WITH ISRAELI cabinet agreement to remove Jewish settlers from Gaza by
August 2005 and the release of 500 Palestinian prisoners, hopes of an end to
the Israeli/Palestinian conflict have been rekindled.
JENNY BROOKS looks at the prospects for peace.
FOLLOWING THE recent summit of Palestinian and Israeli leaders at Sharm
el-Sheikh, the first since Israeli Prime Minister Sharon came to office, the
media talked of a possible end to the decades long Israel-Palestine conflict.
Such reporting is extremely far-fetched, especially given that none of the
fundamental problems were even touched on at the summit, with no reference
being made to the Israeli occupation of Palestinian Authority (PA) areas. Even
the much lauded ‘ceasefire’ was not a formal agreement, but was based on
unilateral declarations of intent.
Although terrible brutality has been unleashed on the Palestinians by the
Israeli regime during the four-and-a-half-year intifada, (three-quarters of
the 4,500 dead being Palestinian), PA president, Mahmood Abbas, laughed and
joked with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and accepted an invitation to
his ranch as well as to the US White House.
Withdrawal
In an attempt to maintain a respite in the bloodshed, particularly in the
run-up to his unilateral withdrawal of Jewish settlements from Gaza, Sharon
has decided to alleviate Israel’s stranglehold on Palestinian areas to some
extent, including the withdrawal of Israeli troops from some West Bank towns.
He has also allowed access to work for some Palestinians across the ‘borders’
of the PA, and ordered a respite in targeted and indiscriminate killings and
house demolitions.
While these measures are wanted by a Palestinian population that is weary
of years of repression and poverty, they offer no solution to end their plight
or to meet their aspirations. The occupation will effectively remain and their
own state is not on offer. There is no promise to stop building the new
separation barrier – already a third completed – which carves through
Palestinian farmland and towns, confiscating more of their land.
The planned pullout of the Gaza Jewish settlements, starting in July, while
being a setback to the previous aspirations of the Israeli ruling class, will
not make much difference to living standards in the Palestinian territories.
And the withdrawal is with the aim of confiscating more land in the West Bank
and rejecting discussion on the fundamental issues concerning the
Palestinians, such as the right of return of refugees and a Palestinian state
(including the future of East Jerusalem). Sharon is in any case refusing any
discussion on these until after the Gaza withdrawal.
Despite all this, the main strategy of Abbas is to further the Palestinian
cause by negotiating with Sharon, backed by Bush’s US regime and other world
imperialist powers. The latter are motivated not by desire to genuinely help
the Palestinian people, but to appear to be doing something towards ‘peace’ in
the Middle East and to aid their own interests there.
Abbas always opposed the use of arms in the intifada uprising, and is now
under pressure from the Israeli regime and his international sponsors to
subdue the militias of Hamas and other armed organisations.
In his speech at Sharm el-Sheikh, he spoke of having "one authority that is
the only party allowed to carry weapons". Applying pressure, Sharon said: "We
in Israel have had to painfully wake up from our dreams… you, too, must
prove you have the courage to compromise, abandon unrealistic dreams, [and]
subdue the forces which oppose peace" and that they must "act together
determinedly to dismantle the terrorist infrastructure, to disarm and subdue
it once and for all".
Yet within two days of the declared ceasefire, the Israeli army killed two
Palestinian men in separate areas, followed by Hamas and other Palestinian
organisations firing volleys of rockets into Jewish settlement Gush Katif.
Occupation
The Palestinian militias, not surprisingly, refuse to give up weapons while
under occupation, and have made it clear they will use them if killings by the
Israeli army continue.
They have also been using their ability to break the ceasefire in order to
negotiate with Abbas in their own interests – such as regarding the electoral
system for legislative elections planned for next summer. Hamas is already in
a position of some strength, having gained a significant majority in seven of
ten municipalities in local elections in Gaza on 27 January.
With the Palestinians’ basic problems unresolved, a return to bloodshed at
some stage is inevitable. An Israeli foreign ministry official, Gideon Meir
admitted: "The short-term will be a ceasefire in fact. But Israel cannot see a
ceasefire as a long-term arrangement because Israelis will see a threat of
violence always hanging over their heads".
This is the best that the capitalist politicians on both sides of the
divide have to offer, but many ordinary people see things differently. An
Israeli cafŽ owner was quoted in The Independent (8 February) as saying: "The
problem isn’t between people, it’s between the leaders and the politicians. We
have the same mentality as Palestinians. We inhabit the same place. We know
each other well".
Increasingly, both Palestinians and Israeli Jews will draw the conclusion
that neither side has a decent future under capitalism, and that a socialist
alternative is needed in both Palestine and Israel.
