Arab-Israeli Conflict

Arab Israeli Conflict Players Israel’s responsibility Israel, as a country, can be held responsible for the absence of peace in the Middle East insofar as its role in combination with other key players of the conflict is considered. Israel’s fault 1. Israel is the main culprit of the politics of dispossession a. Israel has consistently denied Palestinians the right to return. i. This is best exemplified by how Israel, in its Declaration of Independence of 1948, declared that it is a “Jewish and Democratic state”, an active effort on their part to exclude and alienate both Jews and Arabs from their state. b. Most importantly however, would be Israel’s seemingly hypocritical stance. Israel affirms the right of Jews to come to Israel, but not the right of Palestinian return despite the UNSCR 194 in 1948. i. The rationale was that of Israel being unwilling to lose the Jewish character of the state, given that the permanent return of 3.5 million Palestinians in a state of 6 million Jews would lead to a demographic shift that the Jewish government did not want to contend with. c. As a result, any peace settlements aimed at settling the Middle East situation and bringing peace to the region has been impeded by this fundamental denial of Palestinian rights. d. Even the most arguably successful peace settlement, the Oslo Accords of 1993, was only successful by avoiding addressing this issue. A United Nations General Assembly Resolution passed in 1969 states that the “problem of Palestinian Arab refugees arises from the denial of their inalienable rights under the charter of the United Nations and the United Declaration of Human Rights”. e. The Israeli denial of the Palestinian right of return has displaced an entire population, and has resulted in the rise of Palestinian and Arab opposition – all a result and manifestation of the crux of the issue. 2. Israel has also consistently refused to compromise, most notably on a 2-state solution. a. Israel has wanted to increase the size of her country to the point that a 2-state solution is virtually impossible, so much so that they refused to hand over the Occupied Territories (OTs) even with UNSCR 242. b. However, it should be noted that the resolution fails to include the word all, implying that Israel could possibly have the option of not returning the OTs at all. c. Arab states have, however, continually interpreted the resolution as the return of all territories, resulting in a stalemate. d. Israel’s main parties and their inability to stand up to them has also contributed to their refusal to compromise due to Israel being a hung parliament. e. Gush Emunim, a right-wing activist movement that was highly influential in the National Religious Party, even issued a Jewish Law for settlers to resist evacuation and IDF withdrawal orders, contributing to the ultimate failure of the Oslo Accords. f. Prominent Israeli politicians who have seemingly enabled a compromise to be reached with the Palestinia