Burning Issue: Has the West been too weak in holding Israel to account for Gaza attacks?

Published on Sunday 4 January 2009 21:04

Yes HUGH HUMPHRIES secretary, Scottish Friends of Palestine.

THE response has been nil. For months 1.5 million Palestinians, half of them children, have been corralled into the world's largest concentration camp. Besieged, starved and denied access to hospital treatment, they have cried out for help. The response? Bombardment and invasion by one of the world's most militarised states.

The excuse for this carnage? The futile attempt by a minority of Gaza's inmates to retaliate against Israel for breaking the truce when, on 5 November, 2008, it killed six Hamas fighters.

With Gaza now declared a "closed military zone" – which justifies ramming, in international waters, boats carrying humanitarian aid and the banning of journalists – Israel's sophistry has been stripped to the bone. She can no longer deny the military occupation. Under the Geneva Convention, the status of military occupier brings responsibility with regard to health, safety and welfare of those under occupation. And the West has prime responsibility in enforcing this.

Where is the emergency meeting of the signatories to the Geneva Convention? The suspension of Israel from the UN? Where is the slightest movement by the European Union to suspend commercial and academic links with Israel? And, above all, where is the recognition of the rights, the humanity, of all Palestinian people? Are they, after all, Children of a Lesser God?

The West has abrogated its responsibility. Civic society must lead the way.

South Africa is the model and boycott is the only way forward.

No

EZRA GOLOMBOK

director, Israel Information Office in Scotland.

IT WOULD be more meaningful to ask why some in the West have been too weak in identifying those responsible for the crisis.

They all know Hamas (which they have named as a terrorist organisation) has, over the months, launched 8,000 rockets and mortars at civilians in Israel, despite a ceasefire. They know that close on a million Israeli citizens have frequently to resort to shelters.

The war Hamas has declared on Israel is no game demanding a level playing field, but a struggle for existence.

The Hamas leadership, once in control, proceeded to remove members of the rival Fatah, internationally recognised as the Palestinian government in Ramallah. Before crying out that Hamas was democratically elected to lead, it should be remembered that so was Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Iran – and, for that matter, Adolf Hitler in Germany.

In contrast, the United States and the new EU presidency have understood the challenge Israel faces and are supportive, while urging Israel to avoid, as much as is feasible, injury to the Gazan civil population. And, indeed, Israel has virtually announced the areas of the present incursion and has leafleted the populations.

The "weakness" of western response is more likely, in terms of realpolitik, the realisation of the inevitability of Israel's reaction to a bitter terrorist enemy, while yet voicing genuine distress at the resulting loss of life, injury and physical damage. The disappearance of Hamas as a fundamentalist and provocative irritant would be welcomed by almost every government in the West.