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The Heart Says ‘Yes’ the Mind Says ‘No’ to the Palestinian Statehood Bid, Part 3

This is Part 3 of a 3 part series.
To read Parts 1 and 2, click the links below in the Related Articles box.

Summary of last week’s article: Last
week Gangte discussed criteria and barriers to statehood for Palestine.

Margaret Gangte

Nation to be ruined under dictatorship: Middle-east is a special place on earth with special problems. The
convergent point of both theorists and practitioners is on development
and governance which largely depends on leadership. The role of
development leadership is undeniably critical to attaining peace and
vice versa. Palestine needs peace but the key question is: will peace
and development be possible, under the circumstances detailed in my previous articles, with
leadership like Hamas and the like?

More tears on Earth: The ground workers such as the peace activists and humanitarians react to the surface only, they are not equipped to see the undercurrents, the colossal catastrophe for the future (yet to arrive). The truth is that innocent people suffer because of bad leadership; the poor Palestinian populace bears the brunt of its leaders, who are now set to swing them into more miserable conditions after statehood attainment with all liberty and freedom to be buried. For sure, humanitarians job opportunity will increase, but the aid flow has no perennial source to fund forever particularly under the economic crises in humanitarian aid donor countries. Who will bail Palestine out in that crisis? The next phase of conflict is bound to set the globe into flame. The conflict resolution prepared by the Samaritans, who may be genuinely concerned to wipe the tears of innocent victims in the fray, see only the surface without reading the lines behind and have effectively prepared an excellent ground work for more intense future conflict to shed more tears.

Wake-up call to reality: The globe is going through a strange phenomenon. This is the time to integrate efforts for sustainability. Disintegrated piece of land with false ego of statehood having no economic base and in a landlocked position poses very high challenges for nation building exercises, particularly in a condition infested already with the global disease of corruption. Under these circumstances, should it not be wise for Palestinians to verify the feasibility of statehood rationally without being too emotional?

Time to listen and be wise: The most feasible approach to conflict resolution for Israel–Palestine is to seek sustainability of their existence through building development community using an integrated effort in brotherhood, peace and forgiveness and not in promoting disaggregation, disunity and conflict. Since the historicity of conflict may not offer opportunities in that direction, the bilateral arrangement needs to be worked out carefully in detail between the two parties to delete all possible threats to the existence of each in the future, and in case of any conflicting position, UN intervention could be legitimately involved.

The compromises and resolutions however, still do not guarantee a successful state building for Palestine in view of its fragile condition; Hamas and Fatah conflicting positions; leadership finding no legitimacy among the people; an institution under accountability question; an economy without base; territorial boundaries in question; administration in disaggregated territories located distantly from each other; and a future of aid dependency. All of these do not sound like a good package.

There is little hope that the theory of state building can fructify into practice of actual state building to fulfill the dream and aspiration of Palestinians. Instead, Palestine’s statehood is more likely to be a platform to conquer the neighbor as also to conquer the aspiration of Palestinians to live in a developed, progressive nation with liberty and freedom. Alas, the indicators are negative with the needle pointing towards more drops of tears to fall than to wipe it dry. When that happens, the world will no longer listen; they will be too busy in their own turmoil with sustainability and climate change.

Margaret Gangte is the director of the Ministry of Defense for the Government of India. Email: [email protected]

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