Encouraged by the Trump administration - its decision to shift the US embassy from Tel Aviv to occupied Jerusalem and to cut financial support for the UN Relief and Works Agency's operations in the West Bank - Israel is trying to consolidate its control over entire Jerusalem. In a latest development, Israeli forces raided the offices of Palestinian governor of Jerusalem to confiscate important documents. The raid happened after the Palestinian Authority (PA) arrested a Palestinian with US citizenship for selling property in East Jerusalem - the Palestinians see it as the capital of their elusive state - to a Jewish buyer. PA, of course, reacted angrily to the provocation calling it a "dangerous escalation of the occupation and a flagrant violation of all international laws and agreements." Israel occupied whatever was left of the historic Palestine, including East Jerusalem, in the 1967 war and later annexed it in blatant defiance of international law and UN Security Council resolutions.
Much of the prevailing turmoil and instability in the Middle East are a direct consequence of Western interventions. It may be recalled that during the First World War, Britain and France elicited the support of Arabs against the Ottoman Empire using false promises of helping them attain independence from the Ottoman rule. Soon after achieving their objective, the two colonial powers reached a secret understanding to create their respective spheres of influence in the region. They struck a deal called the Asia Minor Agreement, better known as the Sykes-Picot Agreement, drawing mandatory lines in the map of the Middle East. The region's ethnic and religious divisions were purposely ignored. That agreement has been at the heart of so much that troubles the Middle East till to-date. The most intractable problem it produced has been the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. However, many point to the implosion of Arab nation-states - Iraq and Syria - to contend that the Sykes-Picot agreement is unraveling. The argument carries weight to a considerable extent. Yet the fact remains that the breakdown of those three Arab states is the result of US-led Western military interventions. And in each case, foreign meddling has given rise to violent extremists like the IS and al-Qaeda offshoots.
Buoyed by US's blind support and some secret and not-so-secret overtures by certain Arab potentates Israel feels emboldened to continue with its policy of bloody suppression, confiscation of Palestinian lands, and construction of Jewish colonies. Living under occupation for over 50 years - the longest occupation in modern history - the Palestinians have not given up the fight for their legitimate rights. They cannot be forced into submission. Dispossessions and humiliations only fuel Palestinian anger, driving them away from what they see a weak leadership of the Palestinian Authority and towards more radical forces. At some point, Israel's destructive policy is going to blow up in its face.
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