The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

Throughout world history the Middle East has been a hotbed of violence and drama. The area is in constant upheaval and this is especially true today. Iran is trying to procure nuclear capabilities, Iraq is being “liberated” by the U.S. Army, and Israel has setup a blockade around the Gaza Strip forming a prison for all the Palestinians inside. This issue, while it does not garner as much attention as some of the other crisis' going on in the region it is almost even more astounding and newsworthy. Throughout modern day Palestine's existence it has be brutalized and bullied by the nation of Israel and received little to no support from other countries, least of them the U.S. What has been occurring to Palestine over the past few years has amounted to major human rights violations and a general refusal to accept it as its own country. This abuse of the Palestinians has reached its climax in the last few months with ever increasing raids on the Strip and finally this blockade itself. The world has let down Palestine in its refusal to address Israel about its offenses towards Palestine.

In order to understand the full extent of what is going on over there it is important to know the history of what has happened over the past few years. The origins of the conflict that is occurring right now can be traced back to the Palestinian elections in January of 2006. In this election the Hamas party won a majority of seats in the Palestinian Parliament. This group can either be vilified as a terrorist group or praised as a freedom fighters, either way it is an organization that is pronouncedly anti-Israel. It would be interesting to point out here that these elections were democratic and in fact they were conducted in a highly exemplary manner and good not have gone better. What should be taken into consideration is the fact that despite the U.S.'s adamant stance on spreading democracy they refused to deal with Palestine immediately after the elections. This is because the U.S. does not negotiate with terrorists; the U.S.'s attempt at democracy in the Middle East backfired on them and now they are stuck with the smoking gun.

Now after the elections the U.S., European Union, and several Western and Arabic states imposed sanctions that suspended all foreign aid, which Palestine largely depends on, after Hamas gained control of the Parliament. There reasoning for this was because Hamas refused to recognize Israel, accepting the agreements made by the previous party, the PLO (Palestinian Liberation Organization), and denouncing violence. Obviously Hamas refused to do this but was still able to bring in enough money to maintain some structure in there health and education systems. Despite Hamas' renown as a terrorist organization it is really only the militant wing that can be considered terrorist. In fact, it devotes most of it budget to social services, unlike its rivals, Fatah who is viewed as more corrupt than Hamas.

On the flip side Hamas' opposition, the PLO or Fatah as its known was supported by the U.S. and other such countries do to the fact that it is not considered to be a terrorist organization as Hamas. This is ironic because in the 1980's the PLO was considered a terrorist group by many and some countries still consider them to be to a terrorist organization. The U.S. even went as far as supplying Fatah groups with guns, ammunition and training since the election of Hamas and was seriously considering a coup. This stance seems to be opposite of the U.S.'s view on democracy, the U.S. is not, as it would like you to think, concerned about what a country's people want, but instead concerned with what will benefit the U.S. the most regardless if it is democratic or not.

War between Hamas and Fatah eventually did come. Fighting between the two parties slowly escalated over a period of several months starting in December of 2006 and finally reaching a climax in June of 2007 with the Battle of Gaza. This battle lasted over a period of four days of intense fighting with Hamas taking control of the Gaza Strip by force from Fatah. The clashes between the two resulted in over a hundred deaths.

This hostile takeover by Hamas was denounced by the majority of the world and the US, EU, and Israel still only show support to the non- Hamas controlled government, increasing aid to the parts of the country that is run by the Palestinian National Authority. This has left the Gaza Strip without any aid or help from outside powers. This fact sets up the tragedy that is occurring there right now.