With his latest declaration endorsing the vision of “Greater Israel,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has revived a Talmudic-biblical project that invokes religious mythology to justify Zionist expansionism. Years earlier, Netanyahu vowed to lead Israel into what he called its “centennial era.” At the United Nations General Assembly on September 22, 2023, he shocked the world by displaying a map of Greater Israel—a vision now embedded in his policies of annexation and war.
This project, long championed by Israel’s far-right, is today openly embraced by Netanyahu’s ruling coalition. In 2016, Bezalel Smotrich—then a Knesset member and now Israel’s Finance Minister from the Religious Zionism party—declared that Israel’s borders should stretch to Damascus, covering lands of six Arab states: Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia, fulfilling the Zionist dream of “Greater Israel from the Nile to the Euphrates.”
Smotrich repeated this vision in March 2023 during a speech in Paris, where he stood on a platform decorated with a map labelling Jordan and historic Palestine as part of “Eretz Yisrael” (the Land of Israel).
Biblical Framing of a Colonial Project
The idea of Greater Israel was first formalised in Israeli politics when Likud, under Menachem Begin’s leadership in 1977, turned it into a political program. This ideological framework had long existed, rooted in biblical references and advanced by Revisionist Zionists, who renamed the West Bank “Judea and Samaria” and promoted Jewish settlement as a divine command.
Supporters of this biblical claim often cite verses from Genesis and lean on Zionist voices that called for expanded borders to secure domination over the Middle East. One of the most telling examples comes from David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s founding Prime Minister, who wrote in 1937 and 1938:
“The establishment of a state, even on a small part of the land, is the greatest strengthening of our power at this time, and a great boost to our historic mission. We will break the boundaries imposed on us—not necessarily through war.”
This gradualist doctrine has guided Zionist policy for decades: secure part of the land, expand settlement, and slowly erase imposed limits.
At its theological core, the Greater Israel idea claims that the “Promised Land” stretches from the Nile River in Egypt to the Euphrates River in Syria and Iraq. The Israeli “Torah and Land Institute” states on its website:
“The Land of Greater Israel extends from the Euphrates in the east to the Nile in the south.”
This claim traces back to Theodor Herzl, founder of political Zionism, who promoted this expansionist vision as early as 1904. Zionist militias such as the Irgun, which operated during the British Mandate and later merged into the Israeli army, also demanded that historic Palestine and Jordan be transformed into a Jewish state.
From Theology to Military Reality
What makes Netanyahu’s pursuit of this biblical project especially dangerous is his attempt to translate theology into political and military reality.
Since October 7, 2023, Israel has waged a genocidal war on Gaza, while intensifying displacement in the West Bank, bombing Syria, and preparing for full-scale confrontation with Lebanon. With the collapse of Syria’s regime in December 2024 and the country’s deepening crises, Israeli attacks have targeted its remaining military power—part of a larger regional plan.
In a recent interview with i24 News, Netanyahu described the “Israeli dream” as a “mission of generations”—a spiritual and historical duty passed down through time. For him, Greater Israel is not a fringe fantasy, but a strategic and ideological mission to be advanced under the cover of regional instability.
The Map of “Greater Israel”
The map Netanyahu now brandishes includes:
- All of historic Palestine (27,027 km²).
- Lebanon (10,452 km²).
- Jordan (89,213 km²).
- Over 70% of Syria’s territory (from its 185,180 km²).
- Half of Iraq (from its 438,317 km²).
- Around one-third of Saudi Arabia (from its 2,149,690 km²).
- A quarter of Egypt’s territory, approximately 1,000,000 km².
- A portion of Kuwait (17,818 km²).
In sum, the project of Greater Israel threatens the sovereignty of at least eight Arab states and endangers the stability of the entire Middle East.
Conclusion: The Mask Falls Off
Netanyahu’s endorsement of Greater Israel exposes the true face of Zionism: not a project of “security” or “peace,” but an expansionist colonial plan rooted in biblical mythology and pursued through war, settlement, and displacement.
By invoking scripture to justify conquest, Israel’s leaders echo the supremacist logic of past empires. But in today’s context, this project is not ancient history—it is unfolding in real time, through genocide in Gaza, annexation in the West Bank, and aggression against Lebanon and Syria.
The declaration of Greater Israel should serve as a wake-up call for the Arab and Muslim world, as well as for all advocates of justice: the occupation does not seek coexistence. It seeks domination, from the Nile to the Euphrates. And unless confronted with unity and resistance, the Zionist map will continue to expand—at the expense of Palestine and the region’s very future.
