After the initial hope during the Camp David talks in 2000, Israelis and Palestinians descended yet again into murderous waves of violence with the suicide bombings of the second intifada following Ariel Sharon’s visit to the Mount Temple at the start of the decade to the horrific aerial bombardment of Gaza at the end. Yasser Arafat died amidst many conspiracy theories of Israeli involvement while his nemesis, Ariel Sharon, fell into a coma and is now locked into a vegetative state.
Hamas democratically came to power and were instantly ostracised while Israel continued their settlements expansion on Palestinian land, conducted military incursions and assassinations inside Palestine and constructed a wall to pen the Palestinians, and the suicide bombers, inside.
While support for Israel stayed strong in America, its already poor reputation elsewhere plummeted following the Lebanon conflict and then the devastating bombing of Gaza in 2009 which was officially in response to the Hamas rockets landing in Israel but was widely believed to concern the then upcoming Israeli election which returned Benjamin Netanyahu to power.
The Goldstone report for the UN labelled both the Palestinian and Israel leadership guilty of war crimes and heavily criticised Israel for its violations of international law and crimes against humanity in its policies towards the Palestinian people before and during the conflict.
At the end of 2009 we don't seem any closer to a lasting peace then we did in 2000 despite the intervention of Barack Obama and Israels Ally America, to oversee a peace deal. Palestinians and Israelis are still dying, truces come and go and any criticism of Israel is still shouted down with cries of anti-semitism although the sting has been neutered by over use in trivial cases.
What has changed is that Israel is increasingly seen as the country with billions of aid given to it by the world largest military power bullying, bombing and shooting at the poverty stricken desert people barely able to feed themselves.
The noughties saw Israel trying hard, and failing, to justify the continuation of its policies of the past 60 years towards Palestine to the rest of an increasingly sceptical world.
2 comments:
It's mainly Palestinians who are dying, Lucy. This has been the case all along and is part of the Israeli plan for racial purity!
Both Israel and America are wearing the odium that comes with imperialism by force.
True David over the last decade there has been deaths on both sides of the conflict and regardless of whether they are Palestinian or Israeli, most are innocent victims and that's deplorable.
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