Here is my comment on the current situation in Palestine and Israel. A controversial topic I do realise but definitely one that needs addressing. Basically this is a war over land between two nations who have at various times in history owned all to none of it. The conflict that arose out of this has now escalated to be about more than just land. Obviously the problem/conflict/whatever-you-think-is-a-liable-term-for-two-nations-liberally-trying-to-destroy-each-other is extremely complicated and has run on for years on a tit-for-tat fighting relationship with increasing aggression. A simplified version is needed when the conflict itself is older than even my parents.
The reason I am now more fully aware of and writing about the situation, is that it has recently escalated beyond all proportion. The bombing and killing which occurs between these two nations has made its way to the centre of the world stage (next to Putin vs Ukraine which is an issue for another day) and I, as a young, up and coming person, am forced to face these problems.
What I have found is that people feel compelled to pick sides. They pick sides because of religion, race, past war experiences, personal moral decisions, pride, bias, manipulation by their own countries’ bias, along with a myriad of other personal or national prejudices. My question is why? Why pick a side?
I myself have been asked such questions as ‘who do I believe is right’ and ‘who do I support’ and, although I generally try to stick up for the underdog, which in this case I do feel is Palestine, I have decided not to pick one. I don’t think any of us should. Not as people, organisations, communities or countries. If you are not a fan of the idea of ‘fence-sitting’ then picture it as picking the side of peace. I feel that by supporting one of these countries you are supporting what that particular nation is doing and in both cases that means that you advocate violence. At the moment the simple way of putting it is that both sides are trying to cause harm to each other (and yes I do realise that they each have their own reasons but I will get to that).
And it isn’t just you and me at grassroots level. It is also the big shots, the countries and their leaders who have chosen to support either Palestine or Israel. I don’t see how the great USA supplying weapons to Israel is helping peace be achieved. I see no freedom that they greatly claim to understand. I just see more reasons to fight and the more they fight the bigger the support seems to become. The conflict has been named the middle-eastern Apartheid and if this is true surely we should learn from the past. Something which made a huge impact on the National Party government’s decision to end Apartheid in South Africa was sanctions imposed by other countries which (unsurprisingly) America and Britain joined in with quite late, but as soon as they did things started to change and although there were other forces at play sanctions and boycotts made a huge difference. So I propose that we all sanction sports and boycott goods from Israel. And this includes no longer selling weapons to Israel which means the USA has to decide whether they choose wealth over morals once more. Yes you may notice that I only said Israel and that is not me being hypocritical but Palestine doesn’t really have anything to boycott. The country is currently in appalling conditions and I think they have bigger worries right now whereas Israel has created an image of strength and built themselves up quite well and so boycotts would make a bigger impact but still let us not send weapons to either country.
Now I do understand that some people will use the excuse that they have to support a specific country because they have religious affiliations with it. This is an inadequate excuse. With that logic every Christian in the world should have supported Hitler. Besides don’t you think by sending bombs into another country they are putting negative connotations with those religions? Again it doesn’t help save lives or achieve peace when Muslim and Jewish people are fighting worldwide.
A friend of mine asked me if either country was justified in what they are doing. To that I say no and yes. Yes because justification as a term is quite flexible and is personal to an individual system so I am assuming and hoping that both sides of this conflict, the Israeli military or the Palestine rebels do at least think they are justified and obviously both sides have had some terrible things done to them, by each other and outside forces, however I think we’ve gone beyond this to a point where each side has done enough wrong to each other for them both to be unjustified. It has gone past the point of justification. The violence, the ‘justified’ violence, isn’t solving anything and the problems which have led to this violence could just as easily justify a peace talk and compromise.
Children have died in this conflict. The people in charge have said that it was a tragic outcome and it was tragic but it was also a foreseeable outcome. As a human race we have gone into no war in our history which uses modern warfare and children haven’t been killed. Children are innocent. They have no control over their bias and in no world is it fair or justified to kill them. When enough people have died these two countries will have to talk or one will be gone.
If one country is gone, will that be a good legacy for the other country? Will it be honourable that forever they will be known for annihilating an entire nation? Will it be worth it? I don’t think so. And if they both survive and after they have killed too many people for the world to finally force peace what will have been the point of those deaths and the foreseeable death of more children? So why not cut to the peace talks now?
Jewish people do deserve a homeland but the Palestinians do not deserve to be kicked out of their own homes to achieve this. Somewhere between trying to settle roots and protecting their people Israel managed to do the exact same thing they were running away from to the people who took them in and from there it escalated. Both the Israeli and the Palestinian people are fighting for a safe ground, for a place they can call home where nobody is going to persecute them. They want the same thing so it needs to be asked… Why are they fighting?
(For anyone who, like me, didn’t fully understand what on earth was going on in the conflict you can watch this video https://org.salsalabs.com/o/301/p/salsa/web/common/public/signup?signup_page_KEY=7203. I believe it explains the issue simply enough without pointing fingers too dramatically at one side – although it isn’t without bias.)
Plain Old Glasses 