It was, predictably, only a matter of time before the tumbrils of geopolitical folly rolled out another spectacle. This time, it is the always-incendiary combination of Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu, two titans of ego who seem determined to reshape the Middle East with all the finesse of a bull in a porcelain shop. The BBC’s John Bowen, a man whose basset-hound solemnity usually signals calm, has now bellowed a warning: we are heading for a ‘permacrisis’. And he is, for once, absolutely correct.
Let us be clear. The term ‘permacrisis’ is not merely the latest buzzword from the jargon factories of think-tanks. It is a descriptive tool for an era where conflict settles into a low-level, chronic fever; a constant state of emergency that grinds down institutions, economies, and the very sanity of nations. Bowen’s analysis points to the likelihood that Trump and Netanyahu, by pursuing maximalist aims — whether over settlements, the status of Jerusalem, or outright annexation — will not achieve a solution but will instead lock the region into an endless cycle of retaliation, terror, and martial law. This is the intellectual equivalent of setting fire to your house in order to roast a pig.
Consider the historical parallels. The late Roman Empire, exhausted by a cascade of crises, saw its frontiers hardened into permanent war zones. The border with Parthia and later Sassanid Persia became a ‘permacrisis’ of its own: a furious, grinding stalemate that bled the treasury dry and soured the public mood toward authority. Similarly, the Thirty Years’ War in the 17th century degenerated into a self-perpetuating conflict that ravaged Central Europe for decades, not because anyone particularly wanted to fight, but because the logic of escalation and revenge had become autonomous. Trump and Netanyahu, by acting as if the status quo is a blank slate upon which they can draw a new map, seem to be ignoring this grim historical calculus.
What Bowen, in his characteristic sotto voce, implies but does not state outright is the intellectual decadence at play. The Western foreign policy establishment, long enamoured with ‘transactional’ deals and ‘art of the deal’ histrionics, has forgotten that peace requires not just leverage but legitimacy. And legitimacy, as any Victorian statesman knew, is the currency of empires that last. The Victorians, for all their imperial bluster, understood that you cannot rule men by bayonets alone. You need a story, a shared sense of order. Trump and Netanyahu offer only the story of dominance. That narrative will not bring peace. It will bring an endless series of micro-crises that, like a bad penny, keep turning up.
Moreover, the warning carries a neglected layer: the erosion of national identity. Israel, grappling with its own internal divisions, risks becoming a garrison state where the demands of perpetual security override the liberal traditions it once championed. The United States, meanwhile, may find itself enmeshed in a ‘forever war’ of a different kind — not a war of occupation, but a war of political commitment to a partner that offers no exit strategy. Bowen’s permacrisis is not merely a foreign policy problem. It is a cancer that metastasizes into the domestic body politic.
Critics will, I am sure, accuse me of Cassandra-like gloom. They will point to the Abraham Accords as evidence of progress. Perhaps. But the Accords were a sideshow, a functional arrangement built on shared fear of Iran, not a genuine reconciliation. The core of the conflict, the Palestinian question, remains untouched and festering. To ignore it is to guarantee Bowen’s prophecy comes true.
So here we stand at the precipice. The Trump-Netanyahu approach is not so much a reshaping as a shattering. And as any historian will tell you, shattered vases are difficult to reassemble, especially when the hands doing the gluing are still waving hammers. Bowen has raised the alarm. It would be a tragedy of Sophoclean proportions if we decided to dance instead.
