I spent the last two weeks doing the mental equivalent of watching paint dry otherwise known as solicitor accounts. And yes this point with a knee eight days to guide it seems that I've mastered everything for January the eighth. I find myself reflecting on the last years events and being glad that I live in the West and not some terrible place in Southeast Asia and the Middle East.
I see the Israelis and Gazans have started what seems to be a new New Year's tradition. The Gazans will fire a few homemade rockets from their refugee camp in West Israel laughably described as a territory (in reality it is effectively the world's biggest prison). Yes I do know the Palestinians of Gaze cannot live in Israel (in fact being pro Israel I am completely against it). But I also know that an area of land 350 square miles large which is basically desert cannot hold 2 million plus people. As a result then now seem to be some worrying consequences of what may happen next.
In the Guardian they talked about Islamic extremists attacking their pro-Western governments and among these governments was Egypt. If you've read my blog before or read the report by crisis group Egypt's Sinia question then you will know that Gaza is basically the fuse to what could become Egypt's civil war. If you want to know what I'm talking about just get a map of the world with a boarder of every country. Your soon find out that the Sinai sits rigth next to Egypt and recently the Sinai has had a few problems!
The problems pointed out by the crisis group report a rapidly now coming true. Not only are we seeing an appalling loss of life in Gaza but we'll also rapidly seeing the de-stabilize of Egypt. The other opinion of crisis group was that the Sinai would trigger a crisis in this nearby country. As I watched the events unfolding in the Middle East I can only hope my own goverment in Britian would not be as stupid as the one in Jerusalem. The longer the conflict goes on the more likely the region will destabilize as a whole. Crisis groups last and the most serious prediction was that Egypt could end up lossing the Sinai if the situation continued as well the country being destabilized. I know the situation is not completely the Israeli's fault the fools in Gaze have a large amount of the responsibility as well as the government of Egypt who have miss run the Sinai for decades. But you have to realize there was a big golf of difference between flying an F-16 over a heavily populated area and firing a few rockets. Yes I know the intention the people who fly the rockets is to wipe Israel off the map but I think virtually everyone I life today notice a have no chance of doing this most the zealots attacking Israel uneducated poor and quite frankly desperate we know from history that people stop doing destructive things when they have hope. The Israeli's with their West-like democracy seemed to not understand the concept of proportionality. Unfortunately till they do understand the concept or a UN peacekeeping force is sent to Gaza it seems to me that we are going to gain a new New Year's tradition what with the Gaza fence breacking last January.
Its time for Israel to grow up or unfortunately if they carry on like this they going to end up needing to occupy Gaza if they want to remove the insane regime in Gaza or they may need to learn how to live with them. The problem is the longer this conflict carries on the more likely the Egyptian government could collapse as well I'm pretty sure most Israelis do not want Islamic brotherhood being the next government in Cairo the result if that happeened would result in Israel needing to take over the Sinai Peninsula as well.
Happy new Year! x