Gaza 3 – The End Game

My lovely grandson recently visited my place and was scared out of his wits when a low flying fighter jet screamed by. His questions were first; “What was THAT?” Flummoxed, I tried to explain the role of a fighter jet, still upset he asked “WHY?” Try answering that to a seven year old. At the same time such instruments of mass destruction are killing and maiming seven year old kids in Gaza. By the time you read this post, several of them will be dead.

This last of three posts looks at what the outcomes of this horror might be.

Now

There has been more terrible news from Gaza. The killing goes on unabated with daily strikes on civilians in the ever more packed south. Aid to Gaza is not getting through as demanded by the UN resolution and the situation is approaching apocalyptic. The Israelis government, in anticipation of sanctions from the International Court of Justice, is telling the world that nothing will stop them and increasing their own manufacture of weaponry.

Meanwhile the US and UK have been joining the bombing after raids by Yemens Houthis on international shipping in the Red Sea in support of the Palestinians cause and is a threat to Western consumption. Iran has hijacked a US tanker in retribution of the US theft of one of theirs, they have bombed ‘terrorists’ in neighbouring Pakistan who retaliated with killing of Iranian ‘terrorists’. All bets seem off.

The central issues in all of this remain Palestinian nationhood and Israeli security.

Peace process

If the miracle of peace and security were somehow to arrive, I feel sure, as in Northern Ireland and South Africa, the vast majority of people would be keen to live their lives and look after their families as best they can despite lingering hatred. Though not without problems, Northern Irish and South African’s bitter divisions were turned from violent impasse to peace. Those previously labelled terrorists entered government – enemies became friends.

Understanding Irish history and the evolution of the IRA and Sinn Fein did not mean condoning their violent campaigns. Understanding Afrikaans history did not mean to condone vile state racism. Evil does not come from nowhere. Peace requires a process and part of that process must be a will to come to an understanding, an accommodation with enemies and establishing systems of seeking truth and finding reconciliation. A foundation for peace can be found if the desire is there.

There is however, something intractable about the Israeli position of occupying land promised to them by a no lesser figure than God, and the Palestinians who, after a century of persecution insist on a political solution involving nationhood. At the moment there seems no way out of this. Both sides see each other as terrorists, a word which has become not only meaningless, but an impediment to any progress since its first use in the ‘Terror’ following the French revolution.

Yet, todays terrorist is tomorrow Government, one persons terrorist is another’s resistance fighter. History is littered with this. Simply declaring war on Terrorists is likely to be as fruitless as declaring a ‘War on Drugs’. Declaring someone a terrorist is also a carte blanche to torture, killing and atrocity.

The Hamas murder of civilians was a terrible atrocity. It has hit the Israelis hard and they feel threatened again by an enemy who wants them gone. The scale of the attack was unprecedented and the rockets too have hardened attitudes and perhaps made the idea of a two state solution unacceptable, even though Palestinian autonomy is the only route to lasting peace. To question the response in Israel is to lose your job and possibly liberty

The only aim in which it has succeeded in is bringing the plight of the Palestinians to the worlds field of view by exacerbating their suffering which previously had been, in political terms, ignored. Perhaps the attack was just one last desperate act of war of a thoroughly and increasingly desperate and marginalised people. The Israelis response too is evil, the scale of which has not been seen since the atrocities of WW2.

Yet time will move on and history is begin written, so what are the potential outcomes?

Potential solutions – the two state solution.

An independent Palestinian nation in the West Bank and Gaza now seems almost impossible, certainly until Netanyahu is gone. Almost. 750,000 well armed Israeli settlers driven by extreme religious beliefs and God given rights occupy the West Bank and are protected and encouraged by the IDF. Atrocities against Palestinians are well documented and are increasing – bombs are falling there too. The recent supply of free military grade weaponry from the Israeli Government to settlers is a sure sign of worse to come. Israeli settlers are unlikely to ever live under Palestinian rule – how could they as the Palestinians rightly consider their land stolen.

So the two state solution would mean, as in Gaza in 2005, removal of well armed Israeli settlements, perhaps to borders different to those established in 1967. That would not be impossible, but seems hardly likely given the Israelis governments support of colonisation driven by minority religious extremists needed to shore up a minority government. If it were to happen, it would form a basis for lasting peace.

It would also need courageous leaders who are so sadly lacking at the present time. It seems, as in the US, the most visionary leaders seem to end up assassinated by those who believe they are acting under Gods instructions.

A two state solution would also have to include communication between the two Palestinian territories, with perhaps a train or road link across intervening Israel potentially providing a bridge between the two culturally and historically connected communities. Its is easy to envisage this, but it seems right now there is little by way of a mechanism to arrive at any sort of compromise.

The window for a two state solution is slowly closing in line with increases in the numbers of Israelis occupying the West Bank. Some commentators think that if that number exceeds a million it will be impossible, and that 100,000 settlers of the 750,000 would need to be resettled. There is potential for land swaps to deal with some of the issues of occupation.

One state solution?

Is it impossible to work towards a single secular state? The religious extremists would fight it, but might a sizeable majority might see it an option to be explored? A one state solution with citizens having to swear allegiance to a Jewish state would leave Muslims precariously disenfranchised, and would exacerbate the system of religious Apartheid pertaining in the West Bank.

Real Democracy would leave the Israelis and Palestinian voters balanced and is increasingly being discussed by some as the only way out of this impasse, though I fail to see current Israel leaders contemplating this. Again it is possible if the will was there. 21% of Israels population is Arab already – that is 2 million Arabs living in Israel and despite widespread discrimination, taking part in the democratic process.

Indeed, according to the Times of Israel, religion has an outsized role in the state:

“An Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics survey published in 2021 found that among Israeli Jews over the age of 20, about 45 percent identified as secular or not religious, while 33% said they practiced “traditional” religious worship. Ultra-Orthodox Jews, known as Haredim in Hebrew, made up 10%.”

Perhaps many Palestinians would prefer this to the current hopeless chaos? Given the destruction of Gaza and the dissolution of Palestinian resources in the West Bank, it what we are actually heading for. A Greater Israel from the river to the sea with Palestinians in some sort of statutory limbo.

Three state solution

This too has been suggested, East and West Palestine and Israel living together with recognised nation status and agreed borders, and no bridge between separate Palestinian communities, but seems to ignore Palestinian history and the links between the two areas.

Reality – The No-Solution Solution

Israel will just carry on and obliterate Gaza. At some point they may declare ‘victory’ and leave behind the remaining Gazean’s to continue to die in their hundreds of thousands. Those remaining could be penned into a smaller and more severe prison and leave the international community to keep them alive with aid or assist their migration as refugees once again. The borders are currently closed, but if they were opened, Gazeans would flee. If enough migrate, then ‘resettlement’ of Gaza has been suggested by extreme right wing Israeli politicians.

The only hint coming from the Israeli government regarding the ‘day after’ is the “International Community” taking responsibility for rebuilding the Gaza they have destroyed while Israel is responsible for security and surveillance. I could hardly believe my eyes when I read this.

For now, create a no-mans land all round Gaza; much bigger fences and increase the total surveillance so evident in the West Bank. War objectives ticked off – apart from the hostages whose inevitable death in this scenario will forever be used as a justification for ongoing hatred and persecution of Palestinians.

Keep expanding the Israeli population of the West Bank until it is annexed and declared it a region of Greater Israel. Palestinians will live in a single state but be stateless. They will be numbered, intensively monitored, excluded from any democratic processes which would lead to expansion of this new and vicious type of Apartheid. All beyond any legal framework as it is seen as divine will.

And get ready for the second coming! This is predicted by Christian Extremists who are suffering from that most peculiar of conditions – mass psychosis. They believe the second coming will be triggered by the expansion of Israel to the borders promised to it by god. This cataclysmic fantasy is believed by an astonishing one third of Americans.

A reporter from Jerusalem recently described the sacred Al-Aqsa mosque where Mohammed was said to have ascended to heaven to meet the prophets of Islam; the sacred Christian site where Jesus was said to have ascended to heaven and the sacred Jewish site of the Holy of Holies where Gods presence first appeared. It seems barely credible that places and objects can be so venerated alongside such hatred of other living people. Israels recent provocative visits to the mosque formed a part of the background to this whole saga and to any atheist like me it all seems like utter madness. Where are the religious leaders advocating the peace which is also, clearly in theory only, fundamental to religious belief? We also seem to lack leaders espousing secularism.

In this scenario, of course, all of Israel’s neighbours would become enemies, they would lose support of the west, and face increasing isolationism. The Palestinian question would remain unresolved and with weaponry and surveillance increasing in its sophistication, future conflict more devastating than ever. This is a recipe for disaster.

History unfolding

There are huge questions – expansion of Israel into the West Bank is a reality – how on earth is the Gaza strip ever going to liveable again? Who will pay for its reconstruction? What might it be reconstructed into? Before this latest war it was already one of the poorest places on earth so where will it stand now, apart from being a breeding ground for desperate resistance/terror. Just continue till the next atrocity and its revenge, again and again. It is really beyond humanities collective vision to do better than that?

Even the unlikely total destruction of Hamas and the continuation of a Palestinian Gaza would leave a vacuum and a traumatised people full of more hate than ever and immediately lead to another similar organisation to Hamas. Young people with damaged minds and bodies whose only aspiration is retribution, including more international acts of violence perpetrated on the West, who have done so little to help the Palestinian cause would be inevitable and for who the future as it stands is without any significant hope. Their schools and universities have been intentionally destroyed. It does not have to be this way, but it does seem the most likely outcome.

Zionists see all this as Gods will and progress towards a Greater Israel, the previous existence of what is called the West Bank and Gaza could be just another chapter in the regions ugly history. Perhaps if the bombardment continues Gazean Palestinians, or what is left of them after the bombings, starvation and disease, will simply have no homes to go to or country to live in, or be forcibly ejected to the Sinai and thus become Egypts responsibility.

While all this is going on, licenses for oil and gas off Gaza’s coast have already been issued – by Israel – so perhaps any ‘solution’ is a pipe-dream.

Aftermath

If the international community cannot even restrict the supply of endless weapons to the region, what hope is there? It seems any US presidential candidate needs the Jewish vote to win in their own bizarre and outdated system of democracy, while at the same time in Israel their system of PR will continue to generate coalition government with the Israelis largest minority bloc needing the votes of religious fanatics to stay in power. These forms of Democracy seems outdated and dangerous.

The status quo means widening regional conflict with an increasingly expansionist and dangerous Israel who seem to treat non Israeli life as expendable. Any chance of better relations with neighbouring countries seems to be fading with attacks on Lebanon and Syria. There is a real risk of this getting out of any sense of control with more US attacks on Yemen – not for the first time – Obama authorised bombing of Yemen with cruise missiles in 2010 as a response to terrorism and us Brits have once again have a self interested, messy colonial history there.

Indeed we should not forget the Saudi led bombing campaign in between 2014-21 in which 377,000 people were killed overall, 150,000 from violence, out of a population of 33,000,000 and failed in its attempts to remove the Houthis from power.

Genocide

Meanwhile, South Africa has brought a charge of genocide against the Israelis to the International Court of Justice. Perhaps a guilty verdict of genocide at the ICJ will stir the consciences of enough Israelis to make a difference, though (incredibly) the final verdict may take a decade to arrive. Preliminary directions can be given to the court which would be highly significant. Despite a vigorous defence of the charges, Netanyahu has already signalled their directions will be ignored.

The expanding list of war crimes which Israel is clearly guilty of must be prosecuted somehow. To see the victims of the Holocaust squaring up in court against the victims of Apartheid was something hideously significant. Israel did plenty of business with Apartheid South Africa and South African Jews benefited from and supported the system. As always , there is history.

World dis-order

In the middle east power and influence is shifting from the old order of western dominance to ascendancy of Iran with its links to China and Russia. Russia is swopping its jets for Iranian drones and offering help develop fossil fuel resource. This has enabled the ‘Axis of Resistance’ to Israel in Yemen, Lebanon, Gaza and elsewhere. US influence has unsurprisingly waned after its only marginally unqualified support for Israels bombing campaign. Joe Biden is hideously known as ‘Genocide Jo’ to some of his former supporters and a second Trump presidency along with a nuclear armed Iran looks increasingly inevitable. His finger will be on the nuclear button – a truly horrifying thought.

It all could be resolved by a ceasefire, a lasting political solution involving a Palestinian state, and Israels security. That is far from impossible but Netanyahu is prioritising his career in a manner which can only be described as historically evil. ‘Israel’ is becoming a dirty word.

Despair

These posts are simply my quixotic effort to do something more than donations to Oxfam’s Gaza appeal, letters to politicians and so on. In the face of the now ongoing bombardment of packed civilian populations, at the very least I can be contemplative.

I wake up thinking of the mass murder of civilians, the festering wounds, dreadful diseases, the misery. The thousands of imprisoned Palestinians, those wide eyed miserable, traumatised children in Gaza. Women giving birth with no skilled help available, amputations without anaesthesia, the destroyed hospitals and murdered healthcare workers. I imagine the smell of death, urine and excrement, those masses with diarrhoea and vomiting, starvation and the lack of any hope whatsoever.

2024

As we drift away from the new year with all its promise and threat, I so appreciate all the luxuries of western life. Water that comes out of my own tap, a hot bath at my whim, functional toilets, full shelves in the shops, a warm dry home, my family snug and safe with lives full of choice to lead. Though struggling with neglect, public services remain the jewel in our crown. I can choose what to eat. I can sleep in a bed. How lucky I and my family are to be in Devon.

And how unlucky the Palestinians are to be in Palestine. Or many Ukrainians in the Ukraine, or a Sudanese in Sudan, or the Uyghers in China, or the Yemenis, or many other millions of people who will be having a miserable time due to the inability of the human species to solve conflicts with anything other than brute force inflicted mainly upon civilians. Murder remains tragically profitable.

If our world leaders cannot solve these conflicts, what hope is there to solve the problems essential for a sustainable future – indeed, any future for any of us? Last year was the hottest ever know to our species – this year will bring new challenges – all of our western luxuries are vulnerable to far more than Yemenis interfering with shipping. I view the forthcoming year with apprehension.

For the Gazeans and so many others, right now, getting through each day is enough.