Insights into complex conflict
Opinion
Nine months ago I wrote about the Hamas attacks on a kibbutz in southern Israel where I lived and worked as a volunteer in the early 1980s.
Back then I spoke of my conflicting emotions as I watched videos of the shocking terrorist attacks on Israelis and the subsequent relentless bombing of Gaza.
I had hoped that by now negotiations would have resulted in the release of all hostages and a halt to Israel’s bombardment of Gaza.
Tragically that’s not the case. Instead, we see an estimated death toll of 35,000, the displacement of more than 80 per cent of the population and an unprecedented humanitarian disaster.
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The ongoing conflict has sparked disturbing tensions in Australia where an increasing number of people feel at liberty to express extremist views. Those opposing Israel’s military response to the Hamas attacks do not all deserve to be labelled antisemitic, but there are some who have used the war as an opportunity to show prejudice towards Jews, and in some cases engaged in neo-Nazi activity. Similarly, the Hamas attacks have been used to justify Islamophobic sentiments.
The Prime Minister has taken the extraordinary step of appointing a Special Envoy to combat antisemitism in Australia as part of “ongoing efforts to preserve social cohesion in Australia”. He also stated he would appoint a Special Envoy for Islamophobia.
When I came across a brief article in the Sacred Heart College publication, the Blue & Blue, featuring old scholar Jodie Clark (class of ’81, nee Geale), I was eager to hear firsthand about her experience running the UN’s Rafah border crossing operations. I was also interested in her views on a conflict that is so polarising.
As luck would have it, Jodie was back in Adelaide to see her mother. When I caught up with her for a coffee it didn’t take long to work out why this easy-going Aussie redhead has endeared herself to her workmates in Rafah. iPhone videos capture the camaraderie between them as ‘Mama Jodie’ hands out chocolate bars and jokes about not letting the fat boys take two.
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In contrast, another video shows the chaos of food trucks being looted and a sea of people converging on the spoils.
In the morning you might be being attacked and in the afternoon you’re having a joke, messing around or whatever, you do the best you can,’ Jodie told me.
At the Rafah depot she is the lone female amidst an army of workers directing trucks, loading and unloading goods, operating forklifts and repairing barbed wire fences.
Clearly she has built a reputation as a trouble shooter in emergencies and a person who can get things done. But she is also insightful and refreshingly objective when it comes to the complex Israel-Palestine conflict.
Unlike those vocal onlookers from afar, she is right in the middle of the crisis and busy dealing every day with the people most affected by it.
Jodie speaks frankly but passionately about the desperate plight of the Palestinian people as they struggle to survive on virtually nothing, and she is outraged by the humiliation and mistreatment of innocent people detained by the IDF.
But she also is acutely aware of the impact on Israelis of the brutal October 7 attacks in which 1200 people, including 34 children, were killed. Jodie repeated what I wrote in this column last year, that many of the kibbutzniks killed or kidnapped by Hamas were peace activists who assisted Palestinians when they need medical and other assistance outside Gaza. She believes most of the remaining hostages are alive because that gives Hamas negotiating power.
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Just as many Israelis don’t agree with the actions and decisions of their government, nor does everyone from Gaza support Hamas. In fact, Jodie says it has been very hard for anyone to provide an alternative to the ruling party. And she doesn’t believe the population of Gaza was at tipping point prior to October 7. She believes it was vastly better in terms of the standard of living and education than it was when she was worked there more than a decade ago. All of which makes the Hamas attacks so incomprehensible.
In her words:
‘I don’t think they (Hamas) thought through quite so much the reaction of the IDF, I think they thought the international community would stand up for them differently. Is anyone now trying to stop the war? Now everyone has October 7 in their mind, even I who desperately love the Palestinians but I have very good Israeli friends as well. I still can’t comprehend why you would do that. Then I see the catastrophe in Gaza unfolding, I’m like ‘no Israel you have to stop’, because now they’re targeting the people – they’re doing exactly the same as Hamas did to them.’
Amen to that.