THE GAZA SYNDROME

While ‘Palestine’ may have become taboo in public discourse, this position amounts to denying history and the long tradition of India’s support to the Palestinian cause

- Malay Mishra

With two years of war having passed into the bloodied history of modern times, celebrations were seen on both sides of the northern frontier as the ‘historic’ Gaza peace plan was foisted on Palestine by an American-led international order. This plan is likely to bite the dust like previous ones including the January agreement which was violated by Israel after just two months. Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will try to subvert the agreement (finalised for the first phase only) to hold on to power with the Israeli Supreme Court waiting in the wings to oust him from office. In fact, Trump while signing the first phase plan stated that he couldn’t guarantee that Israel would not attack Hamas again if they tried to regroup.

The first phase of the peace plan is done, and 20 living hostages were released from Hamas’ captivity while Israel delivered on its agreement to free nearly 2,000 Palestinian militants and civilians. A grand ceremony jointly hosted by Egypt and the USA on 13 Oct at the Egyptian resort town of Sharm al-Sheikh brought some 20-odd world leaders from the Western world as well as the region to applaud the statesmanship of the US President. For the latter it has been a godsend as the Nobel Peace Prize for this year went to the Venezuelan Opposition leader Maria Corina Machado who in turn dedicated the prize to Trump for his “untiring efforts for peace.”