When a tree falls in the West Bank, we all hear it.
The world is full of ethnic conflict. In Papua New Guinea, the Bougainville islanders fight for their independence. Over in Indonesia, the government suppresses an uprising in West Papua. The Muslims of Mindinao struggle to be free of the Philippines. Chechens fight Russians, Albanians fight Serbs, Christians fight Muslims in Sudan, everyone fights everyone else in the Democratic Republic of Congo. I could go on and on. It is an unfortunate reality that, in an ever shrinking world, neighbour is increasingly turning against neighbour.
Yet there is one conflict which stands head and shoulders above all others. The struggle between Arab and Jew in the land between the Jordan and the Mediterranean draws a hugely disproportionate amount of world attention. Whether measured in the inches of newspaper coverage, the hours of debate at the United Nations or the decibels of angry voices all over the world, this conflict is in a class of its own.
Even the words “Israel” and “Palestine” are highly charged, full of history and emotion. Simply to use one rather than the other is to make a powerful political statement. Alone among ethnic conflicts, the struggle in Palestine has the power to elicit strong emotions from large numbers of people with no ethnic connection to the combatants.
Why is this? Certainly it’s not because of the scale of the violence. In the last four years, four thousand people out of a population of nine million have been killed. By the standards of low-intensity conflict, this is at the high-end of the scale. However compared to a “proper war” this number is piffling. It simply doesn’t compare to the scale of suffering in places like East Timor or Chechnya.
Neither is it a question of resources. The world economy is not based on oranges and olives. Palestine has no oil and not much water. It has no large reserves of minerals or precious metals. In economic terms, there’s no reason for other countries to take a close interest in its affairs.
The high level of international interest is the result of many factors. Given the spiritual significance of the place, religion seems like a good place to start. For Jews, the Land of Israel is of critical importance. Jewish experience over the past two thousand years has been defined by the condition of exile from the Promised Land. As the world’s only Jewish state, Israel is the recipient of massive financial, political and emotional support from Jews all over the world.
Christianity also began in the Holy Land. To look at a map of modern day Palestine is to be reminded of all those Bible stories forced down your throat at school. Galilee, Nazareth, Bethlehem – these names all have resonance. For Muslims, Palestine is also important as the place from which Mohammad ascended to heaven. No member of a monotheistic religion comes to this conflict without baggage.
This all comes together when the issue of Jerusalem is raised. The Old City is the most keenly contested few square miles of real estate in the world. For centuries religious groups have fought for control of Jerusalem. Rivers of blood have been spilt to take or to hold the Old City. The current intifada began in Jerusalem when Ariel Sharon went to the Temple Mount in 2000.
Access to, and control of, the holy sites has been a source of violence for centuries. When negotiating the future status of Jerusalem, both sides are conscious of the implications of their decisions, not just for Israelis and Palestinians, but for all Christians, Muslims and Jews. Negotiating the future of Jerusalem is quantitatively more difficult than negotiating the future of Sarajevo or Belfast.
Some Israelis claim that religious hatred, rather than religion itself, is the reason that so much attention is paid to their conflict. They believe that Israel is condemned around the world not because it is unjust, but because it is Jewish. Certainly they are correct that far worse things happen in other places with far less outcry. One third of East Timor’s population was wiped out by Indonesia while the world looked away. Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, however brutal, simply doesn’t compare. Yet it is Israel, not Indonesia, which is most regularly condemned at the UN General Assembly.
Some Israeli critics are motivated by anti-Semitism. For some, attacking the Jewish state is an acceptable way to secretly vent dark prejudices. Nevertheless, while Israel is lambasted in op-ed pieces globally, physical attacks on Jews are thankfully rare. Taking a broad historical sweep, this is an era of low anti-Semitism.
I believe that so much attention is paid to Israel not because it’s Jewish but because it’s Western. It is an economically advanced parliamentary democracy whose values are defined by the Enlightenment. Israelis are part of our world.
When we in the West see our civilisational kin involved in ethnic conflict we pay more attention. That’s why Northern Ireland gets more coverage than Sri Lanka, why Kosovo is better known than the Congo. We are fascinated that “people like us”, with mobile phones and beer-guts, can be blown to bits on a bus. When Kosovars and Serbs kill each other, it’s the lead story and “something is done”. When Christians and Muslims fight in Ambon, few know and even fewer care.
Fighting ethnic wars is not something that “civilised” people are supposed to do. Other Westerners are appalled when Israelis, Serbs, Irish etc. behave in the sort of savage manner which, it is tacitly assumed, is the preserve of darker-skinned peoples. This is a deeply racist view of the world which totally ignores the West’s very recent and very bloody colonial past. Nevertheless, it is widely held.
Because we consider Israelis to be “civilised” we hold them to higher standards than less “advanced” peoples. We care when Israelis kill Palestinians because, “they really should know better”. When Hutus kill Tutsis, subconsciously, we shrug and say “what do you expect?”
Israel also suffers from the colonial guilt of other Western states. The killing, the ethnic cleansing, the settlements – all this is very passé these days. Zionism was a century too late, developing its colonial practices when the rest of the West was abandoning theirs. Like South Africa before it, Israel is the victim of a Western need to atone for our imperialist crimes. We know that plundering the rest of the world was wrong and, hey, we’re really sorry. To prove our new-found purity, we say a few nasty things about Israel.
All this is not for one moment to excuse Israel’s occupation policies, merely to contextualise them. The fact is that far worse happens elsewhere with much less outcry.
In the Arab world Palestine has long been a cause celebre. The most obvious reason for this is the profound sense of solidarity felt with fellow Arabs being dispossessed. There are other, less noble reasons that the conflict is so widely-covered in the Arab world. The presence of four million Palestinian refugees in Arab states gives the issue a sense of urgency. States like Lebanon and Jordan long for the day that the conflict is resolved so they can be rid of their “guests”.
Palestine also serves as a welcome distraction for many corrupt and useless regimes in the Middle East. Israel is given almost God-like powers when it is blamed for all the ills of the Arab world. The autocratic regime in Damascus derives much of its internal and external legitimacy from Syria’s status as the last front-line confrontation state. Keeping Palestine in the forefront of people’s minds is often in the interests of Arab leaders, though in doing this, they are pushing at an open door.
Then there is the US. The world’s only superpower is so deeply involved in the conflict that its claims to be an “honest broker” are laughable. Israel would not survive in its current form without the billions of dollars of American money which flood into its coffers each year.
Diplomatically, the US is not afraid to be the odd one out when it comes to defending Israel. With embarrassing regularity, John Negroponte is the only of the fifteen Security Council representatives saying “nay”. Israel can brazenly ignore international law thanks to the US diplomatic shield.
The fact that Israel and the US are so closely associated means that the Jewish state is the recipient of what one might call “secondary anger”. If you’re upset by US opposition to Kyoto, or the war in Iraq, or Guantanamo Bay, you’re unlikely to look kindly on America’s best buddy either. Significantly last year’s huge march in London, titled: “No War in Iraq” had the subtitle: “Freedom for Palestine”.
Finally there is 9-11. The terrorist attacks of 2001 brought the Palestinian conflict into even sharper focus. Israel’s oppression of the Palestinians fuels Muslim resentment against the West. If some way could be found to resolve the conflict in the Holy Land, then the wider conflict between Islam and the West would be greatly reduced. It wouldn’t disappear, but it would dissipate, if this great boil could be lanced. Policy-makers in Washington have a strong incentive to find a pliable Palestinian leader who can sell continuing Israeli occupation to his people.
Those of you who read my blog will know that I’m as guilty as anyone of concentrating on the conflict in Palestine. This is my fifth or sixth blog on the subject. I take an interest in many different parts of the world but, for one reason or another, the Israeli/Palestinian conflict has always had a unique hold over my thoughts. There’s nothing wrong with being more interested in one place than another, this is natural. However I believe that you still need a sense of perspective. The suffering on both sides in Palestine is a terrible human tragedy but there are far worse tragedies elsewhere.