ATLANTA, Georgia, Sep 03 (IPS) – Most people think that Israel’s main goal in Gaza is to return the hostages taken by HAMAS on October 7, 2023 in a campaign declared to eliminate HAMAS as a threat. If you thought that, you would be wrong. Abundant evidence reveals a different strategic objective—to destroy all aspects of Palestine’s legitimacy as a nation.
Despite repeated calls from the Biden-Harris-Blinken White House to stop the bombing of Gaza, Israel refuses to end the massacre. What’s going on? As always in the Middle East, the apparent plot has a hidden subplot. Israel’s most important strategic goal during more than ten months of its senseless, horrifically destructive campaign in Gaza was not only to kill HAMAS terrorists and tens of thousands of Palestinian citizens in Gaza, but instead to kill the trumpets of “Two States”. The solution.” The ongoing killings in the West Bank are aimed at destroying, not just the Palestinian infrastructure or the hopeless youth resistance of the “Lions Den”, but the very idea that the Palestinian people have the right to self-government, or any legitimacy at all as a state. As much of the world condemns the massacre in Gaza, the war full of West Bank towns and residents has escaped scrutiny. The most obvious proof of that is the fact that Netanyahu’s extremist Likud government continues its bombing campaign in Gaza, and continues to refuse HAMAS’ promises to release hostages even for a temporary ceasefire , Israel’s military leaders have admitted that HAMAS will not be completely eradicated. Sadly, the horrendous loss of life in Gaza is not yet a distraction from the occupation of the West Bank, what Israelis call their “Judea and Samaria.” he emphasized these settlers’ claim that Israel cannot be accused of being illegal military occupiers of “our land.” One of the first shibboleths to come out of President Biden’s mouth following the abhorrent HAMAS war crimes on October 7 and shortly before he arrived on Air Force One to humbly bow the war criminal that Netanyahu was accused of, was to give meaningless words, “Two-State Solution.” But surely the man who was Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee must have known that the “Two-State Solution” was on its last legs and it was unlikely to be renewed. Now Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris is echoing “Genocide Joe,” not so much by offering a formula for peace as simply responding to an empty phrase. The first lesson in international relations on a large scale is that a state must be legitimate as a group of people before it can achieve any kind of concrete reality as a nation. The birth of the United States is an example. The Boston Tea Party, Patrick Henry’s speech, and Paul Revere’s ride consolidated America’s popular identity.
Washington at Valley Forge and Yorktown essentially gave birth to a nation. Achieving legitimacy, the unquestionable right to exist as an organized political entity, is how a people or a terrorist organization becomes a state. By smashing peaceful West Bank towns with tanks and aerial bombs, razing their streets and branding all Palestinians as terrorists, the traditional community is stripped of its heritage and its present and future legitimacy. Any chance of statehood is destroyed by Israel’s “top-down” destruction of human life and infrastructure in Gaza and the entire West Bank. Meanwhile, the political class’ pretense of supporting peace is a sick practice. Let’s stop saying “Genocide is bad” and “Killing people is bad,” without saying “Genocide is bad,” because it kills the future of all people.
James E. JenningsPhD is the President of Conscience International www.conscienceinternational.org and the Executive Director of US Academics for Peace. He delivered aid to Gaza hospitals from 1987-2014, including during the 2009 “Cast Lead” bombings and periods of Israeli, PLO, and HAMAS control.
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