Giant Leap Forward

It is never too late to mend. If the age-old proverbial saying stands true in the case of Palestine, the recent move by some European Union nations to recognise the state of Palestine is, indeed, a giant leap forward. This is particularly because of the elongated stalemate that had eaten up the Palestinian cause for ages, as despite relentless disregard for international law, Israel had been entrusted carte blanche to keep getting away with murder to the extent of genocide, building settlements at the Palestinian territories with almost zero consequences as well as taking security control of the Palestinian area in a climate of absolute immunity accorded by the world powers. Be that as it may, Israel’s unrelenting atrocities committed in the Gaza strip, especially after the October 7th Hamas attacks in southern Israel, have seemingly put a dent into the global consciousness.

The official recognition of a particular state by the UN member countries means that it fully meets the statehood conditions under international law, which opens up a path for other nations to establish their diplomatic relations and open their embassies there. Most important of all, the centre of the slew of recent yet positive developments has been the West, not to exclude some South African nations. This is another major shift towards the fate of the decades-old dispute that had been put on the back burner. However, thanks to the distressing turn of events in the last few months, the international community’s moment of rude awakening to the harshness of Israeli brutalities seems to have arrived at long last. Enough is enough. As things currently stand, much-needed pressure is finally building on Israel by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to call for an immediate cease-fire in Rafah and the rest of the places in the Gaza Strip, with more nations getting in on the act to recognise the state of Palestine. On the flip side, Tel Aviv, which has already reduced entire neighbourhoods in Rafah to rubble and forcefully displaced hundreds of thousands of people, looks hell-bent on continuing its killing spree with the misplaced hopes of achieving its sinister objectives through open intimidation and ceaseless bombardment, together with forced displacement of Palestinians from their own territories. Now being perceived by the global community as a kind of international villain owing to its brazen belligerency, Israel has a proven track record of flouting the UN resolutions not once but on a number of occasions. Still, when the world community is asking Tel Aviv to show some restraint, the Israeli leadership is dead set on pushing the oppressed people of Palestine to the wall to the extent of total annihilation and displacement outside the ambit of their own territories called home.

In spite of all this, the role of the Muslim countries in general and of the filthy-rich Arab nations in particular has been nothing more than that of a captive bystander. The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) is almost missing from the picture as it is not only low in taking any concrete measures against Israel other than doing some lip service, but the OIC platform has also, yet again, proved its shallow existence as how worthless this forum tends to be, being unable to serve the primary purpose it was established in 1969. At long last, the need of the hour is to keep up the momentum and put Israel’s reprehensible behaviour in check by not allowing it to further quash the Palestinian uprising against the Israeli occupation and let the people of Palestine have their land back once and for all.