FEATURE ARTICLE

E O EkeFriday, August 1, 2014
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THIS IS NOT WAR, BUT MASS SLAUGHTER OF THE INNOCENT PALESTINIANS

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or several weeks, Israel has been attacking Gaza. First with its fighter jets, firing missiles into residential buildings to destroy rockets fired by Hamas, 99% of which is intercepted by its iron dome missile defence system and now, it has sent in ground troops who are firing at homes, schools and hospitals.

For a hawkish, hard line primer Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu does not see the injustice of continuing to build on Palestinian lands and walling off Gaza into a concentration camp. He feel he has enough excuse to embark on utter destruction of Gaza by using the IDF to attack civilians, in a way no country has ever done in recent times.

Why is Israel doing what she is doing? why does Israel think that killing Palestinian children sleeping in their beds or playing in their schools will bring peace to her borders, while it continues to treat Palestinian in the way and manner the then South African apartheid government treated it black population?

What Israel is doing in Gaza, is war crime. It is not a war to kill children and innocent people who want peace to get on with their lives. It is not right. It is unjustifiable. It is cruel, utter wicked and a disproportionate response to a provocation. Yes, Israel has a right to exist and defend itself, so do Palestinians and the people living in Gaza.

America cannot continue to turn a blind eye to the atrocities Israel is committing in Gaza and at the same time believes that it has a moral authority to sanction Russia for what she is doing in Ukraine.

It cannot continue to be one law for Israel and another one for the rest of the world. Israel has no moral justification for the way it treats Palestinians and the mass murder it is committing in Gaza.

The argument that Israel has a right to defend itself can no longer serve as excuse for the deliberate mass killing of innocent Palestinian civilians who wants to live in peace with her. Palestinians have a right to live as free citizens in Palestine.

I love Israel, but what the country is doing in Gaza is wrong and unjust, and must now be brought to an end. Israel must demonstrating that it wants peace with Palestinian by ending the occupation and stopping building on occupied lands so that the dream of a two state living side by side and benefiting from each other can be realised.

On the other hand, the use of Islam to turn every Muslim and Palestinian into enemy of Israel is also to be condemned in equal measure. While the resistance of Hamas is understandable, it falls on Israel as the stronger partner in this conflict to offer Hamas a choice that will enable her give up suicide. No one can live in peace with a man who has conducted his funeral, unless he first gives him a reason to live and value his life. Israel must give the Palestinians the reason to choose life by stopping the occupation as the first step towards peace.

What we need to do is apply justice as fairness to all, without giving consideration to ethnicity or religion. In that way, we will realise that it is as much wrong to occupy someone's land, as it is wrong for the oppressed to fire rockets into the occupiers' settlements.

Israel cannot be allowed to rewrite the definition of justice, just because it believes that it has the power and means. The land of Palestine belongs to both Jews and Palestinians. After all, they are all related to Abraham. Abraham had other grandchildren apart from Jacob.

A Palestinian life is no less valuable than the life of an Israeli. I suppose, it time to broker a peace based on justice as fairness.

No one can have good reason to commit mass murder of the innocent.

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