Obstacles to Peace between Israel and the Palestinians - Essay Example

Obstacles to peace between Israel and the Palestinians Name: Lecturer: Course: Date: Introduction The Israel and Palestinian conflict is a contentious battle that has existed for decades. When contemplating the probability of peace between the Israeli and the Palestinians, it is difficult to ignore the images of various wars, bombings, suicide and the loss of innocent lives experienced by both groups. Events such as the Intifada al –Aqsa, the construction of the West Bank as a security barrier, the battle between Fatah and Hamas fighters that lead to Hamas taking over the control of Gaza in the year 2007 and the incursion of Gaza by Israel in 2008/2009, make it even more difficult to see the possibility of peace between the Israeli and the Palestinians. Despite of the many attempts to bring peace in the region, it has been challenging to get the two factions to look beyond their conflicts and live peacefully. This paper seeks to evaluate the main obstacles to peace between Israel and the Palestinians. One major obstacle to attaining peace between Israel and Palestine is the contention over land division and borders. The conflict concerning land can be traced back to the 1947-1948 Arab- Israeli war which revolved around the West Bank, Gaza and Israel. The Palestinians claimed that they were the rightful owners of the land, with the argument that their ancestors had settled there for many years. On the other hand, the Israeli believed that the land was their property since it was given to them by God. Through the Zionist Movement the Israeli battled and settled on land occupied by the Palestinians. In 1948 the state of Israel was established in Palestine and by 1967, Israel occupied the left part of Palestine (Matthews, 2011). Since Israel’s settlement, dividing the borders has always been a contention, which has further instigated wars between the two factions. Another barrier to the attainment of peace between the two factions is the Palestinian concern over Israeli settlements in West Bank. Since Israel’s occupation of West Bank in 1967, the region has always been an area of dispute. For a long period of time, the Palestinians have contended that the whole West Bank region should be left for them in order to create an independent state. On the other hand, the Israeli have insisted on land swops by making certain areas of the West Bank to part of Israel. Recent peace talks held between negotiators of both groups ended up in a deadlock due to controversy over the region. The Palestinian faction through their leader Abbas maintained that if some sort of exchange in the Land is to take place, then the size of the land has to be equal. In addition, no citizen or military from Israel should remain on the future Palestinian land. The Israeli on the other hand through Benjamin Netanyahu their prime minister restated that the existing Israeli cities in the West Bank region cannot be relocated. Approximately half a million of the population consist of the Israeli people who have settled at Green Line on the Palestinian side. Today the region is off limits for the Palestinians. The West Bank issue has therefore constantly been an obstacle to attaining peace in the regions (Dorell, 2013). The Jerusalem factor has also been a difficult obstruction towards attaining peace between the two factions. When examining the issue from the initial position of the political leaders of both factions, the difficulty is achieving an acceptable compromise over Jerusalem arises from two key factors which connected to each other. One of the factors is linked to a huge gap concerning the proper status of the city in the respective Israeli and Palestinian states. Consequently, the Palestinians contend that the only satisfactory solution is to divide the city so that West Jerusalem would be the capital city of Israel while the Palestinians would take East Jerusalem. The Israeli government however opposes this view by asserting that Israeli will not consent to nothing less but the status quo which is Jerusalem to remain undivided and be the capital city of Israeli. The second factor is attributed to the undisputable importance of Jerusalem to both the Israeli and the Palestinians (Ginat,et al 2002). The Palestinians consider the eastern part of Jerusalem important since it possesses Islamic holy places. The Israeli on the other hand consider the entire Jerusalem as a cornerstone of the Jewish religion and people which cannot be surrendered as portion of a peace process. Thus, reaching a compromise concerning Jerusalem has always been a difficult issue that affects peace (Ganim, 2010). Strong emotions which result to conflict is another obstacle of attaining peace between Israel and Palestine. One such emotion is the existence of hatred which further instigates war. The potential impact of the existence of hatred is that peace can actually not be attained (Yaacov, 2010). For instance, surveys conducted in 2007, revealed that one third of the Israeli youths have high emotions of hatred towards the Palestinians (Kupermintz, et al, 2007). Fascinatingly, similar findings were also recorded among the adult population. An astonishing factor is that this level of hatred remained constant and did not rise even after escalating conflicts and mutual disagreements. Furthermore, another survey conducted after the Lebanon war, indicated that a third of the Israeli population (35.6%) did hate the Palestinians (Halperin et al, 2009). Also another study during the previous war in Gaza revealed that a third of the Israeli population hated the Palestinians (Halperin, 2010). Although the level of hatred recorded was at medium level, it can be argued that hate is evidently one of the most destructive emotions with the capability of influencing conflict (Halperin and Gross, 2010). Consequently, it cannot be surprising to find that when an implicit or unspoken measure rather than an explicit measure is used to examine the level of hatred, it can be found that 63.9 percent of the Israeli people hate the Palestinians. Consequently, what is evident is that the existence of hatred is bound be barrier against attaining peace between the two factions (Gross and Halperin, 2010). The security concern of Israel over terrorism has also been a major obstacle to attaining peace between Israel and Palestine. Over the years hundreds of Israeli people have been killed due to acts of terrorism. The Israeli believe that the Palestinians are the core perpetrators of terrorism on the Israeli people (Rothem, 2011). Israel specifically blames major terrorist attacks on Hamas the Islamic terrorist movement which controlled the Gaza strip (Bender, 2014). An additional factor that makes attaining peace even more difficult is the recent unity between Palestinian Hamas which Israel views as a terrorist organization and Fatah which governs Palestine. In the previous year’s Fatah and Hamas were two rivalry sides, however recently the two sides came into an agreement that entailed parliamentary and presidential elections that were to be conducted in six months after which a unity government was to be formed. Israel however was against the unity between Fatah and Hamas. Avigdor Lieberman the Israeli Foreign Minister stated that a peace agreement with the Palestinians is impossible to achieve after the opposing Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas settled on an agreement to form a unity government. Benjamin Netanyahu the Israeli prime minister also accused Abbas the Palestinian leader of choosing ‘’Hamas a terrorist group and not Peace’’ (Oral, 2014). Terrorism is therefore a deadly obstacle to attaining peace. The move to create safe borders by the Israeli has also affected the attainment of peace between the Israeli and the Palestinians. In order to maintaining security the Israeli government has frequently established barriers in order to ensure that only a small number of Palestinian population is included Israel territory (Jacoby,2013). In addition the Israeli government applied constrains of movement for the Palestinian people. For instance, since the September 29th the year 2000, the Israel government enforced constraints on the freedom of movement in the territories that she had occupied. For a period of one hundred and twenty three days, (I st October 2000- January 31st 2001), the border between Israel and Palestine was closed. Other restrictions included; the closer of Dahania Airport which was the only airport that the Palestinians used, the international border crossing from West Bank to Egypt was also closed and the Safe passage from the Gaza strip to West Bank (Lane, 2008). The cumulative implication of the constraints on the freedom movement of goods and people has been viewed by the Palestinians as an obstruction. It has led to series social –economic difficulties within the Palestinian territory. For instance approximately 100, 000 Palestinians could not access their places of work as a result many families suffered from a total lack of income. According to estimates by the World Bank the effect of the closure by the year 2001 was that an estimated 50% of the Palestinian population was unemployed, while the level of poverty was 43.7% (Lane, 2008). The imposition of such restrictions by the Israeli in order to create safe borders has been a contributory factor in hindering the development of peace between Israel and Palestine. This is because when the Israeli continue to implement more border restrictions, the freedoms of the Palestinians are infringed. Incitement is another hindrance to attaining peace between the two groups. Incitement usually arises from external forces. The involvement of the international community in the Israel and Palestine conflict has been a major source of incitement. The involvement of the international community such America, Arab states and other international countries in the affairs of the peace process has also often hindered peaceful resolutions. The main current challenge arises in the sense that the international community has made leaders of Arab nations to develop the view that Israel can actually be weakened by pressure from international entities and also be de-legitimated, and thus if the Palestinians can stand their ground for a long period then they can attain their final objective, which is to terminate the existence of Israel as Jewish nation that has been acknowledged by the international community. For instance, a recent statement that was issued by Hamas and other Palestinian secular groups in Damascus highlighted that the present position of the groups is to reject negotiations and wait until Israel will be secluded. The groups believe that the isolation of Israel by the international community continues to deepen as a result and with time the national rights of the Palestinians people will be achieved and finally the Palestinians will be able to ‘’return’’ to what is currently Israel and make it a Arab – Muslim nation (Dershowitz, 2010). The dispute concerning Palestine refugees has also been a significant barrier towards attaining peace between Israel and Palestine. The challenge of Palestinian refugees begun in 1948 and has existed for many years. According to the Palestinians the invasion of the Israeli on their land has been a traumatic event. Thousands of people have lost their property, land and their social lives. Palestinians have often viewed their refugee situation as a social injustice that has influenced their collective struggle for about 60years. In many peace negotiations, the Palestinians usually demand that the Israeli should acknowledge their contribution in making the Palestinians refugees. Furthermore, the Palestinians demand that they should be given a right to return to the land which they had occupied before the return of the Israeli people. The Israeli on the other hand place their Identity on the Land in question, it has therefore been difficult to resolve the refugee problem. The refugee issue has therefore been a justice issue for the Palestinian’s and is basically an obstacle to attaining peace between the two factions (Yaacov, 2010). Failure of previous attempts at making peace has also affected the achievement of lasting peace between the two factions. Most peace talks end up in a deadlock thus implying that the chances of attaining peace are minimal. For instance, the Madrid conference of 1991, which led to the development of a cooperative environment and thus leading to the Oslo accords of 1993 failed. Although the two factions begun to negotiate directly and openly with the promise of coexisting together peacefully. Nevertheless, the objectives of the accords were not entirely met due to continued violence in the regions (Cordesman and Moravitz, 2005). Also reconciliation efforts such as the Camp David Conference of the year 2000 still failed leading to the second Palestinian Intifada, the second war in Lebanon in the year 2006 and the war in Gaza in 2009. The failure of the various peace attempts still give an indication that the culture of conflict is still deeply rooted among the two factions and that peace is difficult to attain (Bar-Tal and Sharvit, 2008). Conclusion The above discussion has highlighted various obstacles to attaining peace between Israel and Palestine. Some the issues raised include; contention over land division and borders, the Jerusalem factor, incitement, the issue of terrorism , strong emotions between the two divides , Palestinian concern over Israeli settlements in West Bank and the creation of safe borders. This paper acknowledges the fact that there are many other obstacles that hinder peace among the two factions. In addition, as years go by new issues keep emerging. In conclusion, what is evident from the discussion is that attaining peace between the Israeli and the Palestinians is an issue that is far reaching and requires a change of mind, believes and cultures that hinder peace. References Bar-Tal, D and Sharvit, K2008, The influence of the threatening Trannsactional context on Israel Jews’ reactions to Al Aqsa Intifada, Esses and R.A. Bender, L 2014, The one real obstacle to Israeli- Palestinian peace , Greater Philadelphia District. 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