Pitt students, professors react to conflict in the Gaza strip

Students and professors are decidedly split when it comes to recent events in Gaza.’ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘… Students and professors are decidedly split when it comes to recent events in Gaza.’ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ Members of Jewish student groups, such as Chabad House, said they believe firmly in the validity of Israeli aggression in Gaza, where casualties continue to mount. The Muslim Student Association and the Students for Justice in Palestine argued that Palestine has a legitimate claim to the Israeli territory. Pitt professors also disagreed about who’s to blame for the current solution and what should be done to fix it. A truce between Israel and Hamas expired Dec. 19, according to The New York Times. Palestinians firing rockets from the Gaza Strip into Israeli territory quickly grew more frequent, and Israel conducted air strikes in response. Magid Shihade, a visiting professor at Pitt’s University Center for International Studies, said a large degree of discrepancy exists between the accounts of the Gaza situation presented to different regions of the world. ‘What is sent across in the media is that Israel attacked Gaza as a response to Hamas sending rockets into Israel,’ said Shihade. ‘That’s the official narrative. The Israeli government also claims that Hamas broke the cease-fire agreement between the Israeli government and Hamas.’ In Shihade’s opinion, the reality is something quite different. Citing unnamed ‘news and intelligence reports within the country of Israel itself,’ he said that he believes Israel broke the cease-fire agreement, instead of the other way around. ‘ Ari Daniel Miller, a Pitt student associated with Chabad House and a number of other Jewish organizations on campus, asserted Israeli innocence. ‘Israel got sick of it and decided to act,’ said Miller of the events that began last month. Though Miller said that Chabad House has not yet done anything in response to the attacks on Gaza, he predicted that the group will most likely make an effort to educate the public about the situation. Miller added that he hoped the situation would end peacefully. ‘I think it’s part of the Jewish understanding of how the world works that you are supposed to love your neighbor as yourself,’ said Miller. Jonas Moffat, the leader of Pitt Students for Justice in Palestine, said he hopes for a one-state solution. ‘ ‘I believe that as it existed before, with Jews and Muslims and Christians sharing the same land … Israel and Palestine can exist as one state,’ said Moffat. ‘I don’t believe that two states could ever function as a functioning economy for either side or a functioning state in general.’ Donald Goldstein, a professor at Pitt’s Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, said that while the public generally bases its opinion of the issue on ethnic or religious background, the situation has a fundamentally political nature and could only be solved if treated as such. ‘Where you sit is where you stand,’ he said. ‘The issue is not religion. It’s never been religion. It’s over who owns a piece of property.’ Goldstein said that the issue will only simmer when Palestine receives land and Israel receives an ensured border. He maintained that resolution of the conflict demanded the creation of a separate Israeli state, brokered by the involvement of the world’s most’ powerful nations. ‘The only possible way [to solve the conflict] would be for the great powers not just to talk about diplomacy but to sit down and say, ‘You guys cut this crap out,” said Goldstein, also suggesting that the great powers state that ‘as of today the U.N. controls Jerusalem, and we’ll keep troops there and we’ll save the shrine and maybe 15 or 20 years, when it all blows over, they’ll all love each other.’