Eternal Darkness, Perpetual War
By Bhakti Shringarpure. Whom does Israel's Operation Eternal Darkness really implicate?
On April 8th, 2026, Israel’s savage attacks on Lebanon left over 300 dead and thousands injured in a day of massacres reminiscent of 1982. They targeted the capital, Beirut, and many areas of Southern Lebanon with several dozen fighter jets and hundreds of rounds of ammunitions. No warnings were given. In fact, even before this bloodbath, Israel’s unhinged strikes on Lebanon have left over 1500 dead and over a million people have been displaced in the last three weeks. Nearby, Israel’s genocide continues unabated in Palestine and only a little farther away, the death toll in Iran keeps rising from US-Israeli bombardment.
While most braced for the worst after Trump gave an ultimatum to Iran and threatened to destroy an entire civilization, a news channel in Israel aired a countdown clock, and excitedly waited for Trump to obliterate Iran. Soon, a ceasefire appeared on the horizon. Israel could barely believe it. Lest they stop killing for a brief minute, they pounded Lebanon with a vile and hungry intensity. They went on to beat their own record at murder: 100 airstrikes in 10 minutes.
The Israeli military has called this Operation Eternal Darkness. Ironically, it describes the Israelis themselves because they are the ones plunged in an eternal darkness — they have no empathy and define themselves by the desire to annihilate an entire race of people. They have no knowledge of themselves and of the world they inhabit; certainly neither do they have the intellect nor wisdom to pull themselves out of this darkness.
The US, Europe and plenty of other nations enable Israel to thrive in this darkness. The spoilt child is coddled, and their narratives of trauma and victimization are strategically held up so that it can become a justification for the rest of the world to keep on plundering, killing, colonizing with impunity. But the jig is up and the game has gone stale. Even the bloodthirsty US is seeking to cease the fire but Israel will not even entertain the notion of it. If they stop killing, who will they be?
Due to collective moral collapse and an evacuation of humanity, Israel has no functioning institutions that can pave the way with notions of rights and justice. They have voted to legalize the death penalty for Palestinians; a majority of whom are held without charges, and many of whom are mere children. Israel’s economy is entirely dependent on the US, there is rampant censorship, and there is no robust anti-war movement. All of this exposes a dark national psyche.
Israel’s existential darkness makes it impossible for them to see the light. But their eternal darkness means perpetual war and suffering for everyone else.
Love and solidarity❤️🔥
Bhakti Shringarpure
Recent publications on the Radical Books Collective
1) A conversation with scholar and editor Nikhil Pandhi about his book Love in a Time of Caste: A Dalit-feminist Anthology of Love Stories. Listen here or watch below👇🏾
2) On the problems inherent in the ‘No Kings’ protests.
3) A conversation with writer Tareq Baconi about his queer, Palestinian memoir Fire in Every Direction. Listen here or watch below👇🏾
4) And Michael Jackson mania officially begins.
