If recent history is anything to go by, the many upheavals taking place in Islamic countries will now be overshadowed by what is happening in the Gaza Strip.
Those who have been following the ups and downs of the events in the Middle East over the past decades can put their finger precisely on this conflict as the heart of much of the tension that is embroiling the region. In truth, this is a bold statement to make but one can observe even now the sudden shift of international attention to what is happening in Gaza, momentarily alienating world leaders from the many other hotspots in Islamic countries.
The crisis really started with the Fatah-Hamas agreement of April 23, which states that a unity government would be formed within weeks between Fatah, the moderate Palestinian Liberation Organisation, and Hamas, the self-proclaimed resistance movement to Israel. The agreement was welcomed by the EU but cold-shouldered by Israel and the US citing Hamas as a terrorist group only intent on destroying Israel.
On June 12, three Israeli teenagers were kidnapped somewhere on the border between Israel and Gaza by unknown persons. Tension in Israel grew daily as the search for them went on in the West Bank and reached its peak when, on June 30, they were found to have been murdered. The Israeli government’s reaction was, as expected, typically forceful by immediately naming two well-known Hamas members as prime suspects and purposely fanning public emotions in the country to almost fever pitch.
In the meantime, an Arab teenager, Mohammed Abu Khdeir, was burned alive by unknown Israeli fanatics in revenge for the death of the three Israeli teenagers. The ancient principle of ‘an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth’ applies to both sides of the conflict and makes it almost impossible for moderate deliberation to ever gain ground and allow wise leaders to find equitable solutions.
The increased tension soon escalated into a full military operation by Israel, which started on July 8, followed by a ground operation on July 17 as Israeli tanks rolled into Gaza shelling indiscriminately both residents and armed Hamas positions with the specific intention of severely damaging Hamas by destroying its military capacities and tarnishing its name among Palestinian citizens for bringing war and bloodshed to their doorstep.
In all this darkness, some fragment of hope remains
In the meantime, Hamas had launched an incessant attack on Israeli territory through haphazard rocket launching that made little real impact other than terrorising Israeli citizens in a number of towns within range.
There is a depressing familiarity as such events unfold: the number of dead climbs every day, mostly Palestinians who have very few places where to find refuge against the Israeli bombs.
In the whole story of this volatile region, the underdogs remain the Palestinians. Israeli has always found the full backing of America since its very shaky foundation in 1947. In Palestine, every attempt to find a solution was complicated by the influence of American-Jewish organisations and partly also by consistent British backing for the Israeli cause in whatever circumstances.
The idea of a Jewish homeland was, in fact, originated by the Balfour Declaration of 1917, which stated that the British government would view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.
This famous declaration failed to take serious consideration of the fact that Palestine had been populated by Arab people for 1,900 years and that the settlement of large numbers of Jewish people from Europe in Palestine would entail the displacement of many thousands of people whose home had been Palestine for many generations past.
It is no wonder, therefore, that this flagrant breach of human rights would bring about lasting enmity and resistance on the part of those violated. However, at the end of World War II, international opinion was being shaped in favour of the Jews as a result of the Nazi extermination policy and the existence of millions of Jewish refugees in Europe.
Shlomo Sand, a professor of history in Tel Aviv University, stated that the hardest question that Israelis have to answer is: “To what extent Jewish Israeli society is willing to discard the deeply-embedded image of the ‘chosen people’ and to cease isolating itself in the name of fanciful history?”
On the other hand, Palestinians have to accept the Jewish presence as an established fact of history that cannot be turned back.
This is a very tall order for two proud peoples such as these two with a long history of resentment and hatred to accept willingly and unconditionally.
But, in all this darkness, some fragment of hope remains. People in the region, like Yishai Frenkel, whose nephew was among the slain Israeli boys, are a rarity but they may, one day, gain ground. He said: “There is no difference between those who murdered Mohammed and those who murdered our children. Those are murderers and these are murderers. And both must be dealt with to the full extent of the law.”