Chris Floyd : Sham, Shock and Awe: False Peace Process Bears Bitter Fruit in Gaza

[laststeamtrain]

Sham, Shock and Awe: False Peace Process Bears Bitter Fruit in Gaza
Written by Chris Floyd

The deepening agony in Gaza may be shocking, but it is not surprising. It is the inevitable outcome of what Henry Siegman -- a thoroughly Establishment figure and former CFR stalwart -- has called "the most spectacular deception in modern diplomatic history": the so-called "Middle East peace process." As Siegman makes clear, the "peace process" has been a deliberate sham on the part of Israeli leaders, abetted every step of the way by the knowing collusion of American, British and European governments.

This week, the London Review of Books website has reposted a prescient article by Siegman that was first published in August 2007. It provides a cogent overview of the true political and diplomatic context of the present situation.

Although Siegman does not cast it in these terms, what we have been witnessing in Palestine over the past several decades is a remarkable echo of the dispossession and destruction of the Native American nations by the United States. There are myriad differences, of course, but the broad outline is basically the same: a people denigrated as primitive and inferior are being stripped of their land, driven into poverty and desperation, and killed in large numbers by another people who believe that their "manifest destiny" and moral superiority justify violent conquest and repression. Any violent resistance to the conquest is treated as barbaric terrorism -- and another justification for yet more repression, for even harsher tactics to grind down the conquered, secure "the frontier" and make it safe for "settlers" and the "civilization" they bring.

One reason that Israel persists in its harsh policies of decimation and destruction against the Palestinians is that such methods very often work: you can dispossess another people, destroy all but an ineffective remnant of their society and colonize their land to your own lasting profit and advantage. And you can do it in such a thoroughgoing manner that there will be no realistic possibility of the conquered people ever rising again to take back what was theirs. This is the example that the United States has set for Israel. It is unlikely to work in the same way or with the same degree of success for Israel in 21st century, for a number of reasons. In fact, it can -- and probably will -- end in disaster. But it is not an irrational policy; it does have many successful historical precedents -- including the history of Israel's chief benefactor.

Of course, in our more enlightened modern world, one must always cloak naked imperialism with stylish, sophisticated robes of euphemism. And as Siegman notes, one of the most ingenious of these has been Israel's on-going PR success in re-labeling a deliberate, long-term policy of confiscaton and oppression as a "peace process."

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http://www.chris-floyd.com/component/content/article/1679-sham-shock-and-awe-false-peace-process-bears-bitter-fruit-in-gaza.html

[aquart]

1. Ah. Because the Arabs were totally into a settlement.

No bias here. Nuh uh. Those poor woolly lamb Muslims. Just pawns incapable of commanding the smallest part of their own destiny.

76% percent of the Palestine Mandate was awarded to the Arabs in the UN Partition. Where is that land?

[tom_paine]

2. Why don't you tell us? You asked the question. Where is that land?

:shrug: