The Israel-Palestine conflict has remained unresolved for a long time, despite the involvement of the United Nations since 1947-48.The United Nations was created on 24th of October, 1945 with the prime objective to maintain peace and to prevent wars in the world but it has failed to maintain peace in the Middle East especially in the Israel – Palestinian region. Israel has been targeting civilians in Palestine for a long time and the entire world is watching the destruction of property and killing of innocent civilians especially children. With the recent killing of Hizbullah Chief Hassan Nasrullah, the region has now become a battle ground and Iranian retaliatory measures in the form of missile attacks on Israel has now put the entire world to the huge risk of emergence of Third World War as the conflict has actively involved not only Israel and Palestine but the former is backed by USA and its allies while as the later is backed by Iran and indirectly by anti US powers like Russia and China. Before going ahead we need to understand the reason of this conflict and the origin of Israel as a nation. After the defeat of the Ottoman Empire, Britain gained control of the region known as Palestine. The area was home to a Jewish minority and an Arab majority, along with other smaller ethnic groups. The international community entrusted the UK with the responsibility of establishing a “national home” for Jewish people in Palestine. For Jews, Palestine was considered their ancestral homeland, but Palestinian Arabs also claimed the land and opposed this plan. In due course of time the number of Jewish settlers increased, especially the Jews escaping persecution in Europe, particularly during the Nazi Holocaust in World War Second, leading to a rise in violence in the entire Palestinian region. In 1947, the UN proposed a partition plan to divide Palestine into separate Jewish and Arab states, with Jerusalem designated as an international city. However, the Arabs rejected the plan. By 1948, unable to find a resolution, Britain withdrew, and Jewish leaders proclaimed the establishment of the State of Israel. Tensions between Jewish and Arab militias escalated for months.
Israel continues to occupy the West Bank and claims all of Jerusalem as its capital, while Palestinians see East Jerusalem as the capital of a future Palestinian state. The United States is one of the few countries to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. Over the past 50 years, Israel has constructed settlements in both the West Bank and East Jerusalem. These settlements are considered illegal under international law, a stance supported by the UN Security Council and the UK government, among others, though Israel disputes this. Gaza, a narrow strip of land between Israel and the Mediterranean Sea, also shares a small southern border with Egypt. Israel occupied Gaza during the 1967 war and retained it until 2005, establishing Jewish settlements during that period. In 2005, Israel withdrew its forces and settlers, though it maintained control over Gaza’s airspace, borders, and coastline. The UN still regards Gaza as being under Israeli occupation. Several contentious issues remain unresolved between the two sides. There are many key issues which have remained unresolved. Their is the issue of the future of Palestinian refugees and the fate of Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank, whether they should remain or be dismantled. The question of whether Jerusalem should be shared by both sides stands another big issue. Perhaps the most challenging issue is the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel. Due to tension in the region, a large number of attempts were made to maintain peace by persuading both the nations to come together and sign peace agreements. Peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians took place intermittently from the 1990s to the 2010s, with occasional flare-ups of violence. Early on, a negotiated peace seemed possible. Secret negotiations in Norway led to the Oslo peace process, notably marked by a 1993 ceremony on the White House lawn with President Bill Clinton. In the 2000s, attempts to restart the peace process included a 2003 roadmap devised by world powers with the goal of achieving a two-state solution, though it was never fully implemented. The most recent peace initiative, put forward by the US under President Donald Trump, was called the “deal of the century” by Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu but was rejected by the Palestinians as biased and did not move forward. Gaza is controlled by Hamas, an Islamist group committed to Israel’s destruction and designated as a terrorist organization by the UK and many other nations. Hamas won the 2006 Palestinian elections and forcibly took control of Gaza in 2007 by ousting the Fatah movement, led by West Bank-based President Mahmoud Abbas. Since then, militants in Gaza have engaged in several conflicts with Israel. Both Israel and Egypt have enforced a partial blockade on Gaza to isolate Hamas and prevent attacks, particularly the firing of rockets at Israeli cities. Palestinians in Gaza argue that Israel’s restrictions, along with airstrikes on densely populated areas, amount to collective punishment.
“The two-state solution is a proposed method for addressing the Israeli–Palestinian conflict by establishing two separate states within the territory of what was once Mandatory Palestine. This approach is frequently compared to the one-state solution, which envisions the creation of a unified state in the same region, granting equal rights to all residents. The two-state solution has the backing of numerous nations and the Palestinian Authority. While Israel does not currently endorse this plan, it has supported it in the past.”
According to the UN, this year has seen the highest number of Palestinian deaths in the West Bank and East Jerusalem on record. Iran, a key adversary of Israel, is a major backer of Hamas and Hezbollah, with Hezbollah militants frequently exchanging fire with Israeli forces since Hamas’s recent attack. On this Saturday Israel killed Hizbullah Chief Hassan Nasrullah which has caused mass protests throughout the world especially in Iran. As a retaliatory measure Iran fired missiles on Israel and further intensified the war like situation. Israel – Palestine Conflict has been a major threat to the world peace from last few decades. The conflict has taken lives of thousands of innocent civilians and has caused destruction of property worth of trillions of dollars. No religion justifies the killing of innocent people. Killing of innocent human beings whether they are Jews of Israel or Muslims of Palestine is the worst act of this modern civilization. The conflict is taking a different direction and if timely action is not taken, the entire world may soon be engulfed by World War Third. We need to take all kinds of efforts especially the below mentioned strategies to resolve the issue once for all.
It is the litmus test for United Nations to take strong measures to get the issue resolved. Till date the UN has failed to maintain peace between the two nations and to bring them on a single table for resolving this conflict.The United Nations has lost its relevance as a peace keeping organisation as it could not maintain peace and restrict US from taking unilateral steps in Middle East and has to prove its neutrality. Nowadays, materialistic desires of Nations have increased tremendously and almost all the nations ignore even important matters when they overlap with the materialism. Undertaking external trade by a country with other countries is important for development of a country but trade/materialism should not be preferred over justice, morality and humanity. Nations should come strong for humanity instead of materialism. It is the moral duty of all the nations to actively participate in peace maintaining processes and should not only condemn inhuman attacks but should even stop trading with such countries. In highlighting the conflict, the role of media becomes most important as it is known as the fourth pillar of democracy. The media should publicise the conflict, it’s consequences, problems caused by it and the related issues and even it is the moral obligation of the media to inform the world about the killing of human beings. Human Rights should be preferred over all other rights. Although, a number of organisations are working to prevent Human Rights violations but none has been effective in highlighting such violations throughout the world. The United Nations Human Rights Commission must force both the conflict ridden countries of Israel and Palestine to immediately stop such violations or to face consequences especially the economic boycott. The major powers of the world especially the permanent members of the UN should take the responsibility in resolving the Israel – Palestine conflict. These countries should utilise the powers of the United Nations Security Council to get the peace process maintained. The leaders of all the countries should prefer morality over friendly and other relations and should force the involved countries of Israel and Palestine to immediately come for mutual peace process and to resolve the conflict at an earliest to avoid killings and Human Rights violations.
Economic boycott can be an effective tool in getting the conflict resolved. Both Israel and Palestine need to immediately stop killings of human beings and if any of them fails to stop killings, they should be penalised to the extreme extent as possible and should face economic boycott from all the countries. The two-state solution is a proposed method for addressing the Israeli–Palestinian conflict by establishing two separate states within the territory of what was once Mandatory Palestine. This approach is frequently compared to the one-state solution, which envisions the creation of a unified state in the same region, granting equal rights to all residents. The two-state solution has the backing of numerous nations and the Palestinian Authority. While Israel does not currently endorse this plan, it has supported it in the past.
(The author is a teacher at Govt Higher Secondary School Kandoora, Berwah, Kashmir. The views, opinions and conclusions expressed in this article are those of the author and aren’t necessarily in accord with the views of “Kashmir Horizon”)
Gulzar Ahmad Ganayee
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