The recent breaking down of the wall between Gaza and Egypt is a demonstration of the dignity of the occupied Palestinian people – imprisoned in the Gaza Strip, one of the most densely populated areas of the world – in breaking out of their imprisonment without shedding blood.
As Israeli journalist Amira Hass wrote in the Israeli daily Ha’aretz, the fall of the Rafah wall between Gaza and Egypt was a combination of planning and a precise reading of the political and social map by the Hamas government, mixed with a mass response to the dictates of the overlord, Israel.
According to Hass – who is uniquely placed as an Israeli living in the West Bank city of Ramallah, and therefore knows what is going on in Palestinian society more than most Israelis – many people knew that ‘anonymous figures’ have been destabilising the foundations of the wall for several months, so that it was possible to knock it down when the time came.
But the secret was not leaked, and when hundreds of people began leaving Palestinian Rafah immediately after the wall was breached, they demonstrated a unique partnership between the leadership and the people who, despite the risk, were determined to break the Israeli rules of the game. This is popular resistance at its best – no bloodshed, no violence.
It has been clear for a long time – and many Israeli commentators are in agreement about this – that the closure of the Gaza Strip and the cessation of electricity and other vital services would make the Hamas government and the Gazans more determined than before to resist the consequences of the closure imposed by Israel after it evacuated Gaza.
However, the breakout and the collapse of the wall might indeed motivate Israel to finalise the separation of the Gaza Strip from the West Bank, making the establishment of a viable Palestinian state even less possible.
This, of course, may serve the purposes of the PLO – the only Palestinian partners to negotiate with Israel – who, while condemning the closure of Gaza, enjoy the privileges heaped upon them by Israel.
According to Hass, the chance of using the breach of the wall to move forward towards a popular struggle is hampered by two factors. The first is the continuity of the ‘armed struggle’, such as rocket fire on Israeli towns or suicide bombings inside Israel, even though the ‘armed struggle’, understandable as it is, achieves further oppression. The second obstacle, she stresses, is the refusal of the Ramallah Palestinian government to speak with Hamas, who were democratically elected by the Palestinian people.
Like many others (although still a minority within Israel), I believe that the current avowed aim of the Israeli government of ‘two states for two nations’ – that is, a separation between Israel and the Palestinians by, among other means, the separation wall – is becoming increasingly impossible.
This is not only because of the large blocs of Jewish settlers and the Israeli ref-usal to grant the Palestinians territorial continuity, but also because of the rift between the PLO and Hamas. This rift ultimately serves Israel’s purposes, as the Ramallah government, according to Hass, seems to be listening to Israel and the US, but not to the voices of its own people.
Dr Ronit Lentin is head of the MPhil in Ethnic and Racial Studies at the Department of Sociology at Trinity College Dublin. Her column appears fortnightly in Metro Eireann
