The Israeli Parliament has approved, barely, the US Road Map for Peace in the Middle East. The deal is supposed to keep the Israelis and Palestinians from each others’ throats long enough to let things settle out. Just like the Camp David Accord or any of the other hundred of Memoranda of Agreements, Accords, Treaties, Truces, Peace Initiatives and general meetings over the past 50-some years.
The background on all this goes back to before Year 1. I’m going to try to explain this as best as it can be explained because it is truly complicated. Stay with us now, it gets messy, but we’ll keep it short.
Jerusalem is the center of the Jewish and Christian religions, as this was the place where Jesus and the Lads did their thing. Egypt and Moses, Loaves, Fishes, all the Old Testament doings. And Mohammed was in there too, along with his brothers Stan and Ollie. In the Day, there was no Israel, just villages and towns with a whole bunch of religions living together and lots of sand, rocks and gravel.
Bring up the Grecian Empire, the Roman Empire and the Ottoman Empire. Throw in a Crusade or two, where Christians in England, France and Germany thought the Muslims were desecrating the “Holy Land” and could only be stopped by slaughtering as many people as possible. The Muslims thought the Crusaders were desecrating their Holy Land and figured that killing as many Crusaders as possible was turnabout and therefore, fair play.
Eventually we get to WWII. Jews were treated poorly before WWII in most countries of the known world, with ships full of Jewish refugees being turned away from many countries, including the US and Britain. Much Guilt ensues after the Allies find out what Auschwitz and Belsen were built for.
The League of Nations and Lester Pearson come up with the idea of a Jewish Homeland on a chunk of real estate that was known as Palestine at the time. England was the defacto territory holder, not actually running the place, as there were too many religions, holy places, fights, sand, rocks and gravel to really get into it. In 1947 The League of Nations does a key toss and says “Here ya go, a Jewish Homeland! Enjoy”
The League of Nations overlooked a little point when they handed over the pink slip. There were a few million Muslims, Bedouins, Christians and others already living on that map reference. Most of the people there operated on a simple principle: If I am on the land, farming, or herding, or whatever, it is MY land. This had been the custom for thousands of years.
The soon-to-be Israelis came ashore fighting, tossing out as many non-Jews as they could, then building houses, kibbutzim, cities, farms, villages and towns on the confiscated lands.
The now-Israelis brought technology to the area in a major way, irrigating the Negev desert into farm land along with a deep sense of entitlement. Israelis also seem to have a deeply held sense of paranoia having had to fight to come ashore then fight every last inch until they reached the artificial borders of Israel. Two thousand years of being without a homeland, followed by Global Genocide tends to do that to a people.
Those who were already on the land were also justifiably deeply pissed that some group of suit-wearing old guys from far away gave their land out from under them, without so much as a thanks for stopping by. This explains the Palestinian attitude.
In a highly simplified and massively condensed version, the essential Middle East Conflict can be reduced to: “We were here first! Yeah but we’re here now and WE were here first! Were not! Were too! It’s our homeland! No it’s not! Is too! UN says it’s OUR homeland! Is not! Is too!..”
This conflict can go on, as it does in the playground, forever. Until Mom or Dad step in and tell both the kids to shut up, they’ll keep beating each other over the head.
As the final judge here, both the Israelis and the Palestinians have a right to be there. The Palestinians don’t have the right to blow themselves up in shopping areas and the Israelis don’t have the right to run tanks over Palestinians houses just for shits and giggles.
The US Road Map for Peace is designed to get these two whiny, spoiled little brats to share. Unfortunately the Road Map doesn’t have the one extra feature that all parents have in this situation. Take the toys away and don’t let either kid play with them. Conversely, a good whack across the backside for both kids would probably do them a world of good too, but in a geopolitical sense, this just doesn’t work.
Will the Road Map work? I hope it will, but we’ve got too many centuries of bad behaviour and a bunch of monomaniacal personalities on both sides who can’t forget, won’t forgive and refuse to change the subject.
RoadDave 