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"We left Gaza and they are firing Qassams"
- there is no more precise a formulation of the prevailing view about
the current round of the conflict. "They started," will be the routine
response to anyone who tries to argue, for example, that a few hours
before the first Qassam fell on the school in Ashkelon, causing no
damage, Israel sowed destruction at the Islamic University in Gaza.
Israel is causing electricity blackouts, laying sieges, bombing and
shelling, assassinating and imprisoning, killing and wounding civilians,
including children and babies, in horrifying numbers, but "they
started."
They are also "breaking the rules" laid down by Israel: We are allowed
to bomb anything we want and they are not allowed to launch Qassams.
When they fire a Qassam at Ashkelon, that's an "escalation of the
conflict," and when we bomb a university and a school, it's perfectly
alright. Why? Because they started. That's why the majority thinks that
all the justice is on our side. Like in a schoolyard fight, the argument
about who started is Israel's winning moral argument to justify every
injustice.
So, who really did start? And have we "left Gaza?"
Israel left Gaza only partially, and in a distorted manner. The
disengagement plan, which was labeled with fancy titles like "partition"
and "an end to the occupation," did result in the dismantling of
settlements and the Israel Defense Forces' departure from Gaza, but it
did almost nothing to change the living conditions for the residents of
the Strip. Gaza is still a prison and its inhabitants are still doomed
to live in poverty and oppression. Israel closes them off from the sea,
the air and land, except for a limited safety valve at the Rafah
crossing. They cannot visit their relatives in the West Bank or look for
work in Israel, upon which the Gazan economy has been dependent for some
40 years. Sometimes goods can be transported, sometimes not. Gaza has no
chance of escaping its poverty under these conditions. Nobody will
invest in it, nobody can develop it, nobody can feel free in it. Israel
left the cage, threw away the keys and left the residents to their
bitter fate. Now, less than a year after the disengagement, it is going
back, with violence and force.
What could otherwise have been expected? That Israel would unilaterally
withdraw, brutally and outrageously ignoring the Palestinians and their
needs, and that they would silently bear their bitter fate and would not
continue to fight for their liberty, livelihood and dignity? We promised
a safe passage to the West Bank and didn't keep the promise. We promised
to free prisoners and didn't keep the promise. We supported democratic
elections and then boycotted the legally elected leadership,
confiscating funds that belong to it, and declaring war on it. We could
have withdrawn from Gaza through negotiations and coordination, while
strengthening the existing Palestinian leadership, but we refused to do
so. And now, we complain about "a lack of leadership?" We did everything
we could to undermine their society and leadership, making sure as much
as possible that the disengagement would not be a new chapter in our
relationship with the neighboring nation, and now we are amazed by the
violence and hatred that we sowed with our own hands.
What would have happened if the Palestinians had not fired Qassams?
Would Israel have lifted the economic siege that it imposed on Gaza?
Would it open the border to Palestinian laborers? Free prisoners? Meet
with the elected leadership and conduct negotiations? Encourage
investment in Gaza? Nonsense. If the Gazans were sitting quietly, as
Israel expects them to do, their case would disappear from the agenda -
here and around the world. Israel would continue with the convergence,
which is solely meant to serve its goals, ignoring their needs. Nobody
would have given any thought to the fate of the people of Gaza if they
did not behave violently. That is a very bitter truth, but the first 20
years of the occupation passed quietly and we did not lift a finger to
end it.
Instead, under cover of the quiet, we built the enormous, criminal
settlement enterprise. With our own hands, we are now once again pushing
the Palestinians into using the petty arms they have; and in response,
we employ nearly the entire enormous arsenal at our disposal, and
continue to complain that "they started."
We started. We started with the occupation, and we are duty-bound to end
it, a real and complete ending. We started with the violence. There is
no violence worse than the violence of the occupier, using force on an
entire nation, so the question about who fired first is therefore an
evasion meant to distort the picture. After Oslo, too, there were those
who claimed that "we left the territories," in a similar mixture of
blindness and lies.
Gaza is in serious trouble, ruled by death, horror and daily
difficulties, far from the eyes and hearts of Israelis. We are only
shown the Qassams. We only see the Qassams. The West Bank is still under
the boot of occupation, the settlements are flourishing, and every
limply extended hand for an agreement, including that of Ismail Haniyeh,
is immediately rejected. And after all this, if someone still has second
thoughts, the winning answer is promptly delivered: "They started." They
started and justice is on our side, while the fact is that they did not
start and justice is not with us.
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