As of this writing about one hundred people have died almost all of them Palestinians, at the hands of Israeli forces and militant Jewish settlers. Israel and its main supporter the Unites States have refused demands for an impartial international inquiry into the recent events. The US has also abstained on a watered down UN resolution, which criticizes Israel for using excessive force against the Palestinians. Even though at the recently concluded summit in Egypt the parties agreed, after considerable prodding from the US, to cease hostilities, a low lever of hostilities continues. Instead of an international commission as asked by the Palestinians now a tripartite commission comprising of the US, Israel and the Palestinian Authority will look into the causes of this latest upheaval.
Real peace demands an understanding of each other s history, traditions and sufferings.
This is sorely missing between the two peoples who consider the land of Palestine as theirs and theirs alone. Unless there is a genuine effort to understand and address the grievances of the parties, in this case mostly the grievances of the Palestinians, there can be no peace. A process of demonizing the Palestinians that started in the sixties with the Palestinian demand for a homeland continues unabated. While a Palestinian with bloody hands makes the cover of the Time magazine, tens of Palestinian youth shot dead at close range go unnoticed. Ask any West Bank right wing Jewish settler what he thinks of the Palestinians and he is liable to paint the picture of untrustworthy and uncivilized barbaric people.