Quote:
Originally Posted by PointlessWords
Let’s start with a timeline as to how we got here
What year should we start at?
Well, you got all the 7s:--
1917: the British Cabinet's ill-advised Balfour Declaration that 'HM Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national homeland for the Jewish people... it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine,' as if that was ever going to work. The only Jewish member of the Cabinet, Edwin Montagu, Secretary for India, deplored the whole thing and said it would lead to an increase in anti-semitism worldwide.
1947: UN Partition Plan for Palestine, accepted by the Jewish authority but rejected by the Arabs, which more or less outlined the present-day Israel, West Bank and Gaza Strip. Jewish settlement had been made completely unstoppable by events in Europe, with shiploads of Jewish refugees arriving.
1967: The Six-Day War, in which Israel seized and occupied the West Bank and Gaza.
2007: Hamas take control of Gaza, having won the Palestinian elections of 2006, following the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza (and the dismantling of 21 Jewish settlements) in 2005. Gaza initially had a national-unity government with Hamas and Fatah, but the two factions were and remain extremely hostile, and Hamas people apparently threw Fatah people off rooftops during the takeover. Hamas have never held any further elections.
Hamas claim that Gaza is kept in misery because of the Israeli blockade, made more acute by the fact that Israel controls Gaza's power and water and can turn them off at any time. Israelis claim that Hamas could perfectly well have developed Gaza's economy into a little Dubai, attracting no end of overseas investment, but the blockade and the fence have to stay because Hamas's only policy is to spend money on arms and infiltration exercises to attack Israel.
It's all as pitiful and needless as a bitter, mutually destructive divorce case -- or, if you know your Dickens, the case of Jarndyce v Jarndyce -- where each party treasures grievance above all things.
Last edited by 57 On Red; 10-08-2023 at 01:24 PM.