Come on, there's not been many Israel threads either. And i don't think this one is to bad tbh.
I know I asked West didsblue on an earlier post abt the conflict and his feelings abt the past, present and where he sees the future, he's getting back to me tomorrow with a lengthy post. Is there any chance of reading your take on it all. I should imagine you've forgot more than I know but I'd still be interested to hear your thoughts.
To understand the present, you have to understand the past. Since 79AD and the Roman suppression of the Jewish revolt the territory was just a part of someone's empire. Up to 1917 it had been in the Turkish Ottoman Empire for about 400 years and that including the land that currently encompasses Israel (plus the Occupied Territories), Jordan, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia & Yemen. None of these existed as sovereign states prior to 1918. After the Allies defeated the Ottomans in WW1 this area came under the control of the British & French. They carved it up and gave it to various tribal allies who'd supported them during the war.
The Balfour Declaration was just one of the deals struck, some of which were conflicting. When it'll all been parcelled out and the countries above created, the territory known as Palestine was left under British control via a mandate from the League of Nations. There were Jews living in the mandate at that point although they were a minority. However it was attracting Jews from Eastern Europe where persecution had been quite severe around the turn of the century. So Palestine, as a physical entity, only came about in 1922. The original intention was to set up a secular state jointly run by Jews & Arabs but it's fair to say neither side wanted that. There was an Arab revolt in the mid-1930's over increasing Jewish immigration and, to appease them, the British imposed tight limits on Jewish immigration into Palestine. They also proposed partitioning the territory between Jews & Arabs. The Arabs rejected this outright, demanding a single Arab-run state with certain guarantees for Jews. The Jewish side didn't reject the idea of partition but did reject the physical plan.
The post-WW2 situation in Europe caused further friction as Jewish immigration limits were still in place but many of the few survivors left in Europe wanted to go there. So the violence started with terror campaigns waged by both Jewish and Arab groups. Eventually the British government passed the mandate for Palestine to the newly formed UN, who voted for partition. the Jews were in favour but the Arabs were opposed. Israel declared statehood on May 14th 1948 so just 70 years ago. This set off the War of Independence, which saw Arab armies from Egypt, Jordan, Syria & Iraq attack the newly formed state. It's important to realise that they weren't looking to set up an independent state for the Arabs of Palestine but to annex the territory for themselves. Syrians saw it as part of a Greater Syria and the Egyptian saw the southern part of Israel as theirs. I'm not sure what the outcome would have been if the Arabs had accepted partition. Possibly the same, possibly not but there's no doubt at all that the more established Arab countries saw Palestine as part of their territory rather than as an independent, neighbouring state. Most people don't realise this.
That war and the subsequent armistice left what we now know as the pre-1967 borders. Jordan had control of the West Bank and annexed it as part of their country while Eqypt occupied the Gaza Strip but didn't annexe it, instead installing a compliant government that, while nominally independent, was effectively under Egyptian military control. Another result of the 1948 War was the refugee problem. There's no doubt that while some Arabs voluntarily fled the fighting, there was a tactical and strategic plan by Israel to remove as many Arabs as possible from some areas. At the same time, hundreds of thousands of Jews in places like Iraq, Syria, Iran, Yemen, Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia and some other places were effectively forced out of those countries and most went to Israel.
Between 1948 and 1967, there could have been a Palestinian state in 100% of the West Bank but Jordan kept it as part of their own country, which reinforces the point I made earlier about the Arabs having no intention of ever facilitating such a thing. While Israel absorbed the Jews from the Arabian peninsula and North Africa (not without severe difficulties) the Arab refugees stayed in their miserable camps, with no Arab countries prepared to take them in and offer them citizenship. They are still political pariahs in the Arab world to a very large degree. People talk about Israel as being an apartheid state but the Palestinians in other Arab countries are probably closer to the idea of apartheid, although nothing like it was in South Africa for black people.
Then in 1967 there was another war, with Israel gaining military control of the Gaza Strip and West Bank. The policy of establishing settlements started almost immediately and these are generally regarded as illegal under international law (although Israel naturally disputes this). The 1973 Yom Kippur War made no great difference but it did give the impetus to peace treaties between Israel and Jordan/Egypt. Since then we've had the various Intifadas and elections in the Occupied Territories leading to the more radical & Islamic Hamas ruling the Gaza Strip and the more secular, less radical PA running the West Bank. The rise in suicide bombings inside Israel proper led to the building of a wall in the West Bank and virtually sealing off the Gaza Strip (and that includes Egypt doing so from their side as well).
The political situation in Israel has seen a move sharply to the right. The nature of Israeli politics means that a single party very rarely has an overall majority and usually has to form a coalition. That used to be a centrist coalition involving their equivalent of Labour and Conservatives but as politics has polarised the right has taken control. Coalitions mean that the smaller parties can have the opportunity to call the tune and they do, which means that Netanyahu has to give them a lot of what they want. The more extreme elements would simply annexe the whole West Bank as they see it as historically part of biblical Israel. The compromise from Netanyahu has been to accelerate settlement building and there's now over half a million people in authorised an unauthorised settlements. These tend to be younger. religious and right-wing and they won't give these settlements up without a fight.
So there's a number of issues blocking progress. From the Israeli point of view they want security and being "strong" plays well with the Israeli electorate. They don't particulalry want to give up the settlements, at least not the main ones. Israel and the PA could probably co-exist reasonably well but the settlements and issues with Palestinian freedom of movement restrict any practical progress. The ideal solution would be for Israel and the PA to agree a land swap, with the PA getting land currently in Israel proper in exchange for the land on which the major settlements like Ariel, Maale Adumin and Modi'in stand. I suspect that could be done without too much trouble (relatively speaking) but the sticking point will be East Jerusalem, which Israel occupied in 1967. Some sort of joint administration might be possible although that's been rejected in the past. Both sides want it exclusively so that's not going to be resolved in the short to medium term.
In Gaza the problem is Hamas, which simply wants the destruction of Israel. While they've moderated their position slightly, as we've seen in the last few weeks they are still intent on confrontation and they know Netanyahu won't let them down. I've said before that both sides seem to need each other with Hamas violence giving Netanyahu the excuse he needs to act with excessive brutality and the that reaction breeding increased resentment in Gaza and the Arab world. Hamas is also allied to the Iran/Syria axis which complicates things as they want to make as much trouble as possible. There are signs that maybe Hamas isn't as popular in Gaza as it was but I suspect they won't go away quietly. Both the Palestinian leadership and Netanyahu are weak in their own ways. The former has never shown any imagination and the latter is only too happy to keep his right-wing partners happy and not have ot offer anything bold or imaginative himself.
What needs to happen is for both sides to give something and meet halfway. If Hamas were to say that they renounce violence and are prepared to accept the continued existence of Israel, in exchange for opening the border and working with the international community to get the economy going there. I'm a firm believer that prosperity blunts people's desire for violence. As I said above, land-swaps could open the way for a peaceful resolution in the West Bank if we ignore the issue of East Jerusalem.
Finally there's the issue of the so-called Right of Return. The Palestinians are demanding that all the refugees can return to their homes and land but that's not really practical after all this time. The solution seems to lie in the payment of compensation with maybe some symbolic returns of refugees.
It's a sad and very undesirable state of affairs and unless there's a sea-change in the attitude of the leadership of all parties then nothing much is likely to change in the short-to-medium term. I'd say that a majority on both sides really is fed up with posturing and just wants to be able to live in peace and security butthat the extremist elements on both sides are currently setting the agenda.
