By Adewale A Soremekun JP
The death of any civilian in conflict is a profound tragedy, regardless of the side. Every human life holds sacred value—not only civilians but also soldiers and militants, many of whom join armed groups out of economic desperation rather than ideological zeal, seeking basic dignity and sustenance for their families. Wars represent the ultimate failure of human wisdom, patience, and diplomacy in confronting perceived existential threats, greed, or implacable adversaries. They also expose humanity’s baser instincts: selfishness, tribalism, and the animalistic drive toward violence. As the Bible starkly observes, “The heart of man is desperately wicked; who can know it?”
Despite the devastating humanitarian, ecological, economic, and climatic costs of war, humanity has yet to exhaust its appetite for it. Conflicts persist as long as grievances—real or perceived—remain unaddressed. When parties view issues through their own skewed prisms, the global community bears responsibility to intervene with holistic solutions that tackle both immediate triggers and root causes, extinguishing every ember that could reignite future violence. Global peace must remain sacrosanct.
Lessons from History: International Efforts and Their Limits
History offers precedents. The Concert of Europe (1815), forged through the Treaty of Vienna after the Napoleonic Wars, sought to maintain stability among great powers. It paved the way for the League of Nations after World War I, established under the Treaty of Versailles in 1920. The United Nations succeeded the League, mandated to maintain international peace and security, uphold human rights, and promote cooperation. Yet today, the UN appears to be faltering, echoing the weaknesses of its predecessors and risking irrelevance amid escalating global tensions that could edge toward broader conflict.
Critics point to institutional biases and failures in the current Middle East crisis. UNRWA faced scrutiny after allegations of staff involvement in the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led attacks on Israel; investigations led to the termination of at least nine staff members. Separately, Pramila Patten faced questions over methodology when Israel was added to the UN’s “blacklist” of entities accused of conflict-related sexual violence in May 2026. She acknowledged it was “not my job” to personally verify every detail criminally.
Secretary-General António Guterres has drawn accusations of one-sidedness: his October 2023 statement that the Hamas attacks “did not happen in a vacuum,” disproportionate focus on Israeli actions, delays in condemning specific Hezbollah tactics like indiscriminate rocket fire into civilian areas, and an initial emphasis on preserving UNRWA funding amid revelations of staff complicity. As Nigeria’s late General Sani Abacha reportedly observed, prolonged insurgencies often imply deeper complicity or failure by authorities. While the Israel-Palestine conflict long predates Guterres, his tenure has coincided with sharp escalations and diplomatic stalemates.
Humanitarian suffering in Gaza is undeniable and heart-wrenching, often amplified by emotional media narratives. Yet effective leadership demands piercing through such appeals to grasp underlying realities, immediate triggers, and long-term drivers of aggression.
Jewish Indigenous Roots and Continuous Presence
Any serious examination of the conflict must begin with historical truth: the Jewish people are the indigenous inhabitants of the land of Israel, with a continuous connection spanning over 3,000 years. Archaeological, historical, linguistic, and religious evidence—from the ancient Israelite kingdoms, the Hebrew Bible, and Jerusalem-centered worship to documented communities through Byzantine, Islamic, Crusader, Ottoman, and British periods—confirms this unbroken link. Even after periods of exile and dispersion, Jews never fully abandoned the land. Small but persistent communities endured in Jerusalem, Hebron, Safed, Tiberias, and elsewhere, while the Jewish people maintained an unbroken spiritual and cultural yearning for return to Zion, expressed in daily prayers, rituals, and literature across millennia.
The modern re-establishment of Jewish sovereignty in 1948 was not an act of European colonialism but the restoration of an indigenous people reclaiming their ancestral homeland after centuries of foreign domination and persecution.
The very name “Palestine” does not undermine this reality. It was imposed by Roman Emperor Hadrian in 135 CE, after the suppression of the Bar Kokhba Revolt, as a deliberate punitive measure to erase Jewish identity and connection to the land. Hadrian renamed the province of Judea “Syria Palaestina,” invoking the ancient Philistines (long-vanished enemies of the Israelites) to spite and humiliate the Jewish people. This Roman administrative act was explicitly designed to sever the historical link between the Jews and their homeland—it cannot legitimately be construed as evidence that the land belongs to the Arab people now known as Palestinians, whose national identity and majority presence in the region developed centuries later.
Balancing Narratives: The Nakba in Historical Context
Much of world media and discourse fixates on the Palestinian Nakba (“catastrophe”) of 1948. While civilian suffering must never be minimized, the world did not begin in 1948. Jewish communities faced repeated violence long before:
- In 1920, during the Nebi Musa riots in Jerusalem, Arab mobs attacked Jews, killing at least five and injuring over 200.
- Earlier waves of anti-Jewish violence, including incidents tied to rising tensions in the late 19th century, underscored hostility toward Jewish presence and return.
These were part of a broader pattern of rejection predating Israel’s founding.
The 1948 war also created parallel refugee crises. Approximately 850,000 Jews were expelled or forced to flee from Arab countries between 1948 and the early 1970s—stripped of property, citizenship, and rights in ancient communities. Israel absorbed the vast majority, integrating them despite its own challenges. Arab states largely perpetuated the Palestinian refugee situation in camps for political leverage rather than resettlement.
Israel’s Wars: Defensive and Existential
Israel’s military successes stem from repeated existential threats. From the 1948 War of Independence—triggered by Arab rejection of the UN partition and invasion by multiple armies—to subsequent conflicts, Israel has fought defensive wars for survival against forces explicitly committed to its elimination. The conflict is not primarily about “land grabbing” by Israel but about the refusal of significant Arab and Palestinian factions to accept any sovereign Jewish state in the region, regardless of borders offered.
The UN and much of the international community risk a fundamental misdiagnosis by reducing it to a territorial dispute. History records repeated rejections:
- 1947 UN Partition Plan: Accepted by Jews, rejected by Arab leaders.
– Khartoum Resolution (1967): The “Three No’s”—no peace, no recognition, no negotiations.
– Camp David (2000) and Olmert (2008) offers: Generous territorial concessions rejected.
This ideological rejection, enshrined in charters like that of Hamas, perpetuates violence. The UN’s disproportionate focus on Israel, tolerance of institutional biases, and failure to confront foundational rejectionism undermine its role as a neutral arbiter.
True peace demands mutual recognition: Israel’s right to exist as the nation-state of the Jewish people in their indigenous homeland, alongside realistic Palestinian self-determination that renounces terror and maximalist demands. Without historical honesty—acknowledging Jewish indigeneity, the punitive origins of the name “Palestine,” and the pattern of rejection—the UN and global actors risk perpetuating tragedy rather than resolving it. Humanity deserves realism over selective narratives. The embers of conflict must be extinguished through truth, not denial.
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