Jack Dugan
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The Israeli/Palestinian conflict, waged ruthlessly by extremists on either side, has been a source of constant Western scrutiny and Middle Eastern malaise since the Six Day War in 1967, in which Israel launched a pre-emptive attack on Egypt and ultimately seized the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
Though finding a realistic, even-handed, and fair solution that benefits and protects the interests of both the Israelis and the Palestinians is akin to performing international-relations magic, it’s far easier to see the blaring flaws in those solutions proposed by government officials.
Take, for example, the plan proposed by Israeli Labor Party leader Isaac Herzog on Sunday. In an Op Ed published by the New York Times, he proposed the necessity of total segregation between the Israeli and Palestinian populations.
In response to what he describes as a Palestinian-led “terror wave,” he goes to write, “All of this has served as an excuse for [Israeli] Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to make no substantial progress in working toward a two-state solution. Meanwhile, President Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian Authority leader, is Mr. Netanyahu’s mirror image, also doing nothing.”
Though, it must be said, he is right in stating that action must be taken by those in power to end an otherwise perpetual pendulum of slaughter. The most recent swing was seen with the seemingly endless attacks on Israeli settlements by Hamas, the most infamous being the daily rockets attacks lobbed into the nation after Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005.
The Israeli state has been criticized by human-rights organizations with its heavy-handed military responses to these fringe militants, the apex of which was last seen with Operation Protective Edge, in which the Israeli military was responsible for the deaths of more than 2,100 Palestinian civilians, a staggering number when juxtaposed with the 68 Israeli soldier and civilian casualties seen in the most recent conflict, according to the BBC.
Given the Israeli’s lopsided use of military force against the Palestinian population, it’s refreshing to hear an Israeli official proposing, in parts, a rational plan. Herzog goes to write, in his four-step plan, that “beyond the major settlement blocs, Israel should stop settlement activities and remove outposts that are illegal under Israeli law. We should also transfer civilian powers and responsibilities to the Palestinian Authority. This will empower it, improve its ability to counter terrorist activities in the West Bank, and facilitate institution building.”
Given the arguably settler-state identity Israel holds, this is perhaps the most crucial step toward a stable and peaceful region. But, the idea of total segregation seems to be a rocky foundation n which to build anything.
The power of human empathy is just as significant in creating positive change as the power of human fear is significant in creating violence. Segregation, though perhaps capable of hindering the immediate violence of the region, would also potentially put that much more distance between the possibility of this empathy.
The notion of segregation, particularly the notion of combating it, brought about fundamental and phenomenal change in the American social landscape during the Civil Rights Movement. It also taught us perhaps one of the most important lessons of American history: Separate is undoubtedly not equal.
