The plight of the Palestinians is a cause celebre of the left and protests were even held in my hometown of Kingston upon Hull. A large, unsocially distanced group of flag waving protesters was gathered in our city centre at the weekend. My first thought was that I did not know we had so many Palestinians in Hull but as I approached them it became clear that we do not. Most of the protesters were not Palestinian and members of the Socialist ‘Workers’ Party were much in evidence. I have visited many countries in the Middle East and spent a considerable amount of time there but I have never been to the West Bank, the area that contains territory claimed by and under the control of both Israel and Palestine. Therefore, I hesitate to comment lest I am accused, in Peter Hitchen’s words, of exercising my conscience in someone else’s country.
Not having visited myself and seen how life is on the ground there I am at the mercy of others who have and on other secondary information. Nevertheless, I think a picture is emerging. A colleague who has visited and has flown to Tel Aviv says that it is easy from the air to distinguish the Israeli from the Palestinian controlled areas. The former are green and cultivated, the latter are not. It would be easy to come to the wrong conclusion about why this is the case, but it cannot have escaped Palestinian minds that if Iran and possibly other Middle Eastern countries provided them with funds for agriculture rather than arms then they might be in a more favourable social and economic situation. Undoubtedly a simplistic opinion and one based on how things are now, and how things are now is not really the issue. The roots of the problem are historical.
It is well known that the most recent historical issues are related to the lengthy process of Britain leaving the West Bank which started in 1917 with the Balfour Declaration. Britain did not finally withdraw from the West Bank for a further 30 years but the vaguely worded Balfour Declaration, which promised a homeland to the Jewish people, sparked off a chain of events which are still in process. The problem with promising the Jewish people a home on the West Bank was that another group of Semitic people also lived there and thought, with considerable justification, that it was theirs, the Palestinians. This heterogeneous group of Arabs containing both Muslims and Christians had rubbed along quite happily with each other and the existing Jewish population for several centuries. But the Balfour Declaration changed that, seemingly, for ever.
The focus these days is on what are, essentially, terrorist acts by the Palestinians located in the Gaza Strip led by Hamas who periodically lob bombs and other more sophisticated ballistics indiscriminately into Israel. This horrifies the pro-Zionists and is justified by the pro-Palestinians. The latter deflect and misdirect to the Israeli reprisals. Nevertheless, the Israelis are no strangers to terrorism as represented by the brutally effective Stern Gang who targeted the British and killed a great many, both military and civilian. Leon Uris’s novel Exodus—a very pro-Israeli book—does not flinch from describing the antics of some Israeli groups driving out to the desert and using Bedouins for target practice and destroying Arab settlements. The whole venture of establishing a Jewish homeland did not get off to an auspicious start.
It is easy to say that history is history, and we should move on, as I am sure many in the UK do. But we only need to look north of our own border to see, albeit with less fatal consequences, that many people are still hurting from the colossal defeat the Highland Scots suffered at Culloden in 1746. History cannot be ignored but it can, perhaps be accommodated and understood. Even if it is not, then there is absolutely no excuse for not reflecting on the consequences of your own present actions. Hamas is well aware of what the consequences will be of landing high explosives—the ones that get through the ‘iron dome’—within Israel. The Israeli response will not be equal and opposite, it will be disproportionate and far more lethal than anything aimed at them. There is an irony in the fact, as explained by Peter Hitchens, who has considerable experience in both sides of the West Bank, that the Christian and Muslim Arabs in Israel, while undoubtedly suffering discrimination, are considerably better off and have far greater freedom than Arabs elsewhere in the Middle East, with the possible exception of Oman. The suffering of the Palestinian people is both relative and absolute, but the militant tactics of Hamas are doing nothing to relieve it.
Opinions from the Unity News Network (UNN) editorial team & various contributors. | UNN always clearly distinguishes between news and opinion pieces and as an open minded outlet we publish views from a variety of people and organisation that do not necessarily reflect the views of UNN or its writers. Articles published under UNN Opinions are always opinion pieces and if published on behalf of a contributor will contain that authors name at the start of the piece.
