I’ve been reading the updates lately on the Israeli conflict in Gaza, but I’ve stayed abreast of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for much longer.  To understand the current war, you cannot just look at the last three weeks and talk about rockets and “proportional response.”  This war is about something much larger than that.  

It really is unbelievable what this conflict has become.  Back in the early Clinton years Fatah was the bad guys, led by Yasser Arafat.  Now we are talking about a democratically elected Hamas regime taking over Gaza and making not only the Jews, but also the “moderate” Fatah its enemy as well.  Hamas as a group is committed to Israel’s destruction yet some around the world want Israel to sit at a table with Hamas.  I cannot understand it.  Before I get to my analysis, you should know that I consider my view an objective one, one based on historical fact, but if you are looking for something more sympathetic to the Palestinian side, just go to the 95% of media outlets that cover the conflict.  I promise you will find the slant you seek there.

As you most assuredly know, the battle between the Jews and the Arabs did not start three weeks.  It has been a battle waged for centuries and then some.  To keep this as brief as possible and avoid stepping into religious history, I’ll narrow this discussion to World War I and later because the fallout from World War I created much of the fuel for what is debated over today.  

After World War I, the British controlled much of Palestine in what had been the Ottoman Empire.  The British determined that the area formerly known as Palestine should be the Jewish homeland.  The Arabs obviously disagreed and despite the fact that the they backed the losing side of the war, the Arabs lobbied to block the assignment of Palestine to the Jews and submitted to the Americans that as to the Jewish people:  “Their history and their past proves that it is impossible to live with them. In all the countries where they are at present, they are not wanted...because they always arrive to suck the blood of everybody...”  The Jews said nothing of the Arabs in the area but instead stated that they merely desired a nation to call their own.  In the end, the British mandate for Israel was accepted.  However, King Abdullah marched with two thousand soldiers through Transjordan and threatened to take Damascus from the French.  A compromise was reached and the Jews’ land stake was cut in half with present day Jordan being the lost land.

In the time between World War I and World War II, Arabs began instigating riots and pogroms against the Jews who were now their neighbors.  The Arabs were attempting to show Britain, especially in the early 1920’s after the Balfour Declaration (what gave the Jews their homeland), that a Jewish state would not be governable.  Arabs were fearful that Jewish immigration and the buying of land by the Jews would displace the Arabs, even though the Arabs benefited from the improvements made by the Jews to the land and the economy in the area.  As time wore on entering the 1930’s, Jewish immigration skyrocketed due to persecution in Europe.  Fleeing those areas, most Jews settled in either present day Israel or the United States.  The leader of the Arab population, Hajj Amin El Husseini, was not pleased with all of the immigrants.  Even though the British curbed immigration to a degree, allowing only 15,000 Jews per year to enter Israel starting in 1939, Husseini was not appeased.  He organized more revolts and pogroms against the Jews.  The British decided to step in and help stop the persecution in the area, which forced Husseini to flee to Iraq where he began helping the Nazis.  Many Palestinian leaders were sympathetic to the Nazi cause and were in the planning stages for building a railroad from Israel to Auschwitz.  The Holocaust did not help the conflict because many Jews were forced to illegally immigrate to Israel to flee certain death.

After World War II, the British reneged on a promise to allow immigration for Jews into Israel, but under pressure from the United States acquiesced to the U.S. backed UN plan for the land to be partitioned and for the Jews and Arabs to have their own states.  The Jews accepted the plan while the Arabs rejected it, even though, again, the Arabs had backed the losing side in another world war.  The borders were chosen in an effort to be economically equal which meant uneven lines and open borders.  Neither side would be happy in the end with the status quo as the borders were not definite and the UN could not enforce the borders.  Husseini started the inevitable battle and declared war against the Jews.  What resulted was the Israeli war of independence.  The Jews gained an advantage in the war against the Palestinians and declared independence on May 14, 1948.

However, fearing that other neighbors would step in to fight Israel and gain an advantage in the area, Egypt, Jordan, and Syria joined in the war, each with their own goals however.  Egypt was most successful in acquiring land in the desert south.  Syria attempted to acquire land but was not as successful while Jordan, as had been agreed upon earlier with the Jews, did not make any such attempts to gain Jewish land.  The fighting came to a standstill in June with a temporary ceasefire enabling the Jews to organize and train more soldiers, and also to acquire more weapons.  The underground armies for the Jews were organized into a single Israel Defense Force.  The IDF was able to block Arab arms shipments and were clearly the victors in the ceasefire stage of the war.  Israel kept the momentum and when the fighting ended in 1949, Israel had seized more land than had originally been called for and in the process had killed and expelled vast numbers of Palestinians, especially in central Israel.  Huge refugee problems resulted on both sides, but Israel never filed claims on behalf of its own.  It was at this time that the Soviets, previously on the side of the Jews, joined the Arab side, giving much in the area of weaponry to Egypt and Syria.

Sentiments did not improve in the 1960’s and the new Fatah movement, led by Yasser Arafat, decided to wage war against Israel.  Egypt attempted to instill a more moderate Palestinian Liberation Organization while Syria was against it and backed Arafat and Fatah.  Syrians began making terrorist attacks against Israel and giving Fatah the credit.  The Soviets next created a false rumor stating that Israel was massing troops at the Syrian border, hoping to entice Egypt into the proceedings against Israel.  Egypt took the bait and asked the UN to remove troops from the area between itself and Israel.  The UN obeyed.  The Arab community began to unite against Israel, both at the UN, and with individual defense pacts, bringing Iraq and Lebanon into the mix with Egypt, Jordan, and Syria.  The U.S. initially asked Israel not to attack first, but, upon further consideration, changed its position and recognized that Israel would have to act.  Israel struck first, obliterating Egypt’s air force and gained total advantage in the air.  Jordan, despite warnings from Israel to stay out, attacked Jerusalem.  Israel responded and conquered the West Bank from Jordan to add to the Sinai Desert and Gaza Strip, which had been seized from Egypt.  Next, Israel turned to Syria in the north and won there, securing the Golan Heights in the process.  The Six Day War of 1967 was over.  In the aftermath, Yasser Arafat took over the PLO and became the recognized voice of the Palestinian cause.

Following the Six Day War, Israel offered, through secret negotiations, the Sinai Desert and Golan Heights back to Egypt and Syria in return for peace.  The Arab states refused to deal with Israel and turned the offer down.  In response, Israeli citizens began to make settlements in the lands that had been taken over.  Egypt attacked Israel along the Suez canal and the two sides fought to a standstill.  When Nasser died, Anwar Sadat took over in Egypt and attempted to engage Israel in peace talks.  However, despite these talks, which were largely rejected by Golda Meir in Israel, Egypt and Syria decided a on a surprise attack again and thus began the Yom Kippur War.  Jordan chose to abstain this time around despite the wishes of its Arab brethren.  Israel was able to hold its own again despite being caught off guard.  In the aftermath, Golda Meir was forced to resign with Yitzhak Rabin taking her place.  Peace finally came between Israel and Egypt in 1975 with the returning of the Sinai to Egypt.

Following the troubles in Lebanon for both Israel and the U.S. against Iranian backed Pasdaran soldiers and Hezbollah in the 1980’s, Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza revolted in what became known as the First Intifada.  The fighting stopped in 1991, but the way was paved for much of the fighting that continues on today.  

Following the Gulf War in Iraq, in which the Palestinians again backed their Arab brethren against the U.S., the Oslo Peace Process began.  The process led to the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza and most of the West Bank in return for promises of peace.  Despite this, talks broke down, Syria rejected an offer of the Golan Heights in return for peace, and the Palestinian leadership decided on spreading false rumors to its citizens causing the outbreaks of riots and more terrorist attacks.  Israel, however, abided by the deal, withdrawing its troops from the Palestinian areas.

The Camp David Accords led to another deadlock in which the Arabs demanded rights for refugees in Israel, which Israel would not budge on for fear of being bred out of its own land.  In the end, according to the UN, which was never overly friendly to Israel, released the facts of the dealings in 2000.  Israel, through President Clinton in the U.S., offered 97% of the land sought by the Arabs with a capital in East Jerusalem for the new Palestine.  Arafat again turned the deal down and instead upped the terrorist attacks against the Israelis in response.  The Palestinians would never again get anywhere near as good a deal as a result of Arafat’s refusal, under pressure from Hamas.  Arafat publicly called for a cessation of terrorist attacks, but in private backed them through Hamas as documents later seized would show.  

In response to the suicide attacks, Israel seized the West Bank once more.  Despite the violence, both sides came together, made concessions and established the Geneva Accord.  However, both sides came under pressure from extremists (settlers in Israel and Hamas for the Palestinians) and the deal never was lived up to.  Israel erected a wall to ensure its safety creating daily hardships for many Palestinians.  Terrorist actions continued against Israel culminating with the capturing of IDF soldiers by Hamas and Hezbollah.  The war in 2006 against Hezbollah taught Israel a tough lesson.  As was the case in Lebanon in the 1980’s, Hezbollah was fully backed by Iran and Syria.  Israel could not win a war against Hezbollah using only airstrikes and was forced to back out within a little over a month.  The soldiers were not returned despite Israel’s willingness to part with hundreds of prisoners in the past.

Moving to the present, not much has changed.  Abbas took over for Arafat but was overthrown in Gaza by Hamas, which was later democratically elected.  Israel, learning from the lessons of the war with Hezbollah took its army into Gaza to quell the rocket fire there and cripple Hamas, despite what the leadership may say about the latter aim.  Israel understands what is at risk.  If it leaves Gaza and Hamas stays in power, then Israel concedes victory again and emboldens Hamas, and in turn Iran.  The citizens in the area elected Hamas because Hamas provides them with meager social services and tells them that their lot in life is the fault of the Jews and Israel.  Imagine the residents of Chicago falling in love with Al Capone because all they knew of him was his soup kitchen.  

Hamas and Fatah before it under Arafat have been very good at keeping their constituents under their control.  The Palestinian societies in the West Bank and more so in Gaza have little to no middle class.  There is the ruling elite with all of the money and everybody else.  You could feed all of Gaza with one month’s worth of Arafat’s wife’s inheritance.  Why does the world not recognize that the Palestinian leadership deprives its citizenry of all of this money?  In a capitalist society, someone like Arafat would be well within his rights to accrue wealth, maybe not the way he did by being a terrorist for hire, but his status as a wealthy man would be well received.  However, those fighting western ways of life should reject Arafat being rich at the expense of his Palestinian brothers.  But nobody brings this up.  The Palestinian leadership gets away with keeping the general population ignorant and poor.  They then “educate” the citizens with their anti-Jewish propaganda turning the entire population against the Jews and enabling something like the democratic election of Hamas.

Go back to the history of the conflict and a pattern emerges.  Israel fights for the right to exist and its neighbors attack it.  The two sides come to the table for peace and the Arab side either withdraws or attacks or both.  As recently as the Hezbollah affair, Israel promised to withdraw in return for the captured soldiers.  Israel withdrew, but Hezbollah never returned the two soldiers.  The neighboring nations have abstained from more attacks because it is against their best interests to keep attacking Israel.  However, for Hamas, attacking Israel is the only viable option.  If they remain peaceful then their empty rhetoric will eventually be exposed as just that and the citizens under their rule will start to blame them because nothing will have come of their talk.  If they attack, they either chip away at Israel’s security or cause an Israeli response, enabling Hamas to play the role of the victim, as is now the case.  But look at the history.  Look at the facts.  Hamas has never abided by any peaceful agreement.  In fact, when asked about a long term ceasefire, the current Hamas leadership has responded (as was quoted in the NY Times) that a long term ceasefire is not necessary because Israel will be eradicated in the near future.  Is this any kind of leadership that you would want to negotiate with?  No.  Instead, Israel’s only option is to subdue Hamas enough so that Fatah, under the more moderate Abbas, can take over.  Israel must then establish with Abbas a two-state solution backed by other world powers.  Otherwise, both sides will be right back where they are today.  As far as Israel goes, they cannot ebb the attack for the sole reason that the world wants it to.  Again looking to Israel, with the exception of the U.S., Netherlands, and at times Britain, the world has yet to take up the Israeli or Jewish side.  Israel should recognize this and fight the battle now because the next battle will result in the same condemning of Israeli actions from an anti-Israeli UN and the countries that make it up.  Hamas has done nothing to earn a seat at the table and nobody should give them one.  The Clinton attempt needs to be renewed and Israel and Fatah must get together and make concessions that were on the table only a decade before.  It is in the best interests of both the Jews and the Palestinians.  Anything else will result in only more deal breaking and thus more violence.

Note:  For further reading, I suggest (http://www.mideastweb.org/briefhistory.htm) and Alan Dershowitz’ The Case For Israel.  I consulted both and also used some of my own knowledge attained from a childhood of Jewish education.