Yo do know that the Palestinians are armed, don’t you? That Israel allowed the PA to import some 20,000 AK assault rifles as part of the Oslo agreement? That the Palesinians have been supplementing their supply through theft and smuggling ever since?
Or maybe you think that all the attacks against Israeli civilians were carried out with slingshots. Whatever. I’d like you to prove that the majority of the Plestinians killed during the latest operations were unarmed.
The majority of Israelis killed recently have been, after all.
(Etc.)
Anahita, this is the Straight Dope. People here can tell the difference between political rhetoric and facts.
Drumroll, please … cite? Even during the bombing campaign, the US did not close the Afghani border. If nothing else, kindly point out the hundreds of thousands of US troops that would be needed to close the border, not to mention that the Iranians would be, well, a mite upset if we placed troops on their territory to close off the several hundred-mile long border between Iran and Afghanistan.
In any event, food flights and caravans, in extremely large numbers, are going into Afghanistan.
There is a bit of jingoistic vitriole coming from both sides on this one.
To the OP please provide cites of heavy artillery targetting civilians.
Alessan, Israel is not perfect and living in New York, I know quite a few Israelis and I have not met too many that “Love American more than Americans”
To Istara, please elaborate on how a more effective Israeli military equates to a more oppressive one. Had Sharon not been to the temple mount (oh the horror, what a dispicable act, going to a holy site like that) in September of 2000, and had not provided a pretext for a Palestinian uprising, would the Israelis be killing Palestinians by the dozens now?
Please provide cites illustrating the last time that a Palestinian suicide bomber alerted Israeli authorities as to when and where he was going to strike. I can provide cites for Israel doing this for the Palestinian authority many times in the first few months of the conflict if you need me to.
Fact: Terrorists and their benefactors are not affiliated officially with the Palestinian authority, this classifies them as civilians. However, they are civilian combatants. Israel has asked the Palestinians to crack down on Civilian combatants and treat it as a criminal issue. This includes women and children who stand around the gunmen throwing rocks. This is a tactic that is used in many Islamic states and not just Palestine. In the Battle of Mogadishu there was around a 60-1 ration of Somali to American deaths as opposed to the 3-1 Palestinian-Israeli ratio. Or we can look at Desert Storm where there was around a 50-1 ratio, or we can look at Afghanistan where there is no real accounting yet, but it appears to have a similar ratio. The tactic of hiding among civilians tends to contribute to this.
Fact2: Yasser Arafat has time and again released terrorists that were arrested to appease Israel.
Fact3: Israel cannot trust the Palestinian authority to keep it’s civilian populace in check, despite the arms that have been delivered to the Palestinian authority in the past for such a purpose, including riot gear provided by the US, last year.
Fact4: The IDF has a responsibility to keep it’s country safe from harm. Due to Fact3 it must take these matters into it’s own hands.
Fact5: The Palestinian Authority is not a recognized legitimate government, so Israel has an enemy that can claim that it has no ties to the combatants in said conflict, there are certain expectations from Israel in the PA’s quest for legitimacy, see Fact2 and Fact3.
Fact6: Israel exists, that’s the reality. There is a very strong movement within Israel that believes that Palestine should also exist, but not at the cost of Israel’s existance. Israel has given many concessions that harm Israel’s sovereignty. Palestinians have time and again used this to their strategic advantage, or rejected a 90% appeasement because it’s not 100%, where 100% is Israel cessation to exist, or at least giving up Jerusalem entirely. Last time Jerusalem was under Arab control they kicked out the jews and started tearing down Jewish holy sites. Therefore anything more than 90% is not an option for Israel.
Israel has been a very good ally to the US, they give us much needed intelligence, as well as helping us develop new military tactics and technology. They are currently helping us make our airports more secure. Israel also keeps Jerusalem open to foreign tourism, being that Jerusalem is holy to about half of the world, that is very important.
The problem does not exist with all arabs. It doesn’t even really exist with the terrorists, as terrorists many times are not affiliated. The groups have their own agendas and operate independently of one another. The problem exists with the Palestinian Authority, who refuses, or hasn’t the power, to excercise influence over the numerous terrorist organizations. If the Palestinian “Authority” HAD any authority, there would not be any tanks in Ramallah.
Yes, but it has become clear that the PA is part of the problem, and not part of the solution. Those weapons that were given to them to restore order have instead been turned against the Israelis.
If the PA had been arresting people, setting up roadblocks to prevent terrrorists from moving, and in general acting like a real police force, then the Israelis would have responded to the terror by giving the PA even more weapons and authority to enlist them in helping to stop the bloodshed. As you said, Israel simply wants to be left alone.
But unfortunately, the PA has proven itself to be a tool for the terrorists. The latest attacks in Israel can be directly traced to highly trained terrorists affiliated with the PA and with Arafat himself. The PA has a history of looking the other way when terrorist attacks take place, and when forced to arrest people, they are put in jails with revolving doors. Arresting terrorists publically in front of the media, and within a week or a month the terrorists are back on the street. There has been NO good-faith attempt by the PA to prevent terrorist attacks against Israel, other than at times when it suited their temporary political interests to do so.
If anyone is confused as to who is ultimately on the right side of this conflict, all you have to do is ask yourself this question: If all the terrorists in the occupied territories mysteriously vanished, what would Israel do? Answer: It would retract its troops, establish normal relations, and probably help rebuild the areas that it has had to destroy. It would not attempt to subjugate the Palestinians or take more territory. The territory it occupies now was taken in self-defense, and Israel would be mighty happy to give it all back and withdraw into its 1967 borders if it could be convinced that it was safe to do so. Security issues aside, Israelis would love for the Palestinians to have their own state, because they could then rid themselves of the entire sorry mess.
Now, if Israel’s military mysteriously vanished overnight, what would the Palestinians and other Arab nations do? They would attack Israel and destroy it. The PLO has consistently refused to remove clauses in its charter that call for the destruction of Israel, and the peace Israel shares with its Arab neighbors are largely the result of an overwhelmingly superior military, and not any feelings of respect or goodwill towards Israel amongst the Arab nations. Remember that Saudi peace proposal that promised ‘normalized relations’ with Israel if it pulled back to the 1967 borders? Well guess what… That wording has been removed after consultation with other Arab nations. They simply refuse to accept the right of Israel to exist as a sovereign nation.
This defines the nature of the conflict. Violence by Israel is retaliatory in nature, aimed only at preventing further deaths of its innocent civilians and maintaining the security of the country. Violence by the Palestinians is aimed at the destruction of Israel. There is a clear line of morality dividing the two sides, and Israel is on the right side.
One thing that I would like to point out as a point for the Palestinians, is that I believe that any and all Israeli settlements within the occupied territories should be bulldozed and moved into Israel.
While there is some credibility to the idea that the settlements provide a buffer zone protecting Israel’s interior, and that the Palestinians might see this as a weakening of Israel’s position and a perfect time to strike, I still think it would go a long way toward showing Israel’s good will. Then again, there are many who say this Intifada coincided with Israel’s pullout of Lebanon.
Maybe the topic of another debate, but I wonder if it’s even possible for a Palestinian state to stand peacefully next to Israel. The Palestinians appear to have no focus beyond violence toward Israel, whatever their rational is. What will they do, once the violence stops (hypothetically), and they are just a poor decrepit country with nothing to do and no one to blame for their living conditions? Will they turn their aggression toward Jordan, which currently occupies about three quarters of the original Palestinian territory?
I think Zwaldd just hit upon an important point. What would an independent Palestine look like? What kind of economy would it have? Would it be self-sustaining? If not, you’re never going to have a happy population, especially when they are situated next door to a country that took ‘their’ land and turned it into an oasis of wealth and freedom.
As I study the middle east more, I’m moving more towards the belief that the ultimate cause of Arab violence is the ultimate inability of these nations to compete in the global economy. Without oil, these countries would all be backwards, poor dust-bowls. They just haven’t developed the institutions and philosophy necessary to make it on their own. This breeds resentment and anger towards those who live in modern, peaceful, pluralistic countries. Israel is a thorn in the side of the Arab world not just because of religious differences, but because the Israelis have taken some poor land and turned their nation into an industrial powerhouse. Their very existance makes the Arab nations look bad, and robs them of the ability to claim that their various problems are not their fault.
Did you mean this rhetorically, or do you really mean that moving the people out would be insufficient? I’ve heard this line from others, but I never understood the value of destroying functional buildings.
As you know from my previous posts, I am not in the business of defending the Palestinians. But, I maintain that a Palestinian state would have as much if not more working for it than Jordan, which is at least a nominally viable state.
So imagine a peacefully coexisting Palestine and Israel. Imagine the region after a Camp David accord or after a Saudi accord.
First, the public opinion thing. IMHO this shifts very rapidly with a change in situation. I bet surveys looked very different a few years ago in the territories. Palestinians were generally free to work in Israel, and many of them saw their quality of life shoot up. I bet the number of people calling for armed resistance was far, far smaller than current surveys show. I maintain that after a year of peace (or at least relative calm), vitriol on both sides will be substantially reduced.
Second, economy etc. Palestine will have an excellent infrastructure, at least between cities, as these are the roads currently used by Israelis to go around PA territory. Jericho and Ramallah will have excellent ring roads from the bypass routes now in place. There will be a seaport at Gaza, and room for Palestine to operate out of the Ashkelon port (at least according to the Camp David accords). There will be protected passage between the West Bank and Gaza. Water rights and electricity will be negotiated with Israel, giving dependable electricity and guaranteed water.
So what will they do? Well, besides at first being an open labor source for Israel and a cheap manufacturing base (kind of like the US/Mexico plants), there will be good cheap tourism there. Bethlehem is an endpoint for thousands of pilgrims every year. Jericho is the oldest continuously settled city in the world. Add to this tremendous amounts of archaelogic sites. The Gaza seashore is supposedly beautiful and can be developed into a Taba kind of resort.
I see no problems with viability of a Palestinian state in a peaceful symbiotic relationship with Israel. Of course, the Palestinians don’t see it this way (hopefully yet).
If I was a Jewish settler who built those buildings & tilled the earth, only to be evicted because of political expediency, I would burn my own buildings and salt the earth, but that’s just me.
Edwino: I sincerely hope you are right, but Palestine would also have a lot of negatives: First, it has a population of young men that have been raised to hate Israel and to blame all of their problems on others. Second, it would almost inevitably be used as a pawn by other nations that seek to destabilize Israel.
But you might be right. The Palestinians have something that Arabs in other nations don’t have - intimate experience working in a thriving, flourishing democracy. If they can learn management and production from the Israelis, then they could be a modern, functioning state. That would be wonderful.
But I have to wonder if there isn’t something inherent to the Arabian mindset that precludes this, because countries like Saudi Arabia are still largely backwater nations despite being awash in oil money. They have had many advantages Israel never had, yet in 50 years Israel became an economic powerhouse while the others stagnated. Hopefully, the Palestinians will learn from that example.
But I think the notion of a peaceful, coexisting state is a fantasy. I don’t think it’ll happen, for the reasons I stated. Even if Israel and Palestine could come to some sort of agreement, the disenfranchised young men in Palestine aren’t going to forget their hatred overnight, and a peaceful Palestine undercuts the other Arab countries who still will not accept the notion of Israel existing forever. So there will be incitement, meddling, and general chaos.
I can’t offer a solution, though. This is one of those problems that has caused people a lot smarter than me to just throw up their hands and walk away. That’s very, very sad.
What percent of our foreign aid goes to Israel? Egypt?
I agree it is a nasty situation that we should stay out of. And if we are sending aid to one side and not the other then we are really staying out.
Maybe we didn’t directly help them get the bomb but without our aid for necessities could they embark on such a task? I don’t pay for my mother-in-law’s trips. but I pay for her other bills which allow her to save for the trips. So aren’t I paying for her trips. I say yes but wifey says no. WHat say yee?
Explain to me how what I quoted, coming from the mouths of the Israeli reservists themselves is rhetoric and not fact.
It is clear that these reservists who have been to the Occupied Territories themselves saw that what they were being asked to do in the name of their government was wrong, morally.
How is this rhetoric and not fact?
And I’m pretty clever, I can figure out that this is the Straight Dope.
Well the usual debate rages on with the usual Israel-Palestine arguments. Since we lost a large number of such discussions with the transition to the new board, and since I had written dozens of thousands of words on the topic, I am now too demoralized to start over again (previously I could say, “we’ve gone over this particular point before” and draw on past experience).
I disagree with this:
Got cite? And do you think you’re using a big enough brush there? Oil has certainly brought wealth to some countries, it’s true, but there’s more to economy than crude oil production: what about petroleum refining, basic petrochemicals, cement, construction, fertilizer, and plastics, which happen to be the other major industries of Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest producer of oil? Other Arabic countries tend to place less emphasis on oil because they simply don’t have as much (Egypt by comparison has little and its primary industry is textiles, with a national GDP over twice that of Israel). And is it reaosnable to say that without its cut diamonds, American money, and Jewish cabals Israel would be nothing but a collection of mud huts inhabited by rabid Zionists hunting for Arabs to expel? If, if, if…
Well, in fact “they” developed a large chunk of what today is called Western Civilization, and “they” have a philosophical, religious, economic, cultural, scientific, historical, artistic, literary, and even feminist heritage that is deep and rich; the real issue, if you want to talk in general terms, is that a shift towards extremism (attributable to various external as well as internal factors), coupled with a lack of coherent clerical control or direction (there is no central clergy in Islam to issue messages and keep the loudmouths in check), and in addition to various economic and political woes, have in some cases resulted in religio-political structures that are anachronistic and often inadequate to meet the challenges at hand. For example, Saudi Arabia once turned to the Koran and Hadith to settle the debate over whether women were allowed to drive cars.
No, not at all the case to any significant degree for any Arabic country I know of. It’s cute pop psychology and it may fly after a few beers, but it’s still utter bunk. People don’t have a problem with America or Israel or whomever just because Americans or Israelis or whomever are happy and democratic. The envy argument is much like Freud’s output: it kind of makes sense as long as you have no desire to disbelieve or question, and as long as you accept what you are hearing, but closer analysis reveals it as nonsense. There are actually much more complex reasons at work in the real world.
No Sam, the very existence of Israel is a thorn in the side of the Arabs because said thorn was placed right in their side, i.e. smack in the middle of Arab region, on holy land, at the expense and disenfranchisement of local Arabs, in apparent fulfilment of long Zionist efforts, etc, etc. I’m not saying the Israelis lack religious or territorial (or whatever) claims to the area, but let’s not dumb down the argument in this silly and insulting manner please.
Frankly, I’m having a hard time with the whole “Israel good and Palestine bad” vs. “Palestine good and Israel bad” polarization. From where I sit, it looks like side A attacks side B, side B retaliates against side A, side A retaliates against side B for that attack, and so forth and so on. Add to that the fact that both sides seem to derive great pleasure in provoking the other, and it’s like a much nastier version of two kids sitting in the back seat of the car (“Mom, he hit me!” “He hit me first!” “He was on my side of the seat!” etc.).
I watch the (BBC) news, and it’s interesting to see how the people on the street (in Israel) react. Many of the Israelis can’t seem to understand why the Palestinians won’t just let them get on with their lives in peace in their new homes – except that it doesn’t appear to register that those nice new homes they bought were built on land taken by relocating the Palestinians. The Palestinians, OTOH, can’t understand why the Israeli populace don’t see a problem with this, and thus blame them for their current plight – and therefore feel no qualms about attacking civilians. And the average American doesn’t seem to know why the Palestinians can’t just settle down peacefully on the little sections of land the Israeli government gives them (can we say “reservations”?).
Whose fault is it? It doesn’t really matter now. We are where we are. At the moment, it looks like we’ll only get peace when everyone on both sides is dead.
Israel in ahead of the curve. They knew just how dangerous the surrounding Arab nations were getting.
Please remember we were attacked, not by a nation and the attack was not on a nation but “freedom itself was attacked, and freedom will be defended” - G. W. Bush.
We are defending ourselves and are not the aggressor. We have only one alternative and that is to surrender. If we make peace that will only give our enemy time to devise new plans and weapons to use against us.
The only true peace will come when we either crush ALL terrorists forces or they crush us.
Israel is showing tremendous restraint under our request. One reason they have survived so long is when they are hit the hit back much harder - now they must just sit there and take it or risk all Arab nations united against us and Israel.
The B52s are in Belfast? Man, I love that band! Oh wait, that’s not what you meant…
k2dave, one of the more overlooked aspects of fighting against terrorists is that often the act of “crushing” them serves to create more terrorists – I’m willing to bet there are more than a few Muslims in Afghanistan and Pakistan who used to be ambivalent towards Americans and now hate us with a passion, all because we’ve been out there blowing the shit out of things in the name of democracy and freedom.
Which is not to say that I feel that the War against Terrorism is without its merits or successes, but rather that when you’re the one the bombs are falling on it’s a little hard to keep the bigger perspective in mind.
It might dreate more terrorists - at least in the short term, but they will be less capable (again at least in the short term).
My point being is I really don’t see any alternative.
1 If we do nothing (or not enough) we WILL get nuked eventually, our planes WILL get hijacked, chemical weapons will be used iun our major cities, our water supply will be poisoned. (unless we can get off the earth but we are very far away from that technology). And we will have to fight sooner or later.
2 If we fight now the terrorists don’t have nukes (or at least delivery systems) - and we bring the war to them - we destroy their buildings instead of them destroying ours.
3 If we surrender - then it’s over. Men will have their rights basically chopped off (or their heads), women will be reduced to baby making/raising machines who’s skin will never see the sun.
This will just keep going. This situation is not like Sept. 11 and Afghanistan. This is a more complex and dangerous situation.
There is no way that Israel can stop the killings with force and there is no way the Palestinians will stop the Israelis with bombs.
In Northern Ireland the British Gov. could not stop the IRA operating and killing almost at will. They threw almost everything they had at them including shoot to kill policies ( read “Shoot to Kill” by John Stalker ) and the SAS. The IRA just hit back harder and gained support every time the British hit the Nationalists. This would have gone on and on without stop if the two sides had not sat down with each other and talked.
In the middle east we have people strapping bombs to themselves and running into crowded areas. People with this much commitment will not be stopped with force. Hit them hard and they’ll just go into hiding for a while and resurface. Kill them and you’ll just have their brother/sister/friend signing up and strapping on the bomb.
In situations like this you have to talk to terrorists and the terrorists have to talk to their oppressors(as they see them).
All the stuff along the lines of “The terrorists are wrong and should just be dealt with” will not solve anything it will just get more innocent people killed on both sides. The sooner both sides see this the better. Both sides need to compromise to get peace with Israel giving up more most likely (just as the unionist had/have to in NI). This is the hard part.
In NI for example part of the agreement that brought the fragile peace that is still holding was that all terrorist prisoners allied to the groups that held the ceasefire where released from prison. These where people who killed men, women and children in cold blood and are now walking the streets. This isn’t a perfect solution but it was necessary to stop the killing. This level of sacrifice has to made to stop situations like this.
