Israel and Palestine are war-torn and ravaged places. A CNN reporter recorded many of the horrors he saw there. Gaza is now a “wasteland” ruled by Hamas, and because of the Hamas rule, the Israeli government has made it difficult for the people living there to travel or even trade or receive more than is absolutely necessary for life. “No one is staving, but the economy has come to a stand still” and there are severe shortages of other necessary resources, such as fuel for energy, which results in things like hospitals being routinely cut off from energy in order to conserve it. Similar conditions can be seen in the West Bank.
All across both these areas resentment of the ones who let this continue is high. That includes every one from Hamas to the Israeli government to the US, and many fear a third insurgence, far more devastating than the previous two.
Furthermore, there have been and still are many instances of damaging attacks on Israel from Hamas and other anti-Israeli factions.
With this as a backdrop, George Bush has arrived in Tel Aviv declaring his visit “a new opportunity for peace in the Holy Land,” which indicates a good deal of hubris on his part. Rob Malley, an experienced negotiator, believes that there is not a good chance of success in this venture. The constant violence and the need to negotiate between three different groups (Israel, Fatah, and Hamas) in many different sub-conflicts, combined with the fact that a single bomb could at this point launch all three groups into war contribute to this low chance of success. However, Malley says that it is not impossible for some form of treaty to be made, because “all three actors see real merits [in reaching an agreement] because of their relative weaknesses.” There is still a chance for peace in this decades–old war ground.
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