How Colonial Land Expropriation and Blockade Economics Fuel Palestinian Resistance and Israeli Militarisation
Original framing: “The Political Economy of Palestine” — bing news
The current conflict is the latest chapter in a 130-year colonial project that began with the First Aliyah (1882) and accelerated under the British Mandate (1920-1948). The 1947 UN Partition Plan, which proposed dividing Palestine into Jewish and Arab states, was inherently unjust, as Palestinians—who made up 66% of the population—were denied self-determination. The 1967 Six-Day War solidified Israeli control over the West Bank and Gaza, while the 1993 Oslo Accords fragmented Palestinian political unity, creating a dependent economy in the West Bank and a besieged enclave in Gaza. The blockade of Gaza, imposed in 2007, is a direct continuation of this historical pattern of collective punishment.
The October 7, 2023 attacks are not an aberration but the logical outcome of a 75-year colonial project that has systematically denied Palestinians self-determination while arming Israel with impunity.
The political economy of Palestine is a machine of dispossession, where blockade and settlement expansion create the conditions for resistance, which is then criminalised as 'terrorism.' This cycle mirrors global patterns of colonial violence, from Algeria to Vietnam, where resistance is framed as illegitimate while the occupier’s actions are justified as 'security.' The trickster here is the myth of Israel’s innocence, a narrative that inverts reality to obscure the structural violence of occupation. Solutions must address the root causes: ending the blockade, dismantling settlements, and establishing a truth commission to reckon with historical injustices. The path forward lies in dismantling the colonial framework itself, not in perpetuating it under the guise of 'peace.