My Hopes for Gaza

As of 5 p.m. EDT today (midnight local time), Israel will seal off all 21 Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip, as well as four in the West Bank, and begin forcibly evacuating those occupants who do not voluntarily return to Israel proper. I hope very much that the operation goes smoothly, and that the settlers cooperate with IDF forces and Palestinian police there to assist with the transfer.

I strongly agree with the decision taken by the Sharon government to withdraw Israeli troops and settlers from the Gaza Strip. I think that it is a healthy step toward eventual peace in the region, and I sincerely hope that the Palestinian Authority can maintain order within Gaza as well as protect nearby Israelis from attacks by militant groups, both in the short and long terms.

In the summer of 2003, I traveled to Israel with several other college newspaper editors, and while there we had the opportunity to meet Israeli setttlers both from the West Bank and the Golan - although not from Gaza. I will never forget the intensity with which they spoke of their "right" to build and live in the occupied territories, so I can only imagine the feelings now from their counterparts as they are being asked and forced to leave a place they - rightly or wrongly - consider their own.

I will also never forget what a beautiful and fascinating place Israel is, and the hope I left with that someday I will be able to return there without the need to have a young man on our bus carrying an automatic weapon. I believe that only a two-state solution with a viable Palestinian government will make that hope a reality, and the Gaza withdrawal will be, with any luck at all, a good first step toward not only the establishment of a Palestinian state, but also the future security of Israel itself.