12 errores sobre la guerra árabe-israelí

Un día lo traduzco. De  Palestine Loves Israel:

12 misperceptions about this war:

- "The war has weakend Hamas." - This is not true. Before the war, Hamas was weaker than ever. Polls said, only 15% of Palestinians supported Hamas in the beginning of 2014. But history proofs that each war actually strengthens the support for extremist groups.
Tunnels and weapons were not the only thing that was destroyed in the past 4 weeks. Gaza is in ruins and Hamas is not weaker.
 
- "The war makes Israel a safer place" - Probably not. While Israel has any right to defend itself and it's citizens, it should do it wisely. Bombing Gaza to ruins will not drive out the extremists, it will make them stronger.
 
- "Hamas are only defending it's people" - Bullshit. Hamas doesn't care about it's people. If they would, they would sit down and negotiate and would not put them into danger.
 
- "Palestine must only get rid of Hamas and everything is fine" - it's more complicated than this. 1. Hamas is not a unitary organisation any more, they are divided among themselves in branches of which some are more extremistic and some more moderate. 2. If Hamas were gone, the vacuum could possibly be filled with an even more extremistic group such as ISIS, which would cause much more problems. The solution would be to strengthen the moderate parties among the Palestinians and to invest in programmes of de-radicalization and that would mean the end of Hamas.
 
- "It's the Zionist's fault!" - Oh this often heard bullshit! Zionism means to believe that Jews have a right to have their own state in Israel. Most people in Israel are therefore Zionists and many of them do support a free and independent state of Palestine. Zionism is not racism, Zionism is not evil, Zionism is not a conspiracy and Zionists have no horns on the forehead. It's not the fault of Zionists, it's the fault of incapable politicians on both sides.

 - "Over 50% of the dead were Hamas members." Wrong. All of the top members of Hamas have left the strip in the beginning. None of the leaders have died. Most victims were civilians, many of them children and they all died a terrible death.
 
- "But Palestinians voted for Hamas in 2007" - Right. But Palestinians did not vote for Hamas because they are all terrorists, but because Hamas promised them schools, infrastructure, social services and sort of a perspective. Since 2007, the support for Hamas declined dramatically. That's why they hesitate to hold elections now.
 
- "There is no occupation, Israel left the strip in 2005". Partly correct. Israel left Gaza but that doesn't mean that life for Palestinians became better. The ongoing siege on Gaza destroyed economy, created immense poverty, made Gaza an open air prison. The main reason for extremism is poverty and the lack of perspective. No matter how you call it, it's an unbearable situation that creates more problems than it solves.
 
- "Israel has no reason to whine, they are protected by Iron Dome after all!" - Iron Dome catches about 90% of the rockets but that doesn't mean that there is no danger. The south of Israel has been suffering from an almost constant fireing of rockets. Since the year 2000, there were hundreds of terror attacks on Israelis with lots of victims. Israel has enough reason to "whine".
 
- "Jews have no roots in this land." - These are antisemitic lies. People have to understand that Judaism is not only a religion, it's a culture and ethnic group and their roots lie in the area that was once called Canaan. 

 - "There is no Palestine and Palestinians are not a people" - This is a racist lie. Palestine, or "Filistine" as it's pronunced, has never been properly defined as a state (it was part of the ottoman empire before 1948) but that doesn't mean that the palestinian tribe doesn't exist. We have a very old culture of our own and our roots lie in the area that was once called Canaan.
 
- "There is no solution to the conflict!" - There is always a solution but there is not a military solution. This conflict cannot be solved with war and violence. It can only be solved by working very hard on diplomatic negotiations and by strenghtening the moderate forces on both sides. Israel and the PA must now show courage and wisdom to negotiate and work out a new peace plan. Both must invest in programmes of de-radicalization and must show the courage to build bridges. Right now, the only peace work that is done among Israel and Palestine is from NGOs and grassroot-movements like ours and that is too few. Both governments must invest in this kind of peace work.