The two quotes I have heard more than any other today are:
Israel Declares Gaza “Enemy Entity” and Hamas officials say that Israel’s decision to close off Gaza is “a declaration of war”.
Israel states that the decision to cut back on electricity and fuel supplies may stop the daily rocket attacks coming from inside Gaza. These attacks have occurred regularly, attacking Jewish settlements, though they are not officially known to be coming from Hamas itself.
The Palestinian National Authority nominally governs Gaza, although in reality is governed by Hamas’ Gaza Strip Government. The airspace, borders and offshore maritime access are still controlled by Israel. Although Israeli troops have since withdrawn, people argue that it is still under occupation because of the restriction of movement.
Hamas spokesperson Fawzi Barhoum is outraged by Israeli’s decision stating “This is a dangerous escalation of the attempt to legitimize destroying Palestinian land, criminal behavior and bringing a humanitarian disaster on the Palestinian people.”
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice neither approved nor objected to Israel’s decision, but emphasizes the importance of not restricting basic humanitarian aid to Palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip.
The decision is probably fortifying the notion among Palestinians and their Arab backers that Israel will overlook the cost to civilians and keep the U.S. from blocking them. Unfortunately, I do not think that cutting Gaza off of supplies will keep the rocket attacks from hitting Jewish cities. This cutting of supplies will hurt civilians more than the attackers themselves. It will make Palestinians more resentful and feel more justified of carrying out violent actions if Israel does not allow supplies through.
The U.S. will not try to negotiate with Hamas because it is considered a terrorist organization. He took over the Gaza Strip in June earlier this year. This will make peace talks more difficult to establish the Gaza Strip and the West Bank as separate Palestinian states.
10 comments:
I'm pretty sure that Hamas isn't a guy, rather a militaristic Islamic resistance organization.
I think it's hypocritical for Palestinians to complain about not being completely sovereign and yet they rely on Israel 100% for fuel, electricity, water, food, medicine, etc. Palestinian leaders should get their act together and organize a real government not lead by Islamic guerrilla fighters. Maybe then Israel will make some concessions and Western and European countries will take them seriously.
I like the picture of the kids from that documentary. That was a good documentary. People sometimes forget about all the kids that get messed up from the never-ending war, with post-traumatic stress disorder and other conditions.
It's not exactly fair for Israel to give up Gaza, and then to be constantly bombed by Hamas's rockets from Gaza. Hamas said it is an attempt to destroy Palestinian land, when they're the ones sending rockets into Israel. It's just as unresolvable an issue as Iraq is.
"The U.S. will not try to negotiate with Hamas because he is considered a terrorist."
This kind of mentality came up during the CNN Youtube Debates between democratic presidential candidates during the summer. A civilian asked the candidates what he or she would do to stop the iraq war and improve relations with the Middle East. Obama declared that he would sit down with the leaders of countries/organizations the US had tensions with and talk it out. Hilary heavily criticized him after the debates because believes in this American mentality where the government doesn't talk to the people it believes are in the wrong. What do you think?
There was an interesting thing on the Daily Show a couple weeks ago about Obama's "lack of expierence" in foreign relations. Jon Stewart, sarcastically, said Obama's lack of expierence would surely mean his failure in foreign relations. He backed this point up with the fact that the current administration has a lot of expierence, and makes the right decisions. And then Stewart remarks how the US gave money to Saudi Arabia, and so Israel wouldn't get worried, we gave them money. But we needed to give S.Arabia money because we either "rescued" Kuwait, or pissed off Iran, or something. The point was that the "expierenced" leaders continually had to give help in the Middle East because somebody felt threatened by another country that we helped. A neverending cycle.
I'm going to have to agree with Eddie, Hamas is definitely not a guy. On a more serious note, I doubt we are ever going to see peace between Israelis and Palestinians in our lifetime. There is perhaps no solution to the biggest problem in the Middle East: everyone wants everything without conceding anything. As time goes on, the tension between the Palestinians and Israelis is only going to increase. The more built-up animosity, the harder it will be for negotiations to take place.
I agree with Ben. I think that it is going to be a long time before any effective peace negotiations are made if they are made at all. Until then, I think that each side has to take one step at a time and realize that any advancement or step toward peace is a step in the right direction. So, Hamas should realize that by giving up the Gaza Strip, the Israelis gave up something that Hamas wanted. Hamas should not be bombing Israel, it should be thanking Israel.
Sorry, I was under the impression that Hamas was a tangible person in charge of a large organization, not the organization itself. Much apologies.
I agree with Ben that there will likely be no resolution between the Israelis and Palestinians. They hate each other too much becuase of their previous history and their religious differences
I don't think it's as much as a matter of idealogical differences. The majority of people who live there are not extreme radicals. Just a few generations ago both Arabs and Jewish people were babysitting eachother's kids. I believe, despite all of this hurt, that it'll be like that again in the future.
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