- The Israel and Hamas conflict simply meanders along with no end in sight despite concerted efforts, pressures, and threats exerted by the global community in the last several months. Despite undertaking concrete measures to usher in a much-needed ceasefire as well as encourage peace talks by the concerned leadership from around the world, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu is hell bent on ensuring the Hamas top leadership is completely eradicated before even seriously considering sitting across the table for permanent peace. Unfortunately, the hostage crisis hasn’t helped the peace cause simply because of the prevalent distrust between the two protagonists, whose actions have belied overtures of forced thaw in the prevalent antagonism.
PC: BBC
- The number of innocent killings in the Gaza Strip is perennially on the rise, showcasing a catastrophic humanitarian crisis staring us and desperately begging for help. Little wonder, the global critique of Israel is getting sharper since Bibi isn’t even considering stopping the bombardment on the hapless people. Come to think of it, what does it matter if the US keeps backing Bibi blindly? In a consequential development, countries like Canada, Australia, and Portugal joined the UK in recognizing Palestinian statehood over the last weekend. This came ahead of the UN summit co-hosted by France and Saudi Arabia recently that focused on Israel’s war in Gaza and the elusive Two State Solution to the Israel-Palestine mother conflict.
PC: Financial Times
- Indeed, all of this makes clear a growing international momentum against Israel. The Gaza conflict is homing in on two years with Tel Aviv showing no signs of relenting. Meanwhile, Israel is expanding its settlements in the West Bank. This will ensure there is no contiguous Palestinian state. Thus, there’s an increasing realization that Israel is using the Gaza conflict to erase the possibility of a Palestinian state itself. In other words, that means defeating Hamas, the ostensible goal of Israeli military operations in Gaza, is only a pretext. Had it not been so, Tel Aviv would have had no problem in signing up to a plan that would hand over post-war Gaza to the Palestinian Authority (PA) and withholding the latter’s taxes, crippling its essential functions.
PC: Pew Research Center
- As such, this has even prompted Germany – an Israel ally – to consider sending financial aid to the PA. Of course, Israel gets away with all this because of solid US backing. American Jews and Evangelical lobbies have a huge influence on US politics, thereby leveraging it to the maximum where it matters most. Thus, Trump cannot politically afford to dump Israel, even though he was reportedly unhappy with Bibi for striking Hamas leaders in Qatar. It also means the UN can pass all the resolutions it wants in favour of Palestine statehood, but it won’t make much of a difference to Israel or the Gaza conflict. There might be a split in the Western camp over Israel, but it isn’t enough to rein in Tel Aviv. Expect more innocent lives sacrificed in the coming days.
