Gaza: How much more stupid can one get? [Archives:2008/1124/Viewpoint]
Editor
It has been almost two weeks since seize was imposed on the Palestinian people in Gaza on Jan. 16. It has also been a week since the crumbling down of the Rafah boarder between Egypt and Gaza on Jan. 22.
Israel's policy was to turn the Palestinians against Hamas by starving them. Little did it know that Palestinians are used to starvation. And pushing them over the edge has fired back through creating an outlet for hundreds of thousands of Palestinian people who seized the chance to stock up on medicines, food and consumer goods.
After the breaking of the wall, Israeli leadership is frowning at the Egyptians for letting the situation escalate. And slowly the Egyptians are trying to gain control of the boarder and organize the crossing of Palestinians who might as well carry a few ammunitions along with the food and medicines in order to continue their resistance against the Israeli government, who once again proved it is not capable of creating peace.
Now the Muslim foreign ministers plan to meet in Saudi Arabia on Feb. 3, to discuss what happened. They did not meet earlier when the Palestinians were suffering from inhumane conditions. But now that the Palestinian people took matters into their own hands, the Muslims decided they must meet and discuss. The EU and the UN have also issued statements, mostly vague about peace and humanitarian conditions. And Bush will return to the region in May to take part in Israel's 60th anniversary celebrations and perhaps to reinvigorate his peace initiative.
So where does this take us? Starving Palestinians has helped create a turning point that highlighted the foolishness of decision makers in the Middle East. The Palestinian people proved there is a limit to enduring and so they lashed out at the wall in order to save themselves. However, it seems there is no limit to stupidity as our leaders around the world keep making the same mistakes when it comes to the Middle East.
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