As we mourn with the citizens of Orlando, we must also stand by the people of Tel Aviv as they tend to their wounds. India must send an unequivocal message that it stands by all victims of terrorism in their hour of distress
Even as Paris, Brussels and Istanbul are still recovering from the aftermath of recent terror attacks, the United States has just been hit by what is being described as “the deadliest mass shooting” and “the worst terror attack since 9/11”. On Sunday, a 29-year old man, pledging allegiance to the Islamic State, killed at least 50 people at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida.
In India, as expected from a country that has for long faced the brunt ofjihadi violence, the Government was prompt and unequivocal to condemn the terrorism in Orlando — and before that, in the streets of Paris, Brussels and Istanbul.
However, New Delhi’s response to a similar terror attack in Tel Aviv last week has been a long time coming. On June 8, two armed Palestinian terrorists opened fire inside a restaurant, killing four Israelis and wounding at least 16 others.
Perhaps the decision-makers in the Prime Minister’s Office and South Block are still not convinced that terrorism on Israeli soil qualifies as an “unprovoked” terrorist attack. There has always been looming questions about Israel’s culpability and genuine Palestinian grievances in the background. To paraphrase Palestine President Mahmoud Abbas, whose Fatah group is in-charge of the West Bank, “May be the settlers had it coming”.
The current wave of terror that started around October last year has claimed the lives of 38 Israelis and wounded more than 450. In the same period, Palestinian terrorists carried out more than 210 stabbings, 86 shootings and 42 car ramming attacks targeting mainly Jews and Israelis.
While no terrorist group claimed responsibility for the last week’s Tel Aviv attack, Gaza-based Islamist outfit Hamas described the shooting as “heroic” and warned of more acts of terrorism during the Muslim holy month of Ramzan, which commenced last week. President Abbas’s Fatah group issued a statement on social media saying that the people of Israel were “reaping the repercussions of choosing violence against the Palestinian people.”
The fact of the matter is that Israel has completely disengaged from Gaza, removing every single Jewish settlement in 2005, while President Abbas and Fatah-oligarchs have run the West Bank like a fiefdom for over a decade. Yet, the world still makes Israel culpable for every act of terrorism committed by Palestinian terrorists against Israelis.
It doesn’t matter that Israel has complied with the often-quoted United Nations Security Council Resolution 242 by withdrawing from Sinai in return for a peace treaty with Egypt, after decisively winning the Six Day War in 1967. Furthermore, at the Camp David Summit in 2000, Israel agreed to return 97 per cent of the West Bank, only to be rejected by the Palestinian negotiator on the insistence of Palestine liberation Organisation leader Yasser Arafat.
Abba Eban, former Foreign Minister of Israel, famously wrote after the war of 1967 that it was the “first war in history which has ended with the victors suing for peace and the vanquished calling for unconditional surrender.” Even today, nothing short of Israel’s unconditional surrender would satisfy the demands of the Hamas and Fatah leaderships.
In this century-old emotionalised conflict, driven by Arab Rejectionism, present ground realities and historical facts don’t amount too much. Many in India’s media, Government and academia still share the near-messianic belief that only if Israel could willingly squeeze itself to a given boundary agreed upon by the Palestinian leadership and Arab nations, peace will descend on the entire Middle East.
As India’s decision-makers fumble to come up with an apt response to the Tel Aviv attack, it will not be inappropriate to remember Israel’s response when India faced calamity and terrorism. From dispatching rescue teams and setting up a field hospital in the aftermath of 2001 Bhuj earthquake to offering counter-terrorism expertise during the 2008 terrorist siege of Mumbai — Israel has often been the first to respond.
As victims of international terrorism itself, India must not allow geo-strategic or political considerations to impair its judgement on acts of terrorism carried out against innocent civilians, regardless of wherever they take place and, however, it is justified.
Having lost more than 6,000 of civilians and nearly 3,000 of security personnel to terrorism in last decade alone, India knows what it means to cremate and bury its dead while the world looks the other way. As it mourns with the citizens of Orlando today, India must also stand by the people of Tel Aviv, both Jews and Arabs, as they come together and tend to their wounds.
India, as a nation, must send an unequivocal message that it stands by all victims of terrorism in their hour of distress. If terrorism has no religion — as world leaders tirelessly remind us — it should not have any excuses or justifications either.
(The writer is a senior distinguished fellow at the Gatestone Institute)