A One State No Solution

To me, they are like animals, they aren’t human

 Israeli Deputy Defense Minister MK Eli Ben Dahan

There isn’t the slightest doubt that the military leaders of Hamas in Gaza have positioned their military hardware, particularly rockets, purposely at or near schools and hospitals. Their territory is woefully short on food, potable water, and desperately needed medical supplies. Electricity is at best intermittent, jobs are rare and the entire state is mostly devastated rubble. Shiite Iran has come to the aid of this decimated region, provoking ire from both Israel and the United States. Hamas is openly dedicated to the destruction of Israel. This hostility has justified a powerful military response from Israel against the border strife. Israel no longer speaks of a two-state solution either.

Hamas wants casualties among its own peoples. It generates global sympathy. With half this Palestinian population under 18-years-of-age, Hamas is building a legacy of angry memories that will remain with this youthful population for the rest of their lives. Hamas sends these increasingly zealous young males to the front lines to hurl rocks and bottles at the Israeli forces attempting to contain their repeated assaults against the barbed wire that separates them from Israel.

Hamas is ready to sacrifice its young in order to crush world opinion against Israel and generate support for the Palestinian cause. By all accounts, Hamas has been wildly successful in this effort. Israel is generally viewed as a vicious pariah, unable to garner much of any sympathy anywhere. U.S. United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley was unable to garner a single Security Council vote on June 1^st to support her resolution of condemnation against Hamas and was forced to veto a counter resolution with strong Council support condemning Israel’s use of force against Gaza protesters.

If Hamas seems to be playing Israel like a puppet, even at the willing sacrifice of its own people, there is a growing wave in Israel recognizing that the tide of a rising Arab tide with Israeli held lands will eventually outnumber Jews in what is clearly a Jewish state. Already relegated to second class (or worse status), there is a growing feeling among local Palestinians that Israel is going to make matters much worse for its Arab residents. There is an escalating sense of militancy in Israel, bolstered by U.S. support for Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu’s right wing efforts against Palestinians, that is seeping into the consciousness of a growing number of Israeli citizens, reflected in the above quote, denigrating Palestinians as less than human. Shades of WWII actions against Jews or self-defense?

There is also growing concern about purported orders to the Israeli soldiers on the Gaza border to “shoot at their legs.” What might initially seem like a move to prevent unnecessary deaths (Israel’s officially-stated public policy), assuming that shooting live bullets (versus rubber bullets) against rock and bottle throwers is acceptable, may well have a more sinister goal. As the United Nations task force investigating this conflict between Gaza protesters and Israeli soldiers is discovering (information that is publicly available), Israel is well-aware of the abysmal state of medical care in Gaza, the rather dramatic lack of functional facilities and necessary medicine. Thus, too many of these leg wounds are unable to be treated effectively, leading to a tsunami of amputations to prevent the spread of infection. The impacted young men will never be able to fight against Israel goes the theory, and eventually they will be so disheartened that they will simply accept Israeli domination and control.

Accepting the Israeli government’s explanation, the Los Angeles Times (June 10^th) fills in the details: “Israeli military officials blame Gaza’s rulers for the mounting toll, accusing Hamas of using the protests as cover to try to break through security barriers and carry out attacks in Israel… [More] than 14,000 [Gazans] have been wounded — 3,700 of them took bullets — according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza. Nearly 60% of those gunshot casualties were hit in the legs, a strategy employed by the Israeli military to limit killings.

“Doctors say many of these wounds are unusually severe and will require multiple surgeries and months of rehabilitation. In most cases, the patients will be left with lifelong disabilities… At least 28 people have lost limbs, a figure that the International Committee for the Red Cross says could triple — simply because the enclave’s hospitals are collapsing and do not have the ability to cope with the massive trauma load.

“The wounded are not the only ones who will suffer… Entire families depend on the injured, most of whom are young men in their 20s and early 30s. Many joined the protests because they already had lost hope of finding a job, getting married or building a future in this deeply impoverished enclave of 2 million people wedged between Israel, Egypt and the Mediterranean Sea… ‘Now they are incapacitated,’ said Marie-Elisabeth Ingres, head of mission for the French aid group Doctors Without Borders in the Palestinian territories. ‘What is the future for this new generation?’

“Even before the current round of violence, Gaza’s hospitals were beset by chronic shortages of medicines, equipment and basic supplies, including dressings, antibiotics and painkillers… With just 2,200 hospital beds in all of Gaza, health authorities ordered all elective surgeries canceled during the protests…

“The Artificial Limbs and Polio Center, the only facility in Gaza that manufactures prostheses, is struggling to get the materials it will need. It recently had to stop production for nearly two months when Israel delayed a shipment of resin, a material that receives special attention from authorities because some types can also be used for military purposes.”

Having lived in Beirut, Lebanon as the son of a U.S. diplomat in the 1960s, I remember the unpopular Palestinians relegated to “refugee camps,” not allowed to become Lebanese citizens, living with open sewers, surrounded by barbed wire and only able to offer their children powdered milk provided by the United Nations. They were angry, and fostering anger was what anti-Israeli Arab leaders wanted, creating an enemy to solidify their political power against a common enemy.

And while using live ammunition against Gazan protesters might seem like a good idea to right wing leaders in Israel, let me suggest that giving a whole lot of people a powerful reason to hate you for a very, very long time is never a good idea. Lots of people with little or nothing to lose are an exceptionally dangerous force in the world. I have too many friends with children is Israel, and I pray that they remain safe… but I fear for their future. The world, minus the U.S., is on the side of the Palestinians. There has to be a better way.

I’m Peter Dekom, and swatting a hornets’ nest is never a good idea.