Israel and Hamas agreed to ceasefire earlier than was the case in 2008-09 and 2014, the two previous rounds of war-like situations in Gaza. On the former occasion Israel’s air and ground action lasted three weeks and led to at least 1100 deaths in Gaza and 13 Israelis lost their lives in Hamas rocket attacks. In the latter round Israel’s air attacks and the ingress of its ground forces into Gaza continued for almost a month leading to more than 2100 fatalities in Gaza. At the same time 67 Israeli soldiers and a few civilians died in Hamas rocket firings. In this, the third, round which continued for ten days and witnessed Israeli air attacks against Hamas leaders and infrastructure, around 250 persons including women and children died in Gaza while 8 Israeli civilians perished because of Hamas rockets fired from Gaza targeting Israeli territory.
While the ceasefire is a welcome development because it helps to save lives and infrastructure there is no indication that either Israel or the Palestinians have the inclination or the will to pragmatically address their underlying issues. Neither is there any real signal that the international community, including the great powers and the Islamic nations, has the interest to bridge the chasm which divides the parties of what has been called, for three quarters of a century, as the Palestinian issue.
It is obvious that the global community wishes that the issue be managed in a manner that does not lead to large scale violence. When that occurs, the international community intervenes to stop it so that peace can be restored. That was witnessed this time too. Reports indicate that Egypt played a role in mediating between Hamas and Israel to bring about a ceasefire. Egypt shares a border with Gaza and indeed prior to the 1967 Arab-Israeli war it administered Gaza. It was also the first Arab state to establish diplomatic ties with Israel in 1980. It did so following the 1978 Egypt-Israel Camp David Accords brokered by the US and thereafter the 1979 Egypt-Israel Peace Treaty.
The Egyptian role notwithstanding it was the US which quietly worked on Israel to accept a ceasefire. It appears that president Joe Biden was in telephonic contact with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu for this purpose. There is great support all across the US political class for Israel. Both countries are allies. The powerful Israeli lobby ensures that all administrations uphold Israel’s interests. However, within this basic rubric of support for Israel there are different approaches followed by different sections of the two main US political parties. Broadly, the Republicans have little problems with strong Israeli action against the Palestinians while the Democrats are uneasy with its use of disproportionate force. Many liberal groups in the US are also disturbed by the visual evidence of the consequences of the use of such force. Some liberals also want Israel to ensure the human rights of Palestinians whether within Israel or in the West Bank or Gaza. However, the use of violence by the Hamas though erodes sympathy for Palestinian rights.
The passage of time inevitably changes the dynamics of regional and international issues. This has been so in case of the Palestinian issue too. It virtually held global centre stage for more than three decades after the establishment of Israel in 1948. There was great sympathy for the Palestinians in much of the developing world and beyond for they were pushed out of their hearth and home to give back to the Jews what they believed was their historic homeland.
There was an acknowledgement that historically the Jews were discriminated against in most countries. India has been an exception. The fact is that the Jews suffered the most in Europe. Not only were they discriminated through the centuries they were also subjected to violent pogroms in Russia and other East European countries in the 19th century and then six million of them were killed by the Nazis in concentration camps during the Second World War.
After this war the Jews were adamant on the fulfilment of an assurance given by Britain in 1917 when it declared “His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people…”. Palestine was then a part of the Ottoman empire which was extinguished by Kamal Ataturk after the first world war when Turkey was declared a republic. That homeland became a state after the United Nations decided to partition Israel. What was overlooked by the great powers was that the Jewish state would be established in a land in which the Palestinians had lived for more than a thousand years. Naturally, the Arab world erupted with fury. It refused to recognise Israel but was unable though to defeat it militarily through wars in 1948 and again in 1967. The latter ended in a comprehensive Arab defeat and Israel occupied the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem as well as Egyptian territory in the Sinai.
In the fifty-four years since then Israel has consolidated itself and more and more Arab countries have recognised it. A section of the Palestinians too has given up the dream of obliterating the Jewish state. They now want, as does the major part of the international community, a two-state solution which means the creation of a Palestinian state from the Israeli occupied territories and both the states living in peace. Israeli nationalists and extreme Palestinians factions have not reconciled to the creation of two-states, the only pragmatic solution. Till they remain intransigent peace will not be established; violence will continue and the innocent will suffer.