At the end of a week which ushered in 2009 and saw 7 days of Israeli aerial attacks on targets in Gaza with the death toll exceeding 400, two images come to mind.
The first is of Foreign Minister Tzippi Livni in Paris declaring that there is no humanitarian crisis in Gaza. How could there be? Israel has opened its border crossings into Gaza allowing in humanitarian aid to Gazans. BBC TV confirmed the story we quoted from Reuters last Sunday, that the IDF is telephoning people living in close proximity to targets they are about to hit, with a 5 minute warning to get out. Some 9000 people have had these automatically sent calls.
Whoever heard of a major power calling ahead before it bombs its enemy? Imagine if the Germans had called Londoners in advance of the Blitz, or the British and US had called Germans in advance of the 1000 bomber raids over Germany, or the Egyptian and Syrians had called Israelis on the morning of October 6th 1973, or the US had called Iraqis. Would they all have earned themselves the soubriquet of ‘civilised belligerents’?
From all reports on Gaza pre- Operation “Cast Lead”, there has been an accumulating humanitarian crisis, the result of Israel’s ‘control’ on the border with Gaza, developing and worsening since Israel’s 2005 unilateral exodus from the Gaza strip. The sources making these reports are not Palestinian, but UN and EU.
Israel cannot have its cake and eat it – it cannot allow a few trucks in, set up warning phone calls and then pretend that its bombs only hit those it intended them to hit and that women and children haven’t been killed by the bombs.
The second image is of the US passport holder Palestinian woman exiting Gaza describing what she had left behind. She was on the verge of saying “nothing”. Instead she said there was no place to hide from Israeli bombs. The late Tommy Lapid – journalist, party leader, orthodox basher, Justice Minister and Chairman of Yad Vashem – infuriated Israelis by intimating that a scene he’d watched on Israel TV after Gazan IDF attacks in 2004 was reminiscent of the Holocaust. He said "This old woman reminds me of my grandmother!"
The woman was a Rafah refugee camp inhabitant whose home was demolished by the Israeli army, was immortalized by the camera while rummaging through the ruins of her home. Lapid’s grandmother was a Holocaust survivor, but his words had a positive impact, causing a rethink in senior IDF circles.
What will it take for this onslaught to end? We all know that neither Hamas nor Israel will stop their attacks. But Hamas has already suggested it is ready for an EU cease fire proposal. Tom Segev in Ha’aretz said that Israel knows that it cannot bomb Palestinians into sitting at the peace table. Its been trying almost since 1948. The real question isn’t whether Hamas is willing to talk with Israel, but what will happen after they do? What is next after this round of bloodshed? For surely it must stop.
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