The bloody war in Gaza provided a valuable opportunity for the United States' major geopolitical opponents, China and Russia, to gain support worldwide, allowing these two authoritarian and authoritarian countries to take advantage of the wave of sympathy for the Palestinians and claim themselves as supporters of humanitarian values and peace.
China and Russia have maintained close relations with Israel for decades, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu even used his billboard with Russian President Vladimir Putin during last year's election. Despite this, both China and Russia clearly refuse to criticize Hamas's attack on southern Israel on October 7th this year, which sparked the war between Israel and Hamas.
In order to maintain distance from Israel, Russia and China have since focused on characterizing this war as part of the global anti American power struggle, while Israel has become just a pawn of the United States in the region.
Putin stated in a speech last week that when he saw Israel bombing Gaza, he "clenched his fists and had tears in his eyes". The Russian military has razed several cities in Ukraine to the ground. Putin stated that Russian soldiers in Ukraine are fighting against the same "source of evil" as the United States, and their battles "will determine the fate of Russia and the entire world, including the future of the Palestinian people.
  However, Chinese official media is filled with comments criticizing the United States for being "hypocritical" and "belligerent" in the Middle East, and comparing this performance with the Chinese government's demand for an immediate ceasefire and support for Palestinian statehood.
China has stated that its position on the Palestinian issue is the same as that of Russia. Last month, both China and Russia voted against a draft resolution proposed by the United States on the Palestinian crisis in the United Nations Security Council.
Zhang Jun, the Permanent Representative of China to the United Nations, said that relevant countries should uphold moral conscience, rather than being obsessed with geopolitical considerations, and should not engage in double standards. He is alluding to the United States. Zhang Jun stated that China will always stand on the side of justice, international law, and the legitimate aspirations of the Arab and Islamic worlds.
Last month, Russia's representative to the United Nations, Nibija, voted against a resolution supported by the United States on the conflict between Israel and Hamas.
Before the UN Security Council meeting, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, together with China's Permanent Representative to the United Nations Zhang Jun and the US Permanent Representative to the United Nations Greenfield, called for a settlement of the conflict.
Wang Huiyao, Chairman of the Center for China and Globalization think tank in Beijing and former government advisor, said that the difficulties in the Middle East should prompt the United States to abandon its long-standing hostility towards China.
Wang Huiyao said that the United States really should not treat China as an opponent The United States is facing the challenges of the Russo Ukrainian War, and now it will also face the challenges of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. They should not challenge China, but instead treat China as a partner and peacemaker, and cooperate with China on these global issues.
Hamas expressed appreciation for such signals. One of the main leaders of the organization, Khaled Meshaal, stated in a recent television program that Hamas is seeking "cooperation with major powers such as China and Russia". He also claimed that Russia benefited from the October 7th attack as it diverted US attention from Ukraine, and that China may have been inspired by the Hamas raid and could be used in China's plan to seize Taiwan. Unlike Russia and China, most Western countries such as the United States view Hamas as a terrorist organization. On October 7th, members of the organization killed approximately 1400 Israelis and took hundreds of others hostage.
Despite extensive verbal communication, neither Russia nor China has the ability or willingness to actively intervene in the Middle East region as the United States forcefully returns. The United States has deployed three aircraft carrier groups and important aircraft and air defense assets in the Middle East to protect its partners and allies. But with this diplomatic stance alone, China and Russia have enhanced their soft power in the entire developing world, and in recent weeks, the anger of developing countries over the thousands of civilian casualties caused by Israel's bombing of Gaza has continued to intensify. Colombia, Chile, and South Africa have recalled ambassadors from Israel in protest. Bolivia has completely severed diplomatic relations with Israel.
Li Mingjiang, a Chinese foreign policy expert at Nanyang Technical University of Singapore, said that for China, supporting the Palestinian cause will help China unite with developing countries on a global scale. He said that big country politics is another factor, and China is aware of the political opportunities brought by opposing the US position with most countries in the world.
Russian soldiers in Grozny. Putin became president in 2000 and flattened the city during the Chechen War.
Last year, a Russian soldier in Mariupol, Ukraine. According to city officials, at least 25000 Ukrainian civilians died during the months long Russian siege last year.
Russia has been subjected to Western sanctions and global criticism for its invasion of Ukraine, and it is more eager to change the public opinion landscape and break its own isolation.
Nikolay Kozhanov, a former Russian diplomat stationed in Tehran and currently serving as a professor at Qatar University, said, "It is understandable to choose a policy that can bring Russia closer to the Arab world. Due to the Ukrainian issue, the 'global south' is now very important to Moscow." He said, "Russia realizes that the events in Gaza are driving the 'global south' away from the West and the United States, And may make its attitude towards Moscow more enthusiastic and friendly
Russia's past record in Ukraine and elsewhere is full of atrocities. Putin took office as president in 2000, and as soon as he took office, he flattened Grozny, the capital of the then rebellious Muslim Chechen Republic. In Syria, a bombing operation launched by Russia in 2016 left most of the city of Aleppo in ruins. In the city of Mariupol in Ukraine, the Russian Air Force can conduct bombings without worrying about air defense systems. According to city officials, at least 25000 Ukrainian civilians were killed during the months long Russian siege last year. Due to the fact that the United Nations and other independent organizations have never been allowed to enter Mariupol, victims are often pushed into ruins or buried in mass graves, so the true number of deaths may never be known.
Meanwhile, according to US officials, China has detained up to 1 million Muslims (equivalent to the entire adult population of the Gaza Strip) in detention camps in its western region of Xinjiang. China calls these detention camps vocational training centers, and most major Muslim countries have not criticized China's crackdown policies in Xinjiang.
In the 'Muslim world', this issue does not resonate as much as the Palestinian issue, "said Neysun Mahboubi, director of the Future Program for US China Relations at the University of Pennsylvania. He stated that as the Ukrainian war damaged Russia's global appeal and the United States was criticized for supporting Israel, "China has the opportunity to shape a responsible image as a major world power, even more so than its competitors, including the United States.
The picture shows a detention center located in Xinjiang, China. According to US officials, China has detained up to 1 million Muslims in its western region of Xinjiang in detention camps.
Russia and China have a long history of being involved in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The Soviet Union, which once regarded Arab monarchies as agents of Western imperialism, voted in support of the establishment of a Jewish state at the United Nations General Assembly in 1947 and became the first country to recognize Israel after Israel declared independence the following year. The Soviet Union also ensured Israel's survival by transporting weapons to Czechoslovakia under its control. But the Soviet Union severed diplomatic relations with Israel in 1967 and quickly became one of the main military supporters of the latter's Arab hostile countries. During that period, the CPC did not recognize Israel at all.
It was not until the end of the Cold War that Russia and China established embassies in Tel Aviv. With hundreds of thousands of Russian Jews settling in Israel and Israel becoming an important channel for Western technology to enter China, the relationship between China, Russia, and Israel has rapidly expanded. In 2018, during his visit to Moscow, Netanyahu wore the St. George's Ribbon during his meeting with Putin, a symbol of Russian military glory and a symbol of support for Russia's invasion of Ukraine.  
After the Hamas attack on October 7th, the Biden government supported Israel in exercising its right to self-defense.
Tuvia Gering, a China expert at the Institute for National Security Studies of Tel Aviv University, said that the current crisis and the support provided by the Biden administration so far indicate that only a strong alliance with the United States can protect Israel.
Israel has no choice, "he said. China is not neutral. China opposes Israel and provides convenience for those who want to eliminate us. China is indifferent to our suffering and uses it to seek geopolitical benefits for itself
Putin used to value Israel's neutrality and unwillingness to impose sanctions on the Ukrainian war with Western countries. For him, the changes in Russia's own demographic structure can to some extent explain the new friction with Israel. It is estimated that about a quarter of the population in Russia is currently Muslim, and due to the high birth rate in Muslim regions and large-scale immigration from Central Asia, the proportion of Muslim population is still on the rise.
The bloodshed in Gaza has sparked riots in several Muslim republics in the North Caucasus. In late October, with rumors suggesting that Jewish immigrants to Israel in the region would return as refugees, local security organizations raided hotels, searching for Jewish tourists, and on October 29th, after a scheduled flight from Tel Aviv landed at Mahachikara International Airport, they stormed into the airport, waving Palestinian flags and shouting "Allah is the greatest". Afterwards, the Russian authorities arrested about 200 people.
However, a more important factor was Putin's push to restore Soviet era norms, which included rewriting textbooks, erecting a monument to Stalin, and dismantling all remnants of Russia's democratic system. This also means restoring friendly relations with Soviet era allies, such as North Korea.
All of this is part of Russia's overall return to the Soviet era, its return to Soviet thinking, and its return to Soviet tradition, "said Andrei Kozyrev, a former Russian foreign minister and now residing in the West. This is in line with the overall policy of the New Soviet to confront the West. Now, it's Israel's turn