‘I stand with Iran’, says Arundhati Roy calls Indian govt ‘spineless and gutless’

‘On brink of nuclear calamity’

A man passes in front of a destroyed building which was hit by an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, Beirut’s southern suburbs, Lebanon, Tuesday. (AP Photo)

Roy drew a direct line between the conflict in Iran and the ongoing war in Gaza, calling the latest military campaign “the same old genocide, using the same old playbook, murdering women and children, bombing hospitals, carpet bombing cities, and then playing the victim.”

She warned that unlike Gaza, Iran’s involvement dramatically expanded the risk of global catastrophe. “The theatre of this new war could expand to consume the whole world,” she said. “We are on the brink of nuclear calamity and economic collapse.”

Roy invoked the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, suggesting that the United States could be readying itself to attack “one of the most ancient civilizations in the world.”

“I stand with Iran unequivocally,” she declared.

Sharp words for India

Much of Roy’s address was reserved for the Indian government, which she accused of abandoning its historical dignity and independence in favour of what she called craven deference to the United States.

“I am ashamed of how gutless and spineless our government has been,” she said. “Long ago, we were a poor country of very poor people, but we had pride, we had dignity. Today we are a rich country with very poor, unemployed people who are fed on a diet of hatred, poison and falsehoods instead of real food.”

Roy criticised Prime Minister Narendra Modi for travelling to Israel and embracing Benjamin Netanyahu shortly before Israeli military operations expanded, and for signing what she called a “groveling trade deal” with the United States, a deal she said sold Indian farmers and the textile industry “down the river,” only for the US Supreme Court to then declare Donald Trump’s tariffs illegal.

She also spoke of the plight of Indian migrant workers sent to Israel during the Gaza conflict to replace expelled Palestinian labourers, citing reports that the same Indian workforce was being denied access to bomb shelters while Israelis took refuge inside them.

“Who has put us into this absolutely humiliating, shameless, disgusting place in the world?” she asked.

‘Change must come from the people’

Roy was careful to distinguish between condemning foreign governments and endorsing any particular regime. “Any regimes that need changing, including the US, Israel and ours, need to be changed by the people,” she said, “not by some bloated, lying, cheating, greedy, resource-grabbing, bomb-dropping imperial power and its allies who are trying to bully the whole world into submission.”

The speech, first reported by The Wire, quickly drew widespread attention online. Roy is no stranger to controversy. A longtime activist and essayist, she has previously spoken out against nuclear weapons, the conflict in Kashmir, and corporate land acquisition.