Gaza catastrophe must be set in historical context

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/30/gaza-catastrophe-set-historical-context

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Harriet Sherwood (Report, 30 July) highlights Israel’s destruction of Gaza’s power plant and Amnesty International says this represents “collective punishment of Palestinians”. Additional evidence of bombing UN centres confirms Israel’s disregard for the lives of children and other noncombatants in its continued (illegal) domination of the occupied Palestinian territories. The EU and US had developed a doctrine of Responsibility to Protect intended to prevent any repetition of Balkan, Rwandan or Sudan genocide ensuring intervention to keep warring parties apart. Yet R2P seems only to be applied in African scenarios – more convenient to deal with less sensitive states than Israel. Time perhaps for academics and policy-makers to ask for how long they will treat Israel as a special case when they are the illegitimate occupier of Palestinian territory and resistance to occupation remains lawful and just.Ray BushProfessor of African studies and development politics, University of Leeds

• I count myself as a supporter of the state of Israel, of its resettlement in its historic setting. But I have been distressed not only at the news of what is happening in Gaza, but also at the unwillingness of reporters and commentators to bring into the discussion the history of Israel’s re-establishment. I never thought that even the relative precariousness of Israel’s position in the Middle East justified the degree to which the Israeli state has been manifestly unfaithful to what I regard as its own Torah teaching on righteousness and justice, as reinforced by the prophets.

The fact that so few voices of eminent Israelites and Jews have been willing to admit the illegality and injustice of Israel’s West Bank settlement policy, pursued so relentlessly since 1967, I have found deeply disturbing. I acknowledge the legitimacy of Israel’s concerns in building the security barrier, but am distressed that no Elijah-like protest is to be heard or given publicity against the land-grab of the positioning of the barrier or at the abuse of traditional rights of Arab landowners and olive groves.

Nor can I defend the Hamas policy of firing rockets into Israel, but neither can I defend Israel’s policy of treating Gaza as little more than an extended prison camp. We must surely set the current catastrophe within its historical context. Since Israel owes the legitimacy of its status in the Middle East to a UN resolution, would it not be an obvious step forward for a properly representative UN panel to review the rights and wrongs of Israel’s expansion since 1948 and 1967, including the impact on the previous inhabitants of the region, and to recommend how Israel and Palestine might co-exist both peacefully and to the mutual benefit of each other in the future.Professor James DG DunnChichester, West Sussex

• Once again you carry an article pointing out the US secretary of state, John Kerry’s, failure to persuade Israel to agree a lasting ceasefire in Gaza (Report, 29 July). He has a perfectly simple means of ensuring that Israel ends its military dominance and its ability to launch lethal attacks on the Palestinians with impunity. All he has to do is to get President Obama to stop signing cheques for US military aid to Israel. This is estimated at $3bn in each of the last three years. Israel is using aircraft, tanks and shells paid for by the US.Michael MeadowcroftLeeds

• Writing about the latest slaughter of civilians in Gaza, Yuli Novak, a former officer in the Israeli air force, is right to say that “these killings cannot be accepted without question” (A tonne of shame, 29 July). She goes on to say that “public silence in the face of such actions – inside and outside Israel – is consent by default”. I agree. This is why thousands of people in cities throughout the UK have been out on the streets in recent weeks, demonstrating against the Israeli bombing of civilian areas. In London, around 100,000 protesters, including Jewish groups, have marched between the Israeli embassy and parliament on successive Saturdays calling for an end not just to the bombings but also to the blockade which imprisons the civilian population in Gaza and cuts off essential supplies. I find it very disturbing that the BBC and much of the press do not report such protests. Those of us who are speaking out do not wish to be associated with our government’s continuing support of the rogue state that Israel has become. Yuli Novak can be reassured that the public outside Israel is not remaining silent, even if our dissent is largely going unreported.Karen BarrattWinchester, Hampshire

• Yuli Novak writes that there is little public outcry in Israel about the bombing of Gaza. The irony is unbearable. Many German Jews must have wondered in the 1940s why almost no one protested or came to their aid when they were transported to their deaths. Their descendants surely do not wonder so now.Andrew McCullochCollingham, Nottinghamshire

• Your correspondent (Letters, 28 July) stated that one of the first things Hamas did after the Israeli military occupation was to demolish the previous settlers’ houses, in spite of a housing crisis in Gaza. This would seem to be incorrect. According to reports in the British media at the time, all the settlers’ homes were demolished by the Israeli army before leaving Gaza. I remember watching film of the specially built Israeli house-demolishing bulldozers in action in Gaza at the time.Lynn WhiteBlaenau Ffestiniog, Gwynedd

• Anyone who has visited Yad Vashem, the Holocaust memorial museum in Jerusalem, needs no explanation as to why the Israeli government is so determined to defend its people against attack – “never again” might be its motto. But this understanding should not justify further inhumanity and certainly shouldn’t justify the diplomatic malaise that grips Israel’s allies. A message can be sent to both sides that would be firm and directly interventionist, which is to say the Israeli blockade of Gaza should be broken by the dispatch of humanitarian supplies protected by western forces, coordinated under Nato’s auspices.

The cargoes could be independently inspected and verified to everyone’s satisfaction. I very much doubt under such circumstances that such a convoy with its military escort would be attacked. In recent years, diplomacy in this conflict has been just so much hand-wringing and I doubt that either side believes a word western politicians say, since they take so little action.Colin ChallenScarborough, North Yorkshire