Israel’s imaginings of forced displacement, and UN culpability

The forced displacement of Palestinians is taking up much of the Israeli imagination. From the Yellow Line, to pilot projects instead of reconstruction, the bottom line is that, according to Israel, Palestinians should remained forcibly displaced. The latest perception added to these narratives comes from former Israeli General Giora Eiland, who recommended that Gaza remains destroyed for generations and that Israel should not withdraw from the Yellow Line.

As far as not withdrawing from the territory Israel has militarily occupied, the answer has been clear from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. There are no veneers left; the international community has made it possible for Netanyahu to declare colonial intent without the slightest condemnation, let alone political opposition. What happens next, and in the long term, will likely see Palestinians not returning to their homes in Gaza. Eiland stated that Israel does not need to build settlements in Gaza, but the territory can be used as a security buffer zone used by the military. Meanwhile Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has renewed calls for establishing settlements in Gaza.

For Netanyahu, the main concern is establishing military control over Gaza; military occupation supports Palestinians’ forced displacement from Gaza.

The call, according to Israel, is for everyone to make except Palestinians. Building settlements is likely to win more favour among Israelis than leaving Gaza destroyed in its current form. It is also unlikely that Israel destroyed Gaza just for the sake of leaving the enclave as a memory of the genocide it inflicted upon the Palestinian people. If history is a precedent, rebuilding over the destruction is a more plausible scenario than leaving tangible evidence. The fact that the concept of rebuilding Gaza is now reduced to pilot projects also makes the case for allowing Israel complete autonomy over colonial expansion in Gaza. It also validates Netanyahu’s assertion that there will be no military withdrawal from Gaza.

Gaza’s reconstruction as publicised first by the UN and later by the Board of Peace as authorised by the UN Security Council are relics of a past paradigm that failed Palestinians up to the genocide.

Israel will no longer be bound by international efforts, humanitarian aid, or the slightest semblance of international law. When the international community allows a genocide to happen, debates it for almost two years and acknowledges it less than a month before a ceasefire was declared, the ramifications remain deadly. To renege on such impunity as was granted to Israel would require the UN to unravel its own complicity in genocide. Turning a blind eye to colonial expansion is much easier.

However, the UN did not only turn a blind eye to colonial expansion. It also refused to acknowledge the link between Gaza and the forcibly displaced Palestinians by shifting entire responsibility for Gaza to the US which, in turn, will grant full concession to Israel, as is already happening. When Eiland speaks of Gaza as a site of colonial violence – to glorify not to condemn – the repercussions of forced displacement are as clear as building settlements in Gaza. The UN and its penchant for failed paradigms, however, created the foundations for all that transpired in the Gaza genocide. Hidden in plain sight, as always since the 1948 Nakba, are the forcibly displaced Palestinians.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.