Like Donald Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu is desperate to cling to power and he’ll do so through violent means. Other than losing power if he leaves office, like Trump, Netanyahu faces possible prison time for corruption. Trump mostly created boogeymen out of thin air while Bibi actually has one in Hamas, who are very willing to play the part.
Israel has had four elections over the past two years with Netanyahu barely clinging to power while failing to put together a government. Fighting Bibi also helps keep Hamas in power on their side. Netanyahu is the boogeyman to Palestine. Voters normally doesn’t remove a leader during wartime.
Hamas was formed with a “death to Israel” mantra. Bibi has always operated with a “death to Palestine” philosophy and has adamantly refused to include Israeli Arabs in his government. Israel has always been a U.S. ally, but during the Obama administration, Netanyahu treated our president as an enemy. With Donald Trump, he found a nationalistic hateful partner. There were no real attempts by the U.S. and Israel to negotiate in good faith with the Palestinians during the Orange Shitgibbon era. Moving the U.S. embassy squashed any chances of that.
Israel is an Apartheid state. Even when it’s not being bombed by Israeli airstrikes, Gaza experiences power outages daily between eight to twelve hours. The Gaza Strip has been under a U.S.-led economic boycott since 2006. The strip is 25 miles long and seven and a half miles wide. It’s the third-most densely populated area in the word and an Israeli buffer zone leaves a lot of the land off limits to Palestinians. The population is not allowed to leave or enter the strip or import and export goods, but the Israeli military is free to enter at will. Gaza is dependent on Israel for power, water, telecommunications, and other utilities. The people in Gaza are second-class citizens living in poverty. The Israeli government, Netanyahu in particular, does not care about them.
To preserve its Jewish majority in Jerusalem (which is not in Gaza), with both Israel and Palestinians claim, the Netanyahu government was preparing to evict up to a thousand Palestinian families from the holy city. This is what Jared Kushner would call a real-estate deal. After weeks of clashes between Palestinian protesters and Israeli police, Hamas started firing long-range missiles at Jerusalem and other cities. In response, Israel has hit Gaza with airstrikes.
Neither Hamas or Netanyahu refrain from hitting civilian targets. Even if Hamas only aimed at military targets, their rockets are wildly inaccurate. Over the weekend, Netanyahu hit a building containing offices for news outlets which he has justified. Hitting news outlets with air strikes is probably something Donald Trump would be down with.
The Associated Press reports that at least 200 Palestinians have been killed in the strikes, including 59 children and 35 women, with 1,300 people wounded, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. Eight people in Israel have been killed in rocket attacks launched from Gaza, including a 5-year-old boy and a soldier.
At some point, Hamas will stop firing rockets and Israel will stop delivering airstrikes…until next time. Netanyahu and Hamas will both cling to power while using the other to do so. This conflict will continue indefinitely. I hate to be negative but I don’t ever expect to see a change.
Note: I am appealing, but this cartoon has already been removed by Facebook and my account has been suspended for 24 hours. I’ll update if there is a change to that.
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