It’s unreasonable for Israel’s UN Ambassador to accuse the UN Chief of “tolerating terrorism” and call for him to resign when all he said was “It is important to also recognize the attacks by Hamas did not happen in a vacuum. The Palestinian people have been subjected to 56 years of suffocating occupation” moreover he followed by saying “the grievances of the Palestinian people can not justify the appalling attacks by Hamas and those appalling attacks can not justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people”. Ignoring the underlying causes of this century-old conflict will not help achieve any kind of long-term peace and any attempts by Israel to rewrite, cover up, or silence those who shed light on the history of this conflict will fail regardless of how hard they try to keep people ignorant of the crimes, past and present, that their nation was built upon and continues to illegally expand upon in the West Bank.

With that said Israel did return all of Gaza to the Palestinians in 2005 and instead of making the most of it while peacefully advocating for an independent and contiguous Palestinian state they elected Hamas in 2006 who was already well-known for their violent fanaticism. Although Hamas did not win a majority of votes in that election and although most of the people in Gaza were too young or not even yet born to vote in that 2006 election they have been stuck with them for the past 17 years. As for the West Bank while all Israeli settlements there are illegal it unfortunately seems that continued Israeli military control, NOT continued settlement expansion, carried out as respectfully as possible is necessary until the vast majority of Palestinians come to the realization that despite being unjustly founded Israel is here to stay and that the best they can hope for is a two-state solution and that can only come by renouncing all forms of violence and opposing any groups or political parties that advocate for it.

Better yet if they could all put their religious differences aside and agree to a unified secular state, something like a Singapore of the Middle East, then there would be no need to put up security walls and fight over borders within the same country. Unfortunately there’s no shortage of violent fanatics on both sides who would never accept living with each other within a secular state and under a modern constitution that gave everyone equal rights. Maybe one day when more people can breakout of their old tribal mindsets such a state will be possible but in the meantime it seems the only viable path forward is two independent states living side by side but I think this would only work if the Palestinian state disarmed and allowed Israel to secure the borders in the interest of both states while allowing Palestinians to govern and police a contiguous Palestinian state under Palestinian law and under what I would hope would be a modern and tolerant Palestinian constitution.