The relatively muted response from the capitals of the Western world over the conflict in Gaza is a sad testament to a kind of collective failure of the will and imagination on all our parts, commented The Independent, London, in an editorial yesterday. Excerpts:

There are now more than 300 dead in the territory while thousands of others have been rendered homeless. But where are the signs of urgent diplomatic activity aimed at bringing an end to the killing?

What is so desperately ugly about this latest conflict in Gaza is that the two sides involved, object and subject, have a quite malevolent interest in keeping the whole operation going: In Israel’s case, a weak government clearly feels that it needs to act tough before the general elections in February in order to end the rocket attacks on southern Israel fired from Gaza.... Then there is Hamas. With its fundamentalist tunnel vision, this Islamist movement appears to have an interest in the virtual destruction of what is left of society in Gaza, perhaps believing that such a dreadful social upheaval can only tighten its theocratic control over a frightened and shattered population. There is, in other words, no strong incentive for either party in the deadly tango to disengage from the conflict right now, which makes it all the more important for outside factors to involve themselves and force matters to a halt on their own initiative.

Whether it is about going back to the Camp David talks of 2000, or looking harder at the more recent Arab peace initiative backed by Saudi Arabia, there is no shortage of potential solutions on the table. What there is, regrettably, is a dismal lack of willpower on the parts of world leaders to see at least one of those solutions applied.