Nathan Geffen and Doron Isaacs (Why boycott settlement products? Jewish Report October 22-29), hold Israel exclusively responsible for the lack of Palestinian political national independence (see here). In their determination to continue to portray the Arabs as pathetic victims, they fail to acknowledge, that not only Israel , but the Arab Palestinians too, had, and still have choices in determining their independence or lack thereof.
Failure to establish Palestinian independence, is, if one is honest, attributable primarily to the Arab obsession with destroying any Jewish presence in the Middle East in preference to establishing a Palestinian State . This ‘ideology,' cannot be ignored as being a major factor contributing to what Geffen and Isaacs refer to as ‘...the mess we have today.' Absolving the Arabs of any responsibility for the ‘mess' and blaming only Israel and the ‘occupation', is reflective of a naïve, simplistic insight into the dynamics of the conflict.
Geffen and Isaacs, argue that the background to the conflict was the ‘short war' of 1967 after which Israel ‘occupied' the West Bank and Gaza.
The ‘background' to the conflict, of course, goes way back to 1948 and the decades before.
Efriam Karsh, in his recently published book, Palestine Betrayed, details the manner in which Arab leaders, concerned more with expanding their own territorial and political influence than with Arab Palestinian national aspirations, crushed any hopes of establishing an independent Arab state in 1947.
They rejected independence then, choosing war instead; a self defeating strategy which has been repeated in the decades following, with tragic consistency.
War, with the intention of destroying Israel , was again initiated by the Arabs in 1967. Their leaders failed to act in the interests of their people when they rejected the ‘land for peace' framework outlined in UN resolution 242 following Arab defeat. In so doing, they snuffed out any possibility of negotiating independence.
Following the signing of the Oslo Accords (1993) Arafat, speaking in Arabic made it clear that he had no intention of honouring the Accords, but viewed them as part of a ‘step plan' whereby he would accept whatever concessions Israel would make with the final aim being the creation of an Arab State from ‘the river to the sea.'
In 2000 (Camp David) and 2001 (Taba), the pattern was again repeated with Arafat's adoption of terrorism in response to Israel 's peace proposals which would effectively have lead to the end of the ‘occupation' and the establishment of a Palestinian state.
Rival Arab leaders today mimic their predecessors. Hamas, in control of Gaza following Israel 's unilateral evacuation, remains committed to the annihilation of Israel and the overthrow of the Palestinian Authority (PA). The PA even while negotiating with Israel , continues to incite violence through PA controlled media, and to deny Israel 's right to exist.
Geffen and Isaacs in their endeavours to assist, support and campaign for the Palestinians, rather than calling for the boycott of Israeli goods, should possibly direct their energies at holding Palestinian leaders and their Iranian backers responsible for the ‘mess we have today.'
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