I’d just like to note that - speaking for myself, of course - as an Israeli, I think that the sort of right/wrong, black/white thinking presented by the OP is foolish, simplistic and ignorant of the vast array of subtleties which need to be mastered before we can solve the awful mess we’re in. I do believe my country is in the right (how much that is actually relevant is another question), but I’m well aware that “in the right” is a relative term, and I’m pretty sure that most of my countrymen would agree with me. This isn’t WW2.
It occurs to me that there is no Hebrew phrase for “counter-productive”. Obviously, the term does not appear in december’s lexicon as well.
Izzy,
The Palestinians did crack down on Hamas quite hard on occasion so it is not true that they did nothing though probably not as much as they should have. Their side of the bargain (controlling Hamas) was a lot harder to keep than Israel’s which mainly just had to withdraw.
The idea that settlements are unimportant or that Israel made the greater concessions at Oslo is your opinion only. It seems to pre-suppose that Israeli occupation after 1967 was legitimate and recognized by the international community which it wasn’t. Withdrawing from territory which is not your own is not some great concession.
He, however, concluded that Israel has been stringing the Palestinians along. A point of view hardly unique to him insofar as that is rather the conclusion of a number of analysts. You may refer yourself to the past several months articles in The Economist for such characterizations. Indeed, they have a pre-set search. Of course I have also cited these in the past, but…
In the context of the situation, he is clearly moderate. That is, he belongs to that class of people who Israel will have to deal with in the end – and has dealt with.
See the Economist. It is widely understood Israeli intel agencies tried to use Hamas --with some success-- against PLO.
Your impression is as informed as usual.
Ah, now this is rich.
** Why is not adhering to the terms of a deal bad faith?**
Ring around the bloody posy.
Bother, a pox on both their houses. (with due apologies to Alessan & others who maintain no small degree of rationality.) I need to off be.
Alessan – no doubt my OP was black/white with respect to assignment of blame. However, the point of the OP was not to judge israel, but to inquire why some people tend to strongly back Israel’s enemies.
Tomndebb – let me ask you about a single issue. Israel has arrested 2 or 3 Palestinian (alleged) moderates. Arafat’s regime has killed hundreds of Palestinian moderates. You have commented at least twice about the former, but not about the latter. The Palestinian actions are much, much more significant – because hundreds is greater than two or three, and because death is worse than arrest.
I don’t know about “quite hard”. Generally they arrested a few people under pressure, and waited until the fuss died down to release them.
Possible. (This remains true today). But the bottom line is that if you can’t live up to your end of the deal it is not reasonable to expect the other side to do this. The main motivation that the Israelis have to get out of the deal is peace - if the Palestinians can’t deliver on this they deliver on nothing.
(I believe we are getting a bit removed from the origin of this discussion which was whether the Israelis not clamping down on the PA would result in tem being more moderate, or give them free reign to strengthen themselves for further battle).
Can’t say for sure here - most of these (I skimmed them) seem to be heavily dependent on interpretation. Also they address the Netanyahu gov - we are discussing whether the terms of the Oslo Agreements had previously been abused and flouted during Barak’s leadership.
As a practical matter it was.
Col,
Regardless of what he favored, he was involved in actively leading a war against Israel - I don’t think you could call his arrest part of a crackdown on Palestinian moderate leadership. On second thought, maybe you could.
I have no intention of searching through the Economist to verify some claim of yours.
As for my comment to CyberPundit, you have once again demonstrated your frequent inability to comprehend written English. Reread it again, slower this time.
Months ago I was one of the Palestinain apologists. I used to see things in terms of “poor rock throwing Palestinian children versus Israeli tanks” type analysis. I made some pretty outlandish arguments right here in this forum.
I haven’t been there in close to a year. I no longer think either side has clean hands. I detect a similar sentiment among many posters on the SDMB. Therefore, I do not think the premise to this topic - though clever - is legitimate.
I think as presently constituted the Palestin"ia"n leadership believes in pushing Israel out of “Palestine” completely. I don’t see one bit of moderation in Yassir Arafat. Problem is, the Sharon government seems to be no more serious about negotiating away any occupied territory than the Palestinians seem to be about letting Israel survive. Of course, my perceptions are based on news reports interpreted many thousands of miles away from the actual events.
I have no answers to this problem except to suggest everyone in the Middle East get some good reliable body armor.
It is quite possible that the Palestinian leadership is riding the proverbial tiger. Riling up the population is useful in provoking your antagonists - its getting everyone back in the box that it the hard part. Fact is that the Palestinian population is so extreme at this point that the PA is limited in their ability to make major concessions or crackdowns. To the extent that they do so, they lose face, credibility and influence on the street. So focusing on the leadership may be missing the picture, to an extent.
It’s also possible that it could be done and that Arafat is a very risk-averse leader, refusing to make the hard choices that would potentially threaten him, and preferring his current hero rebel status to a possibly shakier rulership one.
And? You have asserted that Israel is doing nothing to provoke the violence. My observations are simply counter-arguments to your assertion. The actions of the Palestinian extremists are not pertinent to my discussion point.
If the PA is truly killing “hundreds” of moderates (and Israel is standing by letting it happen? Why is that?) then imprisoning other moderates, especially highly visible ones, gives the moderates only three options: 1) join the extremists, 2) die at the hands of the extremists, or 3) sit in an Israeli jail. Israel has effectively joined the extremists in saying that they do not want any moderates cluttering the landscape, thus encouraging the moderates to join the extremists.
In a broad-ranging description of all the problems in the region, noting the Palestinian murder of moderates is a point that needs to be made and understood. In the context of a discussion in which Israel is held up as the paragon of all virtue and we are asked to simply agree to give Israel carte blanche to carry out any policies they choose, noting that the Israeli actions are neither pure nor productive is pertinent; noting the sins of the Palestinians is pretty much irrelevant.
You defined this discussion as one in which all “right thinking” people should join in giving Israel their 100% support. This discussion addresses Israel’s virtues; there is no need to discuss Palestinian vices except as they bear on virtuous Israel.
You seem to be operating with a tally sheet mentality in which any mention of an Israeli sin must be matched by a mention of a Palestinian sin (or ten of them). However, crying that they got in more punches does not address the issue. My approach has been to point out a specific course of action that Israel needs to take in order to eventually get past this tragedy. (And I am aware that my suggestion could fail, but I still submit that it has not been tried. The talks need to continue if the situation is ever to be resolved. With only a single exception that I can recall, Israel has been the party to break off discussion on every occasion.)
Your tally sheet mentality has successfully kept the killing going in the Balkans for several hundred years and in Ireland for over 30 years: The shooting must stop, but first we have to avenge cousin Drasiga/Uncle Seamus for their deaths last week in retaliation for our reprisal raid the week before.
That depends on how you define “break off discussion”. For how much time/through how many bombings should Israel keep talking before “breaking off discussion”? Or should Israel ignore that Arafat himself is at the very least signing off on these bombings (as documented by the 100 pages of “terror invoices” that Sharon presented to the US government and the media earlier this year), and merely discuss until the Palestinians have a state with Arafat and Hamas as the two competing elements for power? It is not reasonable to keep negotiating in the face of continuing terrorism on the preposterous hope that once Arafat becomes more powerful, the terrorism will stop.
“But the bottom line is that if you can’t live up to your end of the deal it is not reasonable to expect the other side to do this.”
Well exactly the same could be said of the Israelis. We can argue all day about who started breaking their agreements first and more seriously but the bottom line is that both sides did so repeatedly and therefore deserve to share the blame. This is in sharp contrast to December’s picture of Israel heroically pursuing peace only to be rebuffed by the treacherous Palestinians .
“Also they address the Netanyahu gov - we are discussing whether the terms of the Oslo Agreements had previously been abused and flouted during Barak’s leadership”
Huh? I thought we were discussing Israel’s performance during the Oslo peace process in general. I agree that the Barak government was better but it also broke some deadlines and continued settlements.
“As a practical matter it was.”
Not sure what you mean by that. Once again you seem to be assuming that Israel’s occupation of the West Bank/Gaza was legitimate. By withdrawing Israel only did what UN security council resolutions had demanded for decades. You might view that as a great concession but most independent analysts don’t. For instance the Economist ,at the time of Oslo , stated in its editorials that it was the Palestinians who had made the greater concessions, for instance because they were given no indication upfront about the boundaries of their state.
BTW I have to demand a source for the “hundreds of moderates” being killed by the Palestinians. This sounds like a myth if there ever was one. Is this in the last ten years or during the 60’s and 70’s?
I’m going to jump into this thread on this second page to respond to the OP, expecting of course that in so doing my post is likely to be missed. Oh well, that’ll teach me to hold off.
I believe in Wilsonian self-determination principles. I don’t care a lick what type of government the people in a region want to have or what it does. It’s not my business until they start projecting their power against me or my country, at which point defensive measures should be undertaken.
So, since the state of Israel was forced upon the region by outside influences, it is not a self-determined state. Therefore I would enjoy seeing it become so, allowing the Palestinians to create their own state. I don’t give a hoot what they do with it as long as it’s the state the people of Palestine truly want.
I support the Palestinian people in this just as I support the people of Quebec, all the different peoples of the contrived state of “Yugoslavia”, and as I supported the republics that split off when the Soviet Union broke apart. How they run their country is their business, my only concern is seeing that they get the chance to be a country of their own determination. It’s not my place or our nation’s place to impose its value system on other people. Once Palestine becomes a nation-state, if we don’t like what they do we aren’t obliged to do that state any favors, but I can’t justify preventing them from becoming a state in the first place.
You’re assuming Arafat orders suicide bombers to attack while in route to peace conferences. Please:rolleyes:. Although it is highly likely Hamas and other organizations are getting money from the Palestinian Authority, Arafat has little or no control over Hamas’s actions. If Arafat becomes more powerful and gains an independant country, there is no excuse for keeping Hamas around, and any smart leader will quietly take them down. the US can give a large cash incentive to end the problems and build Palestine up right. (yes, i know the problem isn’t that simple, i’m just mentioning a broader plan)
I Disagree. If you make a deal and the other side
does not live up to its commitments under the deal, you are yourself freed from adhering to the deal. As such, who broke the deal first and how significantly is the crux of the issue. Particularly when the issue at hand is how much to trust this same party in the future.
See above. (Are you now asserting that settlements were banned under Oslo? I’d like to see a source for this).
Who are “most independent analysts” and how do you come by their opinion? My position here is that as a practical matter Israel controlled the WB/G at the time, “legitimately” or “illegitimately” (I’m not even sure what these terms mean in this context). As a practical matter, the net outcome was to have a greater effect on Israel, comparing starting position to ending position than it did on the Palestinians, who stood to gain some sort of autonomy.
In any event, I initially threw this in as a side point - it is not especially significant.
[During the recent conflict, the Palestinians have killed many of their own – so-called “collaborators,” who purportedly aided Israelis. No rules of evidence, judges or juries preceded these spontaneous executions.
A real good faith effort by PA leadership to arrest (and keep arrested) those planning and facilitating terrorist attacks (like Israel has done with those planning terror attacks against Arab targets) would go far. Absolutely controlling Hamas is not a realistic expectation. Trying to is.
Gotta agree with that - collaborators are NOT the same as moderates.
I think the whole “hundreds of moderates” thing has been called into question.
(It is probably true that Arabs who acted in a parallel manner to Israeli Peace groups would be lynched. But I doubt if there are any such Arabs, so there have probably been no such lynchings).
When large numbers of so-called “suspected collaborators” are rounded up and summarily executed or lynched, then, yes, “suspected collaborator” will mean “moderate.”