Melissa Parke (Fremantle, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I lived in Gaza for 2½ years, from 2002 to 2004. During that time I worked for UNRWA, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, which was established by the General Assembly in 1949 to provide humanitarian relief to the Palestinian refugees who lost their homes and livelihoods as a result of the conflict in 1948. The agency was only ever intended to be temporary, until there was a resolution of the conflict. But, as we are all only too aware, the conflict in Palestine is 60 years old this year and, without a major political breakthrough, there is little prospect of a peaceful settlement in the foreseeable future.

During my time in Gaza, my UN colleagues and I were not housed in a high-security compound; we lived in the community alongside the local inhabitants. We were there during aerial bombing campaigns, targeted assassinations and military incursions, and we shared the fear and sense of vulnerability generated by these actions. We witnessed the everyday struggle of people to carry on meaningful and productive lives under conditions of extreme hardship. We also spent time in Israel and we saw the impact of suicide bombings and rocket attacks on communities. We felt the anxiety of driving in the city or eating out at a cafe and wondering if the bus next to our car or the person who had just walked into the cafe wearing a big coat was going to blow up.

This conflict has profound global implications, generating flow-on effects within the Middle East and around the world. Militant Islamic groups, including within our own region, continue to refer to the Israel-Palestine conflict as a root cause to incite violence. The issue unites different groups and countries in a way that could never be achieved in its absence. Concomitantly, resolution of the issue would undercut a large part of the cause and focus of radical Islam and would alter the whole balance in the Middle East. It would also deliver millions of human beings from interminable fear and suffering. It is in our national interest and in our interest as good global citizens to concern ourselves.

Australia is already providing humanitarian aid and development assistance, as my colleague said, to the amount of $45 million this year. In my view, Australia can also play a constructive supporting role through the United Nations in building international consensus and advocacy for urgent and comprehensive action to achieve a peace settlement. We know that the majority of Palestinians and Israelis support peace efforts and are prepared to accept compromises to achieve this objective.

As occurred in Northern Ireland, and as with other seemingly intractable conflicts throughout the world, ultimately the only way out of the quagmire of historical hurts, tit-for-tat violence and present-day suffering will be through a dialogue between the relevant political actors—in this case, Fatah, Hamas, the Palestinian Authority, Israel and the neighbouring states—supported by the wider international community and civil society to reach a political settlement backed up by democratic institution building and economic reconstruction.

The settlement must be comprehensive—in the style of the unofficial Geneva accords, for example—delivering a two-state solution and dealing finally with the main issues. It must include recognition of each other’s right to exist, as well as resolution of issues such as security, the delineation of borders, settlements, Jerusalem, water and the refugee issue, together with interim confidence-building measures, including the cessation of violence, a halt to the expansion of settlements and the release of political prisoners from both sides, including Gilad Shalit.

Last month the well-known Palestinian refugee poet Mahmoud Darwish died. In his last poem, Mr Darwish described Palestinians and Israelis as ‘two men trapped in a hole and bargaining over their share of the common grave’. This is a powerful image and it is a future that we must work to avoid. In reflecting on Darwish’s passing, the Commissioner-General of UNRA, Karen AbuZayd, noted:

… the need to recognize the narrative of the other, the transforming power of simple acknowledgement and the lasting good that flows when two historical currents come together, however painful the confluence might be.

These words eloquently express the mutual respect, courage and leadership that are needed to fulfil the hopes for peace.

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