Israelis And Arabs

3 Pages 692 Words

Both sides claim land in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Moderates suggest splitting of the territory, while extremists want it all. There have been three major Arab-Israeli wars since 1947 when the UN divided the former British mandate of Palestine between its Jewish and Arab populations with Jerusalem as an "international" city. The Arab population rejected that plan. After each was Israel, had extended its boundaries. After the second war - in 1967 - Israel took the West Bank from Jordan and the Gaza Strip from Egypt (who had held them since the 1948 war) and began an illegal program of settlement building in the now occupied territories.
Significantly, these were areas that Palestinian refugees had fled to in 1948. The 1967 war had defended Israel against combined Arab armies massed on its borders when its existence appeared to be under threat, but also put a significant Arab population under Israeli rule (in addition to its own Arab citizens). Its rage was demonstrated in the 1980s intifadah against Israeli occupation and continues to feed into the violence. Much of the economic life of the West Bank and Gaza has been suspended since September 2000, exacerbating unemployment and poverty.
The conflict has developed its own logic of hate and anger that is responsible for the killing. On the Israeli side, many fear the Palestinians want to drive them into the sea. Palestinians feel besieged by Israel and fear the Jewish state will, if not annex the West Bank and Gaza, deny the right of an economically and politically viable Palestinian state to exist.
The United States must radically revise its approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or risk the Middle East sliding further into chaos. Previous approaches to the current violence and to the peace process itself have all been useless: start with a ceasefire, build trust, then come to the hard political issues last. These policies haven’t worked in the war -torn Middle ...