On 14 June 2025, five Western nations — Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Norway, and the United Kingdom — jointly imposed sanctions on two senior Israeli ministers: Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich.

These far-right figures are central to Israel’s governing coalition and have long advocated policies widely regarded as extremist, including the expansion of illegal settlements and the mass displacement of Palestinians.

The sanctions, limited to travel bans and asset freezes, were intended to signal growing discontent with Israel’s actions in Gaza. As of June 2025, more than 37,000 Palestinians — many of them women and children — have been killed in Gaza, according to health authorities. The International Court of Justice has warned of a plausible case of genocide, and humanitarian agencies report famine-like conditions in northern Gaza. Yet, major Western states, including the US, continue to supply arms to Israel and shield it diplomatically at the United Nations. The Israeli military campaign continues unabated.

This raises an uncomfortable, but urgent question: do targeted sanctions on individuals make any meaningful difference when the violence is driven by systemic, institutional forces?

Sanctioning Ben-Gvir and Smotrich might seem like a bold move, but it risks being interpreted as political theatre. Both ministers are indeed influential and inflammatory. Ben-Gvir, Minister of National Security, has publicly called for harsher measures against Palestinians and openly incited settlers in the West Bank. Smotrich, Minister of Finance and a key player in settlement expansion, once declared that “there’s no such thing as a Palestinian people".

But they are not rogue actors – they are integral members of a government coalition that enjoys strong domestic backing. Their views are reflected, or at least tolerated, by many within the Israeli political mainstream. Targeting them without addressing the broader machinery of war — military logistics, foreign aid, arms sales, and diplomatic shielding — does little to alter Israel’s operational capacity or political direction.

There are historical parallels where partial sanctions miss the mark. The case of Syria is a good example. Since the onset of Syria’s civil war in 2011, the US and the European Union imposed sweeping sanctions on the Assad regime. The Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act, enacted in 2020, targeted senior Syrian officials and entities associated with human rights abuses.

These sanctions succeeded in isolating much of Assad’s economic network. But they also deepened the humanitarian crisis. UN assessments and multiple humanitarian organisations have warned that sanctions contributed to shortages in food, fuel, and medicine, compounding the suffering of ordinary Syrians while doing little to shake the regime’s grip on power. Assad remained in control — bolstered by Russian and Iranian support — and his forces continued to act with impunity.

The lesson is clear: unless sanctions are part of a broader diplomatic and strategic framework, they often punish populations more than policymakers.

Unlike Syria, Israel is not an isolated pariah state. It is deeply integrated into Western economic and security systems. The US provides Israel with US$3.8 billion annually in military aid under a 10-year agreement signed in 2016. In April 2024, amid global concern over civilian casualties in Gaza, the US nonetheless approved a new shipment of precision-guided munitions to Israel.

This kind of material support, along with consistent vetoes in the UN Security Council to shield Israel from international censure, enables a sense of impunity. Ben-Gvir and Smotrich may be sanctioned, but the bombs continue to fall, and the siege on Gaza persists.

The disconnect is striking: while individual ministers are targeted as symbols of extremism, the systems that facilitate mass violence remain untouched.

Sanctions can be effective when they target the real levers of power. In the case of South Africa’s apartheid regime, for example, broad-based sanctions and disinvestment campaigns played a critical role in eroding the regime’s legitimacy and economic sustainability.

But effective sanctions require coherence and consistency. A handful of symbolic measures — especially when not accompanied by restrictions on arms sales or diplomatic cover — risk becoming morally hollow. They provide the appearance of action without consequence.

If the international community is serious about preventing further atrocities in Gaza, it must ask itself: are we sanctioning individuals to feel better, or are we willing to confront the deeper structures that sustain violence?

Until then, ordinary Palestinians will continue to suffer – not because the world did nothing, but because it did not do enough.

The views expressed in this article may or may not reflect those of Pearls and Irritations.