Salim Nazzal

It is obvious now that the Jewish extremist’s government in the Zionist state is interested in anything but not in peace.

This government rejects all sort of political compromise which made the earlier American president Bill Clinton, who is visiting the region these days, telling them that since Jews has chosen to come to the Middle East, they have to agree on political compromise; otherwise they will have no friends in the future. But it is doubtful that the Jewish extremists are ready to hear any voice expect their own voice following the saying of the founder of the state of Israel the war lord Ben Gorion that the important thing is what Jews do, and not what Goyem (non Jews) say.

Netanyahu made it clear Last month that he is not ready to listen to anybody in the question of building Jewish settlement in the occupied Palestine.

This weak too Israel has rejected the calls of the UN, Europe and the USA to stop building Jewish settlements in the occupied Jerusalem. After 42 years of its occupation and despite that the PLO recognized the state of Israel in the Palestinian land occupied in 1948, and despite the tons of the UN resolutions which condemns its occupation, Israel does not consider that it is an occupation force in Palestine. While the whole world considers that region occupied area according to the international laws, Israel does not recognize any laws considering that God has given them the land of Palestine. This explains its policy in building Jewish settlements in the Palestinian land with the aim to create a de facto on the ground.

The question is from where does Israel bring the power to challenge the UN and the world community? The answer in my view is that the strong states in the world are unwilling to confront Israel and to say enough is enough. They are simply lack braveness or hypocrites and that is why they do not want to call the spade a spade. When Israel commits war crimes the western condemnation is uttered in the weakest form. And even when western writers criticized Israel, they use the writings of anti Zionist Jewish writers as reference and shield. And in the only case where it was impossible to conceal Israel war crimes, the UN did not find any attorney except a Jewish attorney who equalizes the Palestinian homemade rockets with the most advanced Israeli arms. Even this inquiry , that portrayed the conflict as between two equal powers was considered in Israel as biased and lack objectivity while the fact if the Un brought an investigation team from the moon or from mars they would have come with results much worse for Israel than Goldstone report.

The Betselem Israeli human rights consider that the year 2009 was the deadliest for the Palestinians in the last two decades. In a statement the organization said that more than a thousand Palestinians have been killed so far this year, at least one third of them are children.

The political scene in the Middle East was optimistic when the Bush term was over and many Arabs hoped that Obama who came from a historically oppressed community will have a different approach. In the Cairo speech he spoke a different language which Arabs liked to hear. But soon Obama failed to challenge the strong Jewish lobby which has been and still the real obstacle in the Arab American relation. The political fruit is obvious, Obama failed in the first test in the question of freezing settlements.

Many in the Arab world feel that the reason that Obama surrender to Israel is due to the influence of the Jewish lobby. More disappointing for Arabs was the position of Mrs Clinton which considers Netanyahu restricting settlements as a big concession from Israel which is apparently an attempt to conceal the American administration weakness towards Israel. The Palestinian side lost its confidence in the USA and this was obvious in Abbas’s decision not to run for next election if it ever to take place. The consequence is that the dark clouds are hovering over Palestine and the Middle East. The recipe of the coming war is very obvious to everybody, a right wing Zionist government, a long and brutal occupation, which in fact is the longest occupation in modern history, a total failure to 18 years of empty negotiations and a weak will from the UN and the major powers to put limits to Israel.

In the time being Israel is launching a psychological warfare against Lebanon, Syria, Palestine (Gaza) and Iran. The Zionist state claims that its latest exercises considered the largest in its history are meant to face two or three fronts at time. Military analysts say that even if Israel is claiming that these exercises are for defense, its real goal is attack Lebanon, or Palestine (Gaza). General Ashkenazi has confirmed that when he said that he does not exclude a wide operation in the Gaza strip.

The Israeli agitations and threats against Iran is going almost on daily basis and in Lebanon and Gaza Israel military planes flies daily accompanied with verbal threats against them. And two weeks ago Israel practiced state mercenary when it kidnapped the Francop ship which was 150 kilo meters from its shore under the claims that it carried arms to Syria or Lebanon. All this is contributing in the creation of an atmosphere that might lead to war.

If this war will happen Israel will for sure call it a defense war. In the past 60 years every single Zionist war is done under the name of defense. Yet what is worrying is the news that the NATO has added Israel in his operation against (terror) in the Mediterranean, a step that raised concern in the Arab world because it involves indirectly NATO for the first time in the Arab Israeli conflict. Involving Israel to patrol the Mediterranean to fight the so called terror is like the bank manager inviting a bandit to revise the bank accounts.

Arab observes think that Israel seeks to push NATO gradually to get involved in the conflict. While on the political level Israel is very active in agitating against Muslims and particularly against Iran.

In the occupied Jerusalem the Zionist attacks against the Aqsa mosque has been intensified since the arrival of the ultra right wing government. The Aqsa mosque has a strong symbolic value for more than one milliard Muslims in the world. In 1968 the Zionist burning of part of the Aqsa has resulted in the establishment of the Islamic conference organization and many observers think that the protests of 1968 is a cup of tea compared to the volcano which might happen in the future if Jerusalem and the Aqsa are threatened.

The Zionist efforts in evicting Palestinians from Jerusalem and the policy of surrounding the town with new settlements to create a Jewish majority has become a great source of concern in the Islamic world. It is obvious that Israel is unable to grasp the extent of the Islamic world reaction towards the question of Jerusalem. Many observers do not exclude that the question of Jerusalem might be the spark which leads to a total Muslim Jewish confrontation in the whole world.

The Arab media estimate that the war will broke out either next spring or next summer. But it is obvious that nobody know what the near future will bring despite that nobody is optimistic at the moment.

How the war is to start is yet another question which is not easy to answer. Some analysts think the question of Jerusalem will spark the war; others think that the spark might come from an Israeli attack on Iran or Lebanon or Gaza or even on Syria. However it must be remembered that the first decade of this century has witnessed two Israeli wars, one in Lebanon in 2006 and the other in Gaza in 2009.

Regardless of from where or how the war will begin ,and regardless its timing, what is foreseeable that the dark clouds which are hovering over the Middle East are clearly indicating that the region is heading towards a major war that many observers think it might put the region into a state of confrontation and chaos for many years.

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Dr. Salim Nazzal is a Palestinian-Norwegian historian in the Middle East, who has written extensively on social and political issues in the region. - snazzal@ymail.com