Netanyahu miscalculates, again

There is no question that Israel is faced with a serious Palestinian uprising.

It is hard to predict when the current wave of violence unnecessarily provoked by extremist Israeli settlers with their government’s encouragement and protection will end. But with Israeli leaders pouring oil on the raging fire, rather than ordering an immediate halt to the actions that instigated the crisis in the first place, things are only set to get worse.

The spark may have been the daily Jewish incursions into the Muslim holy places, particularly Al Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem. But the determined, and indeed spontaneous, manner of response of young Palestinians all over the West Bank reflects the piling up of frustration and despair resulting from five decades of brutal occupation with no end in sight.

The responsibility for creating the current crisis lies completely on Israel for not preventing settler crimes and unlawful provocations.

The so-called international community is also responsible for allowing the situation to deteriorate by maintaining deadly silence on what Israel continues to do without lifting a finger against such atrocities.

And indeed, the US and EU can take the blame for their endless political, diplomatic, financial and military support for Israel’s occupation and other crimes.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu must have believed that with the Arab states in disarray, the Palestinian Authority of Mahmoud Abbas weak and cooperating, and the customary impunity afforded by the “international community”, he could surge ahead with longstanding plans to radically change the status quo at Al Haram Al Sharif compound in Jerusalem.

He would have known that there would be ritual condemnations, but that is just noise to Israel, which never deterred or stopped it.

But he seems to have miscalculated. In addition to all Israel’s other crimes, the assault on Jerusalem was too much for the Palestinians and seems to be the straw that broke the camel’s back.

For the Palestinians under occupation, the incursions and threats to holy places are part of the endless trail of attacks by settlers and other Jewish extremists on Palestinian lives, property, dignity and rights.

The Jewish settlers who stormed and set fire to the house of the Dawabsheh family in the village of Duma, near Nablus, last July, with the intention of burning alive its inhabitants, was not the first crime of this kind.

As a result of the savagery, an infant son of the Dawabsheh family died instantly, while the parents who suffered severe wounds died, agonisingly, later on.

Another child, Mohammad Abu Khdair, was abducted and burned alive last year by Jewish extremists.

None of the criminals who committed those two heinous crimes against innocent Palestinians have yet been brought to justice, although they were identified and arrested by the Israeli authorities.

In fact, it is hard to point out any case in Israel’s occupation history where settlers’ aggression against Palestinians was ever seriously brought to account. Impunity is the law of the land for settlers.

Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, five decades old now, is crippling people’s freedom and controlling their lives. Israel confiscates Palestinians’ property to colonise their land, evicting them from their homes, restricting their movement, imprisoning them without due process, raiding their dwellings to chase suspects, regularly causing innocent loss of life.

It is daily humiliation, degradation and violence at Israel’s hands.

Those young Palestinians who react to such humiliation by taking a knife out in the street to openly stab an Israeli soldier or civilian know for sure that they will be instantly killed as a result. And yet, the level of despair among those Palestinians seems to be on the rise.

It is the Israeli occupation that has made their lives without hope or meaning. Rather than scoring a victory, Netanyahu’s miscalculation is putting Israel once again before a major crisis.

Even if the stabbing incidents are very few, and even if the Palestinian protesters are no match for the power of the Israeli army, panic is spreading all over Israel.

The heat of the fire that Israel and its settlers lit is being felt more by the Israelis than by the Palestinians.

The Palestinians do not have much to lose. The Israelis do. Netanyahu has painted himself in a corner.

He may want to crack down on Palestinians even more bloodily and brutally, but even he must know that while that might appease his public, it will only produce more violence.

He has to find a way out for, intensified usage of excessive force would only further enflame the situation.

The victory Netanyahu sought is turning quickly into a strategic failure, both at home and beyond. But that is what the Israeli prime minister tried last summer when he ordered the massacre in Gaza. 

Apparently he believed that time, as he did this time, that a military operation by the well-equipped Israeli army and air force in besieged Gaza under the rule of a “terrorist” organisation would hand him an easy victory.

That was also a terrible miscalculation; the Palestinian fighters managed to fight well and cause the invaders major losses.

While 90 per cent of Israeli losses were military, Israel’s “most moral army” mostly murdered Palestinian civilians in their homes.

The 51-day war against Gaza landed Israel in a quagmire. It was a miserable adventure that ended without achieving any of its declared objectives.

The Israeli army was faced with bleak choices: to press ahead with a land invasion of Gaza, with limited chances of improved outcomes, or end the campaign prematurely, which would be hard to present as anything other than defeat.

The Palestinian resistance in Gaza did not win the war against Israel. It only deprived the powerful Israeli army of victory against a besieged population with far fewer means to defend themselves against their attackers.

Israel was humiliated. But that is what endless occupation leads to.

As long as Israel continues to deny that it is an occupying power and that it will never live in peace and security while the occupation lasts, it will be moving from a bad situation to a worse one.