Moments of dread

ONE might say that nothing will happen and that the world will continue just as it has so far. However, after last week and the endless volley of attacks, bombings and assassinations we witnessed, it certainly feels like something is imminent.
True to their métier, the world’s astrologers portend events based on an annular solar eclipse set to take place today. Solar eclipses — or so they say — represent the death of a ‘solar’ figure: perhaps a monarch or a leader who dies, is deposed, or loses power in some other way. Adding to all the malevolent possibilities, astrologers say that the reappearance of several ‘stars’, whose earlier presence had brought discord, does not augur well and that these stars feature prominently in the astrological chart of the United States.
Astrology must always be taken with a grain of salt: after all, there are soothsayers on both sides of the fence, and the way an event — any event under discussion — plays out will prove one side more ‘accurate’ than the other.

However, prophecies and auguries are not needed. It does not take much looking around to note that the world, always tumultuous, is undergoing exceptional mayhem. It is not only the events that have dominated the Middle East which portend terrible outcomes. Undoubtedly, the ongoing war in the Middle East, the barbarous Israeli bombings of Gaza, and now Beirut and southern Lebanon, are significant factors in the assessment of the dire international situation. But on a wider scale, too, everything points to escalations, one-upmanship, covert actions, and undisclosed secret actors.
Even if we choose to ignore the specifics of these conflicts and carefully insulate ourselves so that we are not exposed to the news and its macabre content, the general malaise is contagious. Anxiety is heightened because in witnessing the helplessness of others one dwells even more on one’s own set of circumstances.
Repeatedly watching people suffer — thanks to the age of social media — is a particular predicament of our age. Experts have already found that it increases levels of latent anxiety in people. So does confronting problems that one is not able to address. And in our world, we seem to be surrounded by challenges that do not appear to have a solution.
Wars undoubtedly belong to this latter category. This weekend, as Beirut was pummelled by the Israeli Defence Forces, it was dispiriting to watch members of the UN Security Council (UNSC) talk past one another while people were being killed in real time. As a recent report issued by the charity Oxfam notes, this multilateral body, which was created with the specific intent of preventing catastrophe, has failed miserably in its mandate.
The report, Vetoing Humanity, says in its summary: “A handful of powerful nations who represent only 25 per cent of the world population but hold its nuclear button, have too often manipulated the global peace and security system to meet their geopolitical and economic interests. Between 2014 and 2024, one or more of the five permanent UNSC member states … vetoed 30 UNSC resolutions on protracted crises, including resolutions on the Occupied Palestinian Territory … and Israel, Ukraine, Syria and Yemen.”

The Middle East war may dominate the headlines, but other major conflicts may be waiting in the wings. Over in the South China Sea, a situation is escalating. For several years, China has been constructing and lately fortifying islands that are decreasing the physical distance between itself and the Philippines. In the past two weeks, China and the Philippines’ coastguard have had skirmishes. The fight is over an area of the South China Sea called the Sabina Shoals, which the Philippines wishes to control because it is key to its trade routes with the rest of the world. Given that China has also had testy exchanges with Taiwan, the area seems poised to become a major flashpoint for a wider conflict.
Then there is Europe. American newspapers in the past two weeks have been full of ominous editorials warning that Ukrainian soldiers are about to bleed out of the conflict because of the lack of support from the US. Others point out that the issue is not only the Russia and Ukraine theatre but also Russia’s assistance to Iran, which could cross the nuclear finish line, causing a huge shift in the power balance in the region.
It is a good time to keep a diary or a journal. Accounts of such documents kept by people during World War II show a variety of perspectives of the same sets of events. In fact, much before the war broke out, even before the rise of Hitler, some people had recognised the pockets of hostility that would propel tensions towards a massive conflict.

Others felt safe until the Gestapo came knocking at their door and dragged them out of their comfortable homes in Berlin or Vienna or Krakow or Paris to be transported to the deathly gas chambers. All of them have perished but their accounts remain to tell us who was right and who had no idea of what was going happen.
So, too, will it be with us. Whoever is ultimately right about the future — the ones that prophesy peace or those who warn of war — will be dead by the time the ultimate outcome is known. In this sense, the accounts of the past provide an odd source of solace: Whatever ills may be peculiar to this age of internet, wars have wreaked havoc on human lives for far longer.
Then again, perhaps those are the rationalising words of someone who is not directly facing the rain of bullets or barrage of bombs, which are taking lives thousands of kilometres away from their vantage point.
The writer is an attorney teaching constitutional law and political philosophy.
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Published in Dawn, October 2nd, 2024