Gaza: What next?

The Gaza ceasefire agreed this week has brought relief to the long-suffering Palestinian Arabs in the beleaguered Palestinian enclave and hope at last to the relatives of the prisoners held on both sides whose fate hinged on the success of the talks in the capital of the Arab state of Qatar. It remains to be seen if the Israelis honour the agreement they signed up to in Doha. But it’s difficult to see how they go back on their word over the truce that was pushed through on the insistence of an emissary of President-elect Donald Trump who returns to the White House on 20th January.
The deal – a total Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip in return for a prisoner exchange – is essentially the one Hamas agreed to last May to end the fighting. Endorsed at the United Nations the Biden administration and the Netanyahu government both supported it – indeed they said the plan had orginated in Israel in the first place. But it was just a ruse to stall for time and divert world public opinion while the Israelis assassinated Hamas leaders and pushed on with their plan to re-occupy the Strip and drive out most, if not all, of the Palestinians Arabs to make room for Zionist settlers.
UN resolutions provide the basis for a just and lasting peace in the Middle East. First of all Israel must totally withdraw from all the occupied territories seized in 1967, including Arab East Jerusalem and Syria’s Golan Heights. The Palestinians must be allowed to establish a state of their own on the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The Palestinian refugees whose homes are now in Israel must be allowed to return or, if they so wish, be paid appropriate compensation in exchange. And all states in the region, including Israel, should have internationally agreed and recognised frontiers guaranteed by all the Great Powers.
Joe Biden fully approved of Israeli aggression. When he met Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during his visit to Israel last year he said "I don't believe you have to be a Jew to be a Zionist, and I am a Zionist". But American support for Israel began long before Biden. When the Zionist state was proclaimed in 1948. When the first Arab-Israeli war began and around a million Palestinians were driven out of their homes to make way for Zionist settlement.
Israel is nothing without the United States. It is a pawn of the United States.The Zionist leaders strut the world posing as independent politicians. But US imperialism provides the military and economic support that keeps Israel going. The country is an American protectorate and their leaders will ultimately do whatever America wants. 
Trump, in turn, loudly proclaims his own support for the Zionist entity. He also wants to keep the oil princes sweet. The section of the US ruling class that he leads wants to maintain the American presence in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf to build a new military bloc to threaten Iran and pave the way for US imperialism’s total control of the global energy market. Trump and his cohorts may well believe that an end to the fighting is enough to keep the feudal Arabs on side. But the Palestinians, and indeed, virtually the entire world outside the United States want to see a final end to the crisis.
 As for Netanyahu – he wants to end his days covered in glory as the man who built “Greater Israel” and brought the Palestinians to their knees. But he’s failed on all counts. Whatever happens next this is their victory – not his.

Bi Bi Netanyahu?

 It seems that Benjamin Netanyahu’s days at the helm of the State of Israel have finally come to an end following a general election that saw the Likud leader’s party pipped at the post by General Benny Gantz’s new Blue and White bloc. While the Blue and Whites are only one seat ahead this should give Gantz first crack at forming a coalition with the minor parties that will control almost half the seats in the Knesset, the Israeli parliament.

            Though the views of General Gantz barely differs from those of Netanyahu, his Blue and White alliance defines itself as a “liberal” centre party and the retired general at least pays lip-service to resuming negotiations with the Palestinian leadership.

            The leaders of the communist-led ‘Joint List’, which draws much of its support from the Arab Palestinian minority in Israel, were pleased at their own showing in the polls with a projected win of 13 seats in the new parliament.

“We’re back to being the third largest party in the Knesset,” said Joint List head, Ayman Odeh, who expressed the hope that “the era of Netanyahu is over and he will now either have to go home or to prison.” Odeh agreed with observers that, if the final results indeed match the exit polls, Arab voters will have “prevented Netanyahu from forming a government”.

Let’s hope so…