Editorial: Palestinian peace solution in Israel's hands

Smoke and fire from the explosion of an Israeli strike rise over Gaza City. Photo / AP

Opinion

With luck, the latest ceasefire agreement in Gaza will still be in force this morning. Though agreed to last only three days, the talks to be held in that time envisage a deal that looks like a balanced settlement for the time being. Hamas, the elected hardline Government of Gaza, would let soldiers loyal to the more moderate Palestinian President, Mahmoud Abbas, control the territory's crossing points to Israel and Egypt. That gives Gaza reason to hope its essential supply lines will be restored. Israel, meanwhile, is satisfied that its four-week campaign has reduced Hamas' fighting capability and hopes the border controls will prevent it rearming.

Once again, Israel may have bought itself a respite from rockets and other incursions from Palestinian territory, but nobody expects it will be a lasting peace. It was another unequal contest as the death toll daily testified. Palestinian casualties were not only heavy, they included children in schools that Israel bombed in the belief militants were using those places as human shields. The carnage was well reported by foreign correspondents in Gaza, and Israel's international stocks of goodwill sank further by the day. Protest marches were mounted in Auckland on the past two weekends and this week, the Green Party called on the Government to expel Israel's ambassador. The Government rightly declined to go that far.

Expelling an ambassador is one of the more drastic steps available to diplomacy and it should not be devalued by use in circumstances where New Zealand's national interest is not directly involved. It would do little to influence events; it would merely signal that this is not a country willing to hear both sides of a distant debate. It would also deprive New Zealand of the ability to take that drastic action in the event of an incident as serious as the attempt by suspected Israeli agents to obtain New Zealand passports in 2004.

At that time, Israel had already closed its Wellington embassy to save money and Helen Clark's Government suspended diplomatic relations that had been conducted through the embassy in Canberra. It was not until 2009, under a new Government, that Israel reopened a mission in New Zealand. We should not be too hasty to close it down.

International outrage is said to have little impact in Israel, where public opinion heavily supported the crackdown on Gaza. Many were probably hoping for a more decisive result than this week's tentative deal. But few, if any, Israeli citizens these days appear to entertain the hope that they might live in genuine and lasting security. They are resigned to living under more or less permanent siege and to the need to strike back periodically, as they are doing now.

Militant leaders can be killed, their known positions destroyed, their tunnels blown up and their supply lines blocked, but all of this has been done before. The world has witnessed innumerable cycles of Palestinian provocation and heavy Israeli retaliation over the past 40 years and nothing has been achieved. Palestinians continue to lose their homes and territory to unauthorised Jewish settlements on the West Bank and Israelis continue to live under constant threat of bombs from people they have displaced.

When trouble erupts, there is always fault on both sides. Analysts can always argue about which incident started the latest outbreak. But in every intractable conflict it is the side in possession of more power that has the greater ability to break the cycle. Peace may be possible in Palestine only when Israel comes to an accommodation with Palestine's displaced population. Until something of that magnitude happens, the Middle East will continue to endure regular bouts of an endless war.