WHITHER GAZA?
WHITHER GAZA?
On 2 November 1917 in a letter to Lord Rothschild, leader of the Jewish community in the UK, the British Foreign Secretary, Arthur Balfour stated:
His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.
Traditionally Britain had been Arabist, as a counter to the Ottoman Empire, but the United States had declared war on Germany on 6 April 1917, and it was felt necessary to make some concessions to Jewish influence there (one and a half million Jews had emigrate to the USA from Russia in the 1880s). At the time of the declaration Jews were a small minority of the population of Palestine. While various interpretations of the Balfour Declaration are still argued over, it is probable that by using the word ‘home’ the British did not then intend a separate Jewish state.
With the defeat and collapse of the Ottoman empire following the First World War Britain assumed control of Palestine under a League of Nations mandate. It was then that promises made to the Arabs in exchange for their support against the Turks in the war and the impression given by the Balfour Declaration began to come into conflict. There was strong Arab opposition to increased Jewish immigration, exacerbated by refugees from the Russian civil war, and increasingly that opposition became violent. By the time of the Second World War Britain was attempting to limit Jewish immigration, although in 1943 the British cabinet decided on a two state solution, one for Palestinian Arabs, and one for Jews, to be implemented at the end of the war. By then Jewish demands for a separate state had metamorphosed into anti British agitation and then terrorist attacks on the British administration in Palestine. One of these groups, known as the Stern Gang after its leader, murdered the Minister Resident, Lord Moyne, and his driver Lance Corporal Fuller in Cairo on 6 November 1944, and on 22 July 1946 another terrorist grouping, the Irgun Zvai Leumi blew up the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, the headquarters of the British administration of Palestine, killing ninety one and injuring forty-six, British, Jews and Arabs. These were the most dramatic actions of the Jewish gangs, but there were many others, with probably the one that had most effect on British public opinion being the kidnaping and hanging in July 1947 by Irgun of two sergeants of the Intelligence Corps, and the booby trapping of the bodies.
By now it had become apparent that the wholesale murder of Jews by Germany during the war made any opposition to a Jewish state untenable. Jewish immigration, much of it illegal, increased massively, accelerated by a pogrom in Soviet-occupied Poland and the release of those Jews who had survived the death camps. Britain handed the problem over to the United Nations which voted for a two state solution, with Jerusalem governed by an International body. British forces withdrew in May 1948 and the new state of Israel came into being, with the various terrorist gangs now becoming the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF). A series of wars with Arab states and uprisings by Palestinians now ensued: the first in 1948 subsequent on the announcement of the founding of Israel, then the Suez Crisis in 1956, the six-day war in 1967, the Yom Kippur war in 1973, two Lebanon wars in 1982 and 2006 and two ‘intifadas’, armed resistance from Palestinians on the West Bank and Gaza, between 1987 and 2005. In all of these with the exception of the Suez operation in 1956, the Arab states have been the aggressor, but Israel has prevailed. From no Arab state recognising the legitimacy of Israel in 1948, now Egypt, Jordan, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Sudan and Morocco recognise and have full diplomatic relations with her. The flash points that remain are the West Bank, annexed by Jordan in 1950 until occupied by Israel in 1967, and the Gaza Strip, captured by Egypt in the 1948 war until taken by Israel in the six-day war. Israel occupied the Gaza strip until 2006 but had no wish to annex it, for if she had done so the population of two million Palestinian Arabs (overwhelmingly Muslim), would have had to be given votes. Of the Israeli population of 9.3 million just over twenty percent, or almost two million, are Palestinian Arabs and there is no desire to add another two million to that figure.
With Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip the Palestine Authority nominally governs it, as it does parts of the West Bank and East Jerusalem. In 2006 Hamas, an anacronym for Islamic Resistance Movement, won the Palestine Legislative Election in Gaza and after a brief civil war when it ejected Fatah, the other Gazan political party (which recognises Israel and which administers parts of the West Bank), has governed Gaza ever since. It is important to realise that Hamas is not only a terrorist organisation based in Gaza but it is also the government voted into power by the Gazan inhabitants (one might say that a people gets the government it deserves). Its armed wing has regularly mounted rocket attacks on Israel and minor acts of terrorism, but with both Israel and Egypt blockading the strip, with only water, electricity, fuel and telecommunications being provided by Israel, up to 7 October this year it was considered that the threat from Gaza was minimal.
Then, on the morning of 7 October Hamas launched a horrific raid on Israel. Breaking through the boundary fence and on para gliders, terrorists embarked on a frenzy of murder and mayhem, killing around 1,300 men, women and children, nearly all civilians, the most despicable being the murder of several hundred completely defenceless young people at a music festival. In addition to the killings around 200 hostages were taken back into Gaza.
Hamas cannot have thought that their actions could overthrow the state of Israel. Rather what they have done, presumably deliberately, is to create a huge elephant trap, into which Israel has fallen. Israel had no option but to react violently and instantly. Had she not done so then public outrage would have been unstoppable, which could even have brought down the government. But by blasting civilian areas within Gaza, despite Hamas’ well known tactic of deliberately positioning rocket launch sites and arms dumps in residential areas, world opinion is beginning to turn from initial wholehearted support and sympathy for Israel into demands that Israel stop shelling Gaza, and all this before the inevitable ground invasion by the IDF.
On 15 October 30,000 people marched in London in support of Palestine. Many of the protesters were obviously of foreign origin, but there were a lot of white faces there too. The repeated cry of ‘from the river [meaning the River Jordan] to the sea, Palestine shall be free’ advocates the complete elimination of the Israeli state. While not all the protesters would support Hamas, a sizeable minority probably do. The Palestinians do have legitimate grievances, in that the Jewish settlements in the West Bank and in East Jerusalem are generally regarded by international authorities as illegal. Palestinians are entitled to press for their removal, but that is very far from legitimising terrorism, mayhem and murder. According to the Office of National Statistics the 2021 census showed that the Muslim population of the UK has grown from 4.9 percent of the population to 6.5 percent in ten years. The vast majority of the 3.9 million Muslims in the UK population would not support Hamas, but given that many live in deprived areas, are reluctant to integrate and adhere to an extremist interpretation of Islam, there is little incentive to be loyal Britons. A significant number may well be prepared to take violent action in support of Hamas. The UK government has (rightly in my view) declared unequivocal support for Israel, which has cross party backing, but our own government institutions and security apparatus, including military installations and personal within the UK, could well be under threat from home grown militants. Already there has been an upsurge in anti-Semitic incidents and sabotage of Israeli companies.
So far Hezbollah, the terrorist organisation based in Lebanon and a client of fellow Shia Muslim Iran has been quiescent. They have rarely cooperated with Sunni Hamas but may well see an opportunity to attack Israel’s northern border. They are more numerous and much better armed than are Hamas. Iran, which regularly states its aim to wipe Israel off the map, could well activate them. As for further escalation one may hope that the despatch of two US carrier groups and a number of Royal Navy ships to the area will discourage intervention by any state actors, although it will not stop deniable attempts to intervene. Already the US navy has shot down missiles fired at Israel from Yemen, presumably by Houthi.
The problem does seem insurmountable. Whether the Israelis would agree to a cease fire if the hostages were returned is problematical and in any case Hamas would probably prefer to hold them in order to extract more concessions. Removal of the Gazan population and annexation by Israel is not a starter – Egypt would not allow them in and Jordan already has almost half its population made up of displaced Palestinians. The IDF could certainly reduce the strip to rubble and occupy what is left, but there seems no indication of an exit strategy – what do you do once you have occupied it? A properly constituted Palestine state would be ideal but where to put it? Israel might be persuaded to give up the West Bank but probably not Jerusalem, and in any case previous Israeli governments have tried to remove the settlers from the West Bank without success. Even then forming a credible and democratic government to include both the West Bank and the Gaza Strip excluding Hamas altogether is almost certainly not possible, at least for now.
Already negotiations with Saudi Arabia for recognition of Israel have stalled, and when the war fighting is over there will almost certainly be mass resignations from the IDF and the Israeli intelligence services, normally very good at detecting possible terrorist attacks but which were completely caught out this time. There may even be a change of government as it is clear that many Israelis blame Netanyahu and his excessively nationalist government for the lapse. Whether a more centrally based Israeli government would be any better at finding a solution is itself in doubt, as the electoral system forces government by coalition, which nearly always has to include the hard line orthodox elements. Meanwhile there is to be an even greater pro-Palestinian protest march in London this weekend, largely by people who have never been to the area and see the problem only in black and white terms and including the usual rent-a-mob who will turn out for anything as long as it is opposed to the West and against the establishment.
In the meantime we should be alert for Iranian/Hamas inspired attacks on our own infrastructure here in the UK.