1.4 million Palestinians live in Gaza, a closed space of 360 square kilometers, with hardly any industry, commerce or any other viable productive sectors. Occupied by Israel since 1967, Gaza was a continuous moral and financial drain on the Jewish state. In the early 1990s Yitzhak Rabin, the slain Israeli prime minister, wished Gaza would disappear into the Mediterranean Sea. In 2005, then Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon took the calculated decision to evacuate Gaza, taking with him all Jewish settlers. The Israeli Army closed the gates of Gaza shut, deployed the Israeli Navy to the Gaza Sea, and kept control of the only passage Gaza has to the outside world through the Rafah crossing in the south. More than 100,000 Gazan laborers subsequently lost their jobs and became redundant overnight.
The occupation by definition is mean and ugly, and is synonymous with persecution, oppression, and violence. It corrupts people. In Gaza, the situation was even worse. With the presence of Jewish settlers, and the need to expand and protect settlers’ interests, the population of Gaza faced the iron fist of the Israeli occupiers.
Before Oslo, the Fatah-dominated PLO was the main Palestinian organ responsible for Palestinian resistance to the occupation. In the mid 1980s Hamas, a religious movement, became active. Disillusioned by the outcome of the Oslo Accords, Hamas attracted many to its rank and file. With the support of the Muslim Brotherhood movement, Hamas grew stronger.
In 2006, Hamas won the Palestinian Legislative Elections, and began implementing its election manifesto calling for reform and change. The world community, spearheaded by the US and the EU, boycotted the Palestinian people. Israel on its part, tightened its closure on Gaza further, and held back Palestinian money it collects as tax and VAT on Palestinian products and imports. Around $50-60 million is collected by Israel each month, representing around 40 percent of the Palestinian annual budget. Subsequently, Palestinian government employees went unpaid, and the economic situation deteriorated very quickly.
Gazans who grew up with the occupation are a hardened lot, never having experienced normal life as others see it. They have had to struggle all their lives, and became accustomed to suffering. They also became rebels, hostile to any authority, and only accepted rules compatible with their upbringing in a hostile environment, forced upon them by the long years of occupation. Recent reports in the press suggesting the UN is close to dubbing Gaza a “dangerous zone” although not far from the truth, cannot absolve the United Nations of its responsibility. The UN and the West are responsible and cannot allow themselves to leave Gaza before adequate sustainable solutions for Gaza’s problems are found.
A weakened, boycotted, and blacklisted PA is part of the problem. What is needed in Gaza and the West Bank, including Arab East Jerusalem, is a comprehensive strategy capable of undoing much of what the occupation did in the last 40 years. Disarming gangs, clans, and all other foreign-sponsored militias in Gaza in parallel with serious efforts to institute one authority, one law and one gun is the first step. At the same time, a comprehensive economic recovery plan must be implemented. A third step would be the launching of an information and media campaign designed to educate and promise people a certain, peaceful, prosperous, occupation-free, future.
Squeezing and blackmailing the Palestinians more and more is not the solution. Starving them to a point of surrender will not work, and will make things worse. The EU and the US have no credible reason to go along with Israel’s persistent refusal to deal with the Palestinian unity government. The unity government is not a Hamas government. In fact, the new government’s platform explicitly states that it will honor all PLO agreements (including recognition of Israel and renouncing violence).
Recognizing the Palestinian national unity government, empowering it politically, financially and logistically will go a long way toward stabilizing the Palestinian internal situation, and might convince the Israeli general public to pressure their government to embark on genuine negotiations leading to a just and lasting solution with the Palestinian people.
The West can do more than that. In Gaza, a regime similar to that existing in southern Lebanon, where UN forces are stationed to implement a UN resolution, can be imitated. This can be a temporary stabilizing solution. Under such a regime, construction of the Gaza seaport can begin, the airport can be rebuilt, industrial zones re-established, agriculture produce can be exported, and Gaza fishermen can return to the sea. A whole range of opportunities can be opened.
Not one single economic activity mentioned above will occur if the West waits for Israel’s voluntary acquiescence. And hence, the international community should take the lead.
Israel should also be made to answer the question if she is willing to enter into meaningful peace negotiations with the PLO, end its procrastination, ease Palestinian hardship, and accept the Arab peace initiative.
— Walid M. Awad is associated with the Central Media Commission, Ramallah.
