By Imran Khan
For decades, the West presented itself as the guardian of freedom of speech, democracy, human rights, international law and the protection of civilians. These were not merely policies. They became part of the West’s identity and the basis upon which it judged the rest of the world.
Gaza has subjected those principles to perhaps their greatest test. The question is no longer whether these values are admirable. It is whether they really are universal.
Free Speech—Until Palestine?
Freedom of speech supposedly sits at the heart of Western liberalism. Yet since October 2023, numerous public figures have faced professional consequences following statements supporting Palestinians or criticising Israel.
Artforum editor David Velasco was dismissed after the magazine published an open letter calling for a ceasefire. Michael Eisen was removed as editor-in-chief of scientific journal eLife after sharing a satirical post concerning Gaza. Other celebrities and public figures have faced intense professional and institutional pressure.
Individual cases can be debated. But collectively they raise an uncomfortable question: what does freedom of speech mean if expressing certain political opinions risks your livelihood?
A society’s commitment to free speech is not really tested by popular opinions. It is tested by speech that challenges governments, powerful institutions and political consensus.
Gaza has revealed where some of those boundaries lie.
The Right to Protest—With Conditions
The same contradiction surrounds protest.
Britain proscribed Palestine Action after activists targeted military infrastructure and companies connected to Israel’s defence industry. France attempted to prohibit pro-Palestinian demonstrations. Germany restricted numerous protests. In America, Mahmoud Khalil became the subject of deportation proceedings following his role in Columbia University’s Palestinian solidarity movement.
Criminal damage is usually prosecutable. But something more fundamental is at stake: where does civil disobedience end and extremism begin?
The West has historically celebrated protesters challenging governments it opposes, as we saw Belarus and Russia. Gaza has demonstrated that protest becomes much more complicated when demonstrators challenge Western foreign policy itself.
The West has historically celebrated protesters challenging governments it opposes, as we saw Belarus and Russia. Gaza has demonstrated that protest becomes much more complicated when demonstrators challenge Western foreign policy itself
Starvation and the Protection of Civilians
Perhaps the greatest contradiction concerns civilians. International humanitarian law was designed precisely to restrain what states can do during war. Yet shortly after 7 October, Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant announced a “complete siege” of Gaza involving restrictions on electricity, food and fuel.
The issue became even more serious when the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Benjamin Netanyahu and Gallant in November 2024, finding reasonable grounds concerning alleged crimes including starvation as a method of warfare. Western governments nevertheless continued supporting Israel.
The contradiction is difficult to avoid. If civilian protection and humanitarian law are universal principles, they cannot become optional because the state accused of violating them is an ally.
International Law—But Not for Us?
Nothing exposes the problem more clearly than international law.
The West enthusiastically invoked international law against Serbia and, more recently, Russia. Vladimir Putin’s ICC arrest warrant was presented as evidence that even powerful leaders should face accountability.
Then the ICC turned towards Israel. The response from Washington included sanctions and threats against the institution and individuals associated with international investigations.
US Senator Lindsey Graham provided perhaps the most revealing statement when discussing the Rome Statute: “It wasn’t conceived to come after us.” That sentence encapsulates the crisis.
If international law is legitimate when directed against adversaries but unacceptable when applied to allies, it ceases to represent universal justice. It becomes an instrument of geopolitical power.
“Never Again”—For Everyone?
Gaza has also generated the gravest accusation of all: genocide.
International organisations, human-rights groups and experts have raised allegations concerning Israel’s conduct. A UN investigation reported attacks affecting Palestinian reproductive healthcare, while the International Court of Justice has been considering South Africa’s genocide case against Israel.
Whatever the eventual legal determination, the political question already exists. The West spent decades building institutions intended to prevent another Rwanda, Bosnia or Holocaust. Its message was simple: never again. But “never again” cannot mean never again only for particular populations.
If the principle is universal, the identity of the alleged perpetrator and victim should not determine whether evidence is investigated and law applied.
Conquest Returns
Another post-war principle was equally straightforward: states cannot acquire territory simply through force.
That principle underpins Western opposition to Russia’s annexation of Ukrainian territory.
Yet Israel has expanded territorial control while invoking security requirements and buffer zones.
Israel may believe it faces security threats. But allowing security concerns to justify territorial acquisition creates an obvious precedent. Russia invokes security in Ukraine. China could make similar arguments elsewhere.
Once territorial sovereignty depends upon who is taking the territory, the governing principle is no longer law. It is power.
The Rules-Based Order Is Breaking
All these contradictions ultimately converge on the same problem: the rules-based international order.
The West built institutions designed to constrain power through rules. But what happens when those institutions investigate Western allies? Increasingly, the institutions themselves come under attack.
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney acknowledged something important at Davos in January 2026: the old order always contained hypocrisy, with powerful states sometimes exempting themselves from rules they expected others to follow.
His conclusion was stark:
“This bargain no longer works.”
That may prove to be one of the defining geopolitical realities of our age. The West remains enormously powerful. Its militaries, economies and institutions will not disappear. But power and legitimacy are different things.
For generations, Western influence rested not simply upon aircraft carriers, financial markets and technology, but upon the claim that its political values represented something universal. Gaza has damaged that claim.
When freedom of speech becomes conditional, protest becomes permissible only within acceptable boundaries, international law applies differently to allies and enemies, and civilian protection depends upon geopolitical convenience, the contradiction becomes increasingly difficult for the rest of the world not to notice.
The greatest danger to Western influence may therefore not come from China, Russia or any external challenger. It may come from the West itself. Because great powers rarely lose legitimacy simply because their enemies expose their weaknesses. Sometimes they lose it by abandoning the principles that made others believe in them in the first place.
