Breaking the terms of the Cease fire

My 90- year- old cousin who lives in our area called around noon.  Both being widowers, we always check on each other, so as usual, I asked how he was. “Zift” was his answer. “Did you fall? ”I asked , worried about his answer “zift”  which literally means (tar) used metaphorically when one is  “at the lowest ebb.” No, I did not fall but I am so upset because Israel is shelling Gaza and the number of people killed is rising while the world is watching. Aren’t you going to write something?  I immediately sat at my computer and recalled  the famous quotation by Edmund Burke “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to do nothing.”  

Although a little bit too late, but actually many good people have tried to do a lot for Gaza   during this genocide, and many ended up paying a high price for their solidarity, whether they were students, professors, doctors or journalist.  But in the meantime, the international community has failed to hold Israel accountable.  Furthermore, Israel,   encouraged by Mr. Trump, broke the terms of the cease fire it had agreed to, and the Palestinians continue to pay the price.

In March 2003 Rachel Corrie, a young American woman volunteering in Gaza, was bulldozed as she was trying to  prevent the demolition of a house.  In today’s local paper Al-Quds,  Bin Maummar el Haj Issa wrote a column in  memory of Rachel,  noting that  the “World conscience has been bulldozed and buried just as Rachel was.  So, unless the international community and its organizations  that were established to maintain world peace and order take action, and implement their resolutions, nobody is going to be safe, including those who think  themselves immune like emperors and can run the world as they wish. We have learned from history that even empires eventually do fall.  And for those who use the Bible to justify their actions,  remember the legacy of prophet Micah :”What does  the Lord require of you but to do justice and to love mercy  and to walk humbly with your God."

UNRWA

 On January 30, 2025 Israel announced officially the closure of UNRWA in Jerusalem, adding another blemish of shame to the international community for its failure to implement the United Nations resolutions concerning the question of Palestine.   For those of you who might not remember why UNRWA was established in the first place and what its mandate was supposed to be, I would like to remind you that it was indeed established as a temporary relief organization in the wake of the 1948 war and the expulsion of around 750,000 Palestinians from their homes upon the establishment of the State of Israel.  UNRWA was established as a temporary organization because the United Nations had also passed resolution 194 which stipulated the return of all Palestinians who were forced out of their homes or had fled out of fear upon the establishment of the state of Israel.  Of course, this resolution was never implemented because Israel refused to implement it and The United Nations failed to take any action against Israel.   But in the meantime, it had to exert its energy on raising funds for UNRWA to enable it to continue providing services for those Palestinian  refugees who were spread out in the region (including the Palestinian territories Jordan,  Syria,  and  Lebanon. )  So, the funding of UNRWA, and its health, educational, and social services  was always at the mercy of those countries who footed the bill of UNRWA.

Ordering UNRWA at this very crucial time to close its offices in Jerusalem, and to prevent its services in Gaza which has been practically razed by the Israel forces in the wake of October 7, 2023 is not surprising.  The world has been watching the intensive raids on other refugee camps in the occupied territories like Jenin and Tulkarem.  So will the international community just continue to watch and record numbers, or will this international body eventually have enough guts to stand up and challenge all those violations. 

On the first of February, there was another exchange of prisoners.  The whole episode of taking hostages by Hamas was for the purpose of exchanging them with Palestinian prisoners who have been languishing in Israeli prisons for years without any hope for their release.   Even upon the signing of the Oslo Accords, Israel did not abide by the stipulation of releasing all the prisoners.  At long last, this is happening now.  However, I   could not help but wonder whether with some wisdom, this exchange could have happened without bringing so much devastation and suffering to the whole population of Gaza as well as so much anxiety to the Israeli families of the hostages   Any way anybody who was watching the process of the exchange of the hostages with the release of the prisoners could see clearly that the hostages looked quite well, while  most of  the Palestinians prisoners looked sickly. 

 I hope this is a wake-up call for all the people of this land, their leaders, and the world community to realize that Justice and only justice will bring peace and tranquility to this land, so called “Holy”.  So please Mr. Trump do not exert your pressure on Egypt and Jordan to take the people of Gaza because these are not refugees from other countries.  They are Palestinians, from Gaza or Palestinians made refugees from their original villages and homes around Gaza when they were ethnically cleansed in 1948 upon the establishment of the State of Israel, and were replaced by Jewish immigrants who came from Europe, and other parts of the Western World.