The Israelis and the Palestinians are at it again. It is only a slight exaggeration to say that more than 2,000 chapters could be written about the various conflicts that have erupted in the area. Israel is in the area that serves as the land connection between Europe, Asia, and Africa. A lot of people have gotten into a lot of fights trying to move to or through the area.
As a result, the region has a storied history. How storied? As is commonly reckoned Seattle, the city I live in, has a history that dates back all the way to about 1850 AD. (This ignores the history of the various peoples that were there when the White man arrived, but cut me some slack here. I'm drawing a contrast.) History in the area in and around Israel dates back to something like 1,000 BC.
And, if we went all the way back to this time, we would find here pretty much what we would find in most of the rest of the world. Tribes wandered around. One tribe would fight with another. Sometimes the invading tribe would completely displace the people occupying the land. Or the occupying tribe would succeed in fighting the invaders off. Or something in-between would happen and they would end up intermingling. In those days possession was not nine tenths of the law. It was the entirety of the law. Nobody back then worried about legal niceties.
At some point the Israeli tribe, a tribe that adhered to the Jewish Religion, moved into what was then called Palestine. But then they got kicked out. But then they came back. This is all discussed in the Bible. During the New Testament era, an era that started around 33 AD, the area was governed by Rome but the bulk of the population consisted of Israelis who were not Roman citizens.
But that didn't last. In 68 AD the Romans got mad at the Jews, destroyed their main temple, and kicked them out of Jerusalem. The eventual result was the "diaspora", the exodus of Jews from Palestine and to small communities scattered all over the world. It took a long time but eventually there were few Jews left anywhere in Palestine.
Then along came the Crusades. They had nothing to do with the Jews. The idea was to wrest control of Palestine, or at least the "Holy Places", from the Arab people who lived there, and give that control to Christians. In other words, the plan was for the official religion of Palestine to shift from the Islamism to Christianity without coming anywhere near Judaism in the process. The Crusades eventually failed. And Jews failed to return to Palestine. The exodus continued unabated.
That brings us to the twentieth century. At the beginning of the century Arabs were in firm control of Palestine, and the Jewish population was still miniscule, at best. But Pogroms (see the musical "Fidler on the Roof" for some insight into how Jews were treated in Russia at the time) and other forms of oppression got Jews to thinking that they should reclaim their ancestral homeland so they would have some place to retreat to.
"Next year in Jerusalem" was a popular Jewish lament at the time. In spite of this, little was done. Then World War I happened. And the Ottoman Empire, the political entity that controlled Palestine and much else, was on the losing side. After the War ended, the winners happily carved up all of the land the Empire had controlled and parceled it out to themselves as spoils of war.
Great Britain was on the winning side. Among other things, it got "The Palestine Mandate". That means that they got to set the rules in Palestine. They saw no reason to make it easy for Jews to immigrate. So, while they made it possible for Jews to move to Palestine, they didn't make it easy. Among other things, they didn't want to stir the locals up too much. And the locals were very hostile to Jewish immigration.
So, by the start of World War II there is a significant Jewish population in Palestine. But they still constituted a relatively small minority. Even so, for the first time in about 1,500 years, there is a significant Jewish population living in Palestine. And, of course, before and during the War the Nazis set out to exterminate all European Jews. They came shockingly close.
After the War Jews the world round got serious about turning Palestine into Israel, a Jewish State. (See the book and movie "Exodus" for one of many tactics they used during this period.) The Palestinians were very unhappy with the Brits about all this. But the Brits and other European countries were embarrassed by the whole Nazi "Final: Solution" business. Ultimately the British decided the area was more trouble than it was worth. They turned control over to the Jews and, for the most part, washed their hands of the whole thing.
The Arab countries surrounding Israel were very unhappy about this. They started a War with the objective of wiping out the Israeli forces before they even got a chance to get themselves organized. They would then change the name from Israel back to Palestine and return control to the Arab population. In a surprising turn of events the small Jewish population with its small military was able to defeat the larger and better equipped Arab armies. Now for an aside.
As I noted above, people have been invading places that already have people in them forever. Once a certain scale is reached with respect to one of these invasions it gets called a war. If you go back far enough it turns out that almost every nook and cranny of Earth has been fought over. (The only exception I can think of is Antarctica.)
In some cases a particular piece of land has only been fought over a few times. In most cases it has been fought over many times. As a result of this, a case can pretty much always be made that the current occupiers of a piece of land are not the rightful owners. Some other group, perhaps several other groups, have a reasonable case for why the land rightfully belongs to them.
Mankind has built up a lot of experience with this sort of thing. Often the same group of people will have been on the winning side of one conflict and the losing side of another. In situations like his informal conventions grow up. One such informal convention is called "The Laws of War". It sets out expectations for what the winners can expect and what the losers can expect.
The Laws of War cover many contingencies. But I am going to only consider one. What happens if a foreign army invades but is successfully and decisively repulsed by the current occupants? The Laws of War says that in this situation all prior potential claims to the land in dispute by the invaders and their supporters are washed away. War settles all ownership questions in favor of the current occupants.
That's what happened in the Israeli War of Independence, which was fought in the late '40s. An army made up of contingents from the several Arab countries invaded Israel. The intention was to drive the Jews out and return control of what the Jews had named Israel to the local "Palestinian" (Arab) population. But the invaders lost. And that loss meant that the outcome of the war conveyed clear title of Israel to the government the Jews had set up.
Prior to this the various Arab countries involved had adhered to the Laws of War just like everybody else. For instance, there was no "Sharia Law" provisions that contradicted the precepts laid out there. Arab had been going to war against Arab and non-Arab for Millenia by this point. In all that time they never found a need to create an alternative to the Laws of War that were in use elsewhere.
But for various political reasons the Arab countries surrounding Israel pretended there was some kind of "Israel" exception. Part of it, I am sure, is that they lost a War that everybody expected them to win easily. A look at the size, level of training, equipment, etc. indicated that the Arab side was strongly favored. So, the loss was an embarrassing one. That left the several Arab governments involved looking for and excuse.
One quickly came to mind. The loss wasn't a loss. It was just a temporary setback. The Arab armies would soon be back and they would be triumphant this time. Once this idea took hold, the various countries involved told the Arab population to flee from Israel to "temporary" refugee camps. The camps were only temporary because the Jews would be gone any day now.
And, since their situation was temporary, these refugees were kept separate from the regular population. After all, they would soon be returning to "Palestine", Israel, but under Arab control. But these refugees have never been able to return.
The "temporary" camps became permanent. But since they were always on the verge of no longer being necessary, at least according to the various Arab governments, no effort was ever made to upgrade them. This created a large group of permanent refugees with a grudge.
By now, generations of "Palestinian Refugees" have been born and raised in these camps. But the fiction that Israel is a temporary country has persisted in Arab politics. Everybody now knows that it is a fiction. But it persists because it serves the needs of the various Arab countries for it to persist. The fact that it is a fiction doesn't inhibit it from gumming up the works when it comes to making actual progress on many fronts.
Surprisingly, this fiction on the part of Arabs that Israel is a temporary country that will soon be gone also serves the needs of Israeli politicians. The imminent demise of Israel means that Israel faces an existential threat. If you facing an existential threat the Laws of War permit the taking extreme measures to overcome the threat.
The political history of Israel neatly divides itself into two periods. There is the "Labor" era and the "Likud" era. For the first several decades of the country's existence the Labor party dominated its politics. Labor believed in trying to come to an accommodation with the Palestinians. "Palestinian" has come to mean the Arabs living in Israel or the "Occupied Territories". (It also applies to the refugees living in the camps, but I am going to ignore that alternate usage from here on.)
The problem is that they never found a willing partner. Fault can be found with this, that, or the other proposal the Labor Government of Israel made. But the Palestinians never seriously engaged. They used the "Israel is a temporary state" idea as justification for this behavior. As a result, Labor found that, for the most part, they were negotiating with themselves.
History never stands completely still. During this period two additional Wars that are of interest to this discussion were fought. Their names are the "Six Day" War and the "Yom Kippur" War. If Israel had lost either, the country would have gone out of existence. In the interests of brevity I am only going to make a few observations about these Wars. The first happened in the '60s and the second in the '70s.
In the Six Day War the Arabs were clearly the aggressors. So, according to the Laws of War, this War again confirmed Israel's right to existence and washed away any competing claims. The situation with respect to the Yom Kippur is more ambiguous. The Arab armies were posed to strike but Israel fired the first shot. So Israel couldn't use the "they shot first" justification. But the Laws or War also address this situation. The fact that Israel shot first is not enough by itself to justify an ownership change.
One other thing, Israel gained control of a lot of land as a result of these Wars. Israel then tried to do a "land for peace" deal. They "voluntarily" relinquished some but not all of the gains. The Palestinians/Arabs did not respond with "voluntary" countermoves, or pretty much any moves at all.
As a result of the by then long and spectacular lack of success, political leadership eventually shifted in Israel from the more moderate and accommodating Labor party to the hard line Likud party. It has not shifted back since. In the Likud era interest in coming to peace with Palestinians and Arabs has waned considerably.
For several decades now sentiment on all sides has been locked in place. Israel is militant about defending itself from various slights, both real and imagined. It has slowly clamped down on Palestinians living in Israel. In the early days the Jews saw Palestinians as a source of cheap unskilled labor. The Jewish population was not large enough to do all that needing doing. So Palestinians were a critical resource.
This has slowly changed. Palestinians have chafed under Jewish restraints. There are he three "P"s: pay, power, and prestige. Jews get the high "P" jobs. Palestinians get the low "P" ones. As resentments have built Israel has learned to depend less and less on Palestinian labor. That has allowed them to crack down even harder. Officially, the crackdowns are all in response to various Palestinian "provocations".
But what's going on is a vicious cycle. The Palestinians agitate. The Israelis treat the Palestinians badly. Some Palestinians use this as an excuse to do something bad. The Israelis retaliate. Then they crackdown further. Wash. Rinse. Repeat. There was an interest by Israelis during the Labor era in trying to break the cycle. But there was little or no effort to reciprocate on the Palestinian side. Eventually Israelis in large numbers gave up and put Likud in power.
In the Likud era Israel has engaged in several military offensives outside of its borders. The anti-Israeli factions within Israel have consistently gotten lots of help from the various countries that surround Israel. These "incursions" have attempted to punish these outside groups, or at least diminish their capabilities, military or otherwise. The degree of success has varied considerably. Needless to say, this has made various groups of Arabs very unhappy with Israel.
And that finally brings us to the current situation. Both sides have arguments as to why "the other side started it". But tit for tat has been going on for a long time. There is always some handy event that can be pointed to when justification is needed.
The fundamental problem is that the conflict remains unresolved. Also, significant motion toward a real solution has been absent for a long time now. Someone on one side does something provocative. That stirs up the other side and things escalate. Then things either simmer down or they heat up. As I write this things are still heating up.
Rather than gong into the "he said - she said" that surrounds the current escalation, let me just note that currently escalation serves the needs of both sides. There is a long simmering conflict between various Palestinian factions. It suits one faction's needs that a lot of rockets are flying into Israel. The same thing is true on the Israeli side. It serves the needs of one Israeli political faction to be seen "fighting a Palestinian uprising".
On paper, it is a one sided conflict, assuming other countries stay out of it. (This is a likely outcome, at least if the conflict does not significantly exceed its current level of intensity.) The Israelis have he military capability to do serious damage to the Palestinians. The Palestinians lack a similar capability to do serious damage to Israel. But the Palestinians continue to lose battle after battle while they make steady progress toward eventually being able to win the war.
This is because Israel is in big trouble over the long term. In the first few decades after the establishment of the country its Jewish population increased quickly. A lot of Jews from the rest of the world moved to Israel and settled there permanently. But this population influx slowed to a trickle many decades ago. Meanwhile, the Palestinian population has continued to increase steadily.
This "Population Bomb" problem for the long term stability of Israel has been well known for a long time now. And for a long time it was thought to be Israel's only serious long term problem. But Israel now has second problem to go alongside the first one. For a long time Israel's government was honest and competent. It has lost considerable ground on both fronts in the past couple of decades.
Israel is a multi-party parliamentary democracy. For a long time two parties, (i.e. Labor, Likud) controlled most of the seats in the Knesset, the Israeli Parliament. One of the two parties would prevail in the election and the other would form the backbone of the opposition. Neither party might command a clear majority, a necessity for forming the government. But they only feel short by a little. They could usually rope in a small party without too much trouble and govern pretty much like they actually did hold the majority.
This in turn allowed a party to create and implement a long term political agenda. They would have to make concessions to the small party. But the concessions were manageable. The small party got to punch above its weight but mostly things went the way the large party wanted them to. And these coalitions would hold together for long periods of time. In short, the system worked.
But the percentage of seats going to the two largest parties has been in long term decline. That means that more votes need to be corralled in order to form a governing coalition. The small parties know that this gives them a stronger bargaining position. They have taken advantage of this to demand larger and larger concessions. That in turn has resulted in the dominant party retaining less control. It has also meant that coalitions fall apart more and more quickly.
A successful Prime Minister must more of a wheeler-dealer than a leader. And keeping policies stable for any length of time becomes harder and harder. Everything becomes about the short term. And it becomes about doing what it takes to keep the coalition together for a little longer. This further incentivizes members of the small parties to misbehave, so they do. All this gets in the way of good government.
Benjamin Netanyahu has been the Prime Minister for a long time. He is the leader of Likud. But the length of time he has managed to remain in office is misleading. For the past few years frequent elections and a near constant reshuffling of party coalitions have become the norm. They are now so common that it takes a score card to keep track of who's in, who's out, who is in charge of which ministry, and what the price of their support was.
Not surprisingly, he has been investigated for corruption several times now. He has shown consummate skill at putting together coalition after coalition. It has left him little time for anything else. Is it natural to wonder whether or not he has perhaps stepped over the line a time or two.
He has been on the brink of going on trial for corruption for some time now. The latest try at getting him in court and before a judge and jury is supposed to happen any day now. This, and other circumstances, have weakened him to such an extent that he has not been able to keep a coalition together for any length of time. The result is a Parliamentary Crisis leading to an election every few months.
There has been no recent dramatic shift in voting patterns, so Netanyahu keeps holding on by a thread. But even he has proved unable to form a government after the last election. The leader of the biggest opposition party was recently given the task after the clock ran out on Netanyahu's chance. That's where things stood when the latest clash suddenly erupted "out of nowhere". Now, hey - there's a war going on. Netanyahu likely thinks that's good news for him.
Even absent a War (or whatever you want to call the current clash) Israel has become less and less governable. And the constant state of not peace makes it an unpleasant place to live. So, it is having trouble attracting and keeping top talent.
And the Palestinians keep getting more and more militant. It really doesn't matter how strong their case is. It's strong enough to convince them. And, of course, the case justifying Israeli behavior is strong enough to convince Israelis.
The Palestinians pay a steep short term price for the resulting escalation. But the Israelis pay a long term price for the same escalation. This is not a sustainable situation. At some point something is going to give. Lots of people, including the U.S. and Egyptian governments, are trying to get things settled down again. In the short run that's the humanitarian thing to do. But I'm not sure it is the right thing in the long term.
The current pattern of behavior by both sides has led to the long term gridlock that characterizes recent history. We have short periods of a lot of misery separated by longer periods of not quite so much misery. And nothing gets settled, ever. So why don't we try something else. Let both sides go at it.
If I had an alternative that I thought had a chance of yielding a solution both sides would be willing to live with, I would not entertain this idea. But I don't. And I don't see any ideas from anyone else or from anywhere else that look good either.
The smart money says that letting both sides go at it for an extended period of time would mean a lot of bloodshed by Palestinians. It would also be bloody for the Israelis but to a far less extent. But the vaunted military might of the Israelis has not always delivered victory. They have even suffered at least one humiliating defeat. The smart money says that they can hurt the Palestinians badly at little cost. But the smart money has been wrong before.
Maybe the Palestinians will be forced to change their position and decide it is finally time to cut a deal. Maybe the Israelis will find military action expensive and unproductive and decide to cut the Palestinians more slack. Either outcome would change the status quo. And it might result in less bloodshed over the long term.
We know what will happen if things settle down after a few days with nothing really decided. The status quo will continue. The status quo is not working in the long term for anybody. Unfortunately, it is working in the short term for powerful factions on both sides. That's why it is the status quo.
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