Category Archives: Gaza

Gaza, Israel, Palestine, United Nations, United States

Donald Trump’s Board of Peace

BOARD OF PEACE

Intro: This newly created body was supposed to give Gaza a future, but the US president is using it to attack and undermine the UN, international law, and multilateralism

Just a cursory glance at the logo of the Board of Peace tells you all you need to know. It is the globe and laurels of the UN – only gold, because this is Donald Trump’s initiative, and shows little of the world beyond North America.

The charter of the board, formally launched at the World Economic Forum in Davos just days ago, suggests that this is less America First than Trump Always. It is not “the US president” but Mr Trump himself who is named as chair, for as long as he wishes. He can choose his successor, decide the agenda, and axe whomever he chooses – even if they have down-paid the $1bn demanded for permanent membership. It is the institutional expression of his belief that he is bound not by law but “my own morality, my own mind”.

The body was born and constituted through subterfuge: the UN security council authorised a board of peace chaired by Mr Trump to oversee administration and reconstruction in Gaza. There were misgivings about the colonialist model and the free rein given to the US president, as well as the vagueness of the resolution. A desire to ensure his buy-in to a ceasefire won its passage.

What the US has created is something entirely different. The board’s charter does not mention Gaza once. A man increasingly fixated on landgrabs now heads an “international peace-building body” to replace “failed” institutions. To what extent this is a serious attempt to encroach upon, if not supplant, the UN, versus a symbolic declaration of power and creation of another forum for polishing his ego, is unclear. The early signs indicate that Mr Trump has overplayed his hand again. His claim that Vladimir Putin had joined (Putin disagreed) made it easier for the UK and others to back away from an offer they were not supposed to refuse.

Benjamin Netanyahu, another leader indicted by the International Criminal Court, will sit alongside stakeholders from Belarus, Uzbekistan, and Hungary. Eight Muslim-majority states, including Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Turkey have together agreed to join. Traditional US allies, however, are conspicuously absent. It remains unclear how others can make themselves heard on Gaza’s future if they rightly shun a deliberate attempt to undermine multilateral institutions. But they must. The already difficult, almost intractable task of winning peace in Gaza and justice for Palestinians has been further compromised. With an executive board – featuring Tony Blair and Mr Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner – and a Gaza executive board containing regional officials, Palestinians are relegated to a fourth-tier technocratic committee.

For 2 million Palestinians enduring a brutal winter amid the ruins and ongoing bombardment by the Israeli Defence Force, the presentation of plans for the next 100 days by Palestinian and US officials suggests that the administration has not totally lost interest. Mr Kushner’s ambitious proposals will displease those on the Israeli right who want to displace Palestinians entirely. Increases in aid, the reopening of the Rafah crossing, repairs to essential infrastructure, and the reconstruction of homes and hospitals are all desperately needed. But what will materialise and on what terms?

Mr Trump’s real-estate fixation and desire to be applauded as a peacemaker may be the best hope of keeping him engaged, and reducing Netanyahu’s sway. Nonetheless, the rights of Palestinians are most certainly being treated as an irrelevant detail. That cannot stand. Mr Trump has contempt for international law; others must continue to strive to defend it.

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Aid, Foreign Policy, Gaza, Israel, Middle East, Palestine

Decisive action is needed in Gaza if it is to be saved

ISRAEL-GAZA WAR

Intro: Palestinians need deeds, not words

THE UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher has signalled his fears that thousands of babies are at imminent risk of death in Gaza unless aid reaches them. Inconceivable, is that Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s Prime Minister, is concerned that foreign politicians could now see too many graphic pictures of Palestinian children in dire need of aid and is doing everything in his power to censor and suppress such images.

Two months after all supplies were cut off, the Israeli government denies the obvious truth: that Gaza is on the brink of famine. A few days ago, Netanyahu announced that “minimal” aid deliveries would restart, adding that his country’s “greatest friends in the world” had told him that they could not “accept images of… mass hunger”. His entirely cynical response saw a handful of aid trucks permitted to cross into Gaza. Reportedly, 100 aid deliveries a day will now be permitted, but even if that happens that is still grotesquely inadequate given the vast scale of need. Reaching the most vulnerable will be perilous and extremely dangerous anyway amid Israel’s intensified offensive. Netanyahu vowed that Israel would “take control” of all of Gaza.

His words show both that Western allies can shift Israel’s behaviour, and that they are insufficiently willing to do so. The trickle of supplies is meant to ensure the continuation of a war that enables his political survival, but has killed almost 54,000 Palestinians. That death toll may be a grave underestimate, say many researchers.

Foreign leaders are finally stirring as Palestinians starve and the enormity of Israel’s plan sinks in. Britain, France, and Canada have described conditions in Gaza as intolerable and have threatened further “concrete” actions if Israel’s “egregious” campaign continues and aid restrictions are not lifted. An unrepentant Netanyahu accused the trio of “offering a huge prize” for the murderous Hamas attack of 7 October 2023, which triggered Israel’s assault. In a separate statement, 23 other countries including Australia and New Zealand, condemned the aid blockade and ongoing military offensive. And, the European Commission has launched a review of trade ties with Israel. Relatives of Israeli hostages continue to press for a ceasefire and release deal. Outrage has also broken through in mainstream domestic politics in Israel, with Yair Golan, opposition leader of the Democrats, saying that his country was “on the path to becoming a pariah state”.

The growing condemnation is spurred not only by the grotesque suffering in Gaza and ministers’ explicit calls for ethnic cleansing but also by a growing new gap between Netanyahu and the Trump administration. On his recent Middle East tour, Donald Trump didn’t bother stopping in Israel and repeatedly overrode its interests – on Syria, on the Houthis, and on Iran. He has emboldened the Israeli government’s annihilationist approach and would be happy to see a Gaza without Palestinians, but seems now to be tiring of the conflict. Nonetheless, any perceived shift in approach should not be overstated. Support for Israel endures in Washington even as other governments think again.

Others must match rhetoric with action. The UK foreign secretary, David Lammy, condemned the “repellent” words of the extremist minister Bezalel Smotrich. But suspending trade talks is barely a start. The same goes for the sanctioning of settler activists: imposing sanctions on Mr Smotrich and his colleague Itamar Ben-Gvir should have happened some time ago. The UK should follow the example of France, which has said it is “determined” to recognise a Palestinian state. Most of all, it should ensure that no arms, including parts for F-35 fighter jets, continue to reach Israel. Until it does so, it will be complicit in these war crimes.

The US has the ability to stop the slaughter and achieve a desperately needed ceasefire. But pressure from other allies can make a difference. If they care about saving lives – and not just their own optics – it really is time for decisive action.

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Britain, Gaza, Government, Israel, Middle East, Politics, Society, United States

A region in flames

MIDDLE EAST

Intro: One year on from the 7 October attacks, the region is slipping deeper into war. The conflict continues to destroy countless lives. The scenes from Gaza since that fateful day have haunted millions around the world and the crisis is being felt with increasing intensity in Lebanon and the West Bank

THE last twelve months has been a period of slaughter and destruction for the Middle East. Far from any awakening from this nightmare, the region is slipping deeper into war. Israel is planning a “significant and serious” retaliation against Iran for its missile attack. The cycle of retribution is spinning faster, with the conflagration feared growing closer. Once more, civilians are paying the price.

On 7 October 2023, more than 1,200 men, women, and children were killed at a family festival in Israel by Hamas fighters who had crossed from Gaza: the largest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust, in the country built to guarantee their safety. Another 250 – the youngest nine months old – were taken hostage. Though around half were subsequently released, many have yet to return home. Others never will.

The ensuing Israeli onslaught on Gaza has killed almost 43,000 Palestinians; most were women and children, including hundreds of infants. The chilling abbreviation WCNSF – wounded child, no surviving family – has become commonplace. The survivors are displaced, hungry, and desperate, and the humanitarian catastrophe grows as Israel pursues its war in the wasteland. The last year has also been the deadliest for Palestinians in the occupied West Bank. Already 2,000 people are dead in Lebanon.

Israel was embraced with sympathy in the wake of the Hamas attacks. Its right to defend itself does not permit it to trample the laws of war. Ministers and politicians have openly expressed – in the words of prominent Israelis – “the discourse of annihilation, expulsion, and revenge”. That speaks of the impact of permanent occupation; this story did not begin twelve months ago. Benjamin Netanyahu’s determination to remain prime minister, and the zealotry of his political partners, have prevailed over the lives of Israeli hostages as well as Palestinians.

Hezbollah’s leaders too lie dead. The fear of another 7 October is understandably strengthened when Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, praises “a legitimate act”. But Israel’s tactical success to date against Hamas and Hezbollah is not the same as a strategic triumph. Military victory is a mirage. Israeli citizens are under immediate threat from an expanded war and the destruction of other homes and families is no foundation for their long-term, sustainable security.

Israel is now increasingly isolated, not because outsiders did not register the horror of 7 October, but because they cannot ignore the grave suffering of Palestinians. Netanyahu and his defence minister, Yoav Gallant, stand accused of crimes against humanity at the international criminal court. The international court of justice has ruled that Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories is illegal, calling for immediate withdrawal and reparations, and in January ordered it to ensure no genocidal acts are committed in Gaza. While the US continues to ship arms to an ally that ignores its warnings, others are recoiling.

The release of hostages and a ceasefire in Gaza – and now Lebanon too – become only more urgent as the months pass. Power-hungry men of hatred have pursued a war in which innocent men, women, and children across the region have died. Ending it requires diplomacy addressing not only the immediate crisis but long-term security needs, including a fair settlement for Palestinians.

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