The Israeli military offensive that started July 8 has led to more than 700 Palestinian and 30 Israeli deaths. With the ground operation and air strikes carrying on, more than 118000 people are looking for shelter. Food and water are becoming a serious concern. How much longer will this human crisis continue and what can put a stop to it? Azriel Bermant, a research fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies of Israel and Mark Sleboda, an international affairs analyst based in Moscow share their thoughts on the issue with the Voice of Russia's Agree or Disagree.
How justified is the military assault of Gaza by the Israeli forces?
Azriel Bermant: There is a strong support in Israel for this action. Almost the entire Israeli population has been under a rocket attack from Gaza. Once Hamas terrorists submitted Israel to a deadly attack, Israel was left with very little choice but to launch an operation in Gaza against Hamas.
Mark Sleboda: It must be said that Russia has a much softer position towards the Israeli-Palestinian situation than the Soviet Union. Americans love to speak of Israel's right to self-defence. Everyone does have that right. However, this is quite clearly not a situation of self-defence. And it is perfectly OK not to 100% agree with the political orientation of Hamas and recognize that air strikes, tanks on a city full of people are not at all a proportional response to a criminal act that started all of this.
By carrying out a military operation in densely populated areas, obviously affecting a lot of people there, Israel is doing what Hamas wants it to do, no?
Mark Sleboda: It must be said to a certain extent that there is no easy delineation between the Palestinian people and Hamas as a movement and a social group in Gaza. Certainly, by engaging in a type of urban warfare where there will inevitably be huge numbers of civilian casualties Israel is certainly not doing anything that would constructively lead to a peace process. It is really hard to fathom the response of the Israeli government in such an overbearing and disproportionate military force except as an appeal to order. I would have to say at this point that we have seen scenes of Israeli citizens overlooking Gaza, as missiles rained down on it, cheering, partying and drinking.
Azriel Bermant: I think that most Israelis would find the cheering the bombings distasteful. Equally, we find that Palestinians were cheering when three Israeli teenagers were kidnapped and killed. For terrorists the more casualties the better, so Israel was playing into their hands. The problem is that Hamas aims its missiles against civilian buildings, such as schools and hospitals, which is totally unacceptable.
Two months ago Palestinians were cautiously optimistic as rival parties Hamas and Fattah announced the creation of a national unity government and twelve days ago violence flared up between Hamas and Israel. Why did that happen and whose interests were involved?
Azriel Bermant: I personally think it was a mistake. At the end of the day, it was a technocratic government, Hamas' involvement was limited. I think that Hamas has never been weaker than it is right now.
But still, isn't a unity government between Fattah and Hamas better than bitter rivalry? And would it be fair to say that Israel is against unity between Fattah and Hamas?
Mark Sleboda: Israel and many others have been entirely correct to say that a division of the Palestinian people politically between the West Bank and Gaza makes any type of progress in the peace process virtually impossible, that there is simply not a unified negotiator on behalf of the Palestinian people. However, this government has made it perfectly clear that it has absolutely no interest in a peace process, unfortunately. With this in mind, we can see that they have no interest in a united government.
When I asked you about your attitude towards the military assault by Israel against Palestine and Gaza you said that this military operation had support of the Israeli population. But death toll rises on the Israeli side as well. How is the rising death toll on the Israeli side likely to affect the support? Do you expect it to continue or will it rather start to go down?
Azriel Bermant: I believe this has caused some kind of anger. Netanyahu from the outset did not want to carry out a ground operation bur there were a lot of voices in the government calling for the troops to go in. I think that now the support is still holding strong but if the fighting continues for days on end towards the occupation of Gaza, I think, the support will drop.
Mark Sleboda: It has become common to say that Gaza has become the world's biggest concentration camp. It is completely unacceptable for most of the world for Hamas to say that Israel must be destroyed but it is equally abhorrent in the eyes of most of the world for Israel not to recognize the right of the Palestinian people to a nation and a state. And above all, to continue the process of the settlements which can be seen correctly as nothing but a slow process of ethnic cleansing.
Why do you think the settlements carry on? It obviously irritates so many people both in Gaza and in the region, and in the international community.
Azriel Bermant: Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005 and dismantled all the settlements there. Israel is not occupying Gaza.
Mark Sleboda: I think that's the part that most of the world has a problem with.
The international community says that these settlements have to stop. But Israel carries on this policy of building settlements and this creates a lot of tension. Why does this continue?
Azriel Bermant: In my personal point of view, the settlements do not serve Israel's interests.
How can we move on? What is the way out of the current crisis? Obviously, to start up both sides have to exercise restraint and we don't see that on either side.
Mark Sleboda: As an American military veteran, I have to say that it is my belief that the single biggest obstacle to any kind of permanent peace settlement within the Middle East has been the United States. The United States continued unflinching and almost fanatical support of Israel.
What does the US have to gain by this?
Mark Sleboda: It certainly has geopolitical implications. It is Israel's alliance with the United States and Saudi Arabia that forms the core of American influence and control over the Middle East. There is also a strong pro-Israeli lobby in the United States. It really has a poisonous effect on the peace process. We have seen the European Union in the last decade draw, at least on the elite level or the governmental level, extremely close to that US position. As long as the US keeps funding, arming and supporting Israel to the level it does Israel will continue to act with impunity and block any peace process, and this is disastrous for the region.
There are talks going on in Cairo now where John Kerry, US Secretary of State, met UN chief Ban Ki-moon and more high profile talks will be held later. Do you think something will come out of these talks?
Mark Sleboda: No. I think we've seen through previous conflicts that this type of outside negotiations with the United States and other parties that aren't really fully committed to forcing Israel to start a peace process leads to nowhere. This conflict will stop one of two ways when the Israeli people grow tired of the assault or until outside factors. It does not really seem that Hezbollah could be drawn into this conflict, they are preoccupied in Syria this time. Last time they gave Israel quite a bloody nose that led to the ending of the situation. Everyone agrees with people having a right to self-defence but it is equally true that people have a right to resist actively an occupation. The world agrees that Israel is occupying large portions of what should rightfully, as the UN agreed more than 50 years ago, should be part of a unified Palestinian state.
Azriel Bermant: Hamas does not trust Egypt and Hamas is in a weaker situation than it was before and they feel they have nothing to lose by continuing the fighting. Israel wants an end to the rocket fire. For Israel the main objective is to have Gaza demilitarized. In Hamas' point of view, they want to end the blockade on Gaza and have the prisoners released.
Do you think that Israel and Palestine will be able to solve this problem on their own or do you think they need the interference of the international community?
Azriel Bermant: I think that Russia has close ties with all the parties involved, Israel has a good understanding with Putin's government, so Russia could help.
Mark Sleboda: I agree completely. I think that Russia could potentially play a very constructive role in this process. Unfortunately, Russia is extremely occupied at the moment. We see a very similar situation where the people of Lugansk are under bombardment by US-supported regime, very similar to what's happening in Gaza. This makes Russia's immediate involvement some kind of arbitrary in the process. It is hardly a coincidence, I think that Israel deliberately initiated this campaign while the world's eyes were focused on the terrible crisis in eastern Ukraine.
