Category Archives: Palestine

History, Israel, Middle East, Palestine, United States

Palestine: Another body blow for peace

GAZA BORDER

Gaza

THE shocking images of slaughter at the Gaza border earlier this week are a public relations disaster for Israel. At this very moment in time when the Jewish state is marking the 70th anniversary of its foundation, its government finds itself the target of global anger and outrage.

An occasion which may perhaps been one for national pride is now badly tarnished by media coverage of its soldiers shooting teenagers and civilian protestors.

History, of course, has always offered fuel for such controversy in this combustible region. It is filled with the legacies of territorial disputes and religious clashes. Israel’s “birthday” was always likely to provoke some sort of turmoil.

For the creation of the state of Israel is a source of profound grievance to many Palestinians, who believe that their people were driven off their own land and displaced into Lebanon, the West Bank and the Gaza strip.

In this narrative of despair, they feel they were robbed of their livelihoods and their nationhood through the event known as the “Nakba” or the “Catastrophe” whose anniversary fell on May 15, 2018.

Tensions were always bound to be high at this period, particularly as Palestinian demonstrators – some of them crudely armed – gathered on the border with Israel to demand the right of return to the home of their forebears.

But what has really ignited the powder keg was the decision by the White House to move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to the divided city of Jerusalem, which the state of Israel regards as its capital.

It is a step that has inflamed discord with the Palestinians, who lay claim to the eastern part of the city and whose Muslim faith has several sacred sites within its walls, as of course do Jews.

It was the fear of inflaming tensions that prevented a succession of US presidents, including Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, from implementing a pledge to shift the American embassy to Jerusalem.

But Donald Trump, never a man to follow political precedent, has ignored such doubts.

He adopted his stance partly because he has always been a big admirer of Israel and is deeply suspicious of Muslim fundamentalism in the region, as he demonstrated in his decision to pull out of the Iran nuclear deal – a policy that was eagerly welcomed by the Israeli government of Benjamin Netanyahu.

Mr Trump also has close personal ties to Israel, for his daughter Ivanka is married to Jared Kushner, whose family has donated money to Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

For the Palestinians, all of this is highly provocative, making a mockery of US talk about the need for a peaceful solution to the long-standing conflict. This mood of anger is also sedulously cultivated by Hamas, the ruthless terrorist organisation which runs Gaza and relies on the culture of victimhood to maintain its iron grip on power.

That is why it has always been more interested in fomenting bitterness and hatred towards Israel than in improving living standards in the Gaza strip. And why the fact that so many martyrs have died – or been sacrificed – suits its cause.

Endlessly exploiting the climate of indignation, Hamas continually preaches the apocalyptic gospel of the armed struggle and martyrdom.

The interests of Hamas are served by turning a youthful, seething, radicalised population’s anger towards Israel.

That is the opposite of what Israel wants on its border with Gaza. Many British people, viewing the heart-rending reports of bloodshed, will understandably feel that the Israeli authorities grossly over-reacted to the demonstrations.

However, there are two crucial considerations to bear in mind about the Israeli response. First, one of the central themes of the radical Palestinian movement is to reclaim former homelands that are now Israeli territory. It is a drive called “The Great March of Return”.

 

YET, by its very nature, this would threaten the very existence of the state of Israel. The security forces must therefore feel that, however savage the consequences, they cannot allow thousands of protesters in a human wave to cross the border and squat in Israel.

Second, although most of the demonstrators were unarmed, some definitely were. Hamas’s cynical eagerness to exploit the discontent means that there were bound to have been hardened insurgents in the crowd, carrying knives, guns, petrol bombs or even rocket launchers.

The entire experience of Israeli history over the last 70 years is filled with attacks from its enemies. Almost every flashpoint becomes another challenge to the state’s right to exist. That is why the Israeli forces must be so vigilant.

It could be that the hard-line tactics actually work in deterring further border demonstrations. But the tough response could have the opposite effect, emboldening Hamas and fuelling radical fury as well as sympathy for the Palestinians from abroad.

Certainly, there is little doubt that the region will descend into further strife. In the face of the casualties caused by Israeli guns, the more moderate Palestinians, headed by Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and a traditional Arab secular nationalist, have been pushed to make radical protests too, to keep pace with popular anger.

Hamas will continue to say that figures such as Abbas have achieved nothing with their impulse to compromise, with the result that force now must be used.

Similarly, the rapprochement between Israel and Arab states such as Saudi Arabia and Jordan – inspired by their shared fear of a dominant Shia Iran – could now break down.

The three nations formed a close alliance in opposition to president Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria.

But what is certain is that it will now be far more difficult for any predominately Muslim state to work with Israel. For those who may have hoped that Palestinian people-power protests would help bring harmony, this is another bitter disappointment in a region scarred by decades of lost opportunities for peace.

. Reference and appendage:

Six Day War

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Government, Israel, Middle East, Palestine, Politics, United States

Gaza: For a ceasefire to last there needs to be serious negotiation…

PALESTINE

Israel began its latest campaign against Hamas on July 8th. The mounting toll of innocents in Gaza should be reason enough for anyone with heartfelt compassion to demand a ceasefire. Gaza, and the Palestinians who live there, deserve more than just temporary truces, sometimes lasting for just a few hours, after which the attacks from Israel appear more aggressive and disproportionate. Since the start of the ongoing offensive more than 700 Palestinians have been killed with hundreds more injured – most of them civilians and many of them children. Some 35 Israelis have been killed, including three civilians.

It was after the ground invasion of Gaza on July 18th when the casualty rate on both sides soared. Hospitals have been hit and scores of buildings flattened, often with women and children inside. A single Palestinian family of 25, accused of sheltering a Hamas militant during a Ramadan fast was wiped out.

A ceasefire that attempted to revert to nothing more than the status quo would be a grievous mistake. If a more durable peace is to be built, the Israelis must seek a sovereign state for Palestinians. But they, including Hamas, must commit and reiterate their support for a government that disavows violence and recognises Israel. Unless a ceasefire is delivered on such terms, the invective poison of hatred will stir up all over again and the cycle of violence will be repeated, as it has done repeatedly since 2007.

In May, talks of a peace deal foundered. But one reason to be more optimistic now is that both sides have seen how a war has been ignited that neither really wanted. Israel has incurred higher military casualties than it had been expecting.

According to John Kerry, America’s Secretary of State, those recent talks broke down because of Israel. In frustration, Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinians’ moderate leader, formed a unity government that Hamas backed. Whereas the US administration cautiously welcomed this development, Binyamin Netanyahu, Israel’s Prime Minister, railed against it, fearing a united Palestinian front. When in June three Israeli students wrongly identified as soldiers were kidnapped and murdered on the West Bank, the Israeli government instantly blamed the crime on Hamas. The group refused to claim responsibility for it, and subsequently rounded up more than 500 of its members who then, in retaliation, unleashed its multiplying rocket fire at Israel. Some of Hamas’ rockets have reached as far away as Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, one of which landed just a mile away from Israel’s international airport. These continuing missile launches led Mr Netanyahu to mobilise his forces and attack Gaza in the manner in which he has.

There can be no doubt that Israel’s first stated military aim is a legitimate one. That is focused on destroying Hamas’s stockpile of rockets, thousands of which have been fired indiscriminately in to Israel in the past decade, killing a score of Israelis and frightening millions more. Over time, the missiles’ range and sophistication have increased.

A new aim, also legitimate, is to destroy Hamas’s delicate infrastructure, especially the tunnels that provide access to Israeli territory. Guerrillas are sent in to murder Israelis, or to kidnap them as a means of barter for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails.

Nevertheless, war is not only about aims but conduct. Israel is wrong to hit buildings with no evident military purpose and houses packed with civilians, even if householders are harbouring Hamas fighters and its officials. Israel should know that this is always likely to be counterproductive. As the death toll among Gazans rises, Hamas will always be in a better position to promote its cause.

To stop the internecine warfare Hamas must stop firing its rockets into Israel. In return, Israel must commit and agree to honour an agreement from 2012 to lift the siege that has immiserated Gaza’s inhabitants since 2007 in an effort to marginalise Hamas. And Israel should free, or put on trial, some of the hundreds of Hamas prisoners rounded up over the past month on the West Bank, the larger part of a would-be Palestinian state.

Yet, the catastrophe and events that continually befall Gaza stems fundamentally from the refusal of Israel to negotiate in good faith to let the Palestinians have a proper state encompassing both Gaza and the West Bank. Why, many ask, does Mr Netanyahu still allow the building of Jewish settlements there, which makes the creation of a workable Palestinian state even less likely to emerge?

Whilst real mediation is necessary, geopolitically the region is extremely fraught. Egypt has to be involved, but its new military rulers detest the Islamists of Hamas as much as Israel does. Turkey and Qatar could help Hamas towards moderation but are loathed by Israel. The United States is still the one global player that has the political weight, however diminished, to bring everyone to the table. Mr Kerry has to do more than just stop the rockets.

 

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Foreign Affairs, Israel, Middle East, Palestine, United Nations, United States

The cynical invasion of Gaza by Israel…

GAZA

Intro: Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza, which began last Thursday, becomes its fourth such war on the Palestinian strip in the past decade

With the Israeli armed forces having kicked off the latest episode in a 66-year-old conflict, the brutality and cynicism of its actions suggests resolution is further away than ever.

Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza, which began last Thursday, becomes its fourth such war on the Palestinian strip in the past decade. Following its withdrawal from the densely populated enclave in 2005, Israel sent its troops back in 2006 and 2008. In 2012, the offensive was confined to surgical air strikes and a campaign of bombing. In each case, the reason for acting was the same: to halt rocket and missile attacks into Israel by Hamas, the militant Palestinian group that largely controls Gaza. Hamas refuses to accept the existence of a Jewish state.

Each time, the sequence of events has become choreographed into one that is utterly and depressingly predictable. Israel responds disproportionately, always inflicting far greater casualties than it suffers. As international accusations and condemnations of Israeli overreaction multiply, a ceasefire eventually happens, either declared unilaterally by the Israeli government or brokered through a third party, most likely Egypt and/or the United States. In the interim, some Hamas leaders will be targeted and killed, and some rocket launch sites and underground tunnels from Gaza into Israel will be destroyed.

In reality, though, nothing is ever likely to change. More arm shipments will flow into Gaza, new Hamas leaders will emerge, and new tunnels will be dug. When equipped and replenished enough the Palestinian militants will once again fire off its rockets, and Israel will ready itself as it will feel compelled to act in light of the provocation and threats it faces. All the while, as the root causes of the conflict remain untackled, the prospects of a final settlement grow ever dimmer.

The new level of fighting may well lead to a new Palestinian intifada. Israel, protected by its barrier wall – declared illegal by the International Criminal Court – from potential terrorist attacks and by its robust Iron Dome anti-missile system from Hamas rockets, seems less interested than ever in a two-state deal. Far from being concerned about the plight of Palestinians and their livelihoods, Israel simply ignores them, pressing ahead with its settlement building programmes on territory that would be part of any future Palestinian state.

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A ground invasion of Gaza, however brief, was always likely to signal an intensification of the Israeli response to the more than 900 rockets which have fallen into Israeli territory over the past 10 days. Fears exist for a much greater troop deployment in the coming days. Some 40,000 Israeli reservists have already been mobilised. But that will only work to fuel Palestinian resistance and intensify retaliatory rocket strikes that now reach much further than within a 25 mile radius of Gaza.

It is these rocket attacks that the Israeli government is determined to stop. For so long as they continue, Israel’s shelling of targets within Gaza will go on. Inevitably, this puts further civilian lives at risk. Without the strongest foreign diplomatic intervention the bloody cycle of tit-for-tat rocket and bombing attacks seems likely to endure. There are no signs of the current hostilities ending any time soon. The latest outbreak in violence is still young by comparison with previous offensives. Exchanges during the outbreak in 2011-12, for instance, lasted 22 days.

The day after Israel launched its current air offensive in Gaza, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gave a rare press conference in which he was brutally blunt about the danger he believes the state of Israel to be in. He made clear he could never countenance a fully sovereign Palestinian state in the West Bank. Mr Netanyahu’s world-view is that Israel is standing almost alone on the frontline against a rising tide of vicious Islamic radicalism. He insists that the rest of the as-yet free world does its best not to notice the march of extremism. Such indifference says nothing of how western intelligence services are battling against the odds to keep their citizens safe or at the outrage following the recent air disaster over the skies of eastern Ukraine.

Mr Netanyahu has also indicted that he considers the current American diplomatic team led by John Kerry as naïve. Netanyahu made plain that ‘no international pressure will prevent us from acting with all force against a terrorist organisation that seeks to destroy us’.

Operation Protective Edge will thus go on until ‘guaranteed calm’ was restored to Israel. A prerequisite for that, it seems, is a cessation of Palestinian rocket and missile attacks.

Either the Israeli offensive in Gaza will go on until Hamas has exhausted its supplies of air-to-ground missiles (the scale of which, this time around, has been astonishing) or international pressure is brought to bear. Despite Mr Netanyahu’s rhetoric, Israel well knows it only has a narrow window for further military force before international opinion swings heavily against it.

For diplomatic intervention to be effective it needs to come from the top, as well as being co-ordinated with pressure from Western leaders as a matter of urgency. An approach centred on de-escalating the current rocket exchanges should be the priority before any other progress can be made in securing a more lasting truce.

 

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