The terrible suffering of Palestinian civilians is the price for the other people's strategic goals in the Middle East, deems Amira Dan, the Canadian-Bosnian scholar, a research associate at the Centre for Jewish Studies at York University, who spoke to N1's Nikola Vucic about the Israel-Palestine relations and the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Gaza, which comes as a result of the latest escalation of the conflict.

Dan deems that one of the consequences of the Hamas terrorist attack of October 7, the massacre of 1,400 and 200 people taken hostage will be the “death of the creation of the State of Palestine project.”

“It suits Benjamin Netanyahu, who was fighting for his survival up until yesterday; it suits Hamas, which is turning from a terrorist group into a political actor, and which is legitimised by the rallies in the West; it also suits Hamas sponsors Iran and Qatar,” she stressed, noting that in this way the Palestinians have again been sacrificed for the interests of the regional politics.

According to her, Iran sees itself as the only regional power and the leader of the Persian Gulf countries. Also, she added, the rapprochement of Israel with the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, which has been happening under the auspices of the United States over the past years, was seen as alarming in Tehran.

On the other side of the Gulf, Dan said, there is Saudi Prince Mohammad bin Salman, who is about to turn the close ties of his family with the US into a concrete, military supremacy and leadership in the region.

“This rapprochement between Israel and the Gulf countries fell into the background after Hamas attacks and Israel's declaration of war, but according to the transcript of the phone conversation between President (Joe) Biden and Bin Salman dated 10/25, we see that the process will continue ‘after the end of the war.’ So the terrible suffering of Palestinian civilians is (again) the price for achieving other people's strategic goals in the Middle East”, she said.

Asked what are the chances of the Israel-Palestine ‘Gordian knot’ being untied in new peace talks, which would put an end to the suffering of innocent people, Dan said that she sees no immediate solution to the new crisis or the war.

“Benjamin Netanyahu has no vision of the future and offers nothing to the Jewish people but half-baked military solutions on which, judging by the slowness of their implementation, a consensus does not exist. If the creation of Israel was the fulfillment of the promise that the Shoah (a World War II genocide) would never happen again, that promise was broken on October 7. Without comparing the number of victims and the degree of destruction in Gaza and Israel, I can say that every new Hamas rocket that hits a target undermines the sense of security a little more, and strengthens the anger of Israelis towards the government of Benjamin Netanyahu,” according to Dan.

She also commented on the words of Israeli intellectual Gideon Levy, who recently said that radical creation of a new reality is a necessity, and that it implies one state.

According to Dan, creation of one single state at this moment sounds “surreal.”

“It is clear that the unbearable suffering of the Palestinians must stop, and that life as it is today in Israel cannot continue. Is there any prospect of building a modern civil state in Israel/Palestine in the foreseeable future? As I write this, the Israeli army is entering the Gaza Strip. The goals of the massive destruction of life and property that we are witnessing, and now the possible occupation, are still unclear: What does the “total destruction of Hamas” mean?,” she asked, wondering how would a terrorist group even capitulate if it was defeated in the war.

And then she got back to the initial question about Levy's idea:

“A single state may be the only permanent solution, but the question of “when” is still in the realm of science fiction.”