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When Israel holds the Initiative!

May 22,2018 - Last updated at May 22,2018

Israel seems to be in full control of the course of events in our region.

That is an alarming reality because Israel plans to remove any and all obstacles in the face of its grand colonisation scheme of all of Palestine. It appears to be ready to destroy anything in its path, even at the risk of starting greater regional wars with unimaginable consequences.

Israel has always sought total colonisation of Palestine and domination in the region, and has all along been given US support.

The only difference is that if in the past, US backing was just enough to enable Israel to maintain and even increase all of its illegal territorial acquisitions of the little left of Palestinian territory, the current administration seems to be fully committed to adopt Israel's entire perspective, however illegal, destabilising and potentially destructive.

It is quite impossible to expect the US to turn its back on Israel in favour of the Palestinians or the Arabs. The US, and the many other world powers, argue that they have a right and obligation to support Israel. But no such obligation extends to supporting Israel's aggression, occupation, flagrant violations of international law, oppression of the Palestinian people and most dangerously, Israel's relentless incitement to ignite devastating wars, one after the other, to distract from its ongoing lethal practices.

The astounding irony is that a small state, living since its creation outside the perimeters of international law, ended up leading major powers, not only to endorse its flagrant lawlessness, but to defend it, heedless of the harm done as a result to the entire UN system and the main principles of world peace and security as sought by the UN charter.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu leads the most extreme and right-wing government in Israel's history that has no consideration for regional calm based on mutual, orderly, lawful and normal relations.

Netanyahu and his predecessors have chosen to evade all avenues opened repeatedly for them to reach peaceful settlements with the Palestinians and the Arab countries, striving instead to impose by sheer force and continued aggression their plans to deny Palestinians all their rights.

Netanyahu believes that by crushing the Palestinians by all available means: siege and starvation, massive detention, cruel oppression, cutting off any sympathy and external support, demonising them as "terrorists" and by crippling UNRWA, he and his government could sanitise the land for a trouble-free Israel.

Although such tactics have been cruel and catastrophic for the last 70 years, Israel continues to push the same tactics undeterred.

"Ironclad" American support, as President Barack Obama used to call it, has so far been Israel's enabler in blocking peace and maintaining Israel's violent control over the lives of millions of Palestinians.

Despite the elimination of all possibilities for positive change, in fact the situation kept getting worse, some parties continued to entertain hope that one day the sides would return to the negotiating table and talk reconciliation. Towards that end, they kept calling for a peaceful settlement based on the two-state solution, the 1967 borders and a shared capital of Jerusalem, denying the inevitable reality that such ideas, if they were ever viable, have long been destroyed by the facts on the ground imposed by Israel.

With the Trump administration those hopes are radically dashed. Trump appears to be executing everything Netanyahu is asking for.

It began with Trump's decision to recognise occupied Jerusalem as Israel's capital followed by moving the US embassy there, and doing so in a deliberately triumphalist and provocative manner as Palestinians marked 70 years since the Nakba.

All these policies show contempt for US Arab and European allies whose powerlessness to change US policy the Trump administration took for granted.

The ceremony was specifically designed to be offensive. By declaring Israel the custodian of all Jerusalem and its holy Muslim and Christian holy places, Jared Kushner, who represented his father-in-law at the infamous occasion, acted as if the Arab city of Jerusalem was his family's farm to do with as they please.

But neither Kushner, nor those working with him, can abolish Palestinian rights to their occupied city or tamper with His Majesty King Abdulla's Hashemite historic custodianship of the Muslim and Christian holy places in Jerusalem, the future capital of Palestine.

Israel will not escape the outcome of such flagrant aggression, nor will it ever find the peace it claims to want through colonial imposition backed by the US, and indeed by the European Union, which despite verbal protests has yet to take any steps to check Israel.

But that is not all. Netanyahu, an irresponsible adventurer, a warmonger and war criminal who is facing potential corruption charges at home, is pushing for a war against Iran, which would mean more devastation in a region that is still reeling from the shocks of the Israeli-backed American invasion of Iraq 15 years ago.

Sadly, Netanyahu has found regional allies bent on pursuing the same path.

The fanatics in Israel now have their counterparts back in power in Washington, in the form of figures like John Bolton, the US national security adviser. If such people, along with Israel, continue to pursue their extremist agenda, the region faces decades more of violence and chaos.

There are not many reassuring signs except a few sane voices in the US media and in Europe, which needs to do more. The situation remains dangerous and charged. Israel needs to be restrained.

There are enough wars already. Israel's hand is clearly visible in all of them. The region needs, and deserves, to live in peace and normal relations. The only obstacle is Israel's aggression and continued occupation. That has to end.

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