Palestine: Delectation to Deracination
Palestine: Delectation to Deracination
“If you’re not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed, and loving the people who are doing the oppressing.” ― Malcolm X
In the past, it was much easier for Israel to commit atrocities against Palestinians without sustained global repercussions, because of its adopted strategy of denial, and heavy backing by Western controlled media. For decades there has been a systemic desensitization to the plight of the Palestinians, and only determined members of the public were actually aware of the real state of affairs. The advent of technology and social media has been the catalyst that has brought the Palestine plight to the front burner, and people across the globe are able to visualize the reality of such horrific situations. Human beings across the globe have witnessed the atrocities committed against Palestinians for decades, and empathize with the struggle. There are vast numbers of people getting inspiration from the uncommon strength of the Palestinians, and researching about the facts, history and even Islam.
Since the Hamas reprisal attack of October 7, 2023, Israel has vehemently tried to outdo itself in perpetrating death and destruction. Israel has adopted a collective punishment strategy and committed crimes against humanity. The latest onslaught by Israel on Palestinians, particularly Gaza, has set an unprecedented record of evidential real-time genocide, broadcasted by the brave and indefatigable Palestinians. When such acts of brutality were committed in history, it took concerted efforts of investigators, survivors and perpetrators to expose details of the atrocities afterwards. People all over the world have been absorbing horrors that will leave indelible scars for the rest of their lives. There have been various “ceasefire” protests held in many countries.
According to Euro-Med monitor, as of January 5, 2024, over 30,000 Palestinians have been killed, including 12,040 children, 6,103 women, 241 health workers, and 105 journalists. Further investigations reveal that about 60, 000 individuals have been maimed, with hundreds in critical condition. There are at least 7,000 missing — under the rubble, including 4,900 children and women. Israel has attacked people fleeing, designated safe zones, including Churches, Mosques, hospitals, schools and refugee camps. Of the 2.2 million people in Gaza, 1.9 million are displaced — which is about 85% of the population. Also condemnable is the constant impeding of humanitarian aid, and the deprivation of electricity, fuel, food and water. According to Human Rights Watch, starvation has been utilized by Israel as a “weapon of war” in Gaza. The United Nations aid chief Martin Griffiths described Gaza as the “worst ever” humanitarian crisis. The United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres described Gaza as a “graveyard for children”. Entire families, including three generations, have been completely “wiped out”.
Israeli government members have not helped their cause with the use of dehumanization rhetoric against Palestinians that seem to endorse genocide. Some examples of genocidal utterances include, “Amalek”, “human animals”, “complete siege”, “more painful than death”, “there will only be destruction”, “we will eliminate everything” and “overshadow the Nakba of 1948”.
From an historical perspective, it is evident not much has changed. Since its creation in 1948, Israel has violated dozens of UN resolutions, and has been expanding its illegal settlements. After Israel’s creation, coordinated attacks were launched against Palestinians and by 1949 Zionists took almost 80% of land. There was a systematic expulsion of over 400 Palestinian villages, with over 700,000 displaced. The massacres committed by Israeli forces included women and children. The Deir Yassin massacre is just one example of numerous atrocities.
Another instance of committed atrocities from Israel’s institution is depicted in the 2022 Tantura movie, which details ex-Israeli troops gloating over acts of terror unleashed on Palestinians.
The question the Israel leadership ought to answer is how does committing genocidal acts against Palestinians, particularly children, guarantee peace and stability for Israel? History has established that the Palestinians are unwavering in their quest for justice and will keep fighting till the very end. Is it not the ideal time for Israel to consider changing its tactic and giving peace a real chance? It is evident their strategy of indiscriminate violence will only beget more violence, and the continuum of the vicious cycle is not in their best interest. There can never be peace with the deliberate creation of enemies. Except of course Israel is not actually interested in peace.
The reality of the situation is that the Palestine problem cannot be resolved by dealing with the symptoms. To address the issue, matters must be analyzed from the root cause. From a religious prism, it is instructive to emphasize that Jews, Christians and Muslims lived harmoniously in the Palestine region for centuries. Then all of a sudden peace became elusive following the creation of the Zionist State of Israel in 1948. The causality of Israel’s manifestation can be traced to the establishment of Zionism. In 1897, Theodor Herzl founded the Zionist Organization, in Basel Switzerland, and the ideology has atheistic roots. A major milestone that cannot be discounted is the Balfour Declaration of 1917 that changed the dynamics of the entire region and beyond. Following the repudiations and reservations that greeted the mass migration of Jews from Europe to Palestine, the Zionists advanced with their implementation of the Balfour declaration, even as the League of Nations established the British Mandate of Palestine in 1922. Another significant incident was the Peel Commission of 1937, which focused on a partition that wasn’t fair to all parties involved, and was jettisoned. In reality, the British had no right to allocate Palestine to Zionists, especially considering the contretemps caused by their duplicitous agreements — Hussein-McMahon correspondence (1915–1916) and Sykes-Picot Agreement (1916). Nonetheless, the insistence by Zionists to have a homeland on a land that was already inhabited by others is nothing but occupation. In 1947, the United Nations Resolution 181 recommended the partition of Palestine into Arab and Jewish states, with Jerusalem as a corpus separatum to be administered by a special international regime.
The core issues that have persisted and need to be addressed are the illegal settlements, borders, Jerusalem’s status, and the Palestinian refugees and their right to return. Based on international law, Israel should withdraw from all “occupied Palestinian territories” — West Bank, Gaza and Jerusalem, and that all Israeli settlements are illegal. Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention states: “The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.”
There have been attempted negotiations to broker peace over the years. A typical example is the Oslo Accords, initiated in 1993, involving Yasser Arafat of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and Prime Minister of Israel Yitzhak Rabin. The peace treaty was based on United Nations Security Council Resolution 242 (withdrawal of Israeli troops from territories occupied in 1967) and Resolution 338 (ceasefire in the Yom Kippur War of 1973). In 1995, Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated at a peace rally by an Israeli right-wing extremist.
The late Edward Said, who was a Palestinian-American academic, and Professor at Columbia University, described the Oslo Accords as flawed, and “an instrument of Palestinian surrender, a Palestinian Versailles”. Regarding peace summits such as David (2000) and Taba Summit (2001), American Professor and child of Holocaust survivors Norman Finkelstein argued that framing the matter from Israel’s point of view it may appear as if they made “huge concessions”. However, if the matter is analyzed from the point of legality and international law, then “Israel made precisely and exactly zero concessions. All the concessions were made by the Palestinians”.
Ironically, one of the main negotiators at Camp David (2000), Israel’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Shlomo Ben Ami, stated; “Camp David was not the missed opportunity for the Palestinians, and if I were a Palestinian I would have rejected Camp David, as well.”
The tragic reality is that the negotiation framework was evidently skewed against Palestinians, considering Israel — the illegal occupier, is supposedly granting “concessions”. Essentially, the stringent conditions attached to the so-called Israeli “peace” offers make it impossible for Palestinians to live a normal dignified life. Such facts put paid to the myth that Palestinians are responsible for the non-implementation of the “two-state solution”.
Following the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack, some Israeli government officials have publicly stated that the possibility of a Palestinian state is no longer possible. However, claiming Hamas is responsible for the collapse of the “two-state solution” is simply a convenient ruse. The fact is that Palestinians have had to endure various incidents of terror over the years, as Israel periodically “mows” the lawn. Some examples of what can be considered Israel’s “terror” attacks on Palestinians include 2008 Operation Cast Lead; killing at least 1,383 Palestinians, including 333 children, 2012 Operation Pillar of Defense; killing at least 165 Palestinians, including more than 30 children, and 2014 Operation Protective Edge; killing at least 2,000 Palestinians, including more than 500 children, over 10,000 people injured.
Facts have emerged that during a Likud Party faction meeting on March 12, 2019 Netanyahu argued that allowing transfer of funds to Hamas in Gaza helps prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state. This is an archetypal divide and conquer strategy from the settler colonialism handbook, which effectively maintains the status quo of the separation between Hamas in Gaza and the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank. Also, at a press conference in Tel Aviv on December 16, 2023, Netanyahu publicly admitted to being “proud” to have prevented the establishment of a Palestinian state, and effectively affirming himself a “liar”. Netanyahu’s confession prompted former US Ambassador to Israel Martin Indyk to state that all the “promises” Netanyahu made to “world leaders” about his “commitment” to a “two-state solution” were a “bunch of lies”. The truth of the matter is that Netanyahu has actually opposed the prospects of a Palestinian state for decades.
In view of this, Palestinians cannot be blamed for rejecting the “two-state solution”, because the facts are antithetical to the reality. Emanating evidence has established the accusation against the Palestinians is not factually accurate. The primary objective of Israel was never about giving Palestinians their independent State, but to perpetuate Israel’s illegal occupation and inadvertently blame Palestinians for the unsuccessful implementation of a somewhat one-sided and seemingly endless negotiation charade. A carefully orchestrated subterfuge stratagem!
When former US President Jimmy Carter visited Gaza in 2009, he stated that he had to “hold back tears”. In his speech Carter said “Tragically, the international community largely ignores the cries for help, while the citizens of Gaza are treated more like animals than human beings.”
The dynamics of international politics is rapidly evolving and Israel may not enjoy the support it has been accustomed to, especially from the West. There is no amount of Zionist agitprop that can mask the realities on ground, because propaganda has its limits. It is no longer acceptable to justify ethnic cleansing and genocide under the guise of having a right to “defend” itself. No group of people are superior to another, and the Western imperialist ideology that underpinned settler colonialism like those committed against indigenous populations in America, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, should not be tolerated in Palestine contemporarily.
On January 11, 2024, the World Court — International Court of Justice heard the genocide case of South Africa against Israel. South Africa presented a solid case with indisputable evidences. Professor Francis A. Boyle, a human rights lawyer, who in 2007, won the first order of provisional protection ever issued by the World Court, for acts of genocide committed in Bosnia and Herzegovina, believes South Africa will win the genocide case at the World Court against Israel. The irony of the latest legal episode is that the Genocide Convention is a consequence of the crimes committed against the Jews following World War II. “Never again” should not be limited to Holocaust against Jews but extended to all human beings.
An apposite sociological viewpoint by Ibn Khaldun — an acknowledged “progenitor” of sociology and modern historiography, states: “The vanquished always want to imitate the victor…” In this regard, one wonders who Israel is now imitating. Food for thought!
Regardless of the legal outcome, and potential veto at the UN Security Council by Israel’s enabler-in-chief — the United States, it is highly symbolic that South Africa is the country showing leadership by pursuing a case of genocide against Israel at The Hague. During his lifetime, Nelson Mandela supported the Palestine struggle because he endured apartheid in South Africa. The freedom of the Palestine is long overdue and inevitable.
“We know too well that our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians.”
― Nelson Mandela
© M.B.O 2024
M.B.O Owolowo is the author of P.R.I.S.M: Primal Religious Instruction Serving Mankind
Comments
Post a Comment