Israeli-Palestinian conflict deserves an honest look
There are no angels of peace in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. There is enough blame to go around. It is not anti-Palestinian to call the indiscriminate firing of rockets on an innocent civilian population terrorism. Likewise it is not anti-Israel or anti-Semitic to call Israel’s indiscriminate bombing of Palestinian homes and infrastructure terrorism as well.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is more than simple war. It is mutual hate. It is a conflict that likely cannot be solved by the two protagonists. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict can only be solved by an imposed peace. America must exert its leadership on both ‘countries.’
Rehashing who really has claim to Palestine is not productive. At any given time in known history both groups’ descendants had some sort of sovereignty over said land.
The United States would not turn back time and give America back to its predecessor. Neither should that be expected of Israel or Palestine.
The United States would fight back any attempt by any formed group of Native Americans to violently reclaim lands taken. It is not about a moral call. It is not about what is right or wrong. It is today’s reality and the reality of history. It is about societies hitting a reset to the present state and moving beyond in an orderly fashion.
The current escalation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was sparked supposedly by the brutal killings of three Jewish boys. This was followed by a revenge killing/burning alive of a Palestinian boy. This was also followed by a brutal beating of an American-Palestinian boy by Israeli authorities.
Israel used the killing of the three Jewish boys to launch a vicious bombing attack inside Palestine. In the process scores of innocent Palestinians lay dead. No Israeli since the conflict has escalated has been killed.
An article in DailyKOS titled by David Harris Gershon “As a Jew living in America, the past week has changed me forever” should be read by every American. David Harris Gershon writes the following.
What has happened? This: on June 12, three Israeli teenagers were kidnapped while hitchhiking in the West Bank by Palestinians belonging to a rogue branch of Hamas. I, along with friends and loved ones, worried they would become three more Jewish victims (added to the 1,100 killed since 2001) in an unending conflict, and watched closely as the Israeli military began combing the West Bank for them. Only, it soon became clear that soldiers weren’t looking for them so much as collectively punishing Palestinians for the crime of a few people. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu falsely blamed the kidnapping on Hamas – a move likely aimed at derailing the PA-Hamas unity government – and vowed they would “pay a heavy price.” But it was Palestinian civilians who paid a heavy price as for weeks soldiers raided over 1,600 sites in the West Bank, indefinitely detained hundreds, and killed five Palestinians.
Since his article the death toll is approaching if not yet surpassed one hundred persons including innocent women and children.
The traditional media does very little to be ‘fair and/or balanced’ in its coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It is for this reason that Israel’s government, a government very dependent on America’s capital and goodwill can continue to behave with reckless impunity. ConsortiumNews has two article that should open many minds, “Caving In to Israeli Intransigence” and “Plunging toward Armageddon in Israel.” The latter is more comprehensive and interestingly offers three shocking alternatives.
In the short term however the killing continues. The hate is mutual. The propensity to kill one another is mutual. The reality however is that the obvious sites of massacre are in Palestine. The scores of dead people are in Palestine. MSNBC’s Chris Hayes made a great point in his video piece above.
As a matter of both ethical principle and public perception around the world, at a certain point the effect of violence and its magnitude begin to swallow whatever moral intent is behind it. Enough women and children and soccer watchers on the beach are marched to their graves and people stop caring what you meant to do. And it is hard to blame them.
The world is watching. In this ongoing conflict and throughout previous and future Israeli-Palestinian conflicts many questions must be asked. How many dead Palestinians is one Israeli life worth? Can a democracy relegate those of another religion to a permanent second class citizen, to a life within an apartheid state? Can a Jewish state or for that matter a state that is based on any religion really be a democracy? The realities seem to be in complete conflict with all that we believe democracy means and what America supports.
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