150 Palestinian prisoners are being released as part of Israel and Hamas’s recent hostage deal. But thousands more remain behind bars.
150 Palestinian prisoners are being released as part of Israel and Hamas’s recent hostage deal. But thousands more remain behind bars.
I do acknowledge that there are a number of slightly-different definitions of genocide, so here’s the Merriam-Webster definition, which is how I use it: “the deliberate and systematic destruction of a racial, political, or cultural group.” Further, it’s not about the current slaughter in Gaza, it’s about the manifest end-game of decades of Israeli policy and actions. That is, destruction of Palestine is the only possible outcome that would meet Israel’s terms.
What are their terms? At the risk of oversimplifying it:
No one-state solution; Palestinians cannot live in the territory of Israel. It has steadfastly refused the right-of-return for refugees, and passed a law in 2018 that created a Jewish ethno-state instead of a true democracy. This makes sense in realpolitik terms, since that would leaves Jews an ethnic minority in Israel. Obviously, a non-starter. So, no one-state solution.
No two-state solution. That’s obvious from when the government of Israel rejected the Arab Peace Initiative, on offer of peace within the 1967 borders. The rejection may have been ideological, as right-wing Israeli politicians talk about their vision of “Greater Israel” from the river to the sea, and sometimes including the Sinai peninsula. Or it could have been practical, again a non-starter in realpolitick terms, because it would’ve required evicting all the settlers who have stolen land from Palestine. Now, the land that potentially could be Palestine is so chopped up, and disjointed, it’s not really viable. So, no two-state solution.
If the people of Palestine can’t live there as citizens of Israel, and can’t live there as citizens of Palestine, then there’s a third option:
Furthermore, settlers keep encroaching, keep taking more land, and in fact have used the conflict in Gaza to step up the campaign of terrorism and land theft against Palestinians in the West Bank. Not only is the Israeli government not stopping them, some of its members are floating trial balloons about nuking Gaza, and writing memos to each other (which have leaked) about forcing the people of Gaza into Egypt and seizing the land. These are examples of the sole remaining option:
(And, indeed, the military detentions described in the article occur in the West Bank, which is not at war with Israel, so going along to get along isn’t working.)