2023-10-08 00:30:02
The new escalation of the conflict between Hamas and Israel is explained by several combined factors.
The first, of a structural nature, is linked to the absence of a sovereign political solution regarding the Palestinian population, which is subjugated and divided between the Gaza Strip – to the southwest – and the West Bank, to the east. The Strip is almost under siege and the West Bank is suffering a military occupation along with the permanent theft of its territories and water reserves by supremacist Jewish settlers.
The second factor is related to the geopolitical movements in the Arab world, which progressively set aside the cause of Palestinian sovereignty, restricting pressure on Israel to contribute to a political solution. This situation generates a growing isolation of the two political representations: both Hamas and the Palestinian National Authority have been warning of this situation, especially after the diplomatic conversations carried out between officials from Saudi Arabia and Israel. Hamas’s military initiative aims to limit this convergence and force Islamic and Arab governments to align univocally with the right to self-determination and the establishment of a full-fledged State.
Internal competencies
The third causal element is part of the competition between the Palestinian National Authority and Hamas. The latter seek, through military actions, to obtain leadership and become the only point of reference in both Gaza and the West Bank. According to the 1993 Oslo Accords, Gaza is under the Palestinian National Authority, which defines itself as secular and progressive. However, this territory, bordering the Mediterranean, has been de facto controlled by Hamas since July 2007. Its leader is Ismail Haniya, who expresses the convergence between politics and religion, inherited from the tradition of the Muslim Brotherhood. In addition to governing the Strip, Hamas aims, with these actions, to persuade the majority of Palestinians residing in the West Bank that its military project is the only viable one.
The fourth antecedent is directly associated with the political situation of the current Israeli government coalition, led by Bibi Netanyahu. This alliance groups Likud – the premier’s party – with two far-right supremacist parties and other minority parties of an orthodox religious nature. That alliance managed to align, at the end of 2022, 62 parliamentarians out of a total of 120, to install the most reactionary government in Israel’s short history. In his third term as Prime Minister, after having held the same position between 1996 and 1999, and between 2009 and 2021, Netanyahu sought to limit the powers of the Supreme Court of Justice through laws that were approved by his slim majority.
This offensive, aimed at enabling total control of the institutions, gave rise to a series of demonstrations, repeated every weekend, from January to the present. The questions against Netanyahu, expressed in the mobilizations, sought to prevent the imposition of legislation – promoted by the alliance of the right and the extreme right – to limit the autonomy of justice, restrict individual freedoms and strengthen the Apartheid model proposed by his coalition. against the non-Jewish population.
Consequences
This breakdown of internal consensus within Israel was read by Hamas activists as a window of opportunity to project current military initiatives on the military forces and the civilian population. However, the military actions carried out by Hamas will once again unify Israeli civil society behind the founding banner of national security.
Israel has a population of almost nine and a half million inhabitants, of which a quarter are Muslims. Palestine, for its part, has 5 million inhabitants, of which 2 million live in the Strip. The war situation suffered by these 15 million inhabitants benefits both Netanyahu and the Islamic fundamentalist sectors. Both political actors have something in common: they refuse any political solution that would allow the establishment of a sovereign Palestine, living in peace alongside a secular, multi-ethnic Israel, alien to supremacism and Apartheid policies that primarily hit the Arabs who live within it. from its borders and those who survive in the occupied territories.
In Israel, the most lucid analysts affirm that Bibi Netanyahu and Ismail Haniya are partners in continuing the war. They are needed so that the status quo of death continues its course of blood and graves.
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