The Impossible Peace: Why has it been so difficult to achieve peace between Israel and the Palestinians - Essay Example

? The Impossible Peace: Why has it been so difficult to achieve peace between Israel and the Palestinians? IntroductionThe Palestinian conflict is a one of the most controversial topics in the international political arena; it has existed for over fifty years and in spite of attempts by the UN to resolve this conflict there has yet to reach an amicable conclusion. There are several reasons that make it hard for these countries to achieve peace, and there is no doubt the Jewish-Arab ethnic animosity is a part of the cause. The Arab countries’ leaders have been lobbying in the international community and believe that international pressure can easily delegitimize and weaken Israel; therefore, if Palestine stands firm for a long period, they may easily be in a better position to attain their final objective. As shown below there are several issues that make it difficult for Palestine to either get recognition as an independent state or have them reintegrated with Israel as one nation, including several acts committed by the Palestinian community in the recent past have thwarted the peace process from being developed between the two sides. Among these factors include the continuous persecution of Jews in the Arab nation and the refusal of Arab states to treat Palestine refugees hospitably. Those Palestinian refugees had once been settled in Egypt and Syria and still not granted citizenship a generation later points to the unwelcoming attitude the Arab world has given them. This paper will discuss these factors at as well as identify who is to be blamed for war between Israel and Palestine, and then give a conclusion, recommendations, and possible solutions to the unresolved issues. Background history: Formation of Israel The history of modern day Israel can be traced back to the end of World War II in 1946 and the Jewish Arab War when the United Resolution passed a resolution to see the formation of the nation as a home for the Jewish population. The agreement to develop the Nation was mainly due to the Anti-Semitic sentiment that had been shown in Germany with the Holocaust and the fact that the Arab World had continuously demonstrated intolerance for the Jewish ethnic group. Therefore, the nation was formed so that Jews would have a safe place to avoid being ostracized. However, an Arabs majority who were displaced by the arriving Jewish population occupied the area selected to form Israel. A move that the Arab World did not welcome and this resulted in a war, and according to Tessler (1994, p.274) “…they continued to show great reluctance to accept the state of Israel.” The displaced residents of Israel moved to several areas with Palestine and the Gaza Strip being the main areas near Israel and the others fleeing to Syria and Egypt. The displaced individuals at once attained refugee status and their question of nationality has been the main cause of disagreement between Israel, Palestine, the Arab League and the rest of the international community. The emergence of Israel’s Security Network and its essential position can be clarified as the use of the toolkit of the new vital approach, and can be considered as the appearance of an abstract “military culture” as well as “militaristic politics” in Israel (Barak & Sheffer 2006, p.240). The Israel government encouraged Jews to continue migrating to Palestine while encouraging the Arabs to migrate to other areas in the Arab World and vicious fights erupted between these two groups with Israel’s continuous “Inadmissibility of acquisition of land through war” (Ashra?wi? 1996, p.10). The fighting between the Jewish immigrants and the residents increased with the Arabs being displaced to receive support from Egypt and Syria through terrorist activities such as when they bombed the King David Hotel in 1946. After independence of Israel in 1948, there has been deportation of several Palestinians from the area, and because of this, Palestinians have become refugees in different places in the Middle East prompting a war of revenge and reintegration. Religious history of the dispute over Land That the Palestine – Israel conflict has religious has been recognized and the original cause of the Israel-Palestinian war did arise over land that the Jews recognized as Israel while the Palestinians acknowledged it as part of Palestine. Both Israelis and Palestinians consider this land as God given, and they both have a divine right to own and access it. In addition, the conflict started because of the deportation of Jews from the land in ancient times when Romans defeated it, and afterward, the Arabs defeated the Romans and took ownership of the land. Consequently, Jews were not happy with what happened; therefore, they formed a union to help them move to the land that they believed was granted to them by God. According to Tessler (1994, p.19), “Jews further expressed their faith in a return to the holy land on many ceremonial occasions”, and this geared them up for a war between the two groups. Palestinian Refugees After forming the nation, the Jews started taking ownership of the land without considering the Palestinian people who were still occupying part of that land, and instituted what is currently known to be Israel. As a result, war broke out between the Palestinian and the Israelis over the ownership of land, whereby they fought because they both believed that they the rightful claim to the ownership of the land that Jewish had then turned to be their own property. The dispute took place from the year 1956 to 1982; however, ever since, there have been frequent activities of terrorism and fights over ownership of the land, and both groups have been fighting to own the Gaza. Nevertheless, Consequently, Palestinians have employed various brutal methods in an effort to surpass the Jews and take ownership of the land by repossessing it, to enable the Palestinian refugees go back to their previous land. Even if there have been several terrorism attacks carried out by Palestine in Israel there has been an urge for Palestinian globalization. However, after Zionism failed to eliminate Palestinians who were the majority from in the land, the native group of Palestinians combined with Israel’s continuous colonization attempt throughout history of Palestine creating unjust single state were found to be similar to South Africa apartheid era. A fact that irritates the Palestinians who believe their situation is exceptional but as Collins (2011, p.9) points out “The claim that Israel is different and therefore cannot be analysed critically except on its own, such exceptionalism; however, it is an integral part of the ideological armature of settler colonialism”. The politics also involved cases where the indigenous were separated from the immigrants and had their political rights taken away. Farsakh (2005, p.232-233) claims, “The Zionist movement officially accepted the idea of partition of Palestine as a solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict in 1947, but pursued a policy of ethnic cleansing.” This is similar to the case of South Africa where the African populations had been moved to special villages known as Bantustants, while in Israel the Palestinians were reduced to refugees and are not represented politically they are just treated as second-class citizens. Camp David and Israel Egypt peace agreement Throughout the dispute between Israel and Palestine, International community tried to intervene by requesting both groups to sign peace treaties that could resolve their disputes, and several treaties were signed, but they did not solve the problems. Meital (2006, p.54) claimed, “Israel made the Palestinians a most generous, unprecedented offer for the resolution of final status issues.” Between the year 1993 and 2001, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), and the Palestinian Authority (PA) signed six accords with Israel, as well as conducting numerous conferences and proposals for bringing a long-term solution of sustaining peace between the two groups. Analysis of the Key Obstacles The supporters of Israel portray Israel as being blameless and portray Palestine as the intolerant assailants whose objective is to threaten the lives of Israel citizens. On the other hand, pro-Palestinians blame the Jews and praise their individual reasons. However, both Israel and Palestine are to blame for the conflicts; for instance, the Jewish/Israeli faction persisted on building homes in the West Bank and Gaza, preventing Palestinians from constructing the Palestinian state into a self-government territory. This made the Palestinian association such as Hamas not to identify Israel as a Jewish State because Hamas as a political and social organization signifies that it is ready to adjust its stand and depicts how flexible the organization is to the involved parties. According to Klein (2007, p.444), “Hamas has developed into a regime charged with political control”, On the contrary, small but marginal sections of Jews blame Israel for the conflicts in the Middle East, and argue in support of Palestine that the main objectives for the attacks caused by Palestinian are to bring peace in the area and not to eliminate Israel. However, Israel has tried its best to engage Palestine in talks in order to bring peace, but Palestinians keep declining the offer resulting to further conflicts. This is a clear indication that Palestinian’s aim is not to attain peace but to eliminate Israel from their land, and this could be the reason why America supports Israel in carrying out their activities against Palestine. Nevertheless, United Nations blame Israel for the continued conflicts in the Arab world since Jewish people go on building their habitats in Palestinian land. However, both groups are to blame because they have caused death among innocent civilians in the Middle East. Additionally, both groups use superior weapons and tactics to fight each other in order to accomplish their objectives. In order to conclude, one should ask this question, if Israel were to blame for the continued disputes in the Arab countries, why is it that it is the only group that is supported by several countries in order to conquer Palestine. Jerusalem relation to the changing Middle East Modifications in the Middle East diagram might result into diverse geopolitical transformations, which will affect the construction of alliances as well as make shifts in the international energy market. This can be seen through the collapse of nationalized governments and the subsequent increasing insignificance of national boundaries in Syria, Iraq, Libya, and Yemen. For example, the support and encouragement of the Kurds in Syria as it happened in Iraq, shows a tactical chance for Israel. This is because Israel has developed and sustained an agreement with the Kurds all over the area for the previous 45 years. Nevertheless, several groups apart from the Kurds have transformed since the start of radical volatility in the Middle East. These groups presented a new chance for Israel; moreover, they were ready to collaborate with Israel in many ways. For instance, they assisted it to thrill back the Arabs land starting from North Africa to the Persian Gulf. Additionally, the groups’ interest was not to be like the Jews, but they were interested in the similarities they had with Israel whereby in 1994 after coming to an agreement in regards to DoP in Gaza and Jericho. There was the signing of the Protocol on Economic Relations between Israel and Palestine and the protocol was called the Paris Protocol that took place in Paris in which according to Arnon “both parties shall cooperate in this field in order to operate a sound according base for these relations” (2007, p.13). This implies that transactional treaties are helpful since they are based on mutual welfare. Thus, they ought to be in service on condition the parties involved recognize those concerns as mutual ones, and these alterations take place regionally as well as globally. Regional Politics The political process because of the 1948 War stretched to the unsuccessful pinnacle when Ehud Barak, Yasser Arafat and Bill Clinton met at Camp David. The Treaties signed by Israel, U.S.A, and Egypt towards late 1970s were meant mainly to end the conflict between Palestinians and the Israelis. In addition, secretive talks came up in the early 1900s through the influence of Norwegians, which seemed to bear good fruits. This was through the Oslo Peace Treaties, which were closed with an ironic shaking of hands between the Palestinian president Yasser Arafat and Israel’s Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. This event took place in 1993 in the White House and was supported by several communities and nations because there was a sign of peace commencement between the two groups that could result to long-term solutions that were to put an end to the disputes between the two groups. The initiation of the Oslo procedure is depicted as an intersection marked by stability and alteration; with regard to stability, numerous fundamental strategies initially hoisted in the Camp David Accords in 1978 made its way into the Declaration of Principles (DOP) in1993. Conversely, with regard to alteration, the leading improvement was joint acknowledgment by Jews and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), along with their approval of the supposition that the dispute’s solution were to be based on the division of the conflicted land in the two states. Sa?Yigh (1997, p.194) states that “…the Palestine movement faced the reality that Israel was too powerful to defeat through force could not face the Israelis in an armed struggle”. Also, the Arab states had different interests for them and therefore they decided to negotiate their own terms to prevent an Arab domination Jews and Palestinians made key acknowledgment; the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) acknowledged Israel's right to live in peace and safety. Alternatively, the Jewish people also gave an assurance of withdrawing its military powers and control from the West Bank and Gaza whereby their withdrawal was to occur in phases. Besides that, Palestine was allowed to be an independent state for a period of five years as they looked for a conclusion concerning the issues. Nonetheless, sanguinity weakened up because the Palestinians sustainably lived under confines put in place by the Jews armed forces occupation whereas Israel was anguished through assaults caused by radical Palestinians. Currently, after over seventeen years following the penetration of Oslo Peace agreement, it is evident that the two sides succeeded to set up a process that reflected several accords and measures, however, peace was not enough, Milton-Edwards & Crooke (2004, p.40) stated that “it is true that armed struggle appears to define Hamas present relationship with Israel.” Both the Israel and Palestinian representatives accredited huge influence to domestic political restriction; however, it became extremely hard for them to value the restriction on the other side. For instance, the Palestinian immigration was caused by the racial purification of Israel. As much as the Palestinian rights to owner the land was recorded in the International law, the Jews until today are not ready to surrender the land to Palestine. This makes Palestinians even nowadays not to identify Israel as having the rights to live. Key players in the Conflict between Palestine and Israel Many states intervened in the conflicts that took place in the Arab world between Palestine and Israel, and some of the key players include USA, EU, and Iran. A major crisis took place in 1967 in which Israel initiated a bombshell attack against Egypt that was then recognized as the United Arab Republic. The attack took place for a period of six days whereby the Jews attacked Palestinians and occupied their land that covered the West Bank and Gaza. Because of this dispute, the United Nations Security Council voted for 242 declaration that focused on the unlawful and unrightfully ownership of land. They asked the Jews to depart from the land that was meant for Palestinians. Nevertheless, the UN did not succeed in their effort to make Israel withdraw from the land that belonged to Palestinians; currently, Israel owns the West Bank and keeps on bulldozing Palestinian homes as well as constructing Jewish settlements. Rynhold (2004, p.63) says, “They have built settlement camps beyond the Israel West Bank border” Their actions violate the international law along with several U.N. declarations. Regarding the Gaza strip, Israel abandoned it in 2005 leaving it under the ownership of the Palestinians; however, they keep attacking the area leaving the Palestinians under a state of despair. For instance, in 2008, Israel attacked the Gaza, killed several Palestinian civilians, and destroyed Gaza’s infrastructures. The current peace plans that could change Israel and Palestine conflict was drawn from 1990 to 2003 by different nations and organizations namely the United States of America, the European Union, USSR, United Nations, World Trade Organization (WTO), and the Organization Economic Co-Operation and Development. Their aim was to strengthen and increase National Security in Israel whereby the groups were coming in phases and with different conditions, which Israel had to accept and as Freilich (2006, p.638) claims, “Israel became one of the few nations that can produce combat aircrafts and satellites.” Eisenhower is the only US president to have denied Israel his support, according to Little (1993, p.570), “America would support United Nations support unless Israel pulled out of Gaza” other leaders have since withdrawn from this stance. In 2007, their endeavours bore fruits through a re-establishment of legal peace meetings that were intended to take place for a period of seven years. During this time, the Prime Minister of Israel- Ehud Olmert along with Palestinian representative Abbas, pledged to strive and attain agreements on the conditions of a future Palestinian condition. Besides that, in the year 2009, the new Israel Prime Minister - Benjamin Netanyahu assured to negotiate with the Palestinians, and he acknowledged the panorama of the Palestinians ever since the conflict started. The United States of America arbitrated direct peace discussions that started in 2010 which later collapsed. In 2011, the Palestinian representative, Abbas requested the United Nations to identify Palestine as an independent state, arguing that it was significant because of the collapse of the peace talks, but the UN discarded his request. These conflicts and state of affairs have continued for a long time, this is because the United States of America categorically supports Israel in their activities against Palestinians. On the other hand, the global consciousness of the primary cause of modern day Israel- Palestine dispute can be linked to incidents in Iraq, Lebanon, and the horrific war in conjunction with concerns regarding the appearance of two conflicting government in the Palestinian regions. Conclusion, recommendations, and possible solutions to manage the conflict The conflicts between Israel and Palestine are because of land that each group claims rightful ownership to it. The conflicts escalated further after several negotiations failed to bore positive results of bringing peace between the two states. This led to a blame game between the groups whereby each side blamed the other as being the source of their disputes; this is shown clearly in the Camp David treaties. Several accords were drafted out to bring peace in the two states but they all failed making it difficult to achieve peace between Israel and the Palestinians. The disintegration of the political practice considerably created consensual views in the Jews and Palestinian people concerning the blame for the collapse of the ultimate position of talks and the outbreak of aggression and fear. The public’s opinions differ on whom to blame for the outbreak of conflict between Palestine and Israel. For instance, the Palestinians are considered to be innocent victims whose activism arose to protect what was rightfully their own, this is a fact clearly stated in the Camp David Accord. Those supporting Palestine argue that the Jewish people and the State of Israel are not blameless for the Palestinian and Arab hostility and bombing. The Palestinians are a group of people whose native land has been grabbed and occupied by the Jews; however, there are opposition for the grabbing and occupation. Arguably, when such incidents take place, whereby the minorities are snatched off their property, then it is termed to be an action of injustice. Nevertheless, while about six million Jews and their regal cronies try to take over Palestine whose human race consist of more than 100 million Arabs as well as above 1 billion Muslims, afterward if the procedure is not thoroughly amended, the devastating majority finally not only wipes out but also gulp the occupying trespasser. Israel does depend on an overseas superpower (The USA) for support, which is necessary for its survival, but this is mainly due to the overwhelming hostility they face from the rest of the Arab world. Therefore, the U.S should be balanced in its support towards the Middle East countries; otherwise, Israel will be encouraged to carry out a nationwide political suicide as it did in 597 B.C. and 132-135 A.D. On the other hand, Israel has no future in Palestine until it accepts and compensates in one way or another for its confiscation of the Palestinian land. In addition to that, it should be ready to be part of the Middle East world, and not U.S.A’s colony. Moreover, it should be ready to cooperate with the Palestinians and other Arab countries to develop an economic successful and independent Palestine State rather than a subjected state. Apart from that, Israel will be at peace with Palestine after its willingness to help in increasing the water resources of River Jordan. Therefore, in spite of several attempts by US President Obama, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, and Palestinian President Abbas, it is very difficult to accomplish peace between Israel and Palestine. References Arnon, A. 2007, "Israeli Policy towards the Occupied Palestinian Territories: The Economic Dimension, 1967-2007", The Middle East Journal, vol. 61, no. 4, pp. 573-595. Ashra?wi?, H., 1996. This side of peace: A personal Account. New York: Simon & Schuster. Barak, O., & Sheffer, G. (2006). Israel's Security Network and its Impact: An Exploration of a New Approach. International Journal of Middle East Studies, 38(2), 235-261. Collins, J. 2011. Global Palestine. London, Hurst & Co. Farsakh, L. 2005, "Independence, Cantons, or Bantustans: Whither the Palestinian State?", The Middle East Journal, vol. 59, no. 2, pp. 230-245. Freilich, C.D. 2006, "National Security Decision-Making in Israel: Processes, Pathologies, and Strengths", The Middle East Journal, vol. 60, no. 4, pp. 635-663. Klein, M. 2007, "Hamas in Power", The Middle East Journal, vol. 61, no. 3, pp. 442-459. Little, D. 1993, "The making of a special relationship: The United States and Israel, 1957-68", International Journal of Middle East Studies, vol. 25, no. 4, pp. 563-585 Meital, Y., 2006. Peace in tatters: Israel, Palestine, and the Middle East. Boulder: Colo. [u.a.], Rienner. Milton-Edwards, B. & Crooke, A. 2004, "Elusive Ingredient: Hamas and the Peace Process", Journal of Palestine Studies, vol. 33, no. 4, pp. 39-52. Rynhold, J. 2004, "Israel's Fence: Can Separation Make Better Neighbours?", Survival, vol. 46, no. 1, pp. 55-76. Sa?Yigh, Y., 1997. Armed struggle and the search for state: the Palestinian national movement, 1949-1993. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Tessler, M. A., 1994. A history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Bloomington: Indiana Univ. Press. Read More