I have been sitting helplessly in Ramallah, watching endless television clips of the horrific bombardment of civilian infrastructure and residences in Gaza, and the heartbreaking suffering of civilians there. I have heard the Israeli defence minister, Yoav Gallant, say that his country is fighting against “human animals”, and I have seen the aftermath of the indiscriminate killings of civilians committed by Hamas militants in southern Israel. I’ve been waiting for the “significant ground operations” that have been threatening to arrive at any moment. The searing question on my mind has been: “How did we get to this?”
The words that Haidar Abdul Shafi, then head of the Palestine Red Crescent in Gaza, addressed to the Israeli people 32 years ago at the Madrid peace conference came suddenly to mind: “We, the people of Palestine, stand before you in the fullness of our pain, our pride and our anticipation, for we have long harboured a yearning for peace and a dream of justice and freedom.”
