Essay Death in Gaza

Chapter three of Eyal Press’ Beautiful Souls follows Avner Wishnitzer, an Israeli combat soldier serving in the occupied territories during the Second Intifada. In the 6-Day War of 1967, Israel captured the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and has since kept the land under an Israeli military occupation. In 1987 to 1991, a Palestinian uprising involving resistance and civil disobedience, known as the First Intifada, occurred in the occupied territories. Consequently, Israel deployed many soldiers into the occupied territories, and an estimated 1,674 people were killed in total. The Second Intifada, a much more violent Palestinian uprising in the occupied territories, transpired from 2000 until 2005. In response, Israel enacted Operation Defensive Shield, a large-scale military operation, in 2002 to stop the terrorist attacks and suicide bombings of the Second Intifada. An approximate 4,426 people were killed in the Second Intifada. Avner Wishnitzer’s public refusal to serve in the occupied territories was worth getting kicked out of Sayeret Matkal and being disgraced by Israeli society because it made people question the occupation and the treatment towards Palestinians. Even if Avner had been my father, I would have condoned his choices because I could create my own reputation in the military. Additionally, the current controversy over the Israeli occupation legitimizes his stance and actions for many Israeli citizens.

‘Wild Thorns’ by Sahar Khalifeh is an insightful commentary that brings to life the Palestinian struggle under the Israeli Occupation and embodies this conflict through the different perspectives brought forth by the contrasting characters. We are primarily shown this strife through the eyes of the principal character, the expatriate Usama, as well as the foil character of his cousin, Adil. Khalifeh skillfully uses literary devices such as emotive language, allusions and positive and negative connotations to highlight life under the Occupation. As the audience, these techniques help encourage us to consider the struggle more in depth, and due to the wide variety of characters, invite us to relate to them.

In addition, I will examine the current state of political and human rights in Israeli occupied West Bank and analyze how they are approaching a level of apartheid. Finally, I will summarize the effects of these social tensions between Israel and Palestinians in the terms of how potential open conflict could reignite.

The documentary, Promises, introduced the Israeli-Palestinian conflict through the perspective of seven children. The film’s initiator, B.Z. Goldberg, initially interviews seven children, but gradually convinces the children to meet with peers of the opposite side in the conflict. Finally, by synthesizing the opinions of the children, the film achieves a lasting message at the end of the film -- everyone involved in the conflict is a human being, and thus one’s religion does not reflect his or her personality. Rather than enforcing this message upon the participants, the film has the children discover what it is like to be the person they hate -- a discovery which rather lingers throughout the subconscious of the film.

She realised that people of any age will do anything to assist what they are fighting for. Furthermore, Stack lived through a portion of the second Palestinian intifada. During this struggle countless suicide bombers came by day and Israeli tanks acquired Palestinian land in the West Bank by night. Stack describes this period of time as complete chaos, where, “violence fed violence. Blood washed blood”. Stack knew a Palestinian woman who was a victim of the brutality during the first intifada. She was tortured during the days of this time period for being part of an underground Palestinian political movement. Stack’s Palestinian friend was “tortured for days, beaten, abused, threatened with rape” by a barbaric Israeli interrogator. Although she faced strong hostility from the interrogator, she also faced kindness in the form of an anonymous Israeli man who “sat with her hour after dark hour” and attempted to help her get through the pain. This shows that an individual can interact with both negative and positive things throughout a conflict. Stack later faced a conflict when she wrote a feature about how the body parts of suicide bombers had caused a policy debate in Israel. This feature caused Stack to receive hundreds of hate mails regarding as to how she “humanized [suicide bombers]” by writing about them as actual people with families.

A series of stabbings has made the people of Israel restless and afraid. A statistic in the last paragraph of Ori Lewis’s report, “West Bank tensions rise after Palestinian stabbings in Israeli settlements,” stated that 25 people and a U.S. citizen have been killed. Over 148 Palestinians have been killed as well, a majority of them being victims of violent demonstrations (Lewis, 2016.)

Afarat explains that Americans are more privileged by magnifying the problems concerning Middle Eastern school facilities. Gazan students lack engagement and motivation while in school. Compared to the many schools in America, Gaza’s schools do not have certain curriculum and activities. Tafesh explains to Afarat that there were neither science labs, libraries, nor sports teams in Gaza (par. 5), and those missing factors put

This is a devastating reality many are facing in the Middle East every day, some more grim than others. It is through a writer’s words, written or oral, or a photographer’s lens where we see our news, our history being captured. In this

Imagine living in a conflict that has divided two nations, literally, by a concrete barrier. This turbulent and heated confrontation has left many dead and even more injured. Welcome to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The documentary “5 Broken Cameras” is a portrayal of this modern day dispute through the personal lens of self-taught Palestinian cameraman, Emad Burnat. This compelling documentary provides a realistic presentation of the hatred that surrounds these two divided nations. Movie viewers will be drawn to this film is because it demonstrates the harsh realities of what it is like to live in the midst of a conflict and how the lives of those affected are altered as a result of this prolonged struggle.

Joe Sacco’s graphic novel, Palestine, deals with the repercussions of the first intifada in Israel/Palestine/the Holy Land. The story follows the author through the many refugee camps and towns around Palestine as he tries to gather information, stories, and pictures to construct his graphic novel. While the book is enjoyable at a face level, there are many underlying themes conveyed throughout its illustrated pages and written text.

Gaith (2014) describes an incident where israeli soldier take children as young as 11 into custody and do many bodily harm to them in the process. The way children are treated goes against the promise that Israel made to protect children rights. “Violence against palestinian children detainees on rise” (2015) states that in the first 6 months of 2015 there was 10 percent increase of violence against palestinian children in israeli custody. They also say that children are forced to sign papers in hebrew a language they don’t understand stating that they weren’t abused and that it was only an interrogation. According to these statistics, “I’ll treatment of Palestinian children remains widespread and systematic in the Israeli military detention

The graphic novel Palestine, published by Maltan journalist Joe Sacco in the early ‘90s, is a journalistic piece that represents his recollections of two months spent talking to and living with Palestinians in the Occupied Territories. The casual narrative style, which some might say is too shallow for such heavy subject matter, in fact allows Sacco to avoid many of the pit falls that have made Western reporting on non-Western conflicts unhelpful at the very least and more often incredibly damaging.

The film Paradise Now tells the story of Khaled and Said, two Palestinian young men who are recruited for suicide bombing missions in Israel. The two men live rather mediocre, uneventful lives until they are “hand picked” for the attack. The film goes on to tell an insightful story that humanizes the young would-be terrorists instead of vilifying them; expressing a point of view of the Palestine-Israel that is rarely exposed.

There are scenes of poverty and how it affects the children who are forced into an early maturity, but are still able to capture periods of childhood innocence. In relation to the text, children, who are supposed to be the gem of any society, are seen as an unwanted parasite, by other groups, who will inevitably plague their society with further generations of Palestinians. It is through the photographs and the writing in which the issue of the upbringing and future of Palestinian children is brought into question. Previous generations had grown up in a Palestinian society which has since been "interrupted", "obliterated", and "radically impoverished" (688). However the new generations are growing up with the consequences where "everything around them seams expendable, impermanent, (and) unstable" (688). They have no fixed memories of ‘Palestine', only the premature recognition that they are displaced in an unwelcoming community.

Broad international consensus regarding the political and legal controversies of the Israeli and Palestinian Gaza conflict has been minimal at best. At its worst it has fueled the controversies created by the United Nations Fact Finding Mission, through which, both sides maintain their positions and justification for their actions. In ordered to obtain an opinion on this issue one must examine the factual historical background of the Gaza Conflict. By identifying the major legal and political discrepancies, observing the perspectives of those who defend Israeli actions, and those who have a strong critique against those actions we can grasp the complexity of this issue and make an assessment of actions on both sides.