The vultures over Gaza are from hell

Vultures, as creatures of nature, have their norms. Even when they are hungry they do not pounce upon the dying. They wait till the body of its next meal becomes still after the last breath has been exhaled. It is not for safety that they patiently wait till death visits the victim, human or animal. Decency, even a dash of kindness, may be their motivation. Avarice in some humans divests them of this ethical conduct and humane consideration. This cynical and diabolical bent of mind were in full play when president Trump sat in White House with his cronies to discuss post-war Gaza. The two- year old one-sided war in Gaza has ravaged the strip, taking a high toll in human lives through bombings and enforced starvation, victims being mostly children and women. Yet, not a word has been said by America, the main ally of Israel to stop the carnage. Even the cry of genocide from around the world has not moved Trump administration to rein in the murderous war machine of Israel, far less to mediate a peaceful settlement of the conflict. The predecessor of president Trump in White House had at least the veneer of diplomacy and paid lip service to the two- state solution of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. President Trump did away with that pretension as soon as taking office and blatantly said in February in the presence of the war criminal Benjamin Netanyahu that America would take over Gaza and develop into a ‘ beautiful Mediterranean Riviera’ creating thousands of jobs after relocating the Gazans to countries where they would ‘live in peace.’ Later, in a press briefing, when a journalist wanted to know under what law would America take over Gaza, president Trump replied in a deadpan voice, ‘under American law’. That was in February after which Israel stopped aid trucks from entering Gaza and thus started its new strategy of starving the Gazans to death and despair. At the same time the offer of help to Gazans to ‘voluntarily emigrate’ was made by Israel. To facilitate the displacement of Gazans leading to their forced emigration a plan has now been drawn up by the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) to create an enclave in Rafah which bears an eerie resemblance to a concentration camp and many aid agencies have said so. This blue print for ethnic cleansing through bombings, starvation and displacement ending in population transfer unofficially received the nod from the Trump administration. But over time, post- war future of Gaza seems to have gone through a new makeover where Israeli government will have the role, in the words of president Trump, of ‘’finishing the job’’ i.e killing as many Gazans as possible by IDF bombings and through starvation. The surviving Gazans will be so tired and cowed that they would be willing to leave Gaza on any terms, the argument went.
It is in the backdrop of the above developments that president Trump held a meeting in White House on 27 August to discuss the scenario of post-war Gaza. It was attended by some of his cabinet members and by former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, presently the head of a think tank, and president Trump’s son in law Jared Kushnar. Not to speak of any Palestinian representative, no Arab country was invited to the so called ‘ policy meeting’. European Union (EU) was conspicuous by its absence. The most intractable and festering conflict of long standing having long term geopolitical implications was discussed in private by president Trump under guarded secrecy with a motley group in the fashion redolent of corporate takeover or turf war by Mafiosi. The next thing about the ‘policy meeting on post-war Gaza that struck many observers was the fact that it took place even when the war was in full force, accompanied with a man made famine, both taking daily toll of lives in hundreds. The priority of an immediate ceasefire and renewed humanitarian aid to alleviate the sufferings of Palestinians in besieged Gaza was given the go by as if there was no emergency. All that was referred to in connection with this was that the war would be over by the end of this year. The suggestion being clear that what is being envisaged is the continuation of the intensified onslaught begun recently by IDF to capture Gaza and ‘finish the job’. Apart from the insensitivity of the insouciant attitude towards the man- made catastrophe brought on the Gazan population, the anticipatory salivation on the part of the participants in the discussion beggars’ belief. Here the comparison with vultures becomes compelling. Unlike the vultures of nature, these vultures in human form were so bereft of compassion that they thought nothing abnormal about side-stepping the burning is due of ceasefire to discuss post-war Gaza when lives were being lost in the raging war. Evidently, they were unabashedly making plans for land use in Gaza when their owners were still alive and so were their claim to a homeland of their own. Nothing can be more cynical and reprehensible than this attitude of greed, cruelty and aggrandisement. To think that leadership for this heinous crime is coming from America, the citadel of democracy and human rights, is mind-boggling and shocking to the extreme. It is perhaps a moment of epiphany for law-abiding and peace loving people and their leaders around the world that, after all, the Wild West culture of America of yore for land grabbing survives not only as a legacy but as state policy under gung-ho read neck Americans of Trump’s ilk.
The second thing about the meeting is the presence of Tony Blair and Jared Kushner. Both are known for their anti-Arab feelings and murky financial dealings. Tony Blair, as British prime minister, joined America in its war against Iraq on the spurious ground of Iraq possessing WMD. His subsequent record as a member of the Quartet to resolve the Palestine-Israeli problem is summed up by jetting to and fro between capitals of Europe and the UN headquarters, producing zero in terms of policy results. Ensconced in the sinecure post, all that he was interested in is having contracts for his so called think tank. There was clearly conflict of interest in the dubious role assigned to Tony Blair as a peace maker. Given his track record in international diplomacy he can hardly be in a position to be a dispassionate and neutral advisor in Gaza’s future rebuilding as a polity and redevelopment of its economy. As regards Jared Kushner, his conduct as a Jew is on record on the basis of which he can hardly come up with any plan that would protect a modicum of Palestinian interests. He has always looked upon Gaza as a valuable real estate project, a view that resonates with his realtor father- in- law, Donald Trump. That in any future plan for Gaza he would hold the brief for Israel is borne out by the fact that he is on the boards of a number of joint American- Israel investment banks and real estate development projects.
Given the composition of the policy planning team that met at White House on 27 August, the proposal on the anvil cannot be very surprising. According to the snippets of information that have come to light, it has been proposed that America will have the lease of Gaza for 10 years for development of the strip into a tourism and high- tech hub. Palestinians surviving the war will be given $5000 (five thousand dollars ) to emigrate with one year of free food and subsidised housing. Those owning land will, in addition, receive payment in digital currency for sale of their land. While most of the Palestinians are expected to leave Gaza, a tiny minority will be allowed to live in an enclave to be designated by IDF which will be in charge of security.
Several comments can be made on the draft post-war Gaza plan that has been leaked by The Washington Post. The first question is who is going to lease out Gaza land to America for the much touted Riviera project? Israel cannot do it because it is in illegal occupation of Palestine land under international law. Only the Palestinian people living in Gaza can do it and they are not likely to barter away their homeland for a pittance of American largesse. So, the problem here is one of legality. Perhaps, the planners of this ghoulish scheme are hoping that emaciated and starving and facing imminent death, the Palestinians (those of them still alive) will sign along dotted line. But even that is problematic. Then there is the opinion of the international community which has already become tired of giving Israel special consideration because of the Holocaust memory. Through its policy of ethnic cleansing and scorched earth policy in Gaza, Israel has exhausted the pool of sympathy it enjoyed and one by one its allies are calling out to Israeli government to stop its atrocities and reach ceasefire. In the circumstances, the international community is not going to nod its approval to the illegal occupation of Gaza either by America or Israel.
Assuming, under the most unlikely scenario, that the Gazans agree to accept the $5000 grant for emigration, where are they going to go? In spite of attractive blandishments by America and Israel, no country has agreed to receive the emigre Gazans on their soils. The whole idea of forcibly displacing and uprooting a population from their homeland and resettle them elsewhere runs in the face of basic humanity and as of now there is no taker to this diabolical plan and to become a complicit in genocide.
Even as a deal, the incentives given to Gazans are full of holes that expose swindling of the worst kind. For instance, it has been proposed that in lieu of land sold by Gazans for the post-war reconstruction they will receive payment in digital currency (crypto currency). Most probably, it will be the digital currency floated by the Trump family which means the deal is designed to strengthen the value of the fledgling currency in the stock market. This may happen but once the Trumps are out of power, their crypto-currency is in all likelihood going to crash, making the owners holding accounts face zero value. Given this certainty, only crooks can make digital currency a part of the means to finance the post- war Gaza plan.
To conclude, the post-war Gaza plan violates human rights and international laws, rewards people complicit in genocide and is a brain child of persons who are so blinded by greed to amass wealth that deaths and destructions going on for nearly two years making victims of innocent men, women and children don’t register on their conscience. The drafters of the post-war Gaza plan are worse than vultures of nature. If the comparison has to be made at all, they must be described as vultures of hell.

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