The battle in Gaza will end someday soon. Hamas leadership are leaving Gaza strip either running away or in body bags and Israel public opinion is demanding an end to the hostilities. This battle will end, for there is no much more resistance possible.
It is a matter of time until the end of this battle. The war will resume later, at some other time when Islamists amass munitions to another battle against the existence of Israel.
The question now for all people to answer is what will happen after this current battle ends and the IDF withdraw from Gaza.
Gaza is a failed state. Millions of Euros and many more millions of dollars have been donated to the Palestinians both in the Gaza Strip and West Bank. They have nothing to show for the money invested. It seems that the people have eaten the money and the corrupted leadership have embezzled the money.
Gaza government is controlled by Hamas, but Hamas does not have public services beyond food distribution, schooling, policing and army. These are supported by donations from abroad and Hamas controls the distribution as form to keep a firm grip on the population. Without the distribution of food, the population would have revolted.
There is no water treatment and no power generation enough to supply the population. Before the atrocities of 07 of October 2023, the Israeli government supplied the electricity and potable water to the Gaza population for free, as humanitarian aid. Will Israel give away electricity and potable water to a population that is supportive of terrorists?
Hamas did not dig sewers nor water treatment plants. They dug tunnels to be used in the invasion of Israel and to store munitions under hospitals. Instead of making a viable country, where there is no more Israelis since 2007, they created a failed state.
What does the world expect of the Gaza politicians?
Are the Palestinians in Gaza expecting to be fed and kept ad infinitum? Who will invest in the reconstruction of Gaza?
The Islamic nations should use their petrodollars to invest in Gaza and make it a prosperous nation. The location in the Mediterranean makes it a great place for tourism. There will be plenty of challenges for this to materialize. First and foremost is the culture of service. Will there be a willingness to serve guests? Who will travel there?
The problem is that it is necessary to change the culture of the place in order to succeed.
The example comes from Lebanon, Dubai, Mauritius, Bali and nearby Sharm el Sheik.
These places are touristic destinations and this requires that the mentality of the people in Gaza change to welcome all the tourists from all ethnic groups and all religions. This includes Jews, Christians, Hinduists, Budhists, Zoroastrists and others. Moreover, this includes Islamists from different groups like Shias, Sunnis, Wahabites and others.
Do the Palestinians desire to host the visitors?
Some resorts have managed to separate the general public from the tourists, creating a walled resort where the employees are vetted for their willingness to host international guests without breaking the law and without being hostile to the guests. This has been an awkward solution in Cuba, with a reverse ghetto where those inside are pampered and those outside are miserable.
What are the other failed states and how they are faring?
Another failed state is Yemen, in the Arabic Peninsula. They are home to multiple factions of Islamists and until the Biden administration, they were in war with Saudi Arabia. These Houthis – financed by Shiite Iran – toppled the government of Yemen a Sunnite, backed by Saudi Arabia. The intervention of Saudi Arabia restored the government, but Yemen is in a civil war now, fighting each other, with two strong backers, Saudi Arabia and Iran propping them up into conflict.
The conflict has largely been won by the Iran backed Shiites Houthis as the Biden administration has suspended support for the Saudi Arabia intervention. The situation is unresolved and the Houthis are being used by Iran to attack Israel in the Gaza war and Houthis are attacking commercial shipping in the Red Sea and in the Gulf of Aden. There is also pirates operating in its shore, attacking the ships that crosses the Suez Canal and must pass the narrow passage in the Gulf of Aden.
Somalia is another failed state with piracy, famous for the attacks on the shipping lanes near the Gulf af Aden and the Arabian Sea. The territory were colonies of Italy and Great Britain and after independence in 1960 enjoyed a thriving plural democracy until a coup d’etat transformed the country in a Totalitarian Somalia Democratic Socialist Republic with the dictator Muhammed Siad Barre. This dictatorship lasted until 1991, when Somalia was engulfed in a civil war.
Neighbor to Somalia is Ethiopia, another failed state with a history plagued by civil war between socialists factions that dispute the power within themselves and a socialist government including a genocidal conflict named Red Terror, where almost 1 million people were killed between 1976 and 1978.
South Sudan is the youngest country in the world, being recognized as such in 2011. It harbors one of sources of the Nile river and have plenty of petroleum, reason why it seceded from Sudan. Although rich in resources, it lacks the infrastructure to distribute the water from the Nile, resulting in draugh for the rest of the country. Plagued by civil war since the independence from the British, the southern region of Sudan, now South Sudan lacks everything that makes a country and still have to deal with warring parties and genocide of its Christian population.
There are more failed states, like Libya, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Mali and Syria and in the near future South Africa and Lebanon are at risk of becoming a failed state too.
What these countries have in common?
A civil war is part of the destruction of the fabric of the nation, fracturing the country into little pieces, just like it happens in Gaza, where Hamas, Fatah and Islamic Jihad fight alongside against Israel, but murder themselves in a fratricidal civil war. Let’s not forget that when Israel left Gaza in 2005, Hamas and Fatah engaged in a civil war to have sole government over the area.
The lack of economic activity is present in all these countries that are failed states. South Sudan and DRC are rich in oil, as well as in gold and other minerals, but these resources are not exploited for the population, but for their respective factions leaders, making it hard to collect taxes and fund the infra-structure needed for the people.
The other characteristic of the failed state is the intestine dispute within the Islamic religion and within Marxist Leninist factions. One of these alone is trouble enough to be negotiated, but the two problems, religious and socialist disputes make it very hard to create a stable nation.
After the battle is over, Gaza will have to organize itself into a viable state. There will be no more potable water or electricity from Israel. This can be stablished from the start. Gaza will have to resort to Lebanon – a quasi failed state – or to Egypt a country that has closed its border to Gaza tighter than Israel.
Gaza leadership must give up attacking Israel and start creating a nation for the Gazans, with fair democratic representation, justice for the people and a law abiding culture that will allow foreigners to invest there.
This current disaster is not only due to the Israel-Palestinian dispute. The Islamic intestine conflict is old and has been as such since the passing of the prophet. The main ones are Sunni, Shia, Whabbi, Salafi, Berelvi, Sufi and Deobandi (Seven Sects). These are ready to engage into wars between themselves, as seen in Yemen, where Shias and Wahabis a sect of Sunni Islam are at war.
Peace within their Islamic religion is also a barrier that Gazans must conquer.
REFERENCES
Why Saudi Arabia Isn’t Acting Against the Houthis (foreignpolicy.com) https://foreignpolicy.com/2024/01/16/saudi-arabia-red-sea-conflict-houthis-us-strike/
War in Yemen | Global Conflict Tracker (cfr.org) https://www.cfr.org/global-conflict-tracker/conflict/war-yemen
Sudan – Civil War and Genocide: Disappearing Christians of the Middle East :: Middle East Quarterly (meforum.org) https://www.meforum.org/22/sudan-civil-war-and-genocide