A Year To Forget That Cannot Be Forgotten – OpEd
By Yossi Mekelberg
It is hard to digest that it has been a year since Oct. 7, 2023. Twelve months, 52 weeks, 365 days, yet there is no end in sight to this war or the suffering, and to what end? Late last month, I visited the holy land for the first time since the war began, fully expecting to meet two traumatized societies trying to cope — to the best of their abilities — with the losses they have suffered while the war is still raging.
Despite the asymmetry in power between the Israelis and the Palestinians, both endure a profound sense of fear, distrust in one another and in their own leadership, and doubts as to what the future holds for them. With stalled negotiations over a ceasefire and with no prospect for the return of the hostages, along with the escalation between Israel, Hezbollah and Iran, the mood was naturally gloomy, but not hopeless.
One of the first places I visited was Kibbutz Nir Oz, a community that suffered some of the worst carnage on Oct. 7. Of its 400 residents, 57 were killed and 76 kidnapped. Nir Metzger, a member of the kibbutz, volunteered to show a colleague and me the destroyed houses. Nir’s father was kidnapped and killed in captivity. His mother, who was also kidnapped, was released through the first deal with Hamas, in return for Israel releasing Palestinian prisoners.
He surprised us with his calm and measured manner as he described his own battle for survival during the attack, his protection of his young family and the loss of his beloved father. Just before we left, we asked him about the future of relations with the Palestinians. Despite everything he and his family have experienced, Nir said with no hesitation that he still believed in a two-state solution, but one that would ensure that Oct. 7 would not happen again.
It was comforting to hear not only from him, but also from others, as opinion polls indicate, that there is still a sizable minority on both sides who believe that the only way forward for both peoples is the mutual recognition of the other’s right to self-determination. Although it was difficult to find anyone who knows how to make this happen, what the process to achieve it should be and what the preferred model of a two-state solution should look like. I had a very similar impression when discussing the situation with Palestinians. They are also fearful for the future and angry, but not hopeless. They gave me reason to hope that, given the right conditions and right leadership, peace is not impossible.
If there is a consensus on either side of the Green Line, it is that their leaders have failed them. But they are also not able to identify a better leadership than their present one — a leadership with the courage and vision to steer them out of the worst phase in this more than a century-long conflict.
Interestingly, there are growing voices among Palestinians who demand international protection, and one can hardly blame them. In Gaza, more than 1.7 million of the Strip’s 2.2 million population are displaced with hardly any shelter, access to food, clean water, sanitation or medical help. They have been failed by their own leaders and punished by the Israelis, who either see them as collaborators with Hamas or blame them for not rebelling against it.
After the shock of Oct. 7, Israel recovered militarily, as it has done in the past when it was surprised, but politically and diplomatically it lacks a strategy on how to translate achievements on the battlefield into long-term political achievements. Instead, it is looking for more military targets.
One of the aspects that maintains these conflicts is that people on both sides feel like victims and therefore feel entitled to victimize the other, showing little to no empathy. And in this asymmetric war, it is the Palestinians who are paying by far the heavier price, which gives much credibility to their growing demand for international protection, as much in the West Bank as in Gaza, as settler terrorism is on the rise and out of control.
There was a general consensus among those I spoke to that both societies are victims of their leaderships. I can only fully concur with them. As much as one uncompromisingly opposes the indifference of the Israeli security forces to the killing of civilians, as well as the inhuman blockade for nearly two decades before the war, Hamas’ leadership has also oppressed its own people and on Oct. 7 opened the gates of hell by its own actions. They should have realized that, although maybe that was what they wanted.
And with a different government in Israel, there would have been a good chance this annus horribilis would never have happened. Prior to Oct. 7, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his worst government since the state of Israel’s inception was all about expanding settlements, entrenching a cruel occupation on the path to annexation and strengthening Hamas to avert a two-state solution. Netanyahu was also concentrating on his political survival and manipulating the political and judicial systems to ensure his corruption trial would never reach its ultimate conclusion. The results of all of this have been catastrophic.
It is also the lack of a viable alternative in Israel; one that is courageous enough not only to resist the judicial coup by the current Israeli government but to link preserving Israeli democracy with the end of the occupation. There is also a need to inject into the discourse the thought that there cannot be two judicial systems — a democratic one for Israeli citizens, especially if they are Jewish, and one that is, for all intents and purposes, a military one.
For many Israelis, what symbolizes the complete moral bankruptcy of the Israeli government and its disregard even for its own people is Netanyahu’s approach toward the hostages and their families. For the first time in the country’s history, hostages and prisoners of war are not a priority. Typical to Netanyahu and his sycophants’ cavalier attitude to human life, they not only abandon the hostages in the tunnels of Gaza, but they also incite against their families.
A year on and not only does the war in Gaza continue with no end in sight, but it has also now expanded to Lebanon and even Iran. Can this Israeli government define a political endgame or will it take the country down the path of never-ending wars with its enemies? I doubt it will do the former. Yet, despite the hardships endured by all who are embroiled in this conflict, my lasting impression from my visit to the holy land is that there is still an inherent belief in the possibility of a better future for both peoples. It is for the international community to empower them to translate their belief and activism into a new reality.
- Yossi Mekelberg is a professor of international relations and an associate fellow of the MENA Program at Chatham House. X: @YMekelberg