*Originally published in 2025 and preserved as part of our archive project.Get E-International Relations delivered to your inbox, free of charge. As you sign up, consider becoming a paid subscriber to support our work.

The past few weeks have seen an outpour of consternation over reports of hunger and starvation in the Gaza Strip. In some but far from all cases, the outrage also concerned the captivity and conditions in which Hamas and other militant Palestinian groups have held 50 Israeli and foreign hostages – alive or deceased – for over 660 days. At the same time, governments in many western countries have found themselves in a balancing act regarding the recognition of Palestinian statehood, with France having decided to proceed with such a recognition, and the United Kingdom and Canada using it as bargaining chips to elicit changes in Israeli behavior. From its side, the US administration has announced to take into account Canada’s Middle East turnaround in its own trade negotiations with Ottawa. In other countries, the recognition issue risks to upend a long-standing national consensus, as in Germany, or to undermine the stability of a painstakingly formed government, like in Belgium.

Nevertheless, as before, international actors often fail to address the root causes of the horrors on the ground, even if (or perhaps precisely because) these causes form a decades-old and complicated tangle of mutual responsibilities, actions and reactions (as well as inaction). Therefore, it bears repeating that – notwithstanding comparisons and generalizations made justly or unjustly – the issue boils down to the national aspirations of two........

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