Another round of armed conflict between Israel and the Palestinians broke out last month. President Joe Biden has been criticized for his slow intervention, and some foreign media have even condemned America for its hypocrisy on the Israeli-Palestinian issue over the years, despite its emphasis on human rights values. Naturally, China, which has repeatedly confronted the U.S. on human rights issues in recent years, will not pass up the opportunity to taunt the U.S. by expressing solidarity with the Palestinians. However, the complexities of the Israeli-Palestinian issue make it difficult for any stakeholder to advocate a satisfactory solution. There is little substance to China’s verbal support for the Palestinians and its position in favor of a two-state solution. Should China try to intervene further in the Israeli-Palestinian situation, I am afraid it will be similarly fruitless.

Over the years, public opinion has been rife with criticism of the U.S. on the Israeli-Palestinian issue. Among these critiques, one focuses on the fact that the U.S. has from time to time verbally attacked dictatorial states on human rights issues and even imposed punitive sanctions, yet it has condoned Israel’s oppression of the Palestinians throughout the years. China’s criticism of the U.S. on the Israeli-Palestinian issue is not very different from the views of some Western scholars and commentators. In all fairness, those accusations are not without merit.

Although Biden’s response to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been controversial, he does have his reasons. For more than half a century, the dispute between the Israelis and the Palestinians has been ongoing. When Donald Trump was president, the U.S. unprecedentedly recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and released the Middle East peace plan, known as the Deal of the Century, which would allow Israel to annex the West Bank areas under Palestinian control. This has only intensified the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. It is no exaggeration to say that the escalation of the Israeli-Palestinian situation is a hot potato Trump has left for Biden. Western scholars and commentators have two interpretations as to why Biden has not sent an ambassador to Israel since he took office. The first is that Biden intends to cool down the tense Israeli-Palestinian situation, while the second is that Biden has no intention of actively intervening in the Israeli-Palestinian situation for the time being.

These two interpretations are not contradictory. In fact, during his campaign, Biden had strong reservations about Trump’s Israeli-Palestinian policy and made it clear that he would not endorse a century-long deal. His actions since taking office have demonstrated that there are many other issues that require priority attention, such as the U.S.-China confrontation, the fight against the epidemic at home and the stimulation of economic recovery, the Iranian nuclear negotiations, among others, making it difficult for him to take time to attend to the long-standing issues of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Moreover, the crux of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict involves a secular dispute over the sovereignty of Jerusalem, an issue that has proven time and again to be difficult to resolve properly.

The two-state solution of establishing an independent Palestinian state has been the consensus of the United States for many years. When former President Clinton was in office, he even proposed that the Palestinians should have more than 90% of the West Bank, but the Palestinians’ representatives in the peace talk were dissatisfied that they could not have the sovereignty of Jerusalem, and the peace talk subsequently ended as a result of a terrorist attack by the Palestinians. However, the brutal course of history shows that Clinton’s two-state solution has been relatively protective of Palestinian rights. The Palestinians have lost all subsequent armed clashes with the Israelis, making their bargaining power in realpolitik increasingly precarious. With neither Israel nor the Palestinians willing to back down, even if Biden spends a lot of energy advocating a new two-state solution, the chances are still very high that it will end up in vain.

China’s stance on last month’s new Israeli-Palestinian conflict does not have the same level of burden as Biden’s, but at best it can make a mockery of America’s weaknesses. Of course, China could theoretically take a strong stand with the Palestinians, but at the cost of offending Israel, with whom it has close military and technological ties, and without necessarily achieving the relevant goals.

In addition, China has not taken up the issue of power struggle and corruption within the Palestinian government. Last year, when then-Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu seemed determined to proceed with the annexation of the West Bank, Palestinian called again for the abolition of the rubber-stamp body of the Palestinian self-governing authority. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas later agreed to hold the first Palestinian elections in 17 years, but later postponed the elections on the ground that they could not be held near Jerusalem, demonstrating his fear of the knock-on effect if he loses the elections and loses his power. On the other hand, the popularity of Hamas, its main rival organization, appears to have risen sharply in recent years, but articles in foreign media such as “The Economist” and “Foreign Affairs” have also revealed its shady use of terror to suppress dissent. It is also an indisputable fact that a large number of Pakistanis are wary and skeptical of it.

In view of these problems, it is believed that no matter with which side of the Palestinian leadership China deals, it will be difficult to reverse their internal and external problems.

(Yeung Ting-fai, Researcher of Global Studies Institute HK)

This article is translated from Chinese by Apple Daily.

Click here for Chinese version

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