Israel and Palestine

David Ben -Gurion, Israel’s first premier, had said in private conversation -

Why should the Arabs make peace? If I were an Arab leader, I would never make terms with Israel. That is natural; we have taken their country. Sure, God promised to us, but what does that matter to them? Our God is not theirs. We came from Israel, true, but 2000 years ago, and what is that to them? There has been anti-Semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They see only one thing : We have come here and stolen their country. Why should they accept that?

It was a week in which George Bush visited Jerusalem and reaffirmed America as ‘the oldest and best friend of Israel.’ He also stated that it is impossible to negotiate with ‘terrorists’.

I’ve been reading Sumantra Bose’s Contested Lands, a hugely educative book on the nature of conflict in the world’s most troubled regions. Among other things, it shows how the United States’ unflinching support for the illegal state of Israel has served to exacerbate the deep divisions in the Middle East. It is too late to turn back the clock, though the ideal solution would be the deportation of all the Jew settlers who have migrated to Israel with the advent of the Zionist movement in the 20th century. It is one of the world’s great injustices, and its redressal lies in the creation of a state for the Palestinian people on fair and reasonable terms.