Failures of the Peace

The Arab-Israeli conflict has made headlines for decades, but few understand the history of the struggle or the reasons why the attempts at peace have failed. Is it any wonder that the very next day, Israel’s Arab neighbors attacked, determined to destroy the new state. In 1987, a Palestinian intifada erupted and Israel responded to the violence with harsh reprisals. Many attempts at peace have also occurred, but the conflict continued because one or the other parties broke its promises. The peaceful settlement of the Arab – Israeli conflict has failed for several key reasons; the intellectual dishonesty during negotiations by all parties, the injustices committed against the civilian populations and the international and regional politics of the area all contribute to the continued cycle of violence in the Middle East.

The injustices committed against the innocent civilian populations of Israel and Palestine can never lead to a peaceful settlement of the conflict in the Holy Land. Those committed by the Palestinians are well known, and have been covered extensively by murder of the athletes of the Israeli 1972 Olympic Team in Munich. Eight Arab terrorists, who called themselves Black September, invaded the Olympic Village in Munich and eleven innocent young men and women were massacred. In 1999, the mastermind of the killings acknowledged that the PLO was behind the massacre in his autobiography,. In response to this, the Israeli Mossad news outlets all over the world. The one incident that stands out most in history is the initiated one of the most ambitious covert counter-terrorist campaigns in history, called the “Wrath of God”. Again the cycle of violence was fueled.

The Palestinians are not the only ones inflicting injustice and harm on innocent civilians. Israel is also doing this. The construction of Israel’s wandering wall in the occupied Palestinian West Bank is another injustice perpetrated on innocent civilians. In the name of national security, and to secure the safety of its people, Israel bulldozes through large tracks of Palestinian communities, destroying homes and businesses. Next, they erect a wall and declare the area on the Palestinian side of the wall a designated military area. The Palestinians are then forced to obtain “permanent resident permits” to remain in the homes that are left in the military area. These Palestinians are then considered to be aliens without rights under the law. The international court of justice found that Israel had not adhered to the international humanitarian law, and the wall should be dismantled and the Palestinians compensated. Inflicting injustice only creates blind rage in the populace, which then leads to increased violence and in many cases, an increase in radicalization.

Peace in the Middle East will never be attained as long as intellectual dishonesty remains a tool of the negotiators to achieve their goals. If opposing factions continue to accuse each other of committing injustices against civilian populations and justify their own injustices as acts that establish security and safety for their people, violence will only increase exponentially. Finally, if international and regional politics continue to advance their goals without any consideration of the needs of the people of the area, the cycle of violence will spin out of control. A peaceful settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict has failed for all these reasons and will continue to fail until all parties involved in the peace process sit down to discuss the issues honestly, keeping the primary goal of peace in sight.