Gaza

The Israeli bombardment of Gaza over the past three days calls out for commentary. But as I read about what is going on, I find myself unable to focus in a serious way about this latest round of violence. I started to read this lengthy commentary by Daniel Levy, who is one of the first people to turn to for sensible and peace-oriented ideas for the Middle East, and I couldn’t even get through it. My first reaction to the violence was, frankly, anger at the incredibly disproportionate use of violence on the part of the Israeli government. But that reaction quickly morphed into a disturbing indifference brought on by a deep cynicism about the near-term possibility for progress on this issue.

What a final settlement between Israelis and Palestinians will ultimately look like is well known. Regardless of how much blood is shed in the interim, a final settlement will look similar to what was negotiated at Taba, and what has been proposed in the Arab Peace Initiative. Everyone interested in peace knows this. The problem is that many of the primary stakeholders in the conflict—including the United States—don’t actually seem interested in peace.

Perhaps I shouldn’t be so negative. There have been some encouraging signs of late. The debate in America on this issue seems to be opening up a little bit, to the point where labeling someone who makes statements critical of the Israeli government as anti-Semitic doesn’t get much traction any more. The departing Prime Minister of Israel, Ehud Olmert, made some remarkably courageous statements (“The Time Has Come to Say These Things”) in an interview with the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth. And there is, of course, hope that the Obama administration will at least be more proactive than the Bush administration in trying to reach a settlement. Levy offers sound advice for Obama in his piece, “Pursuing Peace Amid Pessimism.”

But the deck is stacked against any real progress, with the bombing of Gaza putting up a whole host of additional obstacles. Ehud Olmert may be interested in peace, but he is a lame-duck. The politicians vying to succeed him—Tzipi Livni, Ehud Barak, Benjamin Netanyahu—are much more interested in showing how tough they are on national security issues by fully supporting the bombing of Gaza. The electoral pressures for such aggression will not change anytime soon. Similar progress-preventing political pressures exist for Obama. He did make some encouraging statements in support of the Arab Peace Initiative, but I remain skeptical that he would risk mucking up his first 100 days by trying any bold moves in the politically treacherous and emotionally fraught arena of Israel/Palestine. As for Hamas, the violence will only strengthen them politically in the Palestinian territories and move them farther away from any accommodative gestures towards peace. The media coverage and debate in America is so embarrassingly one-sided that it won’t produce any pressure on Obama to, in turn, pressure Israel to halt settlement activity.

I feel as though we’ve been here before and we know what happens next: more bloodshed of innocent Israelis and Palestinians, more anti-Americanism and anti-Semitism, higher oil prices, more recruiting opportunities for fundamentalist groups, less American influence in the world.

This violence will accomplish nothing positive. And I’m resigned to riding out this next wave of negative consequences. Wake me up when the stakeholders seem serious about peace.