Israeli-Palestinian+Conflict

rss url="http://newsrss.bbc.co.uk/rss/newsonline_world_edition/middle_east/rss.xml" link="true" description="true" number="10" date="true"Obama and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict Obama Administration and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict By Adam D’Anna Following the Obama Inauguration, the whole world expected some big improvements in the US policy towards the Israeli Palestinian Conflict. Israeli’s expected an affirmed commitment to the Jewish State while Arabs expected new found US tolerance towards Palestinians and all Arabs in general. Obama had taken over literally days after the Israeli Campaign into Gaza to stop rocket attacks by Hamas. Hamas is considered a terrorist group by the UN, United States and Israel. However, Gaza is not the only government of the Palestinians. Its rival, Fatah, is backed by Western Governments and has good relations with Israel. Fatah controls the West Bank while Hamas controls the Gaza Strip. Neither of those regions are actual states though. Also, Israel claims East Jerusalem (part of West Bank) is still theirs. Creating peace between these two factions is a huge challenge to the Obama Administration. The precursor to Obama taking office could not have been more disastrous for any peace process. In late December, a six month cease fire between Hamas and Israel expired. Hamas immediately launched mortar rockets into Israel aimed at causing death and destruction. These rockets did, sometimes, cause deaths. However, they merely created a large disturbance for most people living in Southern Israel. Despite this, Israel or any country understandably is not expected to put up with that. Israel launched a massive three week campaign into Gaza to wipe out Hamas, stop the rocket attacks, and destroy tunnels that were used to smuggle in weapons from Egypt. Over 1000 Palestinians were killed while only 14 Israeli Soldiers died. The international response to this was quite immense. A vast amount of nations condemned Israel on its disproportional attack including their possible use of phosphorous-B rockets, which are banned, its bombing of a Gazan school, and the amount of innocent civilians which were killed. However, Israel claimed that nearly all the Palestinians killed were a part of Hamas and that Hamas used civilians as human shields. Later, a UN report would find both sides equally responsible. Am obvious fact that stood out though in the campaign was the timing of it. It took place literally days before George W. Bush was set to leave the Presidency. Bush fully supported Israel and their war on terrorism. However, Israel knew that Obama would be less tolerant of that kind of war. They withdrew almost right before he took office. Immediately after taking office, Obama named George Mitchell the special US Envoy to the Middle East. He had helped secure peace in Northern Ireland and is known as an expert negotiator. Obama also went out of his way to reach out to Arabs. He did this partly because his predecessor was particularly disliked by Arabs all across the world. Obama did this by holding a huge speech in Cairo aimed at what he called mutual respect on both sides. He went on to say that the US and its ties to Israel were unbreakable, but that US relations with Arab nations needed to improve. Obama then remade US ties to nations surrounding Israel such as Syria after relations with that country faltered during the Bush Administration. The Obama Administration then announced that they formally approved of a Two-State Solution for the Palestinians. This would involve the West Bank and the Gaza Strip each becoming formal nations. This would involve each nation accepting Israel’s right to exist and for Israel to lift the Gaza Blockade and stop its settlements construction in the West Bank. Israel has repeated its right to expansion in the West Bank and claims it still controls East Jurusalem. They have created settlement communities for Jews and have evicted many Palestinians in the West Bank. The Obama Administration has chose to condemn this and call for Israel to stop hindering the peace process. However, the Obama Administration has recently reversed their position on this, and Arabs now feel that the administration is coming away from mutual respect. Another issue is the blockade that Israel has imposed on the Gaza Strip. Israel began this blockade in 2006 after Hams took Gaza by force. Israel did not want terrorism reaching into the country. However, the citizens of Gaza needed to cross into Israel for basic supplies those with jobs across the border lost them. Israel has said that it would support a 2 state solution if the two states would agree to be unarmed. The Palestinians have said that they would not accept that at all. Therefore, the negotiations have stalled as usual in this conflict which has lasted hundreds of years.

Annotated Multimedia Link: media type="custom" key="5226785" media type="youtube" key="rq4Oo4HmrMA" height="344" Livni willing to face arrest over UK warrant

Tzipi Livini, the leader of Israel’s opposition party was interviewed by CNN’s Christiane Amanpour. Livini is no longer part of the Israeli government, but defended its actions in the Gaza Strip a year ago. She said that they were necessary for the safety and wellbeing of Israel’s southern residents and that they had an obligation to fight terrorism. She is willing to defend Israel in any court if she is arrested as there was an arrest warrant for her in Britain for human rights abuses in Gaza. This warrant, to Israel, is absurd. Livini went on to say that more negotiations are needed with Fatah, the legitimate Palestinian government, but that the blockade of Gaza is still needed to protect Israel from the terrorist government. Livini appeared unfazed and gave reasonable answers to Amanpour’s tough questions.