Israel and Gaza: Both Sides at Fault

By Raanan Geberer
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
BROOKLYN — As I’m writing this, Israel has launched a massive air attack on Hamas strongholds in Gaza. This followed a two-day period wherein Palestinian militants fired almost 200 rockets into Israel.

If you want to trace this situation back to its immediate cause (as opposed to addressing the overall Arab-Israeli conflict), one can look back to Ariel Sharon’s 2005 move to evacuate Israeli troops from Gaza. This seemed like a move of peace, but one must examine this closely. Israel refused to negotiate the pullout with the Palestinian Authority (then dominated by the moderate Fatah group). This basically ensured that Hamas would take over Gaza, and that there would be years of back-and-forth violence, thus preventing a true Israeli-Palestinian peace. This would then serve, in a bizarre way, the warlike aims of Gen. Sharon, who believed that peace can only be achieved by total victory. Sharon is gone — well, almost — but we are stuck with his legacy.

But taking a broader view, we can see that both Israel and the Arabs/Palestinians are at fault. The Arabs and Palestinians are at fault for:

Constantly making nasty, disrespectful and condescending remarks about Israel and the Jewish people in general. Read any statement by Hamas or Hizbollah leaders.

Trying to place a double standard on the state of Israel — i.e., it’s OK for almost all the Arab states to define themselves as Muslim in their basic laws, but if Israel defines itself as a Jewish state, it’s suddenly racist.

Constantly firing rockets at Israeli civilian targets — even though these rockets are inefficient, this doesn’t make those who fire them any less malevolent.

Denying the obvious historical connection between the Jewish people and the Biblical land of Israel. Kidnapping Israeli soldiers, and;

Perpetrating attacks against civilians, such as suicide bombings.

The Israelis are at fault for:

Putting Gaza under siege, thus denying civilians medicine, food and water and causing untold human misery.

Subjecting Palestinians to daily harassment and disrespect at border crossings, checkpoints and roadblocks. Israel’s aim in doing so very well may be to try to “encourage” as many Palestinians to emigrate as possible.

Denying Palestinians’ right (on many occasions) to engage in peaceful protest. Violating U.N. resolutions repeatedly.

Violating international law by engaging in torture and by detaining prisoners for long periods of time without being charged; and, perhaps most of all;

Playing by “gangster rules”: “If you kill one of ours, we’ll kill 10 of yours.”

In addition, it’s somewhat odd that whenever Israel makes a military move, the fallout ends peace talks already under way — in this case, talks between Israel and Syria. This brings up the question — do the ruling circles and military leaders in Israel really want peace, or do they want military dominance first and peace only on their own terms?

In an ideal world, I would advocate United Nations troops on both sides of the border, the banning of Muslim extremist groups such as Hamas and Hizbollah, and the banning of Israeli extremist groups as well, such as Avigdor Lieberman’s party (which seeks “transfer” of Israeli Arabs) and some of the settler organizations. I would also call for the end of Syrian influence in Lebanon as well as Iranian influence in the whole region (and hopefully someday, the internal overthrow of the Iranian fundamentalist regime).

Finally, although I cannot in good conscience call for an end to U.S. aid to Israel, since that would give free rein to its enemies to destroy it, I would call for the U.S. to scale down such aid so it matches the amount of aid the U.S. gives other nations.

(Note — Raanan Geberer, the managing editor of the Daily Eagle, has volunteered on two archaeological digs in Israel and was once a summer student at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. His father and uncle both were American volunteers in the Haganah, which became the Israel Army, during the first Arab-Israeli war in 1948.)