Israeli carnage in the name of self-defence

The Israeli-Palestinian war has now entered into the sixth week. Much negotiated second round of 72-hours ceasefire has been agreed and comes into effect from Monday, August 11, 2014. This break is expected to allow the negotiators to evolve a lasting truce which would permit the humanitarian assistance to flow into Gaza.  The death toll in Gaza has exceeded 1,895 and over 10,000 severely wounded. Half a million Palestinians, roughly one third of Gaza population, has become internally displaced. According to UN Relief Agency (UNRA) 50 per cent of the population in Gaza are below the age of 18, 70 per cent are women and children and 80 per cent of the population lives below poverty line. A very few of them are associated with Hamas.
Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu told Wolf Blitzer, CNN correspondent, last week that the people in Gaza are not his enemy and Israeli armed forces are warning the civilians to leave their houses prior to air strikes. Another correspondent countered: where could the civilians go when air strikes are being made from all directions? Netanyahu replied: there are plenty of spaces and this was not the problem. One can see from the media footages that indiscriminate air strikes have levelled entire Gaza into rubbles. People have moved to UN shelters and these were bombed; they moved to hospitals and these were hit by missiles. Children were just blown up into pieces while running to safer places but there were no safe place for them. The Israeli atrocity has shocked the people all over the world. People across religious faith came out in thousands in major cities and demanded immediate halt of the carnage. But Israel does not care because it has the "right to defend itself".
If the people of Gaza are not Israel's enemies, why have they been killed indiscriminately? United Nations estimates that amongst the dead and wounded over 70 per cent are civilians. Hamas was wrong to operate under the human shield but that does not justify an armed force in possession of superior firepower to kill women and children in large scale. When over 70 per cent victims are women and children one will have the reason to believe that the carnage was orchestrated - it was an attempt to exterminate the Palestinians. Conversely, Israel lost 68 soldiers and three civilians. This confirms that Hamas did not target the civilians as claimed by Israeli Prime Minister. Netanyahu and his colleagues know well that the Nazi German leaders tried to exterminate the Jews during the World War II but did not succeed. The Palestinians are being killed in their thousands after every two years but they would still survive. In the process, moderate voice amongst the Palestinians would extinguish to give rise to radicals. This would only compound the security risk of Israel.
When Israel began air strikes last month following the abduction and subsequent killings of three innocent boys, US secretary of state John Kerry, who was in Kabul to pick the winner of Afghanistan's presidential race, roared: Israel has the right to defend itself. This has been a common reaction of the government functionaries in the United States and Europe. Whenever Israel resorts to military actions against the Palestinians the leaders in the west join in a chorus that Israel has the right to exist and defend itself. Why are they so pathetically obsessed with the security of Israel? Ever since its creation Israel has been in receipt of political, military and economic support of the western countries. It receives US$ 3.0 billion per annum from the United States in the form of economic and military aid. It has sophisticated weapons in stock supplied by the US, UK and France. Israel is now a nuclear power. Why does it still suffer from insecurity and why do the western leaders join in a chorus to extend support to Israel? No country on earth is in receipt of so much of assistance as Israel does but it still suffers from grave insecurity. Something must have gone wrong.
The US Senate, on July 17, passed a bipartisan unanimous resolution endorsing Israel's air strikes and ground invasion of Gaza in the pretext of "self-defence". This was a most irresponsible, egregious and errant action on the part of the Senate. What more can one expect from a Senate whose approval rating has plummeted to 15 per cent? This was not enough. The Senate approved US$ 275 million to upgrade the Iron Dome system making the total aid for the programme to one billion dollars. Israel made massive bombings and fell short of the deadly weapons. US administration rushed to replenish the stock, valued US$ 1.2 billion, from the stockpiles it maintains in Israel.
Edward Snowden's recently released documents illustrate a crucial fact: "Israeli aggression would be impossible without the constant, lavish support and protection of the U.S. government, which is anything but a neutral, peace-brokering party in these attacks. And the relationship between the NSA [National Security Agency] and its partners on the one hand, and the Israeli spying agency on the other, is at the centre of that enabling". The crime for the murder of nearly two thousand civilians and destruction of infrastructures in Palestine squarely falls also on those who have provided ammunitions and continued to supply weapons to Israel.
The roles of the governments of Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Jordan have also been exposed. The intelligence services of these countries and their political leadership were in regular contacts with the Israeli government while Gaza was under constant bombardment. They had complicity in the death and destruction in Gaza. Now they are joining the delegation of the Foreign Ministers of the Arab League to visit Gaza as a mark of solidarity. What a hypocrisy! What a travesty of solidarity!
The blockade imposed by Israel and Egypt has brought immense sufferings to the people in Gaza. Before the blockade the United Nations used to provide food assistance to 80,000 in Gaza, now the caseload has increased to 830,000. US Congressman Keith Ellison wrote in a recent column: "There is no military solution to the conflict. The status quo brings only continued pain, suffering and war. Promoting economic development and social interaction in Gaza is in the long-term security interest of Israel and the rest of the region…Ultimately, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict must be resolved with a final status agreement, and ending the violence and blockade is a first step toward a final solution."
The death and destruction in Gaza have shaken the conscience of the people. Baroness Warsi resigned from the British government in protest against her government's acquiescence to Israeli action. Ban Ki-moon, the UN Secretary General, condemned excessive use of force and demanded an investigation into the killings of civilians by Israeli military.
The second round of ceasefire has come into effect but unless the root cause of the conflict is addressed this would be short-lived. The people of Israel should take a pause and do retrospection. During the past 65 years Israel has developed economically, modernised its army with sophisticated weapons, built huge infrastructures and expanded its territory by building settlements. It has also acquired nuclear capability and periodically undertakes military operations and kills Palestinians. All these achievements notwithstanding, Israel does not feel secure. Has Israel chosen a wrong path?
Israel will not be able live in peace until it agrees to mend fences with its neighbours, the Palestinians, living in and around Palestine. This is as simple as this.
The author is a former official of the United Nations.        darahman.chowdhury@hotmail.com