Israeli-Palestinian Conflict Worsens
Channel: A Singaporean
Date: 2021-05-17

Israeli-Palestinian Conflict Worsens

The Situation

The violent exchanges between Hamas in Gaza and Israel continued unabated for the 7th straight day yesterday, with Israel conducting pre-dawn air strikes in Gaza yesterday that killed 33 Palestinians, 13 of them children. Hamas responded by launching rockets into Israel, with most rockets being intercepted and some failing and landing back in Gaza.

Israel also demolished the Al Jala building in Gaza City, which was housing the US Associated Press (AP) and Qatar's Al Jazeera. Israel claimed that it has evidence that the Al Jala building was a secret Hamas base, and that it had given advance warnings to the press to evacuate the building. Israel apparently revealed the evidence to the US, who endorsed it, but refused to show the evidence to anyone else. AP has denied Israel's assertion that Hamas was using the building.

In retaliation, Hamas fired 120 rockets at Israel, while Israel also responded by bombing the house of Hamas leader Sinwar.

The Death Toll

Overall, Israel has suffered relatively minor casualties in the recent conflict, with 10 Israelis dead including 2 children, while Gaza has suffered 181 Palestinian deaths including 52 children as of yesterday.

The reason for the disparity in deaths is Israel wielding absolute air superiority over Hamas, due to Hamas not having planes, meaning that it has no ability to defend Gaza against Israeli air raids. Israel has the Iron Dome, an advanced air defence system designed to intercept rockets and artillery shells, which defends Israel successfully against almost all attacks.

 The Cause

The restarting of violence between Hamas and Israel began after Israeli police clashed with Palestinian worshippers who had been performing evening prayers at the Al-Aqsa Mosque during the holy month of Ramadan. 

The worshippers were outraged by the ongoing Sheikh Jarrah property dispute, as they believed that the Israeli courts would side with the Israeli settlers. The property dispute is about Shiekh Jarrah in East Jerusalem, which was seized from Palestine and occupied following Israel's victory in the 6-day war. The original Palestinian inhabitants living there want to have the right to continue living in their homes, but the Israeli settlers want to evict them and take over their properties. At the time of the occupation, there were no Jews living in Sheikh Jarrah, making Israeli settler claims to the land extremely shaky. The legal documents produced by both sides were called into question many times for being possible forgeries and being made under coercion.

Historical Context

During the creation of the State of Israel in 1948, almost 850 thousand Palestinians were forcefully evicted from their homes. In West Jerusalem alone, only 750 of the 28 thousand Palestinians originally living there were allowed to remain, with the property of former inhabitants confiscated, ransacked and distributed to Jews. In response, a few hundred Jews were expelled from East Jerusalem and their properties seized by Palestinians as well.

It was assumed that as both sides had performed expropriation of property, with the expelled inhabitants of each side receiving the expropriated properties of the other side as compensation, that the matter was settled and that Israel would not make further demands.

However, after Israel took over East Jerusalem in the 1967 Arab-Israeli War, Israel demanded that the Palestinians living there return all former Jewish properties in East Jerusalem. This is in spite of the fact that the Palestinians are forbidden under Israeli law to claim any of their former Palestinian property in West Jerusalem. This is considered by the Palestinians living there to be unfair.

Furthermore, Israel claims all of Jerusalem as its capital, which includes occupied East Jerusalem. This has resulted in conflicts as Palestine wants East Jerusalem to be its capital.

Internal Conflicts

The violence also reached Israel itself. Israeli Arabs, who are considered to be Palestinians that have been fully assimilated into Israel, clashed with Israeli Jews in a rare display of violence in mixed cities such as Haifa, Jaffa and Lod.

Even communities that had been held up as prime examples of multicultural harmony erupted into race riots, with mosques, synagogues, cars and shops vandalised. Mobs of Israeli Arabs and Israeli Jews also lynched lone victims.

International Response

Thousands of people worldwide, from New York to London, and several other large European cities, rallied against the oppression of Palestinians by Israel.