On Gaza

By Richard Falk
United Nations Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in the Palestinian
Territories and Professor Emeritus of International Law, Princeton
University

For eighteen months the entire 1.5 million people of Gaza experienced a
punishing blockade imposed by Israel, and a variety of traumatizing
challenges to the normalcy of daily life. A flicker of hope emerged some
six months ago when an Egyptian arranged truce produced an effective
ceasefire that cut Israeli casualties to zero despite the cross-border
periodic firing of homemade rockets that fell harmlessly on nearby Israeli
territory, and undoubtedly caused anxiety in the border town of Sderot.
During the ceasefire the Hamas leadership in Gaza repeatedly offered to
extend the truce, even proposing a ten-year period and claimed a
receptivity to a political solution based on acceptance of Israel's 1967
borders. Israel ignored these diplomatic initiatives, and failed to carry
out its side of the ceasefire agreement that involved some easing of the
blockade that had been restricting the entry to Gaza of food, medicine,
and fuel to a trickle.

Israel also refused exit permits to students with foreign fellowship
awards and to Gazan journalists and respected NGO representatives. At the
same time, it made it increasingly difficult for journalists to enter, and
I was myself expelled from Israel a couple of weeks ago when I tried to
enter to carry out my UN job of monitoring respect for human rights in
occupied Palestine, that is, in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, as well
as Gaza. Clearly, prior to the current crisis, Israel used its authority
to prevent credible observers from giving accurate and truthful accounts
of the dire humanitarian situation that had been already documented as
producing severe declines in the physical condition and mental health of
the Gazan population, especially noting malnutrition among children and
the absence of treatment facilities for those suffering from a variety of
diseases. The Israeli attacks were directed against a society already in
grave condition after a blockade maintained during the prior 18 months.

As always in relation to the underlying conflict, some facts bearing on
this latest crisis are murky and contested, although the American public
in particular gets 99% of its information filtered through an exceedingly
pro-Israeli media lens. Hamas is blamed for the breakdown of the truce by
its supposed unwillingness to renew it, and by the alleged increased
incidence of rocket attacks. But the reality is more clouded. There was no
substantial rocket fire from Gaza during the ceasefire until Israel
launched an attack last November 4th directed at what it claimed were
Palestinian militants in Gaza, killing several Palestinians. It was at
this point that rocket fire from Gaza intensified. Also, it was Hamas that
on numerous public occasions called for extending the truce, with its
calls never acknowledged, much less acted upon, by Israeli officialdom.
Beyond this, attributing all the rockets to Hamas is not convincing
either. A variety of independent militia groups operate in Gaza, some such
as the Fatah-backed al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade are anti-Hamas, and may even
be sending rockets to provoke or justify Israeli retaliation. It is well
confirmed that when US-supported Fatah controlled Gaza's governing
structure it was unable to stop rocket attacks despite a concerted effort
to do so.

What this background suggests strongly is that Israel launched its
devastating attacks, starting on December 27, not simply to stop the
rockets or in retaliation, but also for a series of unacknowledged
reasons. It was evident for several weeks prior to the Israeli attacks
that the Israeli military and political leaders were preparing the public
for large-scale military operations against the Hamas. The timing of the
attacks seemed prompted by a series of considerations: most of all, the
interest of political contenders, the Defense Minister Ehud Barak and the
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, in demonstrating their toughness prior to
national elections scheduled for February, but now possibly postponed
until military operations cease. Such Israeli shows of force have been a
feature of past Israeli election campaigns, and on this occasion
especially, the current government was being successfully challenged by
Israel's notoriously militarist politician, Benjamin Netanyahu, for its
supposed failures to uphold security. Reinforcing these electoral
motivations was the little concealed pressure from the Israeli military
commanders to seize the opportunity in Gaza to erase the memories of their
failure to destroy Hezbollah in the devastating Lebanon War of 2006 that
both tarnished Israel's reputation as a military power and led to
widespread international condemnation of Israel for the heavy bombardment
of undefended Lebanese villages, disproportionate force, and extensive use
of cluster bombs against heavily populated areas.

Respected and conservative Israeli commentators go further. For instance,
the prominent historian, Benny Morris writing in the New York Times a few
days ago, relates the campaign in Gaza to a deeper set of forebodings in
Israel that he compares to the dark mood of the public that preceded the
1967 War when Israelis felt deeply threatened by Arab mobilizations on
their borders. Morris insists that despite Israeli prosperity of recent
years, and relative security, several factors have led Israel to act
boldly in Gaza: the perceived continuing refusal of the Arab world to
accept the existence of Israel as an established reality; the inflammatory
threats voiced by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad together with Iran's supposed push
to acquire nuclear weapons, the fading memory of the Holocaust combined
with growing sympathy in the West with the Palestinian plight, and the
radicalization of political movements on Israel's borders in the form of
Hezbollah and Hamas. In effect, Morris argues that Israel is trying via
the crushing of Hamas in Gaza to send a wider message to the region that
it will stop at nothing to uphold its claims of sovereignty and security.

There are two conclusions that emerge: the people of Gaza are being
severely victimized for reasons remote from the rockets and border
security concerns, but seemingly to improve election prospects of current
leaders now facing defeat, and to warn others in the region that Israel
will use overwhelming force whenever its interests are at stake.

That such a human catastrophe can happen with minimal outside interference
also shows the weakness of international law and the United Nations, as
well as the geopolitical priorities of the important players. The passive
support of the United States government for whatever Israel does is again
the critical factor, as it was in 2006 when it launched its aggressive war
against Lebanon. What is less evident is that the main Arab neighbors,
Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia, with their extreme hostility toward Hamas
that is viewed as backed by Iran, their main regional rival, were also
willing to stand aside while Gaza was being so brutally attacked, with
some Arab diplomats even blaming the attacks on Palestinian disunity or on
the refusal of Hamas to accept the leadership of Mamoud Abbas, President
of the Palestinian Authority.

The people of Gaza are victims of geopolitics at its inhumane worst:
producing what Israel itself calls a 'total war' against an essentially
defenseless society that lacks any defensive military capability
whatsoever and is completely vulnerable to Israeli attacks mounted by F-16
bombers and Apache helicopters. What this also means is that the flagrant
violation of international humanitarian law, as set forth in the Geneva
Conventions, is quietly set aside while the carnage continues and the
bodies pile up. It additionally means that the UN is once more revealed to
be impotent when its main members deprive it of the political will to
protect a people subject to unlawful uses of force on a large scale.
Finally, this means that the public can shriek and march all over the
world, but that the killing will go on as if nothing is happening. The
picture being painted day by day in Gaza is one that begs for renewed
commitment to international law and the authority of the UN Charter,
starting here in the United States, especially with a new leadership that
promised its citizens change, including a less militarist approach to
diplomatic leadership.