Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro was kidnapped by the United States. Photo: via Donald Trump Truth Social account.
By Robert Inlakesh – Jan 7, 2026
A US invasion reveals deeper strategic goals tied to Israel’s push to weaken Iran, reshape Latin America, and consolidate control over global energy resources.
The overthrow of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro may appear to be a development that, on the face of things, has nothing to do with Israel, especially as Caracas seems too far away from Tel Aviv and its orbit. Yet, this move has a lot more to do with securing Israeli interests than meets the eye.
Following the US invasion of Venezuela and kidnapping of its sitting President, officials in the Trump administration couldn’t wait to express their joy for Israel in such a moment.
The fragrant violation of Article 2, Section 4, of the United Nations Charter barely even registered much blowback on the international stage, although this should barely come as much of a surprise.
Within 24 hours of the operation to kidnap President Maduro, which resulted in the deaths of around 40 Venezuelans and 32 Cuban soldiers, US President Donald Trump had already let the cat out of the bag; he invaded to seize the oil. But then came a slew of other comments that obsessed over the fact that this attack on Caracas comes to the benefit of Israel.
There are two primary propaganda arguments, aside from President Trump’s oil endeavor admissions, that are used to try and justify what just occurred. The most prominent claim is that President Maduro was the head of a “Narco-terrorist” empire, blaming him for the ongoing fentanyl crisis in North America. According to the New York Times, US officials and narcotics experts not only ruled this excuse out as implausible, but concluded that Venezuela doesn’t even produce fentanyl.
The second most prominent argument behind this is that Venezuela was allied with Russia, China, and, more importantly, Iran. From there, Washington-based pro-Israeli think tanks, from the Foundation for Defense of Democracies to the Atlantic Council, have pushed a range of fact-free conspiracy theories regarding Hezbollah and Hamas alliances with Caracas, which they have claimed pose a direct threat to the US.
US Ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, openly expressed this during a recent interview with Newsmax, commenting on the kidnapping of Maduro, asserting that the regime change operation was a massive victory for Tel Aviv because of its impact on Iran. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio also highlighted the Iran angle, as have many others.
What Does Israel Gain?
There are three primary goals in the overthrow of the Venezuelan leadership:
Asserting US dominance across Latin America
Control over oil and other resources
Supporting Israeli dominance
Ignoring the Israel aspect to the equation is something that most analysts decided to do during the months leading up to the US invasion of Venezuela, robbing their viewers/readers of vital context that is crucial to understanding this move’s repercussions.
While the US Trump administration openly seeks to rule “our hemisphere”, doing away with the concept of national sovereignty and international law, his Israeli partners are doing the exact same thing in a different region of the world, seeking to achieve their so-called “Greater Israel Project”. Greater American imperial domination aids and legitimizes this project, and so does Washington’s control over Venezuela’s oil.
See, Venezuela has the world’s largest oil reserves, which means that controlling them equates to more leverage over West Asia, in particular the Gulf Arab States. One of the most threatening tools at Iran’s disposal, in the event of war with the US, is closing the Gulf of Hormuz, which would halt the flow of oil from the entire Persian Gulf area.
In addition to this, the US could, hypothetically, now use its control over Venezuela’s vast oil deposits in order to pressure Gulf States, in particular Saudi Arabia. Riyadh has long been the crown jewel of the US’s so-called “Abraham Accords” normalization deal agenda, yet the Saudi leadership has refused to take the step toward such a deal as of yet. Greater control over global oil reserves means greater potential to weaponize this vital resource.
Furthermore, the Israelis also benefit from seeing a US-puppet regime in Caracas on the diplomatic front. Tel Aviv has seen itself demoted to a global pariah due to its genocide in Gaza, so part and parcel of fixing its global standing is for more governments to come to power that will side with it. All client regimes of the United States are forced to throw their weight behind Israel.
Circling back to the so-called Abraham Accords, the Israelis were struggling to find anyone to join this project, and in the absence of Saudi Arabia, it had stalled altogether. The latest member to join the normalization pact was Kazakhstan, a totally insignificant development, especially considering that Astana had normalized ties with Tel Aviv way back in 1992.
Therefore, the Israeli government pivoted and decided to launch a new initiative, called the “Isaac Accords”, publicly announced first by the US puppet President of Argentina, Javier Milei. The goal here was for the Israelis to establish strong ties across Latin America, using the opportunities associated with the success of right-wing movements and US-backed coups, in order to forge new opportunities.
Keep in mind that the Israelis have historically sold weapons and provided military training to various US-backed militias and regimes across Latin America, infamously including the regime of former Chilean leader Augusto Pinochet.
Following October 7, 2023, it was South Africa that filed its case in the International Court of Justice (ICJ) against Israel for committing genocide. Keep in mind that 7 of the initial 15 nations that filed interventions in support of the case were Cuba, Mexico, Belize, Nicaragua, Colombia, Bolivia, and Chile, all from the region where Israel now seeks to form its “Isaac Accords” alliance.
Immediately following the US attack on Venezuela, the Trump administration has spared no time in taking aim at Cuba and Colombia, even threatening military action, while threats have also been issued against Mexico and Nicaragua. Bolivia and Chile have already lost their left-wing leadership through last year’s elections, too. It is obvious that every country that has stood on the side of the Palestinians is being targeted by the US, and the Israelis are evidently there lobbying for this too, because they understand the benefits of reshaping Latin America.
Marco Rubio is himself a member of the Cuban diaspora and clearly has a personal motivation for seeking regime change in Havana, which appears to be the next on Washington’s regional target list. It has to be said that Rubio is also the recipient of at least $1,013,563 in Israel Lobby funds.
Regime change in Venezuela serves the Israeli agenda in more ways than just a reshaping of regional alliances; it helps further set the stage for another attack on Iran. In Tel Aviv, they view this as another chink in Tehran’s armor, as it loses another ally in Venezuela, just as it lost its ally in Syria. This is why Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was one of the chief cheerleaders for this illegal attack on Venezuela and why prominent pro-Israeli voices in the media were also in support of it.
Robert Inlakesh
Documentary Filmmaker, Journalist, Writer and Political Analyst. Inlakesh regularly contributes to Al Mayadeen.
