Invasion - by Stealth !

When the allied armies started to reclaim occupied Europe from the Nazi regime of Germany the discovery of the concentration camps and their death ovens shocked the world.   The newsreel cameras of that era brought pictures of almost indescribable horror to the great mass of people who felt sympathy for the six million Jews of Europe who had been systematically murdered.

This sympathy found a voice in the deliberations of the newly formed United Nations assembly.  The Jews claimed Palestine to have been their ancestral home and many of the survivors were intent on making their way to what they described as their "promised land ".  It came to a fateful vote in the United Nations and in 1948 that body decided to create a Jewish state that became Israel.

That would have been fine - if it was vacant land, but it had been home to Palestinians for thousands of years and this new Jewish state was founded in a vicious war. Hopelessly outnumbered this tiny enclave fought off invading Arab armies and gained the admiration of the world.   Time and again it came under attack and not only survived, but increased its borders.   The United Nations hoped that the acrimony would be eventually settled by the emergence of both a Jewish and an Israeli state, living peacefully side by side.

That was not to be.  The hatred ran too deep. America held Israel under its protective wing and used its Veto at the United Nations to ward off hostile legislation. Several times hopeful plans for settling the differences between the two sides came close to conclusion, but failed at the last minute.  Israel ruled the Palestinian people with an iron hand and the laws of Israel favoured the Jewish settlers over Palestinian citizens.

One of the points of contention is the "West Bank "- a great portion of land captured in the 1965 war and which would have to be an integral part of any future Palestinian state.  While Israel has not openly permitted Jewish settlers to build homes on this land, it has done little to stop them. In fact the Jewish high court has ruled them illegal and ordered they be handed to the Palestinians, but no action has been taken to enforce that order.

Israel has a hard line leader in Benjamin Netanyahu.  He has walked away from the solution of a Palestinian state and under his watch the number of new Jewish settlements in the West Bank has sharply increased.   In the past, Israel has sheltered behind certain American use of its Veto to remove items criticising Israel to be removed from discussion.   To their shock, this time America not only refrained from using its Veto, it simply abstained in a vote on a measure criticising the Jewish state.

World opinion is hardening and opposition is growing against the rough shod treatment the Palestinian people are receiving from their Jewish overlords.   Unfortunately, the Palestinian people are not helping their cause by their trenchant opposition to all and any reasonable proposals for a two state solution.   Hard core elements are constantly at war with the Jewish state.

It seems likely that the acquisition of the West Bank by stealth is no longer a proposition. It is likely that the United Nations will have new powers to knock heads together on both sides of the divide and force some sort of settlement.   Obviously, there will be elements of compromise that neither will like, but that is the only way this land can be successfully divided.

But on January 20 there will be a different president in the oval office and perhaps that policy change will change again..   The hope for peace in the Middle East looks far from assured !