Few would disagree that the loss of almost 30,000 Palestinian lives in Gaza (at the time of writing) and the massacre of 1,200 people in Israel on 7 October 2023 are moral failings of huge proportions.

Who is responsible for this failure? And how much worse could things get?

Those questions were on the minds of philanthropy leaders, peacebuilding nonprofits and diplomats at a hastily convened meeting in Belfast in February organised by the Social Change Initiative for donors responding to violent conflict.

Western foreign policy has failed on Israel/Palestine. Faced with a fork in the road in 2006, it took the wrong direction. The opportunity for mediation and reconciliation was there when Hamas was elected – pushing the group to the negotiating table and demanding changes in its conduct, behaviour and charter in return for recognition, a path urged by Jonathan Powell who led negotiations in Northern Ireland and Jeremy Greenstock, Tony Blair’s representative in post-war Iraq. Instead, the UK followed the US in turning its back on Gaza, pursuing a failed strategy of security cooperation with the Palestinian Authority. Two decades of conflict management and diplomatic neglect exploded in the attacks of 7 October.