As we are constantly bombarded by the ongoing conflict in Gaza and the ever-widening theatre of war to now include The West Bank, Golan Heights and Lebanon, along with the ever-present threat of Iran being swept up in the carnage, it is important to consider the history of the region, beyond Israel/Palestine and definitely well before the attack of October 7 last year. To understand the seemingly intractable conflict it is good to gain an understanding of cultural, political and imperial ambitions which have so marked the region.

The idea which is Zionism was born out of the growing sense of nationalism in Europe where the various nation states sought to find a special identity, based in part on religion, language and territory. Jews throughout Christendom had been sidelined in the regions they occupied, never accepted into the definitions of nationality, and so sought to define their own definition based on an ethnicity which included six schools of thought.

Political, which sought to define Jews as a distinct people, not limited to religious adherence. With the rise of national identity there was the need to establish a state, a Jewish state since Jews were not considered ‘native’ to any European nation. In 1905 the decision to seek that nation state in the Biblical lands of Eretz Israel was made. 1905 was the timing of a Russian pogrom since Jews were blamed for the instability in Russia, and the first attempt to overthrow the Czarist regime.

In considering labour and how its produce and wealth was to be distributed, the idea of a Kibbutz based economy was promoted and very early settlers began arriving in Palestine and established Kibbutzes, a communal economy where all labour was shared.

Revision of the extent of Israeli borders was promoted to include sovereignty over the Old Testament defined lands.

Other thoughts were on religion, culture, including the revitalisation of the ancient Hebrew language, and the inclusion and support for diaspora Zionism, Jews who did not want to leave where they lived, such as in America, Britain, Australia, Europe, but supported the Zionist ideals and through that to exert the power of the Jewish political lobbyists which is evident on both political support for Israel and repression of pro-Palestinian support.

The political power of Zionists led to British Foreign Secretary, Lord Balfour, in November 1917 writing a letter to Lord Lionel Walter Rothschild who was President of the British Zionist Federation, which included the following 67 words:

“His Majesty’s Government views with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of the existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.”

It is important to note that no where in those 67 words is there mention of the establishment of a Jewish state, rather the implication that Jews can settle in Palestine and live at peace with the existing inhabitants. It also predates the end of WWI, pre-empting the carve up of the Ottoman Empire.

The second consideration is Imperialism.

During the First World War, Britain, France and Russia engaged in secret agreements on the carve up of the disintegrating Ottoman Empire. When Russia withdrew from the war in 1917, the British and French continued to negotiate and came up with Sykes-Picot Agreement which divided up the Middle East with lines on the map which ignored cultural and ethnic divisions, sharing the hoped for spoils of war between the two allies. The importance of oil in the region was recognised with the Mosul region becoming an important bargaining chip.

Importantly, the area of Palestine was excluded in the carve up, instead was designated to be an internationally administered region, part of the ‘Egyptian Protectorate’, with Jerusalem as a free city. In his 2009 book, Balfour and Weizmann: The Zionist, the Zealot and the Emergence of Israel, Geoffrey Lewis notes that “This would make the Jewish infiltration into Palestine less obvious and annoying to the susceptibilities of the Muslim and even certain elements in the Christian world” (page 96)

In a chapter entitled Painting Othello Black of his book Night of Power: The Betrayal of the Middle East, Robert Fisk looks at the destabilising impact of European Imperialism in the Middle East going back into the 19th century, but he cites a particular incident with the Egyptian attempt at nationalising the Suez Canal in the 1950s.

“Just over 70 years after Galdstone’s folly, a Tory government under Anthony Eden decided to invade Egypt yet again, following Colonel Nasser’s nationalisation of the Sues Canal…

… Anthony Eden and most of his cabinet colleagues did everything they could to conceal the shameful history of Britain’s plan – to draw up in secret with France and Israel – to invade Egypt and topple Nasser, even to the point of destroying the secret documents of the agreement at Sevres, where the three powers concocted their bloody expedition. Put simply, they agreed that Israel would invade Egypt and that Britain and France would then ‘intervene’ on the ground to ‘safeguard’ the Suez Canal. The real Purpose of the ‘intervention’ would be the overthrow of Nasser.” (Page 89)

The destabilising actions of Britain and the USA of the Middle East can be seen as a defence of Israel, yet, as so often happens, unintended consequences appear, such as the destabilisation of Iraq through the war in search of non-existent weapons of mass destruction and the excuse to wage war in the wrong country after 9/11 and then handing the oil reserves over to the largest oil companies, BP and Exxon, breeding discontent between the Sunni and Shiite Iraqis which led to the formation of ISIS and support for besieged Palestinians in Gaza.

Again, from Night of Power, “But the sickness continued. America’s disaster in Iraq infected Jordan and then Lebanon with Al-Qieda. The arrival of gunmen from Fatah al-Islam in the Nahr al-Bared Palestinian camp in the north of Lebanon 2007, and scores of civilian dead, were the direct result of the Sunni uprising in Iraq” (Page 109)

The destabilisation of Iraq led to a rise in terrorist groups and a source of weapons and ideology which has led to the growth of resistance to Israeli power.

Is it any wonder that the US and its allies are Israel’s strongest supporters. Imagine if the billions of dollars of oil revenue the oil giants are banking fell into the hands of the ‘terrorists’. Is it any wonder that the supply of weapons to Israel has exceeded $30billion while aid to the stricken Palestinians is less than $1billion.

A destabilised Middle East is in Israel’s interests, it’s territorial expansion, to take in the biblical lands of Judaea and Samaria (West Bank and Golan Heights) to realise the Zionist dream of Eretz Israel. For some, the ambitions are even greater, in a recent interview a speaker claimed the land from the Tigris River to the Mediterranean Sea.

European Imperialism has always been about resources, whether to produce coffee, tea, sugar or tobacco, or to take land for the resources it contains, gold, silver and in more recent times to satisfy the needs of manufacturing, iron, coal, bauxite, and other minerals and let’s not forget oil.

The indigenous peoples are seen as less than human, just in the way of the raping of the land.

Israelis are seen as more like Europeans, some how more civilised, more human, more worthy than the Arabs they seek to displace.

Besides, they are God’s People.

Just ask them.