If Hamas Terrorism Didn’t Exist, Would Netanyahu Invent Them to Ensure Continued Illegal Israeli Control Over Palestinian Territory?
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
By Steve Jonas, MD MPH
For quite some time I have written on the policies of the right-wing Israeli governments towards the original inhabitants of the lands that currently constitute the State of Israel plus the “Occupied Territories” (occupied by Israel of course in contravention of a variety of UN resolutions), otherwise known as the Palestinians. In doing this one is invariably driven to the same conclusion: that since the time of the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and the subsequent slow, grinding death of the so-called “Oslo Peace Process,” with the almost uninterrupted run of right-wing Israeli governments (under the general label of “Likud”), any settlement other than that resulting from the expulsion of all Arabs living in the so-called “Land of Israel,” other than those Arabs who are citizens of the State of Israel (and maybe them too), is not in the cards. This policy is of course not openly stated, but every action, and inaction, taken by Likud-led governments in relation to the Palestinian people living within their orbit would seem to reinforce this conclusion.
In terms of the recent fighting engaging the Gaza Strip and what may, or may not, be an extensive underground set of military installations there, such conflicts, for one given reason or another, arise on a regular basis. And for as long as Bibi Netanyahu has been in power (and his Likudnik predecessors as well), the timing of these outbreaks of these conflicts does not seem to be coincidental. In fact, during his tenure in office, they invariably coincide with some particular trouble that “Bibi” is in. And so, you might ask, how does that apply to this outbreak of violence?
The answers are well-known. For one thing, Bibi has lost the best facilitator-in-Washington he has ever had, represented in the Middle East by his jack-of-all-trades-master-of-none, Jared the Kush. Second of all, in the fourth election in two years, Bibi failed to gain a majority, which in itself is bad enough politically. But also, once he would be out-of-office he would finally be subject to trial for the crimes for which he has been indicted. But then on top of that, the coalition government excluding Netanyahu which was on the verge of taking power was to include at least one of the Arab-Israeli parties, for the first time ever. The implications of that could only be imagined. And Netanyahu couldn’t imagine such a thing happening. So, three reasons to escalate the conflict with the Palestinians in Gaza. Or is it just a coincidence? Time may or may not tell.
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Source: BuzzFlash