A couple weeks ago, Mouin Rabbani had a great Twitter thread about the Houthis and international shipping. Here's the thread reader unroll. Basically, the Houthis in Yemen are attacking international shipping with rockets and drones. While there's been very little actual damage, the cost of these ships is so high that they cannot afford the risk. As a result, boats lining up at the entrance to the Red Sea are having to go around Africa and then through the Mediterranean to eventually make their way to Israel. And they are forced into this because the insurance premiums for transiting the Red Sea are just too high - and this is in comparison to adding weeks to the journey and an ungodly amount of fuel.
Well, turns out that this is exactly right. Since that thread was posted, insurance premiums have increased by an order of magnitude. Shipping companies are in fact making the weeks long detour.
Also, as it turns out, there's a mechanism in place for this. Of course there is - international shipping is so important to the global capitalist system that it would be crazy if there wasn't. That mechanism is the Combined Maritime Forces - "a multi-national naval partnership, which exists to promote security, stability and prosperity across approximately 3.2 million square miles of international waters, which encompass some of the world’s most important shipping lanes." Their mission is to defeat terrorism and prevent piracy. It's like a high seas UN that was created specifically to deal with situations exactly like this one.
So the US went to the CMF to put together Operation Prosperity Guardian. It called on the 38 other member states to pitch in on a mission that exactly matches the mandate. 10 responded. A little better than a quarter of nations agreed to sign up. On a mission to protect international shipping from what are clearly terrorist attacks.
Now some of the CMF countries obviously weren't going to sign up. Yemen is in the CMF! So that's kinda hilarious. But also, there are quite a number of Gulf states (unsurprising considering the importance of shipping crude by boat) that said no. The only Muslim majority country that joined Operation Prosperity Guardian is Bahrain.
IOW, the US and its defense of Israel has become so unpopular that a strong majority of countries are unwilling to be seen with them - even when the US is fighting what are clearly terrorist attacks on international shipping. And make no mistake, this isn't about risking lives and military assets - it's solely about not wanting to be seen as endorsing anything related to the US-Israel military efforts. Participation in Prosperity Guardian does not require that you pony up a boat. Not even an inflatable life raft. For example, Australia is in with their "six troops, no ships or planes". That's literally twice as much support as Canada is providing. And in order to boost the numbers for the "multi-national force", the Seychelles is in despite the fact that they are sending no one and are providing information sharing only.
Here's another way of looking at it - the UN General Assembly resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire passed with a vote of 153 in favour, 10 against, and 23 abstentions. This was cited as evidence that the US was becoming more isolated - because it absolutely is. But also it's evidence that the US is not just alienating all the assorted random small countries that most Americans have never heard of - it is also alienating its allies.
If you consider only the 31 NATO countries, 2 voted against (Czechia and the US - side note, I was surprised to find that Austria is not a NATO member), 8 abstained (Bulgaria, Germany, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Romania, Slovakia, and the UK). Fully two thirds of NATO countries voted for the ceasefire and only one voted with the US. Let me reiterate - a strong majority of NATO countries stand in direct opposition to US foreign policy.
The pro-Israel crowd sees this as evidence that the entire world is deeply antisemitic and supporters of terrorism. And to be fair - there are definitely countries that were likely motivated by antisemitism in adopting their positions. But a strong majority of the entire planet? Come on. One of the things about antisemitism is the dehumanization of Jews. They are reduced to some horrible racist stereotype and not seen as human beings, ones with agency - that deserve credit or blame for their choices and actions.
In their defense, it's a complicated situation. Factually - blaming Jews is a huge part of antisemitism and has been used to support all sorts of atrocities for essentially the entirety of recorded human history. So there most definitely is the risk of enabling some of the worst racists that exist. But also factually - there are some horrible people who happen to be Jews. Being Jewish does not mean you are incapable of bad things.
And bad things have been happening. Israel has been committing atrocities now for over two months. It is in the midst of committing genocide - slaughtering civilians by the hundreds. Day in and day out. And the ones that aren't killed are subject to starvation and disease brought about by Israel's blockade and active destruction of infrastructure inside the Gaza Strip. The vast majority of the world does not approve of terrorism, asserting that they do is nonsense. Terrorism is bad - even if the victims are people you don't like. BUT the thing the Zionist crowd does not seem to get is that Israel is behaving like terrorists - only way better equipped and shielded from accountability by the United States of America.
It's a concept that they are incapable of accepting. Yes, we all agree that Hamas is very bad and the attacks of October 7th were monstrous and indefensible. BUT - what Israel has done and is still continuing to do in Gaza is worse. And the US is doing everything in its power to ensure that the killing continues. No wonder it is sliding into isolation.
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