To take on the military aid issue, both sides will need military aid. An independent Palestine will be endangered by Syria, which has designs on the whole region and wouldn’t hesitate to absorb Palestine the same way it absorbed Lebanon.
The only way there will ever be lasting peace between Israel and the Palestinians:
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Pick one side.
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Kill everyone on the other side.
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Peace!
1st - Suicide Bombers
2nd - Homicide Bombers
3rd - Genocide Bombers
4th - Kitten Rapingcide Bombers
5th - Bombacide Killers
6th - fghjjfhgffcide df’kdfsgsmsd
Brutus:
Ha ha! Great answer!
I can’t see anyone - at this point in history - being able to do anything with this situation, so far as resolving it…
Of course, we (we being the rest of the world, and not just the U.S.) will need to continue trying…
My perception is this…
The Isrealis (disregarding the omnipotent threat of constant terrorist attacks) is largely a middle class Western society with stable governance, high quality education, and very mature and robust civil institutions. They also have quite a commitment to property rights and stamping out corruption.
Conversely, the Palestinians have made some really dumb political choices in the last 70 years. At first, they failed to see the writing on the wall with the Balfour agreement in the 1930’s and rather foolishly believed they could maintain the demographic status quo against the the overwhelming tides of world events. Also, they allowed themselves to be hijacked by the Arab League of Nations in the 1948 war, and then by Nassir in the 1960’s.
They should have sued for peace with Isreal 40 years or more ago, and further, they should have vehemently worked towards being absorbed into Israeli society - including the absorption of the West Bank into greater Isreal as well - along with voting rights, and social equality etc.
But history shows they didn’t, and indeed, time after time the Palestinians have made the mistake of thinking they could get rid of Israel by force, and force alone. I suspect that a lot of historians would agree that at least 50% of the woes of the Palestinian people have been brought upon themselves by very, very poor choices - in particular, backing the wrong sides at the wrong times - and allowing the tribal ugliness of xenophobic Arab racism to affect their decisions.
However, what’s done is done.
But it’s never too late, you know. I suspect that most Israeli’s innately accept that the Palestinian people have quite a valid claim to vast regions of the West Bank.
Nonetheless, the single most overwhelming obstacle to overcome now is the huge disparity in average GNP levels per capita between Israeli’s and Palestinians. The average Israeli is simply far, far more wealthy than your average Palestinian, and the giant gulf between the two peoples is sufficiently large nowadays that I honestly believe that IT has become the single greatest hurdle to peace. That is, Palestinians are just plain bitter about their shitty lot in life, compared to the generally comfy and Western lifestyles of their Israeli neighbours just a stone’s throw away.
Of course, the settlements in the West Bank simply rub more salt into the wounds as well - that is, not only do Palestinians have a valid grievance about being somewhat ethnically marginalised, but also, they perceive the open displays of wealth which manifest themselves in such settlemets as even more offence to be thrown into the mix.
So, it seems to me that the long term solution will be to raise Palestinian living standards up to Israeli living standards. And this includes everything that comes with good quality living standards - a commitment to world class education and health facilities, robust civil institutions, stamping out corruption, a commitment to human rights and property rights etc etc.
When we start to see parity between the two sides on THAT score, I honestly believe that peace will naturally break out by way of course.
Could you kindly explain this?
as much as its a bad idea, have some “force” such as the U.N. take over completely.
Disarm everyone.
Find a gun, kick them out.
No weapons, no fighting.
One state-IsraPal.
Sure, what I mean is unemployment is rampant, their birth rate is out of control.
So, the solution ? Stop having so many babies. Poor people do not have the right to keep churning out children, as if they were part of a mass assembly line.
And I hold everybody to the same standard, not just Palestinians. The same would apply to certain welfare mothers (illegitimate breeding machines), here in the USA, and also to other poor people across the globe.
The last thing I could imagine right now is even having a single child myself, as it would be stretching my finances a bit. I dont see how unemployed, poor as dirt people think they have the right to breed like rabbits. Are they not accountable for their actions. Does being poor give them the right to behave in a irresponsible, stupid manner ?
Just 1% of the money which Arafat has stolen from his people would buy enough condoms to last a very long time, I would assume.
A great idea in theory, but it has one small problem: you want to move Israel next to Idaho? Home to Randy Weaver, location of the world headquarters of the Aryan Nations, etc? If there’s one thing that’ll set off the loony fringe that screams about the New World Order trying to take over the US, that’ll be it. I say make it Canada’s problem.
To quote the Onion:
“Maybe it’s time we stopped thinking of it as the Mid-East crisis and started thinking of it as Mid-East culture.”
Ditto, only then we will see planes crashing into Wyoming.
Kill everyone… big dust bowl. (they may just do that themselves… 
and bizwire I may be mistaken, but weren’t the Isrealies “jumped” by their neighbors. (6 Day War?) Without our aid militarily and otherwise it would be genocide in the region.
I realize this isn’t what you said, but I couldn’t help but read this as “Kill the Palestinians to prevent them from commiting genocide.”
Maybe I just need to get my irony meter recalibrated.
Yes indeed they were jumped; in 1948, 1967 and 1973. However, US military aid didn’t really ramp up until the Nixon administration, in response to the 6-day war. The Israelis are perfectly capable of taking care of themselves, in my opinion.
Israel jumped first in 1967: IDF History of the 6 Day War
Dissonance is indeed, right. Very interesting post, D.
How I’m gonna laugh to learn that somewhere, in your own personal ancestory, that you’ve got great grandparents who were dirt poor when they first had children - thereby allowing the quirks of fate to have produced (many generations later) the sanctimonious, condescending, arrogant righteousness which I’m reading here.
For fuck’s sake - only wealthy people can have children? Go and shove your fascist ideas where the sun don’t shine.
- bomb it
- pave it
Uhh, pardon me, but just prior to the 67 War, didn’t a fellow named Nasser blockade the Straits of Tiran to Israeli shipping and kick the UN peackeeping force out of the Sinai, replacing them with Egyptian troops?
That’s history, though. For the present, let Israel dismantle Hamas, Palestinian IJ and the Al-Aqsa Martyrs if Qurei and Arafat will not or cannot, see to it that Israel dismantles every settlement, and hope and pray that Palestinian moderates will not again be silenced and that the two-state solution may ensue.
Leave Arafat alone. Ignore him. Marginalize him. He’s 74 years old, for god’s sake.
Stand by, and yes, continue spending to engraft constitutional liberalism on Iraq. No CIA coups in Iran even though the mullahs look weak-- let them fall at the hands of Shi’a Muslims.
Reduce reliance on Middle East oil. Cultivate Alaskan oil. When Martin takes over from Chretien, reestablish strong US-Canada relations… for a number of reasons, not the least of which is Alberta’s oil resources. Look to Venezuela and Nigeria for greater output. Tax the living daylights out of gas guzzling SUV’s.
Apart from reducing our reliance on their oil, I haven’t got a damned clue what to do about the Saudis.
[ol]
[li]The U.S. guarantees Israel’s physical security by stationing a brigade in Israel and the occupied territories, in exchange for an end to “targetted killings” by the Israelis, incursions into the occupied territories to arrest terrorists, and new settlements.[/li][li]A U.N. led peacekeeping force occupies the occupied territories and provides policing and civil adminstration, in exchange for the disarmament of Hamas, Al-aqsa, et al. U.S. military muscle backs them up to forcibly disarm them, if necessary. The U.N. also sets up a Palestinian police and military force eventually, conditional upon the transformation of terrorist organizations into political parties.[/li][li]The world throws mad money at the Palestinian areas to bring the civil infrastructure up to par with Israel.[/li][li]The U.N. and the U.S. leave behind a confederacy between the Israelis and the Palestinian territories modelled on the decentralized government of the Swiss. Jerusalem is an extra-territorial capital to both.[/li][/ol]
Fascist ideas, nope. My views on the matter are far less offensive than some of the pro Terrorist viewpoints others offer here. I offer only common sense, something the Palestinians seem not to have much of. In an article from 2000, I read that women in gaza on average had seven children, which is absolutely ridiculous. I’m not saying you have to be wealthy to have children, but I don’t feel sorry for poor people with mindboggling amounts of children. Also, it certainly doesn’t make the situation any better when you see interviews with these disgusting mothers who are smiling and applauding when one of their children just became martyred in some homocide/genocide - bomber attack. Makes one wonder what fate the mother wishes for her “six” other children.