January's War

Obama’s inauguration ceremony made a night that the whole world had stopped to watch. In Israel, that meant a long cease-fire with Hamas in Gaza. For Americans, it meant finally feeling the beginnings of the under-current of change.

The war in Gaza began almost as soon as a six month cease-fire had ended. Why? Everyone has their ‘reasons.’ Israel stated that Hamas broke the cease-fire by launching rockets into Gaza, and therefore Israel responded by air-raiding the strip. Hamas say they launched rockets in response to ‘Israeli aggression.’ Who you choose to believe is up to you. The truth to the matter is that we cannot tell what is fact or fiction in this war. It may be years before any real, tangible, reliable data is released for analysis and finger-pointing.

Finger-pointing is redundant in war. We are all wrong; Hamas for its ill-treatment of its own citizens and the use of human shields, Israel for its neglect in its tactics that led to the deaths of a widely disputable amount of civilians and disproportional retaliation. It is much easier to evaluate the effectiveness of each party’s goals and methods.

Israel began this war firing a number of messages out to the international community: “Our goal is not regime change,” “The rockets must stop,” “The people of Sderot deserve the right to quality of life.” I agree with these things. Regime change is not only unrealistic, but disastrously displacing to Palestinian political ideology. Fatah’s return to Gaza could open for renewed hostility between Palestinian political parties and possibly Israel. The rockets do have to stop, it is a useless act of bestowing fear and frustration on the Israeli public. Everyone deserves the right to quality of life, including the people in Gaza.

After three weeks of war, were these goals been reached? Has Hamas been weakened enough to the point where rocket fire will halt completely? I don’t think so. Even if Hamas has been fatally wounded, approximately 1400 people have been killed. Each one of those people likely has a brother, a sister, a friend, a father, a mother, or a combination of those that now have a perfectly legitimate reason to despise Israel. People may tell me that it is naïve to think about it on those terms, but what other terms does a common man, Gazan or Israeli, have to think about? Even if Hamas is destroyed, there will be another group ready to take its place, just like Hamas took Fatah’s place when Fatah left radicalism for political negotiation. The point is that you cannot destroy an ideology through warfare. You cannot fight fire with fire. It is as obsolete as Hamas itself; it is annoying, aggregating, and frustrating the conflict. Gazans are not born hating Israel, they are either given a reason to, or they are told and educated to. You can’t shoot, shell, bomb, assassinate, blockade, sanction, or starve that concept.

Hamas’ methods are just as redundant. When your source of weaponry is a cache of rockets with a radius of 20-30 kilometers and an accuracy of less than 5%, you are not really in a position to make much of any demands. Especially when your people suffer one of the worst economic climates in the world, and are being used as human shields. It is immoral, regardless of your goals, to bicker in circles at the cost of your people and others.

A method of government which poses itself as theocratic while denouncing and physically tormenting every known moral institution that exists for the betterment of citizen’s lives both in Gaza and the region around it is immoral. The confiscation of UN aid and Red Cross resources by Hamas is only aggravating the hardships of the Palestinian people. As much as Hamas would like its own state, it is not possible when they cannot govern for the people. Hamas has to realize that the destruction of another people at any cost is absolutely ridiculous. That goal is blown way out of proportion to what is realistic, what is logical, and what is socially satisfying. Instead, Hamas must prove to Gazans and the international community that it can e a well-mannered political entity that pursues the best interests of its people. That is just as necessary as allowing economic development in Gaza, through Israel’s lifting of the blockade.

Israel is a government, a nation and a country. Hamas is a small enclave with a lot of support from a lot of very evil people . Hamas is a small enclave, embedded in a much larger, much better people. Yet in Israel’s conviction to destroy Hamas, an entire people have been starved for nearly 60 years. The flipside are the people in Sderot, who deserve empathy. They have been tormented by eight years of rocket fire from the Gaza Strip that has virtually eliminated quality of life outside of a bomb shelter. However, the proportionality of January’s war is not acceptable under international standards . It’s not about numbers, it’s about the preservation and progression of a lifestyle. But for the thousands dead in the history of this conflict on both sides, lifestyle is no longer a concern. The destruction wrought on either side of the border is pointless.

“… Your people will judge you on what you can build and not on what you can destroy.” These were the words that rang most true in Obama’s speech in January. If we all hope for a better future in this region, we need to build the bridges necessary to cooperate and educate. Destruction is irrelevant in this day and age, 60 years should have been a signal to the IDF and Hamas of that fact. Both parties need to think about how to rebuild trust in one another, or how to provide an alternative lifestyle to hatred and insecurity. You cannot destroy an ideology through warfare, but you can make it obsolete by providing a better alternative. That is how this conflict will finally end.