Peace has seldom been the goal.
Crane
I remember seeing a cartoon several years ago (does anyone here remember it–have URL?) which suggested the following political progression among Palestinians:
- PLO
- Hamas
- Al Qaeda
As moderate techniques don’t work, the population becomes increasingly violent. Gaza has already moved from stage 1 (PLO) to stage 2 (Gaza) and if Israel succeeds in demolishing Hamas will probably move to stage 3 (Al Qaeda and similar groups).
As to the answer to your question Israel would need to go in and occupy Gaza for six months or so and either kill or imprison all who violently resist and remove the Hamas government.
Israel’s current military activities are a mistake: either one does something similar to the previous responses–and a ceasefire lasts a year or two or it goes in an occupies Gaza as I stated above. The current action is just going to result in another year two ceasefire–but at a much higher cost.
One nuclear weapon would probably be enough. Gaza is extremely small.
They’ve already destroyed the only electrical generating plant in Gaza, most of the Strip’s medical facilities and the water supply, and they weren’t allowing enough food in for the population to live in good health even before this, due to the blockade.
Bibi Netanyahu and Avigdor Lieberman are two of the “most brilliant political minds in the world”? I mean, really?
They’ve wrapped the U.S. Congress, media and President around their little fingers.
Gaza receives electricity from Israel. When Hamas rockets destroy power lines in Gaza, Israelis repair them. The Israeli Counselor General or whatever his title is in LA said they are giving Gaza medical supplies and food, and asking other nations to contribute.
That’s because those people are determined to prop up Israel for various reasons*, not because the leaders of Israel are geniuses.
*Christian End Times theology, Holocaust guilt, fear of being called antisemitic, the idea that Israel is some kind of useful ally in the region
Israel is not really propped up, they have an extremely high GDP per capita, lots of resources and do lots of trade. They have a robust, functioning economy and a smart, educated population. Essentially all the engines of modern, industrialized States/economies.
If they had not received a large amount of foreign aid it’s not likely they’d be where they are today, but Israel isn’t going to fall apart if all American government aid stops. It’s a big sum to you or me, but the U.S. government aid to Israel isn’t irreplaceable for the Israelis, it frees up $3bn/year or so in their budget or about 4.3% of their government revenues. It’d hurt to lose 4.3% free money, but that can in fact be closed with taxes/etc. Not to mention the Israelis have actually lowered defense spending at times in recent years as a portion of GDP.
Israel at this point is so far ahead of most of its neighbors in terms of organization/technology it doesn’t have to spend as crazily as people think to maintain an unassailable military advantage over its neighbors.
Israel receives substantial aid from its supporters around the world, as well, of the non-governmental kind, but I don’t believe that in total is larger than the U.S. direct aid. I think it’s a good bit smaller.
I think a nuclear strike is out of the question- with Gaza literally right across the street, Israel might as well nuke themselves.
However, some are making the argument that genocide is justified, see here:
Trihs, exactly:
“Christian End Times theology, Holocaust guilt, fear of being called antisemitic, the idea that Israel is some kind of useful ally in the region” are all useful constructs of the Israeli propagandists.
It is quite true that Israel, Gaza and the other occupied territories are totally controlled by the most brilliant political and military minds in the world.
Crane
Here’s a political cartoon that says it all:
(summary:
It’s a cartoon showing Bibi Netanyahu, John Kerry , and Hamas sitting at the negotiating table.
Kerry says to Bibi: “Could you at least meet him half way?”
The Hamas member is holding a paper labelled “Our Demands”.
On it is written just one small demand: “Death to all Jews”.
Try2b,
It’s not just the money. When the mouse dies much of the Israeli myth goes with it and world opinion my turn on them.
Crane
Yes a nuclear strike is out of the question because Israel intentionally tries not to just kill all the civilians in Gaza, but not because it’d be like “nuking themselves.” You do not understand how nukes work and no, the typical yield warheads Israel probably has (100 Kt to maybe 500 Kt range) used on Gaza would not be like “nuking themselves.” You’ve read too much about nuclear tests with 10+ Mt bombs in areas where fallout was dispersed heavily. Very little relation to much lower yielding bombs that make up the majority of today’s nuclear stockpiles and very little relation to how fallout is dispersed in more typical delivery scenarios in a real nuclear strike situation.
World opinion is largely against Israel already, Israel does not at all benefit from its struggle with Palestinians. It may benefit from the status quo more than it does other alternatives, but it’d benefit most from no conflicts at all. Israel isn’t immune from the simple economic / military realities of the modern world in which very few wars are worth the money invested in them.
They have never been popular, except with maybe Christian fundamentalists and post-Citizens United politicians. They founded their country on someone else’s land fer cryin’ out loud. As a Jewish state in the middle of Muslim territory. Not a recipe for the Miss Congeniality prize.
Wow, really? You’re right, I’m no more an expert on nukes than I am on mid-east crises.
Still, I don’t think resorting to WMDs is going to go over very well. The next target will be Israel in that scenario.
Probably the same result if they go for genocide too, though. This one strikes me as a rather intractable problem.
And, also, if Israel really did want to annihilate Gaza…nukes wouldn’t be necessary. Conventional explosives could do the job easily enough. There’s no need to cross that line, which would be diplomatically suicidal.
If Israel could erect a giant force-field, a magical wall, to separate the two regions, without causing one single casualty, I’m sure they’d be delighted to do that and call it peace.
(And Hamas would start working on ways under, over, or around it…)
As long as Hamas has maps showing the entirety of Israel labeled “Occupied Palestine”, peace isn’t what they want.
Israel could have peace in exchange for going back to the pre-1967 borders. It would rather have the land than the peace.
I don’t really think that’s true since there was war pre-1967. But in the 2000 Camp David Summit they offered up a large amount of land. They were going to keep some settlements in the West Bank, but Palestine would have eventually gotten 92% of the West Bank and some Israeli land from the Israeli side of the Green Line (meaning Israeli land that is essentially unambiguously Israeli) as compensation for the parts of the West Bank Israel was’t willing to give up.
The Palestinian call in show I watched on C Band seemed to believe that water rights were an important issue that Israel would not give them.