Solution to Middle East? Essay

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Israel vs. Palestine Conflict

The author of this report has been asked to write an essay about the conflict between the Israeli people and the Palestinians as it has existed over time. Much of the conflict has actually extended over millennia when it comes to the stretch of land that is involved. However, this report will focus on the last century or so. The first question to be answered is simply a summary of the conflict that has existed between the two groups over the last century. The second question talks about sovereignty and nationalism in the context of the conflict that is being discussed. The conflict is then to be analyzed in terms of power and statecraft. Finally, there will be the prisoner's dilemma discussion from a realist and from a neo-liberal understanding.

Questions Answered

Basically, the gist of the Palestinian gripe is that they have gone from controlling all of Israel starting in 1947. They then lost much of their land in the "Partition Plan" that happened in 1947. From 1949 thru 1967, they controlled a sliver in the central part of Israel and then the West Bank. Nowadays, they control a fraction of that land with the West bank and a few spots in central Israel. For the longest time, there was apparently peace in that sliver of land. Indeed, the 19th century showed people living in peace with there being about 86% Muslims, ten percent Christians and four percent Jewish people. In the late 1800's, a group of people in Europe decided to colonize the land. These people were known as Zionists and they represented an extreme minority of the Jewish population. Their goal was to create a Jewish homeland and they considered a litany of locatins in Africa, the Americas and so forth before settling on the area that is commonly known as Palestine (If Americans Knew, 2015).

At first, there were no issues with this migration. However, as more and more people moved to Palestine, it became clear that many people wanted to take over the area for a Jewish state. As this became more and more present, there was more and more fighting as well as general escalating waves of violence. Hitler's rise to power as well as the combination of Zionists activities to stop refugees being placed in Western countries led to immigration more and more to Palestine. This caused the conflict to grow. Finally, there was the United Nations Partition Plan in 1947. This came when the United Nations decided to intervene. Rather than simply adhering to the principle of "self-determination of the peoples" in which people themselves create their own system of government, the United Nations chose to revert to the "medieval strategy" whereby an outside power makes the lines of the nation or nations involved (If Americans Knew, 2015).

Under considerable pressure from the Zionists, the United Nations recommended giving away about fifty-five percent of what was prior-known as Palestine to the Jewish state. This was despite the fact that the group only represented thirty percent of the population and only owned about seven percent of the land. What came next was the 1947-1949 wear. It is widely reported that the resulting war eventually included the totality of the five Arab armies. However, it less well-known that the Zionist forces outnumbered all of the Arab and Palestinian combatants combined. This was often to the point of being to a factor of two or three. Almost all of the battles were fought on lands that were to have been part of the Palestinian state. Finally, it is fairly significant to many that the Arab armies enter the conflict only after the Zionist armies had committed sixteen massacres. This included the massacre of about one hundred men, women and children at Deir Yassin. Future Israeli prime Minister Menachem Begin, who was head of one of the Jewish terrorist groups, described the event as "splendid" and stated "as in Deir Yassin, so everywhere, we will attack and smite the enemy. God, God, Thou has chosen us for conquest." In total, the Zionist forces committed nearly three dozen massacres altogether according to many reports (If Americans Knew, 2015).

By the end of the war, Israel had conquered more than three fourths (78%) of Palestine. Three quarters of a million Palestinians were made into refugees. Roughly five hundred towns were destroyed and eliminated. A new map had been drawn up in which every city, river and hillock received a new name that was in Hebrew rather than in Arabic.

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It was an edict that all vestiges of Palestinian culture were to be erased. For many years, Israel apparently denied the existence of this population with one-time Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir saying "There were no such thing as Palestinians" (If Americans Knew, 2015).

Things were ratcheted up even more in 1967. Israel took even more land from the Palestinians. There was what was known as the "Six Day War" in which Israeli forces launched a high successfully surprise attack on Egypt. Israel came to occupy the final one fifth or so (22%) of Palestine that had eluded it in the 1948 conflagration. That land was the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. According to international law, it had become illegal to acquire land by an act of war, it was deemed that these were occupied territories and that Israel had no rights to the areas. It also acquired areas of Egypt (which were since returned) and even some areas in Syria, the latter of which is still somewhat occupied (If Americans Knew, 2015).

Also during the Six Day War, Israel attacked a United States Navy ship. This ship was known as the U.S.S. Liberty. It killed or injured two hundred American servicemen. President Lyndon B. Johnson recalled rescue flights saying that he did not want to embarrass an ally, ostensibly referring to Israel. While this was never really acted on nor was it every really acknowledged, but the attacked on the U.S.S. Liberty was viewed as an act of war. This came out in the media in some forms but has largely gone unreported (If Americans Knew, 2015).

There are two primary issues that remain in dispute and/or that are problematic. First, there is the "inevitably destabilizing effect of trying to maintain an ethnically preferential state, particularly when it is largely of foreign origin (If Americans Knew, 2015). The original population of what is now Israel was nearly entirely (96%) Muslim and Christian. Yet, the refugees are prohibited from returning to their homes in the self-described state that is Jewish. Those that remain within Israel are subject to systematic discrimination. Second of all, Israel continues to engage in military operations and the confiscate privately owned lawn in the West Bank, they exert control over Gaza and they are extremely oppressive. At the same time, Palestinians have minimal control over their regular and daily lives. Thousands of Palestinian men, women and children have been or continue to be held in prisons. Few of the people involved have legitimate trails. Quite often, the men and women involved are strip searched, are beat, are put into labor camps of one sort or another and so forth. Food and medicine are commonly blocked from entering Gaza and this produces a humanitarian conflict that is every growing and problematic. It is asserted that Israeli forces invade almost daily. They allegedly injure, kidnap and sometimes kill inhabitants (If Americans Knew, 2015).

As for the definitions of sovereignty and nationalism, they are related but they do not mean the same thing. Sovereignty is the general idea that borders exist and that there cannot be invasions, takeover of land and so forth. The United States has borders and it is generally understood that if someone takes armed criminal or war-related actions within our borders, there will be a police and/or international response (probably the latter) against the parties that support or engage in that behavior. At the same time, nationalism is pride in one's country and the Palestinians do not really have a country right now because Israel has taken them over. If the account above is to be believed, the Israelis took over Palestine with the support and consent of the United Nations, at least to some degree, and then they filled in the other areas with their people, armies and so forth. They took the sovereignty and nationalism of the Palestinian people and erased it through United Nations edict as well as armed criminal and war-related actions after the fact over the next twenty years or so (Yack, 2001).

As far as statecraft and power, Israel has an unusal amount of power while the Palestinian people are losing their power more and more by the day. Such was the subject of an article written in 2012 by Yonatan Touval. There are a few relevant clips from that treatise that can be offered. For example, it is stated that "at a time when things may seem to be falling.....

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