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| - by Jaxhawk Ever since [1] the “Balfour Declaration” issued by the British Government in 1917, expressing support for “the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people. There has been fighting, intifada and Peace Accord meetings to settle the Palestinian problem.To no avail! [2] [3] The world once again rallied to the support of the embattled Palestinian government on Monday, pledging $7.4 billion in aid over the next three years at a donors’ conference — a sum that tops the Palestinians’ own expectations. The sum raised Monday was substantial even compared to the more than $10 billion that donor countries have given to the Palestinians in the past decade, according to the World Bank. Officials have said the Palestinians have received more international aid on a per capita basis than any other nation or group of people in the postwar period. The key issues that dominate this area of Palestine are the need for Israel to ease restrictions on Palestinians while not compromising its security, and the fate of Gaza, which has been virtually cut off from the world since the Islamic militant Hamas seized control by force in June. My question is this: will the militant Hamas get control of the money, and start another intifada, or will it go to the 1.5 million Palestinians who live in this area in abject poverty..There are 4 million Arabs living in the Gaza Strip that is only 140 square miles in size. Not much larger than Rhode Island! The West Bank and The Gaza strip has approximately 3.5 million Arabs and 440,000 Jewish settlers living in the area that is situated between Israel and Jordan. This is the area known in Biblical times as Judea and Samaria. Samaria(The West Bank) is approximately 2,270 square miles in size. This was the geography that the Israelis occupied after they won the war in 1967. The Gaza strip is slightly larger than two times the size of Washington, DC! Of course, these historical details are of little interest to the Islamic fundamentalists, who, by most accounts, enjoy majority support in the Gaza Strip.They have expressed a desire to wipe out Israel and claim the whole region. For them, history begins with the conquests of Muhammad and his caliphs in the seventh century. According to Koranic law, all the land they conquered (including not only today’s Palestine but also Spain and Portugal) became inalienable Islamic territory. Or as Mahmoud Zahar, a Hamas leader, said recently, “the fundamentalists seek to control not just the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, but All of Palestine is our land.” I believe that most Arabs would like to “de-Judaize”( eliminate Israel) all of Palestine, and many, no doubt, see the Gaza evacuation as a first step. Is the United States and The European Union going to Pay for this genocide? Yossi Melman of the Israeli Daily Haaretz had this to say about the situation in Gaza and the West Bank. “The official government, led by Mahmoud Abbas and celebrated by George Bush and most of the world, is weak and lacks the authority to reestablish its rule as sole representative of the Palestinian people. At the same time, the government of Ehud Olmert – like most previous Israeli governments – is scared to death of initiating a dramatic, daring move to end the occupation. The Saudi ambassador said that speeches made at the conference need to be matched by deeds. “The proof is in the pudding,” he told us reporters. Once again, he was right. I don’t believe that both sides (the Israeli government and the Palestinian Authority) have the imagination, the vision, and the guts to deliver on the promises of Annapolis. To make it come through, there is a need for two dramatic and probably traumatic events: a civil war among the Palestinians, in which hopefully the Abbas camp would crush the Hamas fundamentalists; and, on the Israeli side, dismantling settlements and moving 200,000 Jews still left in the West Bank – probably igniting a civil war.” And still Diplomats and World leaders keep funneling money down the rat hole that for the past decades has seen nothing but blood, sweat and tears. Is there no end to the fight between Palestinians and Israelis? I don’t think so, because since the early 50’s when the United Nations made Israel a sovereign Country, the Arabs have had a bur under there camels saddle to eradicate the state of Israel. There has to be an end to this bloody fight! __NOEDITSECTION__ From The Opinion Wiki, a Wikia wiki. From The Opinion Wiki, a Wikia wiki.
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