| When Will It End? | |
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Starting in September 2000, it was called the intifada (uprising) as mobs of Palestinian youth would march to Israeli army checkpoints and throw stones at soldiers only to receive tear gas and bullets in response.
Later, when these riots were replaced by sporadic terrorist attacks, it was referred to as ha'matzav (the situation). Situation is a shapeless word that revealed something about our inability to define or our hesitation to accept what was happening.
Today Palestinians are targeting and killing both Israeli soldiers and civilians. Israelis retaliate by assassinating terrorists, bombing and taking over Palestinian political buildings, and enforcing closures. Palestinians are smuggling weapons and training fighters while Israelis strategize at security council meetings. Foreign bodies are calling for cease-fires and a return to the negotiating table.
Today, many in the Middle East call it a war.
Wars are ended physically or diplomatically.
The United States and other western countries do not want a full scale war in the Middle East, and there is strong international pressure on Israel to show restraint in the face of the terror attacks. Thus, at least in the near future, it is unlikely that Israel will be able to resolve the conflict through military means.
Given the failure of the current Peace Process and the growing polarization among Palestinians and Israelis as a result of the violence, diplomatic solutions will not be easy to reach in the near future.
As a result of the difficulty of ending the conflict, many Israelis have modified their goal of peace to a goal of security and co-existence. Talk of peace accords is being replaced with talk of borders and walls.
Unfortunately, there are also no easy solutions to creating security. Walls along the border would be costly and take time to build. They would also only be partially effective as mortar shells, for instance could be fired over them. There are also places along the border where it is impossible to build walls to ensure security, such as in Jerusalem.
Peace will come to the Middle East when the Arabs realize that political goals can not be achieved through violence. It is hard to predict whether it will take months, years or generations for the Arabs to realize that Jews and Israel are here to stay and that the violence is futile in achieving political goals.
In
the meantime, until the violence is renounced, negotiations renewed, and peace
accords signed, the funerals will continue. Babies like Yehuda Shoham and Shalhevet
Pass, children like Koby Mandell and Michal Raziel, teenagers like Yelena and
Yulia Nelimov and Ronen Landau, families like Schijveschuurder and Kahane, expectant
parents like Vadim Norzhich, Tehiya Bloomberg, and Judith Greenbaum, and loving
mothers like Chana may lose their lives.
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Lisa Katz
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