Since its inception, Zionism has undoubtedly been one of the most controversial political movements. It is also one of the deadliest ideologies. However, it is considered marginal in terms of the number of advocates. Yet, as regards the writings, articles and books published, Zionism occupies a dominant position in the media, academia, and international politics. It is undeniable that this is an important subject in the fields of political science, history, and social sciences.
Zionism is at the origin of one of the most unlikely political actions in history, where individuals of a people or community decide it is time to return to their land they left two thousand years ago.
Zionism causes irritation, misunderstanding, offense, and even outrage, in addition to causing death. Some are embarrassed by its arrogance and high-handed behavior, as well as the violence of some of its discourses and inhumane actions. It is also strange because it often presents itself as a winner on one side and a victim on the other.
In its latest report on the Israeli-Palestinian situation, the NGO Human Rights Watch, states that the Jewish state now corresponds to an apartheid state, based on the definition of differential treatment of citizens according to their ethnic or religious origin.
There is no simple solution to this conflict, but refusing to recognize the legitimacy of each can only prevent peace from being achieved. This drama is not limited to the Israeli-Palestinian conflicts, which are those that occur between the Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza and the Israelis, nor to the Israeli-Arab conflicts, which are those that occur between Israel and its more or less distant neighbors, such as Iran. It also includes conflicts between Jews and Palestinians in the State of Israel. On both sides, many Israeli citizens are not Zionists. The situation is extremely complex.
This tragedy is shared by both Israelis and Palestinians. The path to peace is long and it is inevitable that it will cross the difficult path of self-criticism.
As a reminder, here are some causes of the upsurge of violence in the region: 1) In Syria, we witness the annexation by Israel of the Golan Heights since the Six Day War in 1967; repeated violations of Syria’s airspace and maritime space. 2) In Lebanon, we see Israel’s continued occupation of the Chabha farms in southern Lebanon; its military support for the Christian militias in southern Lebanon, created with Israel’s help, and its desire to disarm the Hezbollah militias; frequent violations of Lebanese airspace and sea. 3) In Palestine, Israeli forces refuse to withdraw from the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, despite United Nations resolutions; expropriations of Palestinian lands and construction of settlements in the Negev desert and the occupied West Bank; imprisonment of about five thousand Palestinians, including children; land and sea blockade imposed on Gaza despite Israel’s “withdrawal” from that territory; blackmail about tax money collected by Israel and owed to the Palestinian Authority; desire to annex the Al-Aqsa Mosque to Jerusalem (in fact all of East Jerusalem to make this multi-faith city the capital of Israel), under the pretext that it was built on an old Jewish temple; discrimination in the distribution of drinking and irrigation water ; daily vexations and abuses, etc.
Today, there is so much to tell about the human tragedy that has struck the Palestinian people since their land was colonized by Israel. By appropriating eight-tenths of Palestinian territory since its creation in 1948, Israel ended Palestinian nationality and dealt a severe blow to the identity of this people. Those who remained in the part of the Palestinian territory occupied by Israel became Israelis. But second-class Israelis, discriminated on the basis of their faith and identity and reduced according to their status as colonized people.
Two-thirds of Gazans live in refugee camps in the Gaza Strip and whose families were expelled from their towns or villages in 1948 during the attacks of the Zionist pioneers. They have remained refugees in their own land for generations since that year.
In addition, following an intense battle for power in the Gaza Strip between Hamas, an Islamist party, and Fatah, the party of Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud Abbass, Hamas won the parliamentary elections on January 25, 2006 to choose a new Palestinian Legislative Council. Hamas took control of the Gaza Strip after its victory. It should be noted that the majority of women voted for Hamas. Fatah left the Gaza Strip and has now only control over the West Bank, if that can be considered control when one is under Zionist occupation. The president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbass, actually has very limited authority.
The election observation mission mandated by the European Union openly stated that the parliamentary elections were conducted in full transparency and regularity. However, the European Union does not recognize the results that led to the victory of Hamas, which it has since considered a terrorist group. While proclaiming the victory of Hamas, Israel, which had founded and funded the Hamas movement in order to discredit Fatah, worked hard to sabotage the elections.
Since Hamas won the Gaza Strip in June 2007, there has been a struggle between this party and Fatah that has led to tensions between them. Israeli leaders are particularly determined to suffocate the Gazan population, a policy supported by Western countries that do not recognize the authority of Hamas.
Since Hamas took control of the Gaza Strip in June 2007 and Egypt closed its Rafah border crossing, Israel has imposed a blockade that has hampered the social and economic life of Gazans. The bill is still in force in 2023, 17 years later. The UN estimates that Israel’s blockade of Gaza cost nearly $17 billion.
Israel restricts maritime access to Gaza and prohibits shipping. The city is also prevented from building port facilities. At the risk of being killed by Israeli border guards, the fishermen cannot fish offshore and must content themselves with navigating the area near the coast.
Palestinians are prohibited from travelling between Gaza and the West Bank. As a result, families cannot visit each other. Since 2008, Israel has carried out massive bombings on Gaza. The current war demonstrates the devastating impact of relentless bombing and heavy artillery fire on the civilian population. In 48 days of conflict, about 15,000 Palestinian civilians have lost their lives, including at least six thousand children, and the human toll is expected to rise. More than one million Gazans are displaced or injured and thousands of homes are destroyed. This nightmarish scenario takes place in Gaza and the West Bank where localities like Nablus, Jenin, Khan Younes, Rafah, Bayt Hanoun, and others are attacked by explosive weapons.
According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the crisis is expected to affect two million people who need urgent humanitarian assistance. Reports continue to report civilians trapped in bombed areas. Severe shortages of essential health supplies, fuel and cash are reported in the Palestinian territory, with increased insecurity affecting access to basic services. The Bureau is particularly concerned about the situation of persons with disabilities, the elderly or vulnerable, who face considerable difficulties in meeting their basic needs, such as finding shelter and accessing food. They are trapped and left behind. They need accessible information, safe evacuation routes, shelters and vital medical supplies.
The international community is deeply concerned about the significant loss of life and civilian damage caused by the use of heavy explosive weapons in populated areas, but also by internationally prohibited weapons such as cluster munitions.
Shelling and artillery fire in Palestinian cities also caused damage and destruction of civilian infrastructure such as homes, hospitals, schools, water systems, electricity and sanitation infrastructure and communication networks, disrupting access to essential services. Explosive remnants of war will contaminate the land and affect communities long after the war ends.
We call for a permanent ceasefire and respect for international law, including unfettered access to humanitarian aid. Ending military intervention is critical to protecting civilian lives.
The international community must do everything in its power to prevent this from happening again. The events in Palestine demonstrate the urgency of adopting the political declaration against the use of explosive weapons in populated areas.
The extermination of Gazans carried out by the Zionist state that has claimed thousands of victims is a real genocide in the literal sense of the term. The health crisis adds to the humanitarian crisis. The impact of the invasion on women and children is catastrophic.
In international law, genocide has been recognized since 1948 by the United Nations convention, which lists a series of crimes, including murder committed “with the intent of destroying, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group.”
Is there a possibility of peace between Israel and the Palestinians, or should we simply get used to periodic wars that deprive both sides of the peace and stability they seek? To renounce diplomacy is to accept the unacceptable: endless wars.
The history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is littered with failed peace plans, collapsed diplomatic conferences and disillusioned mediators. Yet even amidst the horrors of the Gaza war, calls for a possible two-state solution remain alive and are increasingly being heard.
The withdrawal of military and civilian colonial forces from the Gaza Strip and the West Bank is the sine qua non condition for establishing peace, offering an opportunity for the Palestinian people to finally found an independent and sovereign Palestinian state.
There is only one way to go in Gaza: the two-state solution. It seems feasible from a geographical point of view, provided that a compromise is found on the territories to be exchanged.
The main barrier to two-state resolution is political. The cessation of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations after the creation of a Palestinian national unity government integrating Hamas in the spring of 2014 shows that there is still a long way to go.
There is still a long way to go. Therefore, the idea of a Palestinian state was no longer on the Israeli political agenda or the international agenda. Even when former US President Donald Trump proposed the “deal of the century” in 2019, where he still referred to the hypothesis of such a state by conditioning it, conditionality was to accept a partial state, with no army and no independent airspace for a $50 billion mega economic development project. Instead, it turned its back on UN resolutions and ignored the nationalist aspirations of the Palestinians. He announced Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, the annexation of parts of the Jordan Valley to the occupied West Bank and the abolition of the right of return of the Palestinians. This deal was turned down by Fatah and Hamas.
Moreover, the Arab regimes gave an incongruous place to the Palestinian cause in their foreign policy agendas for a long time. The current war is aggravating relations between the two warring parties and putting the Israeli-Palestinian conflict back on the agenda.
The two-state theory is based on the idea that we face two nationalisms: Zionism and the Palestinian national liberation movement, each claiming a nation-state. The Oslo Accords, which were signed in 1993, are of historical importance because they formally set out this demand and perspective.
Since the Oslo Accords have not been implemented and the settlements of the West Bank have continued to spread on the ground, the creation of a viable Palestinian state becomes de facto distant but more crucial than ever.
Now that the humanitarian disaster in Gaza has brought the issue to the forefront, it is clear that there can be no resolution without some decisive steps towards a two-state solution despite the escalation of violence and even though the obstacles are enormous. Extremists on both sides want to control all the land between the river and the sea by any means necessary. If one or the other gains ground, this war will become even more deadly than it already is.
The optimal approach is therefore to adopt the renewed perspective of a two-state solution to rapidly galvanize the moderate forces of both parties. Such a conjecture will not apply without a strong and sustained international commitment from the United States, the European Union, Russia, and all Arab states.
Yet, after the horrors of this genocide, how could both sides choose to move closer rather than away? The European experience provides a significant lesson in this domain. New social movements and political coalitions must be created and sustained by the supporters of lasting peace. To create a new political entity, Europe has overcome two centuries of wars caused by deep divisions between ethnicities, religions, politics, and cultures.
The “old continent” became a new type of political entity less than a decade after the Second World War, with its religious and nationalist wars, its great power intrigues and the endless redistribution of national borders. It is now time for Israelis and Palestinians seeking peace to dare to envision an identical future for themselves. As the Chinese proverb says, “Peace and quiet is happiness”. If Europe could do it, the Middle East can.
