[QUOTE=Aeschines]
Personally, I’m philosemitic. Jews are cool, and Israel is a pretty cool country with cool people in it. If Israel didn’t have the Palestinians constantly pissing and moaning and making trouble, it would just sit there and not bother anyone.
But the Arab world (and various fellow travellers like Iran) are antisemitic. Duh! Further, these same Arab countries have a worldview and culture that, if we Westerners are honest about it, makes our stomach turn. Let’s cut all the cultural relativism bullshit and just admit that women dressed in black whatevers is sick and that Islam is the world’s worst major religion, which is saying a lot.
I’ve met Arabs and Iranians who were the nicest and most sophisticated people, but, PC nostrums aside, can’t we just admit that the Middle East is home to some of the most violent, infantile, and just plain negative people in the world? To paraphrase Yoda and Rummy, “Dead-enders, they be.”
Then there is this issue: There’s no reason for a “Palestinian State.” There are plenty of Arab tyrannies to choose from–hmm, Egypt, Syria, Jordan (might not even be too bad, this one).
Should Israel ever have been manufactured in 1948? Probably not. It was a typical arrogant British move. Do the Israelis do plenty of mean, unjustifiable shit to the Palestinians? No doubt. So the line is, They’re both bad, slap them both on the wrist, why can’t they just work it out? Oh, and it’s Israel’s fault, anyway.
Bullshit. We return to the point about the Arab countries being infantile trouble makers. Just as you can’t make peace with a 6-year-old shortbusser with ADD and “emotional problems” (remember how those kids were?), you can’t make peace with the Palestianians. It’s just a priori not gonna work.
So the long and short of it is this: Regardless of Israel’s origin and its various sins, it’s just gotta knock Hamas and Hezbollah and Iran and whoever on their ass and make sure that they never get up. Israel then won’t bother anyone, and, if we’re lucky, the orgs and countries that got knocked on their ass will go down so hard they won’t bother anyone else, either. No loss to world culture, big gain for world order.
(And no, I don’t support Bush’s war. Afganistan good realpolitik, Iraq bad realpolitik. The point IS realpolitik, not trying to democratize countries that can’t handle it.)
All I can say is, Kick some ass, Iz!
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I’m really pleased that you fully understand the problem. 
As we used to say about the Irish Pronlem- anyone who believes they understand the problem has really misunderstood it.
Problems like this are so complex and recalcitrant to solution, that simplistic one-sided analyses like yours totally fail to address the problem.
It is worth discussing details of policy and reactions of factions to changes in the situation, but to make broad brush statements about Israel: “just gotta knock Hamas and Hezbollah and Iran and whoever on their ass and make sure that they never get up.” and assuming that that will make the situation better, rather than drumming up more anti-Israel support, is just not realistic. The Islamic world spreads from Israel west across the north of Africa and east nearly as far as Australia. There are 1.5 billion followers of Islam- a lot of potential enemies.
The strike em hard and wipe em out strategy is hardly likely to work better with Hezbollah and Hamas than it has for Bush and Al Qaeda; in fact it is more likely to be a recruiting agent for future terror.
As with Ireland, what is needed is time. Israel’s best option is to do as little as possible to maintain its borders for a long period of time, gaining time for the Islamic world to accept Israel as a fact, but with the realization that unless they have a fifty-sixty year exit strategy from most of the occupied territories, then they may as well accept that they will remain in a state of terrorist threat for ever. As long as the Palestinians have a justified grievance and little to lose, Israel will be attacked regularly.
Two generations ago, the thought that a British Goverment would have stated that it is willing for the North of Ireland to reunite with the south (which it probably will in some way within another couple of generations) would have been totally unacceptable. Similarly the idea that the Irish Republican Army would lay down its arms and agree to wait for the political process to work its way out would have been totally unacceptable. Both things have happened.
Similarly with the Israel/Palestine problem. I suspect that by the time of the centenary of the Israeli State, there will be some move (maybe completed) toward a return of Arab land to the Palestinians and a comprehensive peace settlement.
That is unless the situation gets completely out of hand and Israel uses extreme force against an enemy and an ‘Islamic’ nuclear attack is carried out on Israel.