The Middle East is in turmoil once again. Over the past few days, Israeli jets have pummeled Hamas inside the Gaza strip. At the moment, more than 350 people have died in the conflict in one of the hottest flash points in the world..
While Israel regards its military action as necessary to stop Hamas from continuing to fire homemade rockets into western Israel, the Arab world has denounced the operation as either disproportionate or wholly unjustified.
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Unfortunately for the people of Gaza, this round of bloodshed appears to only be in the first stages of a new protracted struggle between various factions of Palestinians (and some non-Palestinians) and the state of Israel. Because social upheaval and war have been a permanent component in the lives of Gazans for more than five centuries, nothing is new under the sun.
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From 1517-1914, Gaza was controlled by the Ottoman Empire. Although subservient to Constantinople, it retained a degree of political autonomy. When World War I broke out in August 1914, the Ottoman Empire, which had already been in decline for decades, started to permanently disintegrate under the weight of armed conflict on its territory. Siding with Germany and the other Central Powers proved fatal, and the triumphant British managed to take control of Gaza after three battles on 7 November 1917.
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Gaza, a religiously eclectic area with Muslims, Jews, Christians and others, plunged into chaos in the summer of 1929. The Western Wall or 'Wailing Wall', built in 19BC by King Herod, is sacred to the Jews as it marks the site where the First and Second Temple existed . At the same time, Muslims regard the Western Wall as the holy place where Muhammad rode upon al-Buraq, a divine man-horse from heaven, between Mecca and Medina (and vice versa) in conquering the Arabian peninsula for God. When access to the Western Wall became political, as it did in 1929, violence ensued, and 249 people died in the wake of Palestinian riots. Jews in Gaza went into exile.
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Two decades later, Gazans were swept up in the Arab-Israeli War of 1948. The British, who had retreated as a consequence of WWII, left a power-vacuum in the territory. Three years of tension and war resulted in rival declarations of control of Gaza. Although the Palestinians would declare the formation of a government on 22 September 1948, the same date as 'Day One' of the French Revolutionary calendar in 1792, it was under the tutelage of Egypt - which would essentially control Gaza until 1967. In that year, Israel vanquished Egypt in the 'Six Day War' and became the next master of Gaza. It would last until a Palestinian uprising (of intifada) forced Israel to agree to withdraw under a complicated diplomatic arrangement in 1994.
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Israel has occupied Gaza several times over the past 14 years in efforts to end and preclude further attacks across its border by militants. Despite withdrawing its forces once again in 2005, Israel still retains control over Gazan airspace and its port. Its sanctions on the Hamas-led government have devastated the economy. Unable to export goods or import essential supplies, medicine is scarce and Gazans wallow in misery with 50% unemployment (the highest in the world), gangs in the streets and a constant threats of invasion by Egypt, Israel or both.
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The people of Gaza have been in the crossfire for centuries, and it is time for their suffering to end. Untangling hundreds of years of resentment between rival religions, rival ethnic groups, rival claims for property and rival nation-states around Gaza will neither occur by simply convening a conference nor adopting a cease fire. It will require a sea-change of political perception driven from the bottom-up rather than the top-down. If the world can bring peace to Gaza, then there is hope that the world can bring peace to itself.
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J Roquen