The United States embassy in Jerusalem is the most contentious Donald Trump real estate deal since the building of the Trump Tower; but like most of his deals, it isn’t really his. In 1995, the passing of the Jerusalem Embassy Act recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. However, a clause in the Act allowed the president to delay its implementation every six months.
President Bill Clinton decided to use the delay provision as a bargaining chip during mediations between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). Despite officially recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital last year, Trump has signed the Jerusalem waiver twice. But once a property has the Trump brand, it sticks, and it only misrepresents the consequences.
To say that the victims of violence in Gaza died because of the embassy, or the right of return, the idea that Palestinian refugees have a right to return to Israel, or because of any number of smokescreen excuses is disingenuous. This year, the 70th anniversary of the Nakba, commemorating the birth of Palestinian opposition, coincided with the first week of Ramadan.
Hamas, a Palestinian militant group, would have to be the worst propagandists in the world to pass up such a meaningful opportunity. Unfortunately, they didn’t. They marched the people of Gaza toward the wall under the pretext of defying the most hated American president since Lyndon B. Johnson. Mingled among these frustrated protesters were Hamas agents hoping to provoke an incident to get as much media attention as possible. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF), stressed and paranoid, played into their hands and gave the terrorists what they wanted: dead Palestinians on CNN. They died so Hamas could play the victims at a time of great religious feeling.
The IDF have a standard of military excellence and usually try their damndest to minimize civilian casualties and de-escalate crisis situations. According to the author of the IDF ethics code, Israeli soldiers are supposed to show compassion, as long as it does not put them at risk. In this case though, maintaining and securing the Gaza border demanded more discipline than what was displayed. Mitigating circumstances can’t excuse the results—over 100 dead and thousands wounded by live rounds. Ultimately, responsibility lies on the leadership that failed to meet the challenge.
Gaza has been a hellhole for decades, which serves Hamas’ interests well. Gazans are more prone to terrorist recruitment and compliance when they are cut off from the outside world, with no one looking out for them but the terrorists. So, in Machiavellian fashion, Hamas antagonizes what should be its former Arab ally, Egypt, to better assert control over its population. Hamas is playing a game of power and political domination, not looking out for the well-being of Palestinians.
Of course, this political game-playing is not exclusive to Hamas. Likud, the current ruling political party of Israel, has been playing a (slightly) more democratic version of this same strategy for years.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has made a political career by aggravating tensions and violence with Arabs and thereby driving Jewish and non-Arab Israelis into his camp. To them, he may be a crook, but the worst he’ll do is scam you. The other guys want you and your family driven into the sea or worse. Netanyahu needs to keep this type of political capital now more than ever. He’s currently facing a massive corruption case and constitutional crisis. His only chance is to cast himself as the one man defending Israelis from the terrorists. The movement of the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem and pretending the military failure in Gaza was a victory helps his legitimacy.
Those of us outside Israel should not mistake the people we see on the ground who die or are victimized because of these events as justifying either a corrupt government or terrorism. They are not equal: Hamas is a terrorist group while Likud are egoistic bureaucrats; but both are manipulating the deaths of innocents to secure their own political capital.
As students, we should not let our desire to be on the “right side” alleviate the responsibility or accountability of each in our eyes. Neither of these “leaders” are worth the blood spilled.
