options for non-violent ways to stop cooperating with this unchecked militarism while redirecting tax money to the areas where it is most needed: health, education, environment, general welfare.
We used to say “Hell no, we won’t go.” That is surely a slogan we will need sooner than we think. NOW Let’s say also “Hell no, we won’t pay” and look for ways to redirect for peace.
Find a way not to pay.
Or maybe “No way! We won’t pay!” (though “Hell no!” is more emphatic).
It would be wrong to sink Israeli submarines: there would be Israelis on board, and our aim is to stop all killing – not begin another war, or wage war in a different way.
The most likely solution is to bring war criminals to book, of whatever nationality. An arms embargo might also work.