Broad international consensus regarding the political and legal controversies of the Israeli and Palestinian Gaza conflict has been minimal at best. At its worst it has fueled the controversies created by the United Nations Fact Finding Mission, through which, both sides maintain their positions and justification for their actions. In ordered to obtain an opinion on this issue one must examine the factual historical background of the Gaza Conflict. By identifying the major legal and political discrepancies, observing the perspectives of those who defend Israeli actions, and those who have a strong critique against those actions we can grasp the complexity of this issue and make an assessment of actions on both sides.
In 2005 Israel withdrew forces from the Gaza Strip but did so with conditions toward Palestinian authorities. It must put an end to terror tactics in and around Israeli territory. This seemed a promising step toward Palestinian and Israeli peace until 2006 when the political group Hamas took power and declared that it would not recognize the existence of Israel. It rejected the Oslo Accords and Arab Peace Initiative and separated itself from negotiating with Israel. Since coming to power Hamas had openly advocated for attacks against Israel. In 2007 Hamas’s influence spread to the Gaza Strip, that same year Israel implemented a blockade that crippled Gaza’s economic activity which raised ethical and moral political questions in the international community. In early 2008, after many mortars and rockets were fired across the border into Israel, the air force and defense forces retaliate taking the lives of many Palestinian civilians and militants. Israeli defense officials viewed these attacks as Hamas breaking the P...
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...onflict have been addressed legally, although they have not been respected by either side which hinders the legitimacy of international authority. A major problem that I have observed is the inability of the United Nations Security Council to ascribe certainty to all laws broken and provide punishment to both sides. This lack of legal authority will continue to plague the progress both politically and within the legal institutions being used to approach the situation. Resolution and absolution of the definitions and particulates of these major issues are necessary to achieve lasting peace in the region and eventual coexistence.
Works Cited
Alan Dershowitz “The Case Against the Goldstone Report”
“The UN Gaza Report: A Substantive Critique” Ambassador Dore Gold
Noura Erakat “It’s Not Wrong, It’s Illegal”
“United Nations Fact Finding Mission” Richard Goldstone
In the novel War and Peace In the Middle East, author Avi Shlaim argues that Arab nations have been unable to escape the post-Ottoman syndrome. In particular he describes how the various powers inside and outside the region have failed to produce peace. While some of Shlaim's arguments hinder the message, I agree with his overall thesis that the Middle East problems were caused and prolonged by the failure of both powers and superpowers to take into account the regional interests of the local states.
Bob Hawke once said; “Unless and until something concrete is done about addressing the Israeli-Palestinian issue you won't get a real start on the war against terrorism.” Perhaps Hawke put into a few simple words one of the most complicated issues within our world today, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. As Israel continues to strip the Palestinians of their land and fears it’s very existence because of the Palestinians terrorist acts, there seems to be no solution in sight. The world appears to be split and all over the place when it comes to this matter. According to The Middle East Institute for Understanding approximately 129 countries recognize Palestine as a state while many others do not. Over all the political matters within this issue not only affect Palestine and Israel but the world as a whole, as the Middle East and the West seem to disagree. This has had and will continue to have an enormous impact on many political affairs all over the world particularly in the current fight against terrorism. Personally I feel that the Israeli Palestinian conflict while being a very complicated matter has a simple solution. Within this issue I am a firm believer that the occupation of the West Bank by Israeli forces is extremely unjust and must come to an end. Once this is achieved a two state solution will be the most effective way to bring peace to the area. The occupation of the West Bank violates political and legal rights, human rights, and illegally forces Palestinians who have lived in the area for hundreds of years from their land. This conflict is at the height of its importance and a solution is of dire need as nuclear issues arise in the Middle East due to the tension between Israel and it’s surrounding neighbors, and the...
This marked the beginning of the Palestine armed conflict, one of its kinds to be witnessed in centuries since the fall of the Ottoman Empire and World War 1. Characterized by a chronology of endless confrontations, this conflict has since affected not only the Middle East relations, but also the gl...
The United Nations General Assembly 36-103 focused on topics of hostile relations between states and justification for international interventions. Specifically mentioned at the UNGA was the right of a state to perform an intervention on the basis of “solving outstanding international issues” and contributing to the removal of global “conflicts and interference". (Resolution 36/103, e). My paper will examine the merits of these rights, what the GA was arguing for and against, and explore relevant global events that can suggest the importance of this discussion and what it has achieved or materialized.
In 1991 in the Persian Gulf Israel was continuously bombed by Iraq. If Israel would have fought back chances are there would have had most of the Arabian countries join in with Iraq to eliminate the common enemy. Therefore the problems are yet not resolved yet it seems there is never a perfect solution to any problem. Bibliography 1. Holocaust : the Jewish tragedy Gilbert,Martin, COLLI 1986 2.
Since the inception of an Israeli nation-state in 1948, violence and conflict has played a major role in Israel’s brief history. In the Sixty-One year’s Israel has been a recognized nation-state, they have fought in 6 interstate wars, 2 civil wars, and over 144 dyadic militarized interstate disputes (MIDs) with some display of military force against other states (Maoz 5). Israel has been involved in constant conflict throughout the past half century. Israel’s tension against other states within the Middle East has spurred vast economic, social, and political unity that has fostered a sense of nationalism and unity in Israel not seen in most other states. Over the next several pages I will try and dissect the reasons for why the nation state of Israel has been emerged in constant conflict and how this conflict has helped foster national unity and identity among the people of Israel.
“There is no such thing as a Palestinian.” Stated former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir after three fourths of one million Palestinians had been made refugees, over five hundred towns and cities had been obliterated, and a new regional map was drawn. Every vestige of the Palestinian culture was to be erased. Resolution 181, adopted in 1947 by the United Nations declared the end of British rule over Palestine (the region between the eastern edge of the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River) and it divided the area into two parts; a state for the Jewish and one for the Arab people, Palestine. While Israel was given statehood, Palestine was not. Since 1947, one of the most controversial issues in the Middle East, and of course the world, is the question of a Palestinian state. Because of what seems a simple question, there have been regional wars among Israel, Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq, terrorist attacks that happen, sometimes daily, displacement of families from their homes, and growing numbers of people living in poverty. Granting Palestinian statehood would significantly reduce, or alleviate, tensions in the Middle East by defining, once and for all, the area that should be Palestine and eliminating the bloodshed and battles that has been going on for many years over this land.
The Israeli-Palestine conflict is an event that has been well documented throughout the course of Middle-Eastern history. The conflict dates back as far as the nineteenth century where Palestine and Zionist, will later be known as Israel, are two communities each with different ideologies had the same overwhelming desire to acquire land. However, what makes this clash what it is, is the fact that both of these up and coming communities are after the same piece of land. The lengths that both sides went to in order obtain they believed was theirs has shaped the current relationship between the two nations today.
Bourke, Dale Hanson. The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: Tough Questions, Direct Answers. Downers Grove, IL: Inter Varsity, 2013. N. pag. Print.
The ongoing and explosive Israeli-Palestinian conflict has its roots in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century when two major nationalist movements among the Jews and Arabs were born. Both of these groups’ movements were geared toward attaining sovereignty for their people in the Middle East, where they each had historical and religious ties to the land that lies between the eastern shores of the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River. Toward the end of the 19th century, Southern Syria (Palestine) was divided into two regions, inhabited primarily by Arab Muslims, and ruled by the Turkish Ottoman Empire (BBC News). At this time, most of the Jews worldwide lived predominantly in eastern and central Europe. When the Zionist political movement was established in 1887 and began to fund land purchases in the Ottoman Empire controlled region of Palestine, tensions between the two groups arose. Since then, Israel and Palestine have been vying for control of this land that they both covet, and this conflict remains as one of the world’s major sources of instability today, involving many different players. One of these players who continues to halt the peace process, is a militant fundamentalist Islamic organization called Hamas. Hamas has intensified extreme opposition and bloodshed in the region, with the aim of destroying the state of Israel. However, few people know that starting in the mid 1970s, Israel secretly supported an organization that would later emerge as Hamas, even though both groups had competing future visions for the nation. Why did it choose to do this when it had so much at stake? This paper will address the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict leading up to the beginning of Israeli support of Hama...
Since 1967, numerous illegal Israeli settlements have been built on Palestinian land and the occupied territory, “housing more then 400,000 Jewish settlers.” Even since 1967, there has been a lot of divergence, unrest, bereavement, war and obliteration on both sides. There was a war in 1973 and two intifadas Palestinian uprising one that began in 1987 and one that began in 2000 that brings us into the 21st century. There have been many attempts in resolving conflicts however; the conflict is a matter of whether the Palestinians should be permitted to form their own independent country and government in an area that was once theirs yet now occupied and currently the nation of Israel. The Arab- Israeli conflict is historically a fuse that ignites regional battle due to the occupation of Palestine.
Is peace possible in the Middle East? This question weighs heavy on the minds of many individuals and international players. Turmoil and conflict in the Middle East not only affects the people inhabiting this region, but also has global consequences. To answer this question, one must analyze the sources of conflict in the Middle East, historically, currently, and in the future. The limited amount of natural resources in this region has arguably served as the most major source of conflict in the Middle East. Other contributing factors to conflict are the leadership styles of the key players in positions of power, and religious strife. History is often the best indicator for the future. Unfortunately, the Middle East has had a history of much violence and conflict. Just in the past 50 years, it has been engaged in numerous serious conflicts such as the Israel-Palestinian issues, Iraq-Iran war, and Iraq invasion of Kuwait. It may be possible for peace in the Middle East, but given it’s history, and considering the sources behind the conflict, I think it is a bleak future as far as peace goes for this region.
The System-level of analysis shows that the Iraq Crisis (2003–present) is not a domestic conflict as it involved international actors like UN, IAEA and countries like USA. In 1991, after the second Gulf War, UN enforced the destruction of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) on Iraq. The UN condemnation of Iraq was crucial to preserve its authenticity. The UNMOVIC and IAEA had been responsible to check Iraq's acquiescence with its responsibility to eradicate WMDs (UN Chronicle, 1991). Iraq’s non-cooperation with inspection agencies by obstructing the inspection from 1997 to 2002 resulted in massive international pressure and strengthening USA’s doubts on Iraq. The apprehe...
For many centuries, Judaic and Arabian societies have engaged in one of the most complicated and lengthy conflicts known to mankind, the makings of a highly difficult peace process. Unfortunately for all the world’s peacemakers the Arab-Israeli conflict, particularly the war between Israel and the Palestinian Territories, is rooted in far more then ethnic tensions. Instead of drawing attention towards high-ranking officials of the Israeli government and Hamas, focus needs to be diverted towards the more suspect and subtle international relations theory of realism which, has imposed more problems than solutions.
Terrorism in the Middle East has brought the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to the attention of the world. These terrorist groups use murder, bombs, threats, and other violent acts to get their way politically. Hamas, the organization that has replaced Fatah as the representative of the Palestinians, is a leading sponsor of terrorism. The Hamas are the leading reason there is not peace in the middle east as they strongly embrace terrorism.