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What Will Wreaking Human Tragedy Ultimately Cost Israel and America?
~ “ If too much of the state’s resources are diverted from wealth creation to military purposes, it is likely to lead to a weakening of national power over the longer term. If a state overextends itself strategically it runs the risk the potential benefits from external expansion may be outweighed by the great expense. “ ~ Paul Kennedy, 1986.
~ “Netanyahu could have avoided the whole thing. He could have chosen not to shoot up the West Bank and Gaza and arrest hundreds of Palestinians over what was very likely a rogue kidnapping. He could have chosen not to stonewall Abbas for nine months of peace negotiations. But Israel’s prime minister is and always has been at war with the Palestinians .” ~ Larry Derfner, July 9, 2014
~ “Settler violence happens primarily in areas of the West Bank where Israel has full control over security, and is legally obligated to protect the Palestinian civilian population. They go far beyond acts of revenge committed by settlers. They are more than hate crimes. They are a concerted campaign of terror perennially waged against the occupied Palestinian population.” ~ Mairav Zonzsein, November 2013.
~ “Acts of violence are being committed by Israeli civilians against Palestinians in the West Bank on a daily basis, manifesting in many forms of attacks against people and destruction of their property. These acts of violence are not isolated incidents, nor simply acts of hate or anger. They are part of a sophisticated, wider strategy to assert territorial domination over Palestinians.” ~ Yesh Din, 2014
~ “This operation started because in spite of our efforts to get Hamas to give up launching rockets against innocent civilians in the lower half of Israel, Hamas ignored our message and decided to escalate the situation. We have to make sure that Hamas stops launching rockets and terrorist attacks on Israel.” ~ Yossi Kuperwasser, July 10, 2014
~ “Soon after three Israel teenagers were kidnapped last month, Israeli officials leaked to the press the name of the Hamas operational commander who is believed to be behind a recent surge in kidnapping plots. It was a familiar one for those who follow Hamas closely: Salah al-Arouri, a longtime Hamas operative from the West Bank, who lives openly in Turkey. Now, with the boys’ bodies found and the funerals over, Israeli security forces continue to hunt down the two Hebron-based Hamas operatives believed to have actually carried out the plot.” ~ Matthew Levitt, July 2014.
As I watched and read about, with mounting concern, the massive flare up in violence in Gaza and the West Bank the past month, some awkward, unanswered questions kept coming to mind. To be sure, the kidnap and murder of three Israeli teenagers, followed soon after by the kidnap and burning alive of a Palestinian youth, were utterly horrific and barbaric. Yet the Israeli Government’s response did not appear that of a democratic state applying the rule of law. Even once Hamas had indicated it had no responsibility for the kidnapping – and Israel has yet to produce any evidence that it did ! – Prime Minister Netanyahu launched a massive military crackdown against Hamas – arresting hundreds of its operatives and politicians throughout the West Bank, killing five, and destroying homes as punishment. This has been followed by an aerial and artillery bombing campaign against Gaza – that has so far killed almost 200 Palestinians and injured thousands more. Many homes and buildings – including a mosque and a medical center – have been destroyed.
Despite quite unusual direct signals from Hamas to Israel that they did not want to fight, Israel’s military campaign went ahead and inevitably and tragically led to a Palestinian response – with hundreds of rockets fired out of Gaza into Israel. So far, thanks to the U.S. government supplied Iron Dome missile defense shield, no Israeli has been killed and only one injured from Palestinian rocket fire. Indeed, Israelis were reported to be sipping lattes as they sunned themselves on the beach! Surprisingly, compared to similar conflicts in 2008 and 2012, the Obama administration’s response has been muted almost to the point of neglect.
How did one tragic kidnapping and death of three Israeli teenagers, followed by the equally terrible kidnapping and death of a Palestinian youth, lead not to police and judicial investigations, but to an all-out war? What does this tell us about long-term prospects for peace?
KEY QUESTIONS : What do we really know about the kidnappings and how they happened? How are such crimes handled in our own society? Why in Israel are they apparently handled so differently? How do these acts fit into a much wider ongoing pattern of systematic violence against Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza? How does the Israeli Government’s response form part of its strategy in the now stalled peace negotiations with the Palestinians? How well have American and other Western governments and media provided an unbiased and full reporting and assessment of the current crisis? If the current deadlock in the peace process, and continuing sporadic outbreaks of violence continue into the long-term how will this affect the strength and stability of Israel in the Middle East and internationally, and the standing of the U.S.A.? Could the current crisis be handled differently to help bring an end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?
THE KIDNAPPINGS AND SETTLER VIOLENCE IN THE WEST BANK: Even though Israeli and US government and security services have sought to portray the kidnapping of the three israeli teenagers as a Hamas-led conspiracy to launch a terror campaign (see above quotes from Israeli security chief Yossi Kupperwasser and American security analyst Matthew Leavitt) they do not mention the wider context of rapidly increasing Israeli settler violence against Palestinians on the Israeli occupied West Bank over the past eight years. While coverage of this has been strangely absent from U.S. government and media assessments – no major American newspaper, magazine or broadcast media has mentioned it! – it has been widely reported in Israeli media for the past decade. The above quotes from Mairav Zonzsein and Yesh Din appeared in Ha’aretz and the Jewish Forward among many other Israeli media outlets.
Over the past decade, the United Nations Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UN-OCHA) has tracked inter-communal violence on the occupied West Bank, Gaza and in Israel between Israeli Jewish settlers and Palestinians. According to UN-OCHA, the intensity of settler violence against Palestinians has quadrupled since 2006, and notably in the five years since Netanyahu became prime minister. On an almost daily basis across the West Bank, settlers have been assaulting Palestinians, destroying crops, fire-bombing homes, poisoning wells, attacking herds. They have effectively established “no go” zones even on Palestinian owned lands, where Palestinians are intimidated not to enter. This in addition to so-called “price tag” attacks as retribution for Israeli government anti-settler action. The settler movement’s goal – as independent Israeli human rights observers such as Yesh Din and Btselem note – is clearly to impose total territorial domination throughout the West Bank. Even though they are responsible for protecting Palestinian civilians in the occupied West Bank, the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) and the Israeli police in fact often stand by while settler attacks take place. Over 90% of Palestinian complaints to the authorities are closed without action taken. Where Palestinian attacks on settlers occur, the reverse is the case. Moreover, the settlers benefit from the protections of Israeli civil law, whereas Palestinians fall under the Israeli military justice system.
Turning to the three Israeli teenagers, now, they came from three different Israeli religious settler communities in or close to the West Bank – Nof Ayalon, Talmon and El’ad. The latter is widely known for a high rate of crime, civil disorder, ethnic-religious tension and violence. The teenagers bodies were found at Gush Etzion north of Hebron. This is the site of one of the most controversial Israeli settlements on the West Bank, around which for decades settler violence against Palestinians, including property destruction and murder has been constant and widespread.
This is the real world, on-the-ground context in which the two terrible kidnappings occurred. As Israeli human rights blogger Larry Derfner notes (see quote above) the abduction of the three Israeli youths was in all probability a “rogue kidnapping” that tragically took place in a region where violence and tit-for-tat attacks are an almost daily affair, in absence of the rule of law, that is not upheld by the Israeli occupation authorities. Indeed, it might be no exaggeration to say that the kidnappings were the tragic outcome of the failure of the rule of law. Though Matthew Leavitt (above quote) refers to “a recent surge in kidnapping plots” by Hamas, no other kidnappings have recently been reported in Israeli media! Moreover, U.S. State Department in its 2014 Israel Crime and Safety report, notes that kidnappings are not common in Israel, though reports of kidnap plots – especially against Israeli military personnel – are more frequent in the West Bank. In short, by international standards, the West Bank is a far cry from Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia and Mexico in this regard!
ISRAELI GOVERNMENT STRATEGY: What is the Netanyahu government’s intent in launching an all-out war against the Palestinians rather than proceeding promptly with legal and judicial action to find and bring to justice the perpetrators of the two hideous kidnappings and the murders? Over the past year, the U.S. sponsored peace initiative, determinedly led by Sec. of State John Kerry, foundered and stalled, essentially due to Israeli government intransigence on the issue of continued settlement expansion on the West Bank. Politically, the kidnapping of three Israeli teenagers gave Prime Minister Netanyahu a welcome pretext to justify his government’s actions and collectively to punish the Palestinians yet again for them! The military operation “Protective Edge” was justified as responding to a purported terrorist campaign of kidnappings. This in turn, of course, justifies continued massive U.S. and European military and financial support to Israel, in absence of any progress towards the stated Western policy goal of a “two-state solution”. Even though the latter seems by now far less likely, if not impossible, given the extent of the networks of Israeli settlements now under construction throughout the West Bank. For these will assuredly deny Palestinians the prospect of a future state of their own.
FUTURE CONSEQUENCES FOR ISRALE AND AMERICA: In early 2001, the Sharon-led Likud government in Israel took the fateful decision to walk away from the peace process, in favor of achieving its millenarian goal of building Greater Israel (“Eretz Israel”) by progressively annexing all of the West Bank and Gaza. Since that time, there has been effectively no active peace process – although from time to time futile talks have been held. This is nothing short of a major human tragedy! For by late 2000, Israeli and Palestinian negotiators had worked out full details for a long-term peace agreement. Through their intransigence and belligerence, the Likud administrations since 2001, most notably the current Netanyahu government, have left Israel totally isolated and friendless in the Middle East.
It is no exaggeration to say that today Israel’s continuing regional dominance rests entirely on support from America – weapons and finance, and from Europe – markets, finance and some weapons. Israel’s concern the past decades has been the nearby demographic threat of a rapidly growing Palestinian population that could one day overwhelm the Jewish State. Yet, potentially far more fatal to Israel could be the unfolding demographic changes in major Western countries, its backers today.
By 2050, in both America and Europe, Arab and Muslim populations will grow to be far more influential in national politics. Meanwhile, also by 2050, the Arab and Muslim world will account for 2.75 billion people – many under age thirty. That will represent a third of the estimated world population then of over nine billion. It is worth recalling how quickly, between 1974 and 1980, America and Europe turned away from Taiwan (with a population of 18 millions) to accommodate the People’s Republic of China (population : 1.0 billion) as the official China on international bodies. Large-scale global demographics count powerfully in relations among the major powers in the world. By 2050, for America and Europe, fostering good relations with the Arab and Muslim worlds may outweigh their past support for Israel, perhaps ? Equally, it is worth recalling how, following the end of apartheid there, the new South African government in 1994 and since has been quite reluctant to build close alliances with the West – because of its strong past support for the apartheid regime. Might not Arab and Muslim nations in a future time react similarly to America and Europe given their support for Israeli militarism and expansionism?
CONCLUSIONS: Israel is a scientifically, technologically, agriculturally and financially strong – albeit small – nation. It has much know-how and capability to offer its neighbors in the Middle East. Working together with the (highly educated) Palestinians, Lebanese and Syrians, Israelis could play a vital part in the modernization and rise to prosperity of hundreds of millions in the surrounding area. This would also serve to anchor Israel’s long-term future based upon strong positive relations of trust and mutual benefit – rather as Singapore has done vis-a-vis Indonesia and Malaysia. But building trust – in face of the enmities of today – will take time. It will also take dropping the Israeli Zionist obsession with sole outright ownership of land in return for a long-term stake in their region’s future. 2050 is a mere thirty-five years from now. Time passes fast. After all, the Cold War ended twenty five years ago already! It is in the best interests of both Israel and the United States of America that their leaders move to make this epochal change now! I for one hope they will have the foresight and courage enough to do so!