A history of violence: Examining the conflict in Gaza 

The idea of a cycle of violence is a useful way to understand long-term, self-perpetuating conflicts.  

This type of cycle occurs in family and peer conflicts, where it is studied by psychologists like me, and in international relations, where the classic example is an arms race. Regardless of scale, the cycle can be diagrammed like this: A → B → A → B → A (repeat ad nauseum). Cause and effect blur, as each side believes the other one started it and their behavior is only a response. 

The recent history of Gaza includes a lot of violence, but it is not cyclic. Consider the evidence. 

In 2005, the Israelis withdrew. They maintained control over Gaza’s airspace, coast and border, so the occupation did not completely end, because militants were firing on Israel. 

Although it is hard to remember now, there was a major effort to initiate Gazan development at this time. The G-8 and World Bank provided billions of dollars in aid and coordinated with Israel in an attempt to build a Gazan economy that would become a “Hong Kong on the Mediterranean.” Unfortunately, the people in charge of Gaza were not interested. Immediately after Israel withdrew, rocket fire on Israeli civilian populations began and continued.  

This was not a response to any preceding event. It was part of an ongoing war against the Jewish state. 

Hamas declared this war in their founding charter. Their call for the destruction of Israel was explicit. It was not stated as a response to West Bank settlements, military brutality, or anything other than Israel’s existence. Shortly after Oct. 7, Hamas proclaimed that attacks just like it will be repeated over and over until Israel is destroyed. Such violence is not cyclic. 

Israel’s critics include what they call a “blockade” (import/export restrictions) and Gaza being “an open-air prison” (strict border controls) in their narrative of a violence cycle, citing these restrictions as causes of the Oct. 7 attacks. These critics have reversed cause and effect: Israel imposed controls after and in response to militant attacks from Gaza, not the other way around. 

To understand their necessity, recall what happened the last time a large number of Gazans entered Israel in an unregulated way. 

When Hamas killed 1,200 Israelis last October, they broke a relatively successful two-year ceasefire. During this time, there was an increase in stability and economic progress in Gaza. More and more Gazans were coming into Israel to work. Talks for extending the truce were ongoing. 

Israel responded by relaxing its vigilance, unfortunately. Hamas spent two years planning the attacks of Oct. 7. This is the opposite of a cycle of violence. 

The view that Israelis stole Palestinian land and should go live somewhere else is a logically coherent opinion, although not my own. If Israel does not disband, however, it is fundamentally unreasonable to expect them to respond to massacres of their civilians in some way very different from their present one. 

Most of the world condemned Hamas’s slaughter of Israeli civilians, but the outpouring of blame for the deaths of Gazan civilians has been directed almost entirely at Israel. This is a mistake. Consider what it means to “cause” something: Hamas knew, with 100 percent certainty, that if they massacred Israeli civilians, Israel would respond as they are now. They did it anyway. Gazan civilians are suffering the completely predictable result of Hamas’s actions. 

There is a second way in which Hamas is responsible for Gazan civilian deaths: the way they fight.  

Descriptions of this war contain a remarkable omission: There is no such thing as a Hamas military base, troop formation, fortification or even a building separated from civilians (except tunnels under civilian areas). Hamas never separates its fighters from women and children, nor do they wear uniforms. They devoted an enormous amount of concrete to their underground fortress while building no bomb shelters to protect civilians from the consequences of their frequent attacks on Israel. 

As a result, there is no way to fight Hamas without killing civilians. They make sure of it. And yet there are no demonstrations protesting the way Hamas takes cover behind its own children, while protestors demand Israel stop firing at Hamas because there are children in the way. These protestors expect Israel to care about Gazan civilian lives more than Hamas does. 

Hamas could prevent Gazan civilian deaths immediately and completely by separating their forces from civilian populations, or by not attacking Israel in the first place. But because there are no marches blaming them for Gazan deaths and demanding they come out from behind their human shields, they will continue this strategy indefinitely, unless world opinion finally sees through it. 

There is a cycle that could bring hope to this war-torn region. It would consist of freedom and prosperity for Gazans in a cycle with safety and security for Israelis. There will never be one without the other. If Hamas refuses to participate in a cycle of healing, then for peace to come to Palestine, Hamas must go. 

Jeremy Shapiro, Ph.D., a psychologist, is an adjunct faculty member of the Department of Psychological Sciences of Case Western Reserve University. He is the author, most recently, of “Finding Goldilocks: A Guide for Creating Balance in Personal Change, Relationships, and Politics.”