generalspeaking

All Matters Being Equal

There's little doubt that the Palestinian people living in the West Bank and Gaza Strip suffer a miserable life, bereft of normal freedoms, without the dignity of a free people, unable to advance their lives because of ongoing occupation and uncertainties for the future. Theirs is a life of occupation, where the politics and military of a country adjacent their territories reduce the meaning of their lives, offer social and political and military insult, interfere in the achievement of 'normalcy' in every conceivable way.

It need not have been this way. The occupying country, exhibiting a level of cruel behaviour toward their neighbours would far rather prefer it also, to be vastly otherwise. Jews are not comfortable being placed in the role of the neighbourhood bully, practising a militant rigidity of social and political indignities toward another people. That they do, in fact and reality, represent a brutal occupying power is reason for inner anguish, a truly troubling reminder that they are reacting and acting in a manner they've themselves been made to suffer, historically.

So, how is it that a population of pitiable refugees has been unable or unwilling to advance their futures in their best interests? That they've abandoned all reasonable and legitimate efforts to bring themselves into a normal stream of living and livelihoods, raising their children to anticipate a better world for themselves? They represent the single most heavily supported refugee population in the world today, and the lengthiest duration - heavily and solely dependent on the charity of world funding bodies to prop up their everyday lives.

It's an undeniably true fact that a greater number of Jewish refugees resulted from mass expulsion from Arab countries where they had lived for generations before being recognized by the ruling overseers of those countries as "enemy aliens". Their properties and goods were confiscated, and they were thrust penniless and stateless, in the 1940s, out of a familiar world they had considered they were an integral part of. They represent a far greater body of refugees forcibly displaced and expelled than do the Palestinian Arabs.

Assistance they were given to help resettle themselves, to assist them in finding a new place for themselves, new opportunities to begin anew, was far less than what has been monumentally expended for the same purpose for the Palestinians. The Arab world holds steadfast to the demand that the Palestinians who fled the immediate geography of the newly-proclaimed State of Israel, must be compensated by right of return - inclusive of the millions of their progeny. Should not, then, the hundreds of thousands of Jews forced to flee Arab and Muslim states see like compensation?

More to the point, however, is not merely the unequal treatment and the apprehension of the two situations - where one group can be forgotten and the other held as an example of human rights having been trampled and restitution being required - is why, exactly, the Palestinians have themselves expended no energy in ameliorating their situation, in looking forward, in taking responsibility toward advancing their own interests, beyond grievance and demanding the world consider it the ultimate victim.

Perhaps it's a matter of scarcity of able and responsible and honourable leadership. When Yasser Arafat came close to reaching a grudging agreement with his Israeli counterpart in searching together for a solution to finally reach a settlement beyond defiance, despair and aggression, the more militant factions of his PLO denounced him and he felt encouraged to renege on the agreement, and to foment violence anew against the State of Israel.

Through the process unerringly ensuring that no meeting of minds could take place, as the Palestinians were encouraged to reject passive acceptance and take up the cudgel of violent resistance instead. And when rock-throwing morphed into suicide bombing, then the logical conclusion was that the embattled state had a larger obligation to protect its citizens, erecting the world-despised Wall whose erection functioned as a protection from incursion, as fences are wont to do, and at the same time, eroded property and social rights of the Palestinians.

Is it logical for a large group of people to remain complicit in their own downfall? To accept the vile propaganda about Jews' intentions to destroy the Arabs, to teach impressionable young people that they may never consider their neighbours to be potential neighbours with whom they may live in peace? How can efforts toward a peaceful solution of the aggression between two disparate peoples, religions, politics and traditions be successful when each is not prepared to sympathize one with the other, and tolerate their differences?

The plight of the Palestinians is a dreadful one to be imposed on any group of people. But an alternate must be found to be acceptable to both people, the Arabs and the Israelis, to distrust, suspicion and fear. As long as Israelis have good reason to feel threatened by the ongoing determination of those leaders in the Palestinian territories who profess to have the best interests of their people in mind, and express their dedication by ongoing assaults, nothing can logically advance in meeting the needs of each side.

Sometimes, verily, people are their very own worst enemies.

Labels: Israel, Justice, Middle East, Political Realities

posted by Pieface @ Wednesday, December 24, 2008