The silence of the sultans: Muslim regimes and the holocaust of our time

Tel Aviv is no longer content with turning Gaza into a graveyard—it now flies its missiles eastward, striking Iranian soil with the kind of psychotic bravado usually reserved for Bond villains and colonial empires on their last legs. Over the past year, Israel has escalated its shadow war on Iran into a theater of open provocation: assassinating scientists, bombing consulates, targeting military facilities, and carrying out acts of sabotage with near-total impunity. Not once or twice, but in a sustained campaign that makes a mockery of international law. And yet, through it all, Iran responded not with fire but with what diplomats politely call strategic restraint—a doctrine of carefully calibrated forbearance meant to avoid regional conflagration. That patience, however, may now be wearing thin. With Netanyahu’s Israel running amok, emboldened by Washington’s blank checks and the Muslim world’s blank stares, Tehran is beginning to realize what Gaza already knows: restraint in the face of genocide is not wisdom—it is a slow form of suicide.

It is the year 2025, and Gaza lies in ruins. Again. Except this time, the devastation has reached levels that no euphemism—no “conflict,” no “operation,” no “security response”—can whitewash. Since October 8, 2023, the Israeli state has waged a 20-month campaign of bombardment, starvation, and mass slaughter that has left the Strip resembling a graveyard with Wi-Fi. And while much of the world looked on in horror—or worse, indifference—Muslims everywhere awaited something, anything, from those who rule in their name.

They waited for the Gulf monarchs, drunk on petrodollars and peacocks, to finally do more than issue syrupy condemnations in Arabic calligraphy. They waited for Pakistan and Turkiye—boasting two of the most powerful Muslim militaries on Earth—to emerge from their palaces and barracks with more than soundbites. They waited, because they believed. Believed that perhaps, for once, power would be wielded not just to protect regimes, but to protect the oppressed.

Instead, what they got was the geopolitical equivalent of ghosting.

It’s not that the Muslim world lacks power. Far from it. The Gulf states alone sit atop a financial arsenal large enough to buy and sell entire Western economies—on Tuesdays. Turkey and Pakistan, meanwhile, field massive, sophisticated armed forces. The former is a NATO member with drones and ambitions. The latter is a nuclear-armed state whose generals never tire of reminding the world that they’re ready for “full-spectrum deterrence”—a euphemism for mushroom clouds on demand. And yet, when it came to Gaza, both seemed to have misplaced their playbooks, their backbones, and their sense of duty.

Let’s begin with the Gulf monarchies, those desert dynasties who seem to think foreign policy is a branding exercise. One might have assumed that nations with unimaginable wealth and historic religious legitimacy would have at least tried to pressure Israel—or its patron saint in Washington—through oil leverage, diplomatic retaliation, or even just coordinated sanctions. Instead, their primary response has been to host the occasional summit, offer a few truckloads of aid (carefully photographed), and issue mournful tweets from official accounts. It’s not that they’re asleep at the wheel; it’s that they’re driving in the opposite direction.

These petro-princes have become masters of illusion. In public, they speak of “the Palestinian cause” as though it were a cherished family heirloom. In private, they ink deals, normalize ties, and invest in Israeli tech startups like there’s no tomorrow—which, for Gaza, has tragically turned out to be true. Their vision for the future of Palestine is not liberation but liquidation: turn it into a real estate project, bulldoze the grief, and sell it as beachfront property.

But while one might expect moral bankruptcy from oil barons cosplaying as statesmen, the greater scandal lies elsewhere. For years, Muslims have looked toward Pakistan and Turkey as potential counterweights to Zionist aggression—military powers with at least some historical memory of justice, sovereignty, and resistance. Yet here, too, reality has offered a brutal correction.

Pakistan, for instance, spent the better part of this past year patting itself on the back for having “deterred” a much larger India during the latest round of cross-border brinkmanship. Air Force jets soared. Analysts praised the resolve. Politicians waxed poetic about national honor. And yet, when the skies above Gaza were thick with Israeli F-35s vaporizing children in Rafah, Pakistan’s aerial warriors were nowhere to be found. Evidently, deterrence is a luxury afforded only when the target isn’t backed by Washington.

Let’s not forget the irony: when India allegedly crossed a red line, Pakistan was ready to scramble jets and counter-strike. But when an actual genocide began unfolding in real-time, involving an occupier with a decades-long track record of war crimes, the most Pakistan could muster was a few UN speeches, some hashtags, and a well-timed prayer meeting. The same generals who can launch missiles at a moment’s notice against Delhi were suddenly constrained by “diplomatic complexities” and “strategic calculations.” In other words, the same cowardice dressed up in a uniform.

Turkiye, meanwhile, offers a masterclass in geopolitical theater. President Erdoğan has built his entire persona on being a bold defender of Muslim causes. He famously walked out on Shimon Peres at Davos in 2009. His speeches often sound like Friday sermons. And when Pakistan faced a mere threat of escalation with India, Turkish forces were reportedly placed on standby in an act of “brotherly support.” Gaza, by contrast, has received no such brotherhood.

One might think that, given Gaza’s proximity—less than two hours by air from Turkish airbases—Erdoğan’s military might at least attempt a humanitarian air corridor, a no-fly zone, or even symbolic action to halt the carnage. But no. The “sultan” of Ankara contents himself with fiery rhetoric and strategic inertia. His drones fly everywhere except where they’re needed most. His alliances shift with the wind. His vision for the ummah seems to end at the Bosporus.

And now, we are beginning to reap the whirlwind of that cowardice. The utter absence of consequences for Israel’s genocidal rampage in Gaza has not only emboldened Netanyahu—it has unhinged him. With no meaningful pushback from the Muslim world, and a blank check from Washington, Tel Aviv has graduated from destroying Gaza to provocations in Iran. Airstrikes, assassinations, and cyberattacks have become routine acts of Israeli foreign policy, as though the region were a video game and Tel Aviv the reckless gamer. This is what happens when you let a nuclear-armed apartheid state run wild: it begins to believe it is invincible. The Gulf monarchs and self-styled sultans of sovereignty, by doing nothing, have helped set the entire region on fire—and now, the flames threaten to engulf us all.

What makes all of this worse is not just the betrayal, but the ease with which these regimes could have changed the outcome. A simple threat—a credible show of force, a warning that certain red lines would not be crossed—might have been enough to temper Israel’s unrelenting assault. We are not talking about invading Tel Aviv. We’re talking about deterrence, about consequences, about making the cost of genocide uncomfortably high for those who pursue it. The Muslim regimes didn’t even try.

And let us not be fooled by those who insist that these nations were paralyzed by fear of Western retaliation. The West, for all its bluster, is not omnipotent. It cannot fight wars on every front. The U.S. is already overstretched, politically exhausted, and facing domestic upheaval. Washington’s red lines are not divine commandments; they’re negotiable, challengeable, sometimes even laughable. What is lacking is not opportunity, but will. These Muslim regimes are not helpless. They are complicit.

Their silence is not accidental—it is strategic. For decades, Muslim regimes have internalized a doctrine of survival over sovereignty, obedience over outrage. They fear losing favor with Washington, fear being sanctioned, fear being labeled “rogue states.” But more than that, they fear their own people. They know that any serious confrontation with Israel would galvanize their populations in ways they cannot control. And so, they choose the coward’s path: performative concern, carefully calibrated inaction, and an unwavering commitment to doing nothing that might rock the boat of power.

It is this unholy alliance—between autocratic regimes and imperial patronage—that has turned the Muslim world into a theater of impotence. The rulers wear keffiyehs; the people wear grief. The generals strut; the martyrs pile up. And all the while, Gaza burns.

The bitter truth is that Muslim rulers have become janitors of colonial violence, sweeping up after the wreckage while never daring to stop the wrecking ball. They host summits while hospitals are bombed. They issue statements while children are buried in mass graves. They send aid convoys with one hand and shake hands with war criminals with the other.

But history has a long memory. One day, schoolchildren will study this era and ask: where were the Muslims when Gaza was being erased from the map? The answer will be a mix of press releases, photo ops, and moral cowardice. They will find that the rulers of the Muslim world, blessed with armies, riches, and rhetoric, chose the path of betrayal. They will find that the defenders of Jerusalem were too busy defending their bank accounts. They will find that Palestine was not just betrayed by enemies, but abandoned by friends.

And when that day of reckoning comes, no amount of gold-leaf Qur’ans or palace sermons will suffice. The regimes that could have acted—and did not—will be judged not by what they claimed to believe, but by what they failed to do. In a time of genocide, neutrality is complicity. And silence, in the face of such evil, is not just deafening—it is damning.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.