Newsday Tuesday - The Sky is Falling

It's been an age since I've posted anything remotely serious or semi-thought provoking on this blog. I'll be honest and say its partly because everything seems to be falling apart overseas, and I was a little over it. Plus, every time I would start a blog post, it was out of date before I could press publish. (Things are happening FAST!). I was on a girls' trip the other week and a friend asked me what started this latest round of fighting between the West Bank and Israel. While there is never just one answer to a question like that, I rattled off a few things. That's when it hit me that even I wasn't 100% how this all got started, and if you don't spend your free time reading about the Middle East, you probably don't know either. To further compound things, I've seen some really terrible things posted on Facebook...clearly indicating that many do not know what they are talking about in this situation/conflict. So, today, I'm giving you a cliff's notes of what's going on...and hopefully not too much will change before I'm done.

Just a precursor - I tried my best to give straight facts in this post, and make it very clear when voicing my opinion. Additionally, I believe I pointed out faults on both sides, and did not make a one sided argument for one entity or another. That being said, I will tell you that I am deeply distraught by the violence occurring in the West Bank and Gaza, and have an immense amount of compassion for the people caught in the middle of the fallout.

Some (VERY) simple and brief history...

So start off, the main conflict is between Hamas - A Nationalist-Islamist spinoff group of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood created in 1987 as a political party and the rival to Fatah. The bottom line is that Hamas has essentially controlled the West Bank and Gaza as the main political party.  Some surveys leading up the Israeli-Hamas showdown indicated that Hamas was in fact losing its legitimacy and support of the Palestinian people. I believe this is a key factor in the escalation of this conflict. In prodding and poking the Israeli War Machine, Hamas single handedly shifted the rhetoric from that of its inability to provide a better life for the people to "Israel wants to murder us all". In many ways, I believe this organization is more than willing to sacrifice its own people, just to send a message. This is my opinion from what I've read, and seen on the MSNBC, you can take it with a grain of salt.

While many have blamed the most recent conflict specifically on a few isolated incidents of murder or kidnapping, the drama has been long since mounting.  In January of 2014 Israel approved the construction of over 1700 settlements in the West Bank, an area that was theoretically slated as Palestinian land in prior peace talks of the Two State Solution.  According to the Palestinians, this sent the message that Israel, no matter what it said was not particularly interested in ceding this land back over to become the state of Palestine. These factors merely set the stage for many more events which eventually escalated into an all out war.

The Causes

1.The Israeli Blockade of the Gaza Strip, creating a humanitarian crisis amongst the Palestinian People
2. Continued rocket assaults from Gaza to Israel
3.The kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teens
4. The subsequent kidnapping and murder of a Palestinian teen
5. Arrests of Hamas Leaders in the West Bank
6.Increased rocket fire when the blockade was not lifted ... which essentially turned this into a full on military operation.

The Fallout

This operation, has led to the deaths of over 1800 Palestinians (including 400 children) while injuring nearly 9,000 people in Gaza.  Israel has lost 67 people during the conflict. Israeli operations have focused on closing down tunnels dug by Hamas into Israel, and removing militants. The major issue in this "mowing of the grass" type of military maneuver is the great humanitarian fall out.

My Thoughts

While many agree that Israel does have the right to protect itself and its people, its measure of force has been staggering - to the world. The great tragedy here, is that Hamas will rise again and fight another day, determined to take down the "Evil Zionist Entity". However, these people may not. Even more frightening, these small impressionable children, living in villages without clean water, food, or basic amenities may very well know nothing else about Israel other than its rockets, soldiers, and blood. And, if that is all that you know about a country, why wouldn't you hate it? Why wouldn't you join the cause to destroy it? I fear, that the strong handed approach that Israel has taken might have reestablished Hamas's strong hold over the region, and in an essence, produced its next rounds of recruits.

In the last two hours of writing this post, I have learned that there is yet another ceasefire. I pray that this one holds longer than the last, and that peace can somehow be achieved. This is a conflict that is deep seeded, and one in which I believe no one is blameless. Each side carries its own burden of guilt, and I can only encourage you to read and research as much as you can to understand just how complex this issue really is. I don't think its easy to pick who is 'right' in this issue, but its very easy to see who is losing in this situation.

This video sums up exactly how I feel on this situation. To skip the news part, go straight to 2:03 to hear fomer GOP Congressman Joe Scarborough's opinion on this conflict.




To learn more about the Palestinian Israeli Conflict I recommend the following books:
Children of Bethany
Three Mothers, Three Daughters
Son of Hamas

To learn more about what is happening I recommend the following stories/sites:

NPR: Is there any empathy left in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict?
http://www.npr.org/blogs/parallels/2014/08/04/337657171/is-there-any-empathy-left-in-the-israeli-palestinian-conflict

Israel & Palestine Ceasefire
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/04/us-mideast-gaza-idUSKBN0G008720140804

Why are Israel and Palestine Fighting?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/20436092

How Israel is losing Europe
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2014/08/04/how-israel-is-losing-europe/