ACADEMICS from around the region shared insights into the recent events between Israel and the Hamas terrorist attack.
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The forum was held in the auditorium of the New England Conservatorium of Music, Armidale.
The Hamas terrorist attack of October 7 was followed by Israel's retaliation; bombing Gaza while cutting off its food, water, power and medicine.
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Emeritus Professor of History, Howard Brasted, identified the root cause of the conflict as being Israeli Jews and Palestinian Arabs fighting over the same piece of land for over a century.
Control of land progressively changed hands from Palestinian to Jewish; a process begun in 1918 under British 'trusteeship'.
Over ensuing decades Britain allowed 400,000 Jews to immigrate to Palestine with the acknowledged intention of helping Jews create a homeland in Palestine.
In 1936, Palestinian Arabs took to the streets in protest. Over 5000 were killed by the British. Jewish immigration was halted, but resumed following the World War 2 holocaust.
The scale of dispossession was immense. In 1947 Palestinians owned 94 per cent of centuries old Palestine; by 1948 when Israel was established, this had been whittled down to just 22 per cent.
In a matter of months 750,000 Palestinians fled their homes and took refuge in 50 or so squalid refugee camps in neighbouring Arab countries.
Over 6 million of their descendants remain there.
The West Bank and Gaza Strip are the remnants of Palestine.
After the 1967 Six Day war, they too were occupied by Israel.
Little wonder that Palestinians refer to this history of dispossession as Al Nakba, or the 'catastrophe'.
Internationally mediated 'roadmaps for peace' promoting Palestinian statehood failed in part because Israel would not allow a return to pre-1967 borders and refused to stop building new Jewish settlements in the West Bank.
As a Senior Lecturer in International Relations, my focus was on the war's implications for regional and global security.
Israel's stated plan is to invade and occupy Gaza as long as it takes to destroy Hamas and replace their regime.
This echoes the United States response to 9/11, which embroiled many countries, including Australia, in a 20 year war in Afghanistan with little to show for it.
To date Israel's current campaign in Gaza has caused 8000 fatalities and displaced over a million people.
This unprecedented toll has en-flamed passions amongst militant Muslim organisations, notably Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Since Hezbollah began bombing Israel 200,000 Israeli citizens have been evacuated from the area bordering Lebanon.
Middle East hostilities escalate as Israel bombed Lebanon and Syria for aiding Hezbollah.
Iran called for the destruction of Israel. To this end it sponsors Hamas, Hezbollah, Syria and Yemeni Houthi with finances and arms.
There is speculation Iran encouraged the Hamas attack due to arch enemies Saudi Arabia and Israel normalising relations.
Paradoxically, the onset of full scale interstate war may be constrained by Israel's status as a nuclear weapon state and by the formidable military presence of its superpower ally, the United States, in the region.
But there are no guarantees of rationality in the fog of war.
The United Nations Security Council has been unable to agree on a resolution for a ceasefire, its members have divided sympathies. Israel's allies, including Australia, are convinced of
Israel's expansive right to 'self-defence' in the wake of the Hamas terrorist attack.
Within and beyond the Middle East a security threat is posed by social unrest and communal violence between adherents to opposite sides of the conflict.
There is a possibility of terrorist acts by lone wolves or extremist cells enraged by civilian casualties in the war.
Another threat to global security is the supply of oil. Iran is a major source of oil and can block the straits of Hormuz through which many world tankers travel.
Australia is especially vulnerable with only a 30 day reserve in the event that oil supply is cut off.
The wars in Ukraine and Gaza, as well as geopolitics with China, divert attention from the existential threat of global heating.
World leaders are preoccupied and divided by these conflicts, in turn preventing vital international cooperation on climate change action.
Professor of Peace Studies, Helen Ware, focused on the question of human rights.
She stressed that all human lives are equal regardless of nationality or religion.
Under international law it is illegal to: practice assassination, target civilians, impose group punishment or commit genocide even by attrition.
There are eerie parallels with Gaza in the deaths of half a million Jews by starvation and disease in the Warsaw Ghetto during WW2.
Notwithstanding vengeance, it is unclear what Netanyahu's government aims to achieve with its military campaign in Gaza.
Its strategy of countering terrorism with violence largely harms civilians, half of whom are children, radicalising yet another generation of Palestinians.
Emeritus Professor of Politics, Graham Maddox, examined the inflammatory role of the Christian Right in the United States in shaping policy on Israel.
He traced the push to establish a Jewish homeland back to the Puritans and millennialists of the 17th century.
This stance has since been reinforced by various US presidents and evangelical Christians to this day.
Settling Jews in Israel is believed to speed up the Second Coming, because Christ has to return to Israel to rule the world.
The big catch is that the Christian Right call for Jews to return to Israel, but then they must convert to Christianity before Jesus shall come again.
US Christians see Islam as a subordinate religion. This view has inhibited inter-faith dialogue because it sharply divided the world. Most recently Donald Trump played to this constituency by provocatively recognising Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.
Australia Institute fellow, Dr Tim Battin, critiqued the response of the mainstream Australian political class to the war in Gaza.
He observed a longstanding pro-Israeli stance, among politicians and the media, influenced by the close alignment with United States foreign policy as well as by a vocal domestic Israel lobby.
There is a concerning tendency for foreign policy to be shaped less by first principles and
international standards than by domestic political considerations. The 18th October Australian parliamentary motion on the war thus remained silent on Israel's bombardment of civilians and resisted a Greens amendment for opposition to an imminent Israeli invasion of Gaza.
An ALP conference in August considered calling for a halt to new Israeli settlements in Palestinian territory but this was warded off by Penny Wong who reaffirmed the policy status quo: recognising the right of Israel and Palestine to exist as two states, but with no plan as to when or how this would be achieved.
The forum panel concluded that Israeli and Palestinian peoples are both focused on rights to land, sovereignty, national identity and, indeed, their legitimate right to exist.
Following a ceasefire and humanitarian aid, the ambitions of these two peoples must be incorporated into a lasting two state political solution.
The forum raised $3,030 for Médecins sans Frontières MSF Australia (Doctors without Borders) to treat the civilian victims in Gaza.
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