The war in Gaza briefly pushed all other national news off the front page.
Front and center is the horror of a well-armed terrorist group, Hamas, attacking Israel during Yom Kippur – just as Egypt and Syria attacked 50 years ago. Its atrocities, even in an age of seemingly casual violence, have shocked the world.
Although Hamas was once elected in 2006 to govern the Gaza Strip after Israel abandoned its occupation, there have been no elections since. Hamas rules by force and intimidation, deepening the poverty and misery of two million Palestinians who live there.
Gaza, a pawn between Middle Eastern powers for a century, was once described as the world’s largest refugee camp. It might now be the world’s largest detention center, since Israel has maintained a blockade ever since pulling out its troops.
While understandably focused on the war itself, we shouldn’t forget decisions – mostly those by Israel, the region’s dominant military power – that helped bring it about.
Central to these dilemmas is Benjamin Netanyahu, the Jewish state’s longest-serving prime minister, a polarizing figure even before his current alliance with far-right religious parties that, in the view of many Israelis, threatens to turn this haven for Jews – founded as a secular state – into a theocracy.
Netanyahu, whose trial on potentially disqualifying corruption charges has dragged on for three years, enacted a law that would remove the ability of the Supreme Court to review legislation, spurring nationwide protests.
A significant proportion of military reservists essential to Israel’s defense have sworn not to serve if the court legislation stands. It’s not unreasonable to connect intelligence failures of Shin Bet – the equivalent of our CIA, predominantly secular – with the turmoil created by Netanyahu’s attempt to neuter the courts.
The Gaza struggle will be long and bitter, though it’s doubtful it will extend much beyond its borders.
It’s still pertinent to ask how it could have been avoided, how Israel and Palestinians could have learned to live side by side rather than in endless conflict.
In particular, there’s Netanyahu’s response to one promising chance for peace, in 2009.
Barack Obama had just been elected president, and he vowed not to repeat the experience of his Democratic predecessor, Bill Clinton, who attempted to broker a deal at Camp David in 2000 at the end of his presidency.
The putative partners then were Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Yassir Arafat, chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). After intensive negotiations, the talks failed.
In truth, it’s unlikely Arafat, whose PLO had long vowed to destroy Israel, could have delivered on his promises even if he’d decided to sign.
The new effort, however, seemed promising. Obama, in one of his first official acts, called Maine’s George Mitchell out of retirement as chief U.S. negotiator.
Mitchell, who had brokered the Good Friday Accord in 1998, bringing an end to hostilities in Northern Ireland – a task many thought impossible – had qualifications and a level of trust unlikely to be accorded a State Department official.
The talks were initially led by Ehud Olmert, Israel’s moderate prime minister, and Arafat’s successor, Mahmoud Abbas. Unlike Arafat, Abbas consistently rejected violence.
Then Olmert, like Netanyahu accused of corruption, fell in a parliamentary elections and Netanyahu took over. The talks proceeded painfully slowly.
In retrospect, it’s hard to see how they could have succeeded. Netanyahu, while pledged to a two-state solution, radiated contempt for Abbas during in-person meetings.
Mitchell described the final session, after which there was no point in continuing. All along Netanyahu refused to even receive Palestinian proposals, which Abbas continued to press on him.
When Abbas tried to hand him the papers, Mitchell said, “Netanyahu hesitated,” then “reached out, took the documents and laid them on the floor next to his chair.”
There they remained as the two exited the room; a few weeks later Mitchell resigned and “returned to my family and private life.”
A promising chance for peace disappeared.
It isn’t as if there’s been no progress. The 1993 Oslo accords established infrastructure for a Palestinian state centered in Ramallah on the West Bank, the far larger territory occupied by Israel since 1967.
Yet in recent years, the political situation has only worsened. Abbas’s party still governs the West Bank, but Gaza is led by yet another force sworn to Israel’s destruction.
The U.S. now has no choice but to fully back Israel, our principal ally in the Middle East. Yet we should remember that opportunities for peace are rare and fleeting.
They won’t recur as long as Israeli has a leader dedicated solely to unilateral extension of his own authority.
Douglas Rooks has been a Maine editor, columnist and reporter since 1984. His new book, “Calm Command: U.S. Chief Justice Melville Fuller in His Times, 1888-1910,” is available in bookstores and from Maine Authors Publishing. He welcomes comment at drooks@tds.net.
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