By Maha Nassar
The focus on conflict in the Middle East has again returned to the Gaza Strip, with Israel’s defense minister ordering a “complete siege” of the Palestinian enclave.
The military operation, which involves extensive bombing of residences, follows a surprise attack on Oct. 7, 2023, by Hamas militants who infiltrated Israel from Gaza and killed more than 900 Israelis. In reprisal airstrikes, the Israel military has killed over 800 Gazans. And that figure could escalate in the coming days. Meanwhile, an order to cut off all food, electricity and water to Gaza will only worsen the plight of residents in what has been called the “world’s largest open-air prison.”
But how did Gaza become one of the most densely populated parts of the planet? And why is it the home to militant Palestinian action now? As a scholar of Palestinian history, I believe understanding the answers to those questions provides crucial historical context to the current violence.
A brief history of Gaza
The Gaza Strip is a narrow piece of land on the southeastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. Roughly twice the size of Washington, D.C., it is wedged between Israel to its north and east and Egypt to its south.
An ancient trade and sea port, Gaza has long been part of the geographic region known as Palestine. By the early 20th century, it was mainly inhabited by Muslim and Christian Arabs who lived under Ottoman rule. When Britain took control of Palestine following World War I, intellectuals in Gaza joined the emergent Palestinian national movement.
During the 1948 war that established the state of Israel, the Israeli military bombed 29 villages in southern Palestine, leading tens of thousands of villagers to flee to the Gaza Strip, under the control of the Egyptian army that were deployed after Israel declared independence. Most of them and their descendants remain there today.
Following the 1967 Six-Day War between Israel and its Arab neighbors, the Gaza Strip came under Israeli military occupation. The occupation has resulted in “systematic human rights violations,” according to rights group Amnesty International, including forcing people off their land, destroying homes and crushing even nonviolent forms of political dissent.
Palestinians staged two major uprisings, in 1987-1991 and in 2000-2005, hoping to end the occupation and establish an independent Palestinian state.
Hamas, a Palestinian Islamist militant group centered in Gaza, was founded in 1988 to fight against the Israeli occupation. Hamas and other militant groups launched repeated attacks on Israeli targets in Gaza, leading to Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from Gaza in 2005. In 2006, Palestinian legislative elections were held. Hamas beat its secular rival, Fatah, which had been widely accused of corruption. Elections haven’t been held in Gaza since 2006, but polling from March 2023 found that 45% of Gazans would back Hamas should there be a vote, ahead of Fatah at 32%.
After a brief conflict between Hamas and Fatah militants in May 2007, Hamas took complete control of the Gaza Strip. Since then, Gaza has been under the administrative control of Hamas, even though it is still considered to be under Israeli occupation by the United Nations, the U.S. State Department and other international bodies.
Who are the Palestinians of Gaza?
The more than 2 million inhabitants of the Gaza Strip are part of the 14 million-strong global Palestinian community. About one third of Gaza’s inhabitants trace their family’s roots to land inside the Gaza Strip. The remaining two-thirds are refugees from the 1948 war and their descendants, many of whom hail from towns and villages surrounding Gaza.
Majdi Fathi/NurPhoto via Getty Images
The Palestinians of Gaza trend young: nearly half the population is under 18. The enclave is also very poor, with a poverty rate that stands at 53%.
Despite this grim economic picture, education levels are quite high. Over 95% of Gazan children ages 6-12 are in school. The majority of Palestinian students in Gaza graduate from high school, and 57% of students at the prestigious Islamic University of Gaza are female.
But because of the circumstances of their surroundings, young Palestinians in Gaza find it difficult to live fulfilling lives. For graduates between the ages of 19 and 29, the unemployment rate stands at 70%. And a World Bank survey earlier this year found 71% of Gazans show signs of depression and high levels of PTSD.
There are several factors that contribute to these conditions. A major factor is the crippling, 16-year blockade that Israel and Egypt – with U.S. support – have imposed on Gaza.
Years of blockade
Shortly after the 2006 elections, the Bush administration tried to force Hamas from power and bring in a rival leader from the Fatah party who was considered friendlier to Israel and the U.S. Hamas preempted the coup and took full control of Gaza in May 2007. In response, Israel and Egypt – with U.S. and European support – closed the border crossings into and out of the Gaza Strip and imposed a land, air and sea blockade.
The blockade, which is still in effect, limits the import of food, fuel and construction material; limits how far Gaza’s fishermen can go out to sea; bans almost all exports; and imposes strict limitations on the movement of people into and out of Gaza. In 2023, Israel has allowed only around 50,000 people a month to exit Gaza, according to U.N. figures.
The years of closure have devastated the lives of Palestinians in Gaza. Inhabitants there don’t have enough water for drinking and sanitation. They face electricity cuts that run 12 to 18 hours each day. Without adequate water and electricity, Gaza’s fragile health care system is “on the brink of collapse,” according to the medical rights group Medical Aid for Palestine.
These restrictions hit the young and the weak of Gaza particularly hard. Israel routinely denies sick patients the permits they need to receive medical care outside of Gaza. Bright students with scholarships to study abroad often find that they are unable to leave.
U.N. experts say this blockade is illegal under international law. They argue that the blockade amounts to a collective punishment of the Palestinians of Gaza, a violation of the Hague Convention and the Geneva Conventions that form the backbone of international law.
No end to the suffering
Israel says that the blockade on Gaza is necessary to secure the safety of its population and will be lifted when Hamas renounces violence, recognizes Israel and abides by previous agreements.
But Hamas has consistently rejected this ultimatum. Instead, militant fighters stepped up the firing of homemade rockets and mortars into populated areas surrounding the Gaza Strip in 2008, seeking to pressure Israel to lift the blockade. They have sporadically attacked Israel in this way in the years since.
STR/AFP via Getty Images
Israel has launched four major military assaults on Gaza – in 2008-09, 2012, 2014 and 2021 – in efforts to destroy Hamas’ military capabilities. Those wars killed 4,000 Palestinians, more than half of whom were civilians, along with 106 people in Israel.
During that time, the U.N. estimates that there has been more than $5 billion worth of damage to Gaza’s homes, agriculture, industry, electricity and water infrastructure.
Each of those wars ended in a fragile cease-fire but no real resolution to the conflict. Israel seeks to deter Hamas from launching rockets. Hamas and other militant groups say that even when they have upheld previous cease-fires, Israel has continued to attack Palestinians and has refused to lift the blockade.
Hamas has offered a long-term truce in exchange for Israel ending the blockade on Gaza. Israel has refused to accept the offer, sticking to its position that Hamas must first end violence and recognize Israel.
In the months leading up to the latest escalation, conditions in Gaza have deteriorated even further. The International Monetary Fund reported in September that Gaza’s economic outlook “remains dire.” Conditions became more dire when Israel announced on Sept. 5, 2023, that it was halting all exports from a key Gaza border crossing.
Without an end in sight to the suffering caused by the blockade, it appears that Hamas has decided to upend the status quo in a surprise attack on Israelis, including civilians. Israel’s reprisal airstrikes and its imposition of a “complete siege” on the strip have heaped even further suffering on ordinary Gazans.
It is a tragic reminder that civilians bear the brunt of this conflict.
Maha Nassar is Associate Professor in the School of Middle Eastern and North African Studies at the University of Arizona.
The Conversation arose out of deep-seated concerns for the fading quality of our public discourse and recognition of the vital role that academic experts could play in the public arena. Information has always been essential to democracy. It’s a societal good, like clean water. But many now find it difficult to put their trust in the media and experts who have spent years researching a topic. Instead, they listen to those who have the loudest voices. Those uninformed views are amplified by social media networks that reward those who spark outrage instead of insight or thoughtful discussion. The Conversation seeks to be part of the solution to this problem, to raise up the voices of true experts and to make their knowledge available to everyone. The Conversation publishes nightly at 9 p.m. on FlaglerLive.
ASF says
The Gaza Strip was turned over to Palestinian control in the mid 2000’s. Fatah, unfortunately, made the new Gazan residents very unhappy with their corrupt and inept rule. That paved the way for Hamas, a recognized terrorist organization that had already been kicked out of Egypt, to swoop in and take advantage of the vacuum that was created. After a brief coup, Hamas promised two things that the Palestinian populace found irresistable: (1) the promise of social programs and (2) A charter that offered the tantalizing hope of being able to hunt down Jews behind every rock and tree.
If the Gaza Strip feels like an “Open Air Concentration Camp” to its residents (it isn’t one–Concentration Campos don’t feature shopping malls, horse shows and beaches), it’s because that’s the way they are being governed by the terrorist organization they put in charge of their affairs. The Palestinians elected Hamas to lead them forth in all their terroristic glory which has been on full display for the entire world to see for the past two days.
If the Palestinians want to move about more freely, they need to stop committing terror attacks against their neighbors and threatening Israel’s extinction. If the Palesitnians want to stop being injured and killed by misfired Hamas and Islamkic Jihad rockets and the blowback those rocket attacks create. they need to take that matter up with Hamas and the Isamic Jihad.They need to stop concenting to be exploited as Pallyweood” props and Human Shileds by their own givernments. If they and their enablers expect Israel to stop its efforts to defend its own populace (22% of which is Arab–how many Jews does the author think live in the Gaza Strip?), they are going to be sorely disappointed.
The consequences of the poor governance and abusive choices of the Palestinians are on the Palestinians. All Israel can do is defend their own people from the fall-out effects they have to suffer from them.
JimboXYZ says
Relative Middle East stability is only achievable if the USA is there to keep the peace. Unfortunately that’s quite expensive. Obama & Biden were too soft on Iran. The nuclear deal, if Russia didn’t want Iran to have nuclear power even, why would Obama & Biden enable it ? As long as Russia has been a relative ally of Iran, they certainly could’ve enabled Iran for nuclear capability, long before Obama & Biden (USA) ? No other POTUS has ever gone out of their way to do that. Really, Saddam Hussein was enabled to keep Iran busy, even to the point of chemical warfare (Anthrax & whatever else). W Bush was all about pulling the plug on the Frankenstein Saddam Hussein. 9/11 was a good reason to do it, WMD were the lies to justify the means.
DaleL says
The birthrate in Gaza is one of the highest in the world. The population has almost doubled in 20 years. Nearly 1/2 of the population is under 16 years in age. It is probably true that 95% of Gazan children ages 6-12 are in school, but what are they being taught? I am reminded of the movie Jojo Rabbit.
Also, let us not “whitewash” what just happened. The Hamas militants who infiltrated Israel from Gaza didn’t just kill people. They raped, tortured, and murdered those people. CNN geolocated video five civilians who had been captured alive by Hamas. CNN later identified by clothing in photos four of those people murdered by Hamas. Dash cam video from the music festival captured some of the atrocities by Hamas militants. The intentional targeting of civilians is a war crime.
It is a war crime for the people of Gaza (Hamas) to constantly try and kill the people of Israel! “…militant fighters stepped up the firing of homemade rockets and mortars into populated areas surrounding the Gaza Strip….”
Israel is a democracy. Israel is also the home of 1.7 million Muslims; many of whom serve in the Israel Defense Forces. The United States must support democracies against criminal regimes such as Hamas in Gaza and Putin in Russia.
marlee says
Yes….this has happened before…history repeats…
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
African Americans were subjected to abuse and racism by white Americans during the slavery and Jim Crow eras. Thousands of African American men were lynched by white mobs. White men would lynch black men due to fear of white women being raped. Slaves were treated as property by their white slave owners.
and……………………………….
The indigenous culture was fundamentally crushed, and the inter-generational inheritance of indigenous lives and spirits was under severe threats. The slaughter, forced relocation, cultural assimilation and unjust treatment the United States committed against American Indians have constituted de facto genocides
Karnack says
And before that Christians were fed to the lions, what’s your answer for that ?
Skibum says
Like many others, I have been watching the latest news coming out of Israel, and the details of the slaughter of innocent civilians, including babies over the past few days is absolutely horrific. While I have not agreed with many of the decisions that the Israeli government have made which seem to have only escalated the conflict with the Palestinians over the last several decades, there is one thing that I continue to fail to understand. Israel keeps saying how barbaric the terrorists of Hamas are, and yet the Israeli government has had a very concerted effort of building communities and encouraging its citizens to more into these so-called Kibutz settlements right next to the border areas where the terrorists are located. To me, it defies reason and common sense, especially right now after so many of the Israeli citizens who are in those areas bordering Gaza have been brutally murdered, including babies being beheaded by the Hamas terrorists who stormed across the border into Israel. I have long been concerned about the creation of so many border settlements right next to Palestinian territory, which just seems to inflame more dissention and violence between the Israelis and Palestinians when many rational leaders have tried in vain to de-escalate the tensions instead, to no avail. Having border settlements so close to what Israel calls terrorists appears to be a very, very bad idea, doesn’t it???
ASF says
Many of the Kibbutzniks who were attacked this week chose to live where they live, in part, because they are Left-leaning. They see themselves as being enlightened in their ongoing efforts to partner with Pro-Palestinian Human Rights and other “peace” groups. They weren’t just “dumped” there by Netanyahu. They chose to live in that locale and were free if they so wished.
The music festival that was so brutally attacked was advertised as a “Peace Festival.” Why do you think Hamas chose to target those particular locales first and with such over-the-top brutality? That’s what people should be asking themselves.
Also, more people of good conscience should be asking why there are no safe shelters for the Gazan people to access in times of trouble–while terror tunnels proliferate. Blaming Israel for the fact that the citizens of Gaza have few places to go and no caring government authority to turn to is worse than useless. It enables the “Pallywood” propaganda machine to ensure that more innocent civilians will die–on both sides of the border fence. And it lets Hamas off the hook for their terorrism.
More Palesitnians have died, to date, as resukt of Hamas and Islamic JIhad rocket fire than Israeli strikes. But few care to question that sad reality–or the fact that the Palestinian casualty numbers cannot be relied upon because the Palestinian Ministries routinely mixes in their miltant death counts with their civilian death counts to produce an artifically inflated “civilian death count” number. They did it in 2014 and they keep doing to because it works, all too well, in their favor.
People who claim to be unprejudiced might also ask themselves how many other countries would “react with restraint” and open up their borders upon the command of outsiders if they were in Israel’s shoes. My suspicion is, if many other countries in the supposedly “Free World” were attacked as relentlessly and viciously–for decades– as Israel has been—the attacking countries would have been “put under seige” and “retaliated against” even more stringently a long time ago. And thise countries would not be subject to the microscopic examination and “armchair quaterbacking” that Israel always seems to be.
Dbhammock says
I continue to be amazed at your reporting. You make this out to be the Israelis putting sanctions on Gaza, yet you say what the issue is in plain English, all hamas has to do is recognize the Israel state that was declared by the UN in 1947 and accept the land that was given to both the Jewish population and the Palestinian population and all this would be done with. But Hamas cannot accept that so until they do there will be war. They do not want peace, they they want the extinction of all Jews. And what they are doing right now to civilians and babies and children almost makes the holocaust look tame. The Palestinians are good people, it’s hamas who is the villain. And Palestinian civilians are going to pay the price for something their ideologists signed up for. Where does the head of Hamas live, oh yeah in a mansion in Qatar. He couldn’t give two cents for the Palestinians who will die.
Endangered species says
gaza is an open air prision, most residents are refugees and is one of the most populated places on the planet for people per square foot. They are blockaded on land and sea by israel, so not too surprising that people rise up against their oppressors. unemployment is 70% and nearly all residents are reliant on international aid to eat which Israel determines what gets through. Just saying there are multiple sides to the story and not eveyone that is there supports hamas or their ideals. there is over 2 million people in that little area. There was a good story back in 2016 saying that unless big changes are made it would become unlivable by 2020. so here we are…
ASF says
If Gaza is “an open air prison”, their jailors are Hamas. Take your Human Rights concerns up with them.
Endangered species says
Hamas doesnt have planes, tanks, and american money for supplies to keep 2 million people there. If anything they are the crazy inmates who start a prison riot and now they are on lockdown.
ASF says
Hamas has plenty of rockets from Iran which they are purchasing with UNWRA $$$ and American tax payer $$$. The Taylor Force Act was meant to prevent this but the Biden Administration has been sliding around the precepts of the Taylor Force Act by funneling ever-increasing amounts of “aid” to the Palesitnians through UNWRA.
UNWRA establishes schools in the Pakesitnian territories that literally teach Jew hate. They cannot seem to explain why safe shelters are so scarce in the Gaza Strip while terror tunnels proliferate. It can’t possibly be because all that global aid is misspent, can it? The $$$ for those Pay-for-Slay programs doesn’t magically grow on olive trees.
Hamas stages parades in the streets of Gaza that feature tanks. They have drones. They have weaponry. In 2014, during the last great armed conflict, UNWRA personnel found three rockets stored in the corner of one Gazan classroom alone. They dutifully reported their find to the UN office and then returned the rockets to Hamas.
Hamas now joins in with the Islamic Jihad in staging their terrorist exercises within the Palestinian territories. They get regional back-up and assistance from Hezbollah troops in Syria and Lebanon. Let’s not fool ourselves by fantasizing that Hamas is toothless. They have plenty of teeth left as well as a poisonous bite.
If Israel renders them toothless, we won’t cry crocodile tears for poor defenseless Hamas (well, at least most Americans won’t.)
ASF says
Why don’t you repeat your first sentence to the battered human beings that Hamas is holding hostage, maybe by secreting them in their terror tunnels or using them above ground to serve as Human Shields in their militant operations centers which are stocked with Iranian rockets? I am sure they will find that very reassuring.
Bill C says
We all know that a bloodbath of retribution is coming from the Israelis. They have brutalized the Palestinians for over fifty years. Israel has pushed the Palestinians into insanity with their inhumane tactics of group punishment, bulldozing their homes, blockades denying them food and water and illegally stealing their lands. All the news coverage focuses on the suffering of the Israelis, not a peep about the suffering of the Palestinians who have endured the apartheid policies wrought upon them by Israel for decades. Don’t blame Iran, they are just opportunists taking advantage of Palestinian suffering. Israel can’t wait to finish off their genocidal aspirations using this latest act of suicidal rage by the Palestinians as a pretext to eliminate the Palestinians once and for all, using American weapons to do it.
Ray W. says
Does every FlaglerLive reader intuitively understand what Bill C, intentionally or not, left out of his analysis of underlying reasons for the most recent massacre of Israeli Jews?
Within 15 minutes of Israel being recognized as a nation, all of the surrounding Arab military forces were at war with Israel. Their openly stated purpose was to drive every Jew into the sea. In 1967, every surrounding Arab military force declared war on Israel. Their openly stated purpose was to drive every Jew into the sea. In 1973, every surrounding Arab military force declared war on Israel. Their openly stated purpose was to drive every Jew into the sea.
It wasn’t until the Camp David Accords that Egyptian and Jordanian forces were removed from the equation, changing the IDF’s defense posture for the last 45 years. Both signing leaders were eventually assassinated by extremists within their own countries.
Is it reasonable to argue that there has never been a time in the past 75 years when a vicious and unrelenting element of the surrounding and intermingled Arab population was not planning to drive every Jew into the sea?
And is it reasonable to argue that there has never been a time in the past 75 years when a vicious and unrelenting element of Jewish society was not planning to drive every Arab out of the Promised Land?
Is it possible that Bill C is correct in pointing out that various ultraorthodox elements of Jewish society have long possessed sufficient political strength to repeatedly engage in violations of international law, decade after decade, by expanding settlements further and further into the occupied territories, by terrorizing Palestinians by methods such as invading their homes in the middle of the night, smashing crockery, ripping clothing and bedding, smashing furniture, all the while guarded by IDF soldiers, by depriving them of their livelihoods, by bulldozing their homes, by evicting them without recourse, by humiliating them, by depriving them of medicines, by walling them in, by ignoring their pleas, and the list goes on and on.
I do not claim to have any answer to this most unsolvable of conflicts, other than to comment that, sometimes, ultranationalist or ultraorthodox elements of two peoples so suffer (as Ryszard Kapuscinski so aptly put it) from the “plagues” of nationalism, racism, and religious extremism that their hatred for each other is disconnected from all reason, so much so that all the extremists on each side want is to be left alone so they can all the more completely thrash each other, and it doesn’t matter to them that everyone else suffers.
A short time ago, I wrote of Vladimir Jabotinsky’s 1923 political essay, titled: The Iron Wall. Jabotinsky was one of the founders of what is known as the Revisionist Zionist Movement; he advocated that an unrelenting and forceful iron wall against the indigenous Palestinian population would eventually cause the Palestinians to reject the extremists among them and a more moderate Palestinian political movement would then be able to negotiate for a peaceful two-state solution. I am concerned that a Zeitenweide moment, an epochal turning point, has occurred, and no one can stop the tide of change that is about to engulf the region. Will it be the Iron Wall of Jabotinsky’s vision?
Bill C says
As long as you are dusting off old history books, I’m sure you are familiar with the Balfour Agreement, where the western powers who defeated the Ottoman Empire drew lines in the sand to create nice new countries with straight boundaries out of what had been loosely observed tribal boundaries. The Arabs who actually lived on the land were excluded from the process. The “Promised Land” was promised by His Majesty’s Government.
The Balfour Agreement:
“His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country. ”
Who gave Britain this imperialist authority to take land which was not theirs and give it away to others they favored? Don’t be baffled as to why the Arabs rejected this and hostilities ensued.
ASF says
At least five very generous two state offers have been laid at the feet of the Palestinians since 1948. Although each one of them contained large concessions on Israel’s part CIntrom over poarts of Jeruslaem, large swatches of the “occupied territories that the Arabs ended up surroundering by waging wars against the state of Israel that they LOST), Israel agreed to each of them–during administrations that were both Liberal and Conservative. The Palestinians rejected each and every one of those two state offers out of hand. After three of them, they waged a war and two Intifadas. Despite thatm in the mid 2000’s, Israle turned over cointrol of the Gaz aStrip to the Palestinians and thre out thosuands of Jeiwhs settlers from the region in order to tee it up. The Pakestinians resonded with dramatic INCREASES in their threats of Israel;s extinction, their rocket fire and their unending terror.
To say that Israel is the party that has been standing in the way of any two state solution succeeding is historically inaccurate, And that’s putting it kindly. The Palestinians build plenty of illegal settlemnts on land that is still disputed. Few care to ackowledge that fact and most global media fails to report on it.
The Palestinians continue to prioritize their Jew Hate above everything else in life, including their own childrens’ lives and futures. Everyone in the region, if not the entire world, has to pay some form of consequence for that Palestinians; abysmal choices–including their choice to elect am internationally recognized terroist organization to lead them. That tragic state of affairs is unlikely to change (except maybe for the worse) as long as the world excuses the Palestinians from any accountability for their negative (often deadly) choices. Blamking the Jews they rletnelssly attack is no solution except for people who hate Jews.
Israel has a right and a duty to protect its own populace–22% of which is Arab. It is not contigent upon them to prove their worthiness to exist by submitting to the terms of surrender dictated to them by those who vow to drive them into the sea.
If that’s what some deluded parties expect and demand, they are going to be disappointed. When most Jews say “Never Again”, they mean it. Those who do not agree and expect that still valid statement to be edited to read, “Never Mind” are in serious need of a mirror and a clue.
Ray W. says
I am aware of the Balfour Agreement.
I am aware of the white papers that formed English colonial policy from the mid-18th century, through which England sought favor with weak tribes in all of their colonies. England persuaded their leaders to ally with the English forces, to be armed by the English, to send their sons to English universities so as to train them to lead native governments, to be generals, ministers, judges, powerbrokers, all supported by English guns. The English then drew artificial colonial boundaries right through the middle of the stronger tribes, forcing the stronger tribes to fight two neighboring colonial powers. For example, Kurdistan is split by artificially drawn boundaries, placing the Kurdish people in Iraq, Syria, Turkey and Iran. The Kurds, one of the most powerful tribes in the region, have had to fight Turks, Syrians, Iraqis and Iranians for a century. A naturally drawn boundary would have Kurdistan as its own nation-state. The English policy, and that of other European powers, was always to keep the most powerful indigenous groups out of the power structure. One by one, as the European powers withdrew their colonial governments, they handed power over to the once-weak allied tribes that they had supported for decades. Without the support of the colonial armies, government after government was overthrown. People were slaughtered in waves of tribal violence. Some 25 governments fell in succession in the 50’s and 60’s. Authoritarian rule, coupled with vicious slaughter, has hampered the former colonies ever since. Palestine is more of the same, a fact Winston Churchill addressed in the second of his six-volume history of WWII.
On June 28, 1940, just after the disaster in France, Churchill wrote this to his Secretary of State for the Colonies:
“The failure of the policy which you favour is proved by the very large numbers of sorely needed troops you [we] have to keep in Palestine:
6 battalions of infantry
9 battalions of yeomanry
8 battalions of Australian infantry
— the whole probably more than twenty thousand men. This is the price we have to pay for the anti-Jewish policy which has been persisted in for some years. Should the war go heavily into Egypt, all these troops will have to be withdrawn, and the position of the Jewish colonists will be one of the greatest danger. Indeed I am sure that we shall be told that we cannot withdraw these troops, though they include some of our best, and are vitally needed elsewhere. If the Jews were properly armed, our forces would become available, and there would be no danger of the Jews attacking the Arabs, because they are entirely dependent upon us and upon our command of the seas. I think it is little less than a scandal that at a time when we are fighting for our lives these very large forces should be immobilized in support of a policy which commends itself only to a section of the Conservative Party.”
I am also aware of your decision, whether intentional or not, to speak of only one side of the ancient hatreds that have engulfed the Middle East for millennia. Let’s face it. Jerusalem is considered the home of three of the world’s most far-ranging religions. Palestine is the homeland to Bedouins, Jews, Palestinians, Christians, Assyrians, and on and on; each has a legitimate claim to indigenous status. Everyone on this site should take the time to look up Vladimir Jabotinsky’s essay: The Wall, published in 1923 during the upheavals and dislocations following the dissolution of the long-tottering Ottoman Empire. And you derisively refer to dusting off old history books. When you attempt to lessen the lessons of history, you intentionally blind yourself, and in the process, intentionally attempt to blind FlaglerLive readers. Intellectual rigor itself, not me, demands more of you than your one-sided comments.
Foresee says
From a Haaretz editorial, 10/8/23, (a leading Israeli daily newspaper) titled “Netanyahu Bears Responsibility For This Israel-Gaza War”.
“The disaster that befell Israel on the holiday of Simchat Torah is the clear responsibility of one person: Benjamin Netanyahu. The prime minister, who has prided himself on his vast political experience and irreplaceable wisdom in security matters, completely failed to identify the dangers he was consciously leading Israel into when establishing a government of annexation and dispossession.”
DaleL says
It is important to note that refugees from the 1948 Israel war of independence include huge numbers of Jews. There were significant Jewish populations throughout Ottoman Palestine that date back to Roman times. Particularly in Jerusalem, Tiberias, Safed, Hebron and Gaza. When Israel declared independence, within the UN recognized boundary, every bordering Muslim country declared war on Israel. As a result of the violence perpetrated against the Jewish populations in Muslim majority countries around Israel, those Jews fled to Israel.
Even in the USA, Jewish places of worship need armed guards.
In Hamas controlled Gaza, children are taught that Israel is not legitimate. That the people of Israel should be killed or at least driven out.