From the U.S. Peace Council:
“We are in a state of war…. The enemy will pay a price like they have never known before,” declared Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, immediately after the beginning of the Hamas forces’ military operation against Israel.
Netanyahu’s words conceal a fundamental historical fact: Israel has been in a state of war against the people of Palestine, whom he now blatantly calls “the enemy,” for the past 75 years. The “enemy” he is referring to are the Palestinian people, who have been enduring 75 years of violent occupation, bombings, mass arrests and imprisonment, torture, assassinations, and exile at the hands of the Israeli State, just because they would refuse to submit to the illegal occupation of their land and the blatant violation of their fundamental human rights by the Israeli occupation forces.
More deceiving is the claim that this was a “surprise” attack by the Palestinians. But looking back at the shameful history of Israel’s treatment of the Palestinian people in the past seven decades, and its recent offending actions against the Al-Aqsa Mosque, no rational mind would be “surprised” by the Palestinian reaction.
The historically inevitable bloodshed that has started, and has already taken too many lives, is the Israeli States’ own doing. The State of Israel has no other party to blame for this human catastrophe than itself.
However, this is not where the blame stops. The government of the United States is equally — if not more — responsible for the current tragedy. Decades of unconditional support for the Israeli State’s violations of international law and human rights, tens of billions of dollars’ worth of military aid to Israel with eyes closed to the atrocities and terrorism committed by Israeli military and settlers in the occupied Palestinian territories, and persistent blocking of every effort by the international community to call Israel into account for its illegal actions, all have contributed to this horrendous situation.
We call upon the international community to take every necessary collective action to stop this bloodshed based upon the globally recognized international law and the United Nations Charter.
This bloodshed will not be the last until the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories is ended and the human rights of the Palestinian people are recognized and fully realized.
Good essay. Israel, the United States and the UN created this mess in 1948. Although, if the reports coming our of Israel are correct, Hamas has over-stepped the line of human decency with their attacks. Yes, target the IDF and tear down the border fence but NEVER intentionally target unarmed civilians especially women and children. Those are crimes against humanity. Period.
Let’s put the blame on where it really lies; the UK and David Balfour, through the Balfour declaration near the end of WW1, and in the British administration of the Palestine mandate, and then the COWARDLY abdication of their responsibility to oversee a just settlement in the territory before they ran away home.
I understand the UK was “war weary and broke”; but just like the USA in Iraq and Afghanistan; they willingly entered into the acceptance of the League of Nations mandate, so they are responsible for all the bad things that came out of it.
They weren’t so war-weary that they didn’t fight the Zionists for a couple of decades (after reneging on / disclaiming the Balfour Declaration, which was issued years after Zionists began buying land in Palestine), then leave all key strategic points in Arab hands when they pulled out, then provide officers for one of the five armies that invaded Israel.
True; UK f@$ked up in every manner possible. They promised the Arabs “self determination” in arab lands in order to secure their help against Turkey, and promised the jews a “national home in Palestine”, even though the arabs, at the time, were more than 93% of the population (Zionism, for the first decades of the movement had little appeal; in 1914 only 3% of the population in Palestine was Jewish, and many of them were NOT zionists from europe) and then sat back for the first 20 years afterwards as the jewish population grew and became more and more assertive (because, UK promises); THEN tried to put on the brakes, long after it was too late.
This entire mess began with the Balfour declaration, which energized Zionism, and then 30 years of British mismanagement, dishonesty, and finally cowardice.
Ahmadinejad, from Iran, was much maligned in the US (because, Iranian, so of course) but he was RIGHT in his often misquoted statement, where he basically stated that the West had no right to establish a jewish state in Palestine out of arab lands, and that if the west had really felt guilty about the holocaust, then Israel would be wiped off the map of the middle east and redrawn on the map of europe. Preferably RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE of the UK, as Balfour started this mess so the british own it.
Thank you for the information
OCTOBER 7, 2023 Palestinian resistance in Gaza launches unprecedented surprise attack on Israel
At around 6:30 a.m., Palestinian resistance factions in Gaza launched a surprise attack on Israel from land, sea, and air, as thousands of rockets have been launched into Israel and reportedly dozens of Israelis, including soldiers, have been killed and abducted by the resistance.
https://mondoweiss.net/2023/10/palestinian-resistance-in-gaza-launches-unprecedented-surprise-attack-on-israel/
https://mondoweiss.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/WhatsApp-Image-2023-10-07-at-2.07.03-AM-1536×1140.jpg
So yes, I agree that the plight of the Palestinians is terrible, and Israel has been a bad actor here long before there even was an Israel. That said; while I understand the desperation and desire of HAMAS to strike back, no one can possibly condone the pointless murder of defenseless women and children. So, one step forward, two steps back; the senseless acts of violence by HAMAS (NOT the act of the attack itself; but what the attack targeted) will result in even more death, destruction, and despair settling on their community.
A much better strategy would have been a guerilla war in the west bank, cutting off israeli settlements, planting ieds, targeting security patrols and ambushing convoys. That would, at least, be “fighting”, not murder, and would have a great deal of international support.
The crux of things… no one would condone the murder of defenseless women and children! Exactly. Why condone it against Palestinians then? Genocide, live on the news!
I don’t; I deplore it on both sides. If HAMAS wants to fight, as is their right as a dispossessed people, then they should fight against the Israeli military and police. In part of this assault, they actually did, quite successfully. The actions against women and children can’t be excused though