ISRAEL PALESTINE -WAR AND PEACE

TOP TO BOTTOM - INSIDE & OUTSIDE

Going on the Marxian presumption that all wars have an economic base that I believe to be true, trying to analyze the ongoing struggle between the Palestinians and the Israelis, mandates a look at the economic forces at work over the years from 1948 to the present.

The purpose of this effort is to ascertain the chance for peace between these two Peoples and what it will take to get there.

Top to Bottom is a shortcut description of the forces at work in the economic hierarchies that have influenced the chances of war and peace between the antagonists. Similarly, Inside and Outside delves into those economic forces at work that have influenced and affected peace efforts and continuing war between the two peoples.

It is a given that political leadership is tied to economic or financial powers. The influence over government policy by the public at large, even in open democratic and transparent societies, is minimal and always fragmented by economic status, religion, patriotism, and educational levels. This nurtured lack of cohesiveness saps the “power of the people” and leads to powerlessness. The people, the masses, are the “Bottom” of those who affect war and peace. A primary function of this group is to provide the soldiery for the wars determined by others. This group never gains from war, yet is manipulated to believe that they are doing the right thing, that they are doing good by supporting war and by going to war.

On the other hand, the Top makes money from war. They increase their wealth and control over masses of people who are the cannon fodder. The Top consists of armaments and munitions makers, planes, tanks, and trucks makers, suppliers of clothing, food and all commodities to armies. Suppliers of medical supplies and equipment are the Top. Land beneficiaries are Top. Communications developers and suppliers are Top. Warships and commercial ships are top. Fuel suppliers are Top. Think of all the machinery-makers who make all these elements that go to war. They are also Top. And most important, war destroys all this “stuff,” so the wealth keeps rolling in so long as war continues. The Israeli Palestinian conflict is an ideal educational model for the Top.

Now, for the Bottom. Let’s start with the makers of caskets and the growers of flowers. They benefit from war - but not on the scale of the Top. But they are the Top of the Bottom. The Bottom are the soldiers who march off to death with patriotism in their bellies. The Bottom are the parents, wives and children the soldiers left behind, many glorious in their patriotism and belief in God and country to support the pain and anxiety. Whether the Bottom stays behind or marches forward, they never benefit from war. They only benefit from peace yet have no power to bring peace nor enforce it. “Theirs not to question, “Why?” Theirs, but to do and die.” This powerless mass of people simply forms the mix from which gold is mined- nothing more. They may vote. Yet their vote is meaningless given the choices on their ballots. Convinced that ownership of guns gives them might and rights, the guns they use are to create wealth for the makers of guns, in armies or in pools of slobs. They are the bottom. God guides them as He is wielded by power elites.

What meaning does “Inside” have on the issue of war and peace? "Inside” refers to the entities directly on the front lines; the countries or groups cited in news reports, the nations, countries, rebel groups and the like, shooting at each other. So, for the Israel Palestine conflict, the Inside are Israel and the Palestinian people located in the West Bank and Gaza - and to some degree, within Israel proper. Additional Inside entities are all the terrorist groups shooting at Israel and the supposedly non-terrorist religious groups, like Hezbolla in Lebanon and spin-offs in Gaza who have declared war on Israel and are determined to wipe it off the face of the earth.

“Outside” are all the political and geographic entities that are affected positively and negatively by this ongoing conflict. Indeed, many of the Outside have fomented and contributed to the ongoing conflict believing it to be beneficial to their internal political interests, the maintenance of the status quo. Yasser Arafat, the “George Washington” of the Palestinian People, ran around to the capitols of the Arab world, collecting money and arms in exchange for Palestinian blood to continue the Israel-Palestinian conflict. Arafat scuttled every peace effort that may have halted the slaughter.

The Outside is not to be confused with the Top despite the similarities between the two groups. The accumulation of wealth drives the Top. Most of the Muslim Outside is directly surreptitiously involved in the conflict so as to maintain stability in their homelands. The conflict is pointed to as the reason for the sad condition of the masses in these generally oligarchic countries. The twenty Outside Arab countries have closed their borders to Palestinian refugees from the wars that these Outside countries have initiated, funded, and educated their citizenry to decry. To this day, funding for the continuation of the conflict pours in from Iran, the Gulf States, the Osama bin Laden congregation of terrorist entities, charitable Muslim groups in the Western World, and sadly, also from many left-wing groups deploring Israel’s military tactics in the face of homeless, poverty-stricken Palestinians who have provided most of the blood for the wars fomented by the Top and Outside against Israel.

The Outside are all the countries that dip their toes into the raging waters. The Outside is the United Nations and the United States of America. The outside are all the countries doing business with the oligarchies and their billions of barrels of oil. There is a balance in the status quo of on again off again conflict. This situation provides a laboratory for the testing of future weaponry.

Israel and its “allies” and supporters - and indeed - the hapless Palestinians, have yet to find the way out of this constantly changing maze created to continue the war and destruction so beneficial to the controlling money-making Top and Inside and Outside forces, so useful to their cause and so detrimental to peace. Major wars in other places do not seem to interfere with the ongoing perpetual attempt to wipe Israel off the map.