Recognising Palestine won't stop the killing, on either side
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Australia's white-saviour act at the UN next month won't stop the killing or the associated conflict on our streets. It won't release from hell the Israeli, Thai and Nepalese hostages starved and tortured by Hamas for almost two years now. No pronouncement by any foreign leader will have the slightest impact on peace, security or co-existence for Israelis or Palestinians.
Israelis are screaming and IDF generals threatening to resign because Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's latest plan for Gaza will prolong both the horror of war for all, and the longevity of his coalition.
West Bank Palestinians despise the Palestinian Authority (PA), which has no ability to implement any of the 'commitments' it has made to the international community. I remember a Palestinian academic sneering to our 2023 tour group that the only thing PA leader Mahmoud Abbas could organise was a parade for himself.
Hamas still has a stranglehold on Gaza's population, whom it's terrorised for 18 years, using civilians as human shields, stealing food from them, beating and murdering dissenters.
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Let Palestine be recognised as a state, and held accountable as a state actor, finally. Let the corrupt and complicit UNRWA be shut down because Palestinians won't be refugees any more; they'll have a state to return to. Let there be elections where the PA losers don't get thrown to their deaths off roofs by the Hamas winners, as in 2007. Let them reconcile their contradictory commitments to 'statehood' (the PA) and a global caliphate (Hamas Charter). May our government's great faith not be misplaced.
I wish Wong and Albanese had been on the tour I led this May, meeting Jewish, Muslim, Christian, Druze and Palestinian women who graciously shared with us their intertwined lived experiences. One was the very first non-Jewish person to reach out to me after October 7: a Palestinian friend who lives in East Jerusalem.
The sisterhood, mutual empathy and pragmatism of these women in the middle of a war zone stood in stark contrast with the performative sloganeering that fills our social media feeds and shamefully, our Hansards, too.
The women we met in May were focused on the future. They look into the faces of their children every day.
After WWII, the defeated Germany needed to rebuild its economy and deprogram its people after years of antisemitic indoctrination and warmongering had crippled them. The international community helped them with both, and the result was a spectacular success. Why don't we offer a similar, strength-based approach to Palestine?
Let's put people ahead of political posturing and give the faces of both Palestinian and Israeli children something to turn to with hope in their eyes.
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