The pressure cooker that is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict exploded this weekend.
Normally, I stay out of making comment about anything to do with this particular conflict because quite frankly it appears to be intractable on so many fronts. Between religious and cultural conflicts that go back not merely years, but arguably centuries; and a plethora of issues around everything from territory to resources, and the fallout from the dissolution of Europe’s colonial era political constructs, it’s just one big ugly mess.
However, I’m seeing lots of posts on social media that are blindly supporting either the Israeli or the Palestinian “sides” in this dispute. This is one of those rare times where “both sides are wrong” really does apply.
Nothing justifies the actions of Hamas - nothing. Going after civilians and massacring them is just plain wrong. However, Hamas is a political entity, and like all such entities it represents a portion of the people. Once in power, I suspect that they have used their position to spread propaganda to feed their agenda. I can only imagine the language at use within Gaza that has been used to desensitize Hamas members to the point that they are willing to engage in these horrors.
Israel’s response is predictably heavy-handed - although as of this writing they haven’t yet rolled tanks into Gaza, just resorted to aerial bombing / missile attacks - which are frankly just as likely to kill innocent civilians as members of Hamas. That is an understandable reaction to Hamas’ actions - but that doesn’t make it justified either.
Since the first Arab-Israeli war, we have watched the Israeli state steadily erode the lands originally allocated to the Palestinian peoples. In the last 20 years we have watched Israel build walls around Palestinian settlements, and restrict resource access for those settlements. The border to Gaza is one of the most fortified in the world. Then, the Israeli government has encouraged the formation of “settlements” on those occupied lands.
Whatever the political justification for these actions, they serve ultimately to create a pressure cooker environment for the people caught within those walls, and those forcibly removed from their homes and lands. It’s not hard to understand how that would over time alienate the peoples affected, and make them vulnerable to propaganda. While Hamas is not all Palestinian people, you can be absolutely certain that Hamas leadership has taken full advantage of the opportunity that continued oppression by the State of Israel has created.
The tragedy here is that cynical political leadership on both sides has chosen to use the situation to justify further entrenchment in the conflict. While Netanyahu continues to talk about a "two state solution", his government's actions have done little to move towards any kind of peace. Similarly Hamas profits from the stalemate, using it to justify continuing to lash out at Israel with violence while petitioning its allies in states like Iran for more weapons.
It will take statesmen with bigger visions than the leadership on either side of this conflict currently demonstrates to move in the direction of some kind of peace, and it will also take major steps from the leadership of countries like the US, Iran, and Russia to facilitate a meaningful peace.
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