The ongoing Gaza episode is not a peripheral issue; it is a pivotal matter that defines politics, history, religion, and human society. Unbound by time, it feels like a malignant tumor that repeatedly strikes the human conscience and then subsides into collective apathy. Historically connected to antiquity, with figures like Noah and Abraham, and fueled by Israel's imperial ambitions, it seems destined to persist until the end of time.
Morality as a Communal Matter
The case demonstrates that morality is not just a person-to-person societal issue but also a communal one that judges collective human behavior. It clarifies the debate between secular and religious morality. The secular argument—that morality can be grounded in reason, empathy, and scientific understanding—has utterly failed, as seen in Palestine and Gaza. Humanity's accumulation of knowledge, wealth, and technology has proven inversely proportional to global justice and welfare.
Global Inequality and Conflict
For instance, 55% of humanity lives in lower-income or extreme poverty, while the richest 1.1% owns about 50% of global wealth. The Global Burden of Disease 2023 Study shows rising death rates among youth due to suicide, drugs, and alcohol, with increased anxiety, depression, and diabetes. There are 65 active state-based armed conflicts worldwide, including 13 major wars. Global debt has reached $350 trillion, three times the world economy. These facts show that material progress has not increased morality but has eroded it.
The Failure of Secular Societies
Even the most knowledgeable and cultured societies wage wars, defend genocides, develop dangerous bioweapons, and perpetuate unjust financial systems that enrich the elite 1.1%. Western societies, modeled on high civility, are rife with indecency and abuse. British statistics reveal widespread sexual abuse and harassment in educational institutions. Liberalism and feminism in Europe and America have led to the legalization of porn, prostitution, drugs, and LGBT rights. Pornography generates $97 billion annually, with 90% of content depicting violence against women, normalizing rape and abuse.
The Root Cause
This begins with the idea that religion is evil, leading to the belief that everyone is inherently good and can identify goodness through happiness. Over time, what makes people happy becomes indecent, obscene, and selfish. This breeds insensitivity, breaks families, and dissolves national unity, making the self the center. Thus, Gaza becomes the lowest level of a vicious food chain where the top 1.1% devour the bottom 55%. This is the truth of a world without God, disconnected from its Creator, with relative morality. A jungle of 8.2 billion people, each with their own moral compass, utterly indecisive and impotent.
The Divine Solution
This changes with belief in One God, who is scientifically, technologically, socially, and spiritually the most potent. He created the sophisticated human machine with a moral compass that tilts toward divine goodness. Goodness is defined through His messengers: believe in One God; do not lie, steal, or kill without cause; avoid indecency; and keep the family sacred. Belief in One God unites mankind into accountability and true responsibility. This answers Plato's Euthyphro Dilemma: actions are moral because God commands them, for He created morality and knows best. By defying the Source of goodness, we cut ourselves from the spiritual unity woven into the universe. As the Quran says, 'Lo! As for those who believe not in the Hereafter, We have made their works fair-seeming unto them so that they are astray.' (Al Naml 27:4)
