By Global Solidarity for Peace in Palestine, May 9, 2026

Israel’s war against Palestinians in Gaza and the West bank is a canary in the coalmine. The war  illustrates a broader global shift toward technologically driven warfare with implications around the world. Increasingly, conflicts are shaped by artificial intelligence, mass surveillance, autonomous drones, and rapidly expanding military investment. Israeli military operations have demonstrated how AI systems can analyze vast datasets to generate targeting recommendations and accelerate military decision-making. These developments raise serious ethical concerns about automation in lethal force and the reduced role of human judgment in warfare.

At the same time, rising geopolitical tensions are driving major increases in global military spending and defense technology investment across the United States, the European Union, and parts of the Global South. This convergence of AI, surveillance technologies, and expanding defense budgets suggests the emergence of a new model of warfare. In response, Pope Leo XIV has warned that technological advances must remain guided by ethical responsibility and renewed commitments to peace and disarmament.

Key Data Points Supporting the Argument

• AI-driven targeting: Israeli intelligence reportedly used AI systems such as Lavender to generate large databases of suspected militants during the Gaza war (Abraham, 2024).
• Acceleration of warfare: Algorithmic analysis allows military planners to process intelligence far faster than traditional human-led intelligence review.
• Global military spending: Worldwide military expenditure reached $2.89 trillion in 2025, the highest level ever recorded (Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, 2026).
• Long-term spending growth: Global military expenditures increased by roughly 37% between 2015 and 2024 (SIPRI, 2025).
• AI warfare investment: The United States and other major powers are allocating tens of billions of dollars to AI-enabled defense systems and autonomous drones.
• Financial sector involvement: Governments in the USA and European Union are encouraging institutional investors—including pension funds—to support domestic defense industries.
• Global diffusion: Countries such as India, Brazil, and Turkey are expanding drone production and AI-enabled surveillance systems.
• Ethical concern: Pope Leo XIV has called for an “unarmed and disarming peace” and warned that AI in warfare must not replace human moral judgment.

GSPP Strategic Actions

Gaza:  Canary in the Coalmine

The war between the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, and Israel can increasingly be understood as a “canary in the coal mine” for wider global transformations in warfare. Beyond the immediate human tragedy, the conflict is revealing a new model of technologically driven war—one built around artificial intelligence, persistent surveillance, autonomous drones, and rapidly expanding military investment.

Recent investigations into Israeli military operations have documented the growing integration of artificial intelligence into battlefield decision-making. AI-assisted targeting systems reportedly analyze enormous volumes of surveillance data—communications metadata, satellite imagery, and behavioral patterns—to identify potential targets and accelerate strike decisions. One investigation reported that an Israeli system known as Lavender helped generate lists of suspected militants based on algorithmic analysis of intelligence data, potentially identifying tens of thousands of targets (Abraham, 2024; The Guardian, 2024).

Such systems allow military planners to process intelligence at speeds impossible for human analysts alone, transforming the tempo of warfare and dramatically expanding the scale of possible targeting. Scholars warn that this development represents a profound shift in how war is conducted. When algorithms generate targeting recommendations based on large datasets, the traditional process of human intelligence analysis can be partially replaced by automated pattern recognition. Critics argue that this risks lowering the threshold for lethal force and shifting life-and-death decisions toward opaque technological systems rather than accountable human judgment (Crawford, 2021; Human Rights Watch, 2020).

What makes these developments particularly significant is that military technologies rarely remain confined to a single battlefield. Historically, innovations tested in specific conflicts—from aerial bombardment to cyber warfare—rapidly diffuse through global arms markets, defense partnerships, and military alliances. In this sense, the Gaza war is functioning not only as a conflict but as a proving ground for emerging forms of algorithmic warfare.

The global context reinforces this concern. Military spending around the world has risen sharply in recent years. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), global military expenditure reached approximately $2.89 trillion in 2025, marking the eleventh consecutive year of increases in defense spending worldwide (SIPRI, 2026). Between 2015 and 2024 alone, world military spending rose by roughly 37 percent, reflecting intensifying geopolitical competition and expanding arms modernization programs (SIPRI, 2025).

These spending increases are closely linked to the rise of new military technologies. Governments across the United States and the European Union are investing heavily in artificial-intelligence systems, autonomous drones, and battlefield data networks. Recent U.S. defense planning proposals include tens of billions of dollars for AI-driven warfare systems and drone programs designed to transform future military operations (Guardian reporting on U.S. defense planning, 2026).

Financial systems are also becoming part of this shift. Governments and financial institutions in Europe and North America are increasingly encouraging large institutional investors—including sovereign wealth funds and pension funds—to support domestic defense industries as part of broader national security strategies. The European Union has introduced initiatives intended to incentivize defense investment and strengthen the continent’s military-industrial base (Council of the European Union, 2025).

At the same time, countries across the Global South are expanding their own military-technology capabilities. Nations such as India, Brazil, and Turkey are increasing investment in drone manufacturing, AI-enabled border surveillance, and digital security systems. These developments often occur in partnership with established military technology producers, including firms linked to Israeli and Western defense sectors.

Taken together, these trends suggest that the Gaza war is not simply a regional conflict but part of a broader transformation in global security politics. The convergence of AI, surveillance technologies, and expanding military investment is reshaping how wars are fought and how states organize power.

In this context, the moral concerns raised by Pope Leo XIV are particularly striking. In recent reflections on peace and technology, the pope warned that humanity risks entering an era in which technological progress accelerates the capacity for destruction without corresponding advances in ethical responsibility. He emphasized that artificial intelligence must never replace human moral judgment in decisions affecting life and death (Leo XIV, Address to the Diplomatic Corps, 2026).

At the same time, he has renewed the longstanding call within Catholic social teaching for disarmament and dialogue. Echoing teachings articulated earlier by Pope Francis, Pope Leo XIV has argued that lasting peace cannot be built through escalating militarization but through diplomacy, justice, and international cooperation. In his message for the World Day of Peace he called for an “unarmed and disarming peace,” warning that the normalization of permanent rearmament risks locking the world into cycles of insecurity (Leo XIV, World Day of Peace Message, 2026).

Seen in this light, the Gaza war may represent an early signal of a deeper global transformation. If current trends continue, the future of warfare could be defined less by human soldiers and more by networks of algorithms, autonomous systems, and continuous digital surveillance. The challenge facing the international community is therefore not only how to end a particular conflict, but how to prevent a new technological arms race from reshaping global politics in ways that undermine human dignity and the prospects for peace.

References

Abraham, Yuval. 2024. “‘Lavender’: The AI machine directing Israel’s bombing campaign in Gaza.” +972 Magazine.

Council of the European Union. 2025. EU initiatives to incentivize defense-related investment. Brussels.

Crawford, Kate. 2021. Atlas of AI: Power, Politics, and the Planetary Costs of Artificial Intelligence. Yale University Press.

Human Rights Watch. 2020. Stopping Killer Robots: Country Positions on Banning Fully Autonomous Weapons.

SIPRI. 2025. Trends in World Military Expenditure. Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

SIPRI. 2026. Global Military Spending Continues to Rise. Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

The Guardian. 2024. “Israel’s AI systems and targeting in Gaza.”

Leo XIV. 2026. Message for the World Day of Peace.

Leo XIV. 2026. Address to the Diplomatic Corps.

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