As the Palestinians and their Muslim neighbors will never be happy with Israel being there and the Israelis will be happy with what they have now, then you might as well make the one side happy. Seems pretty obvious, actually.
Only two Arab countries that I know of have agreed to accept and recognize the government of Israel. Jordan and Egypt.
What other countries were you thinking of?
With all due respect, every time you speak on this subject you make statements which cause people to have less and less confidence in your knowledge and understanding of an extremely complex conflict.
Incidentally, you never answered my earlier question.
Please give me the names of the Palestinians you expect to take over a future Palestinian state who will be more moderate than Fayyad or Abu Mazen and why you think they will.
Thank you for asking. I was thinking of the 21 countries of the Arab League who voted unanimously (with Libya absent, and Hamas abstaining, but the PLO voting yes) to accept the Arab Peace Initiative at their 2007 summit. If you don’t trust Wikipedia, here’s another account: http://www.haaretz.com/news/arab-states-unanimously-approve-saudi-peace-initiative-1.216851
I am baffled that a great expert like you is apparently unfamiliar with the Peace Initiative and the Summit, but as the Haaretz article states, “The plan offers Israel recognition and permanent peace with all Arab countries in return for Israeli withdrawal from lands captured in the 1967 Six Day War. It also calls for setting up a Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital and a just solution to the issue of Palestinian refugees.” As I noted in my earlier post, Israel finds these conditions unacceptable, but the offer is there.
Sorry, but it’s a ridiculous question. My point about the Irgun was that radical factions are used while the fighting is going on, and are discarded when they have served their purpose.
The offer was there, and it was a good step forward, but the problem is that the nations that proposed it refused to negotiate about it. It was strictly a “take it or leave it” deal, which was not only unacceptable, but also insulting in Middle Eastern terms. *Everything *is negotiable in the Middle East; refusing to haggle means you’re not serious about your offer.
If the Saudis had made the offer, and then invited the Israeli Prime Minster to Riyad for talks, we might have seen some major progress. As it stands, Israel had no choice but to see it as an empty ploy.
You’re entitled to that opinion. IMO it was a major, major concession by the Arabs, and Israel certainly did have a choice.
And negotiations were built into the initiative – it did not dictate how the refugee issue would be settled, it just said that negotiations to settle it would take place.
The only “take it or leave it” aspect was that Israel follow the UN resolutions regarding its borders, and presumably even that would be a starting point for negotiations after relations were normalized. Were you this understanding of Saddam Hussein when Bush was prating about the UN resolutions he had violated?
Withdrawing to its pre-67 borders would, obviously, leave Israel with 100% of the land it had before the Six Day War. Were you this understanding of Arafat when people were raking him over the coals for not accepting a “take it or leave it” offer of (allegedly) 90% of his pre-67 borders?
First of all, Israel is not in violation of UN resolutions regarding its borders.
Second of all, Israel will not withdraw from 100% of the territories under any circumstances - there are simply too many Israeli citizens there to uproot. The Saudis knew this when they made the offer. If they had said “*most *of the land taken in the 1967 war”, we would have had something to talk about. It seems, however, that they’re willing to perpetuate the conflict indefinitely for the sake of that 10% or so of the West Bank.
Even with the reliable US veto in the Security Council, there are many concerning Jerusalem alone. This is so well known that you must be engaging some form of hair-splitting that I don’t care to explore.
AFAIK they total about half a million, which Israel could easily absorb, judging by its aggressive immigration policies.
In any case, they knew what they were doing when they moved to the occupied territories. I see no reason to reward Israel for its extremely cynical “facts on the ground” strategy.
But I’m not aware of any requirement that they need to move at all. I would imagine that their status in the new Palestinian state would be a matter of negotiation. I don’t see why the new government would not welcome intelligent, industrious people, if they were willing to become Palestinian citizens.
They’re the ones willing to perpetuate for 10%?
Is it really true the special lowering of expectations for Israelis and Jews is this ingrained?
It’s not that we can’t absorb tem, it’s that we can’t force them to leave if they don’t want to go.
First of all, the majority of Jews in the Territories were born there, so they didn’t “know what they were doing” when they exited their mother’s vaginas. Or maybe you believ in punishing children for their parents’ “crimes”.
Second of all, you’re going to have to reward us, because you have no other choice. Facts on the ground may seem cynical to you, but they’re the only thing that counts.
Actually, just recently the Palestinian president said specifically that he would not accept a single Jew in a Palestinian state. So that’s off the table.
Besides, you just saw Israel exchange 1,000 terrorists for a single Israeli citizen. Do you really think it would abandon half a million Israeli citizens?
And place their fate back in the hands of people who hate them? Why should they do that?
Sevastopol, you have received several warnings for comments like this, followed by a suspension. That means you’re on a very short leash here. I’m giving you another formal warning now.
I’m just going to sit her on the sidelines and keep score.
Four points for Alessan!
Can you cite that? Not saying I don’t believe you, but I’d like to see the actual statement and the context.
It’s not abandoning them if you offer them a viable alternative, and the refuse to take it. IOW, I call “bad analogy” on that.
Abbas said that ?
And he’s a moderate ?
I remember someone else who said something like that only it was the German state.
I’d like to see it, too.
But it is apparently not a viable alternative for the Israelis.
It’s funny how every debate about Israel related issues ultimately turns into a debate about whether or not Israel has the right to exist. Fu-nn-eeee.
Israeli, not Jew. That may seem to be a trivial point, but I don’t think it is.
"I’m willing to agree to a third party that would supervise the [possible future Israeli-Palestinian] agreement, such as NATO forces, but I would not agree to having Jews among the NATO forces, or that there will live among us even a single Israeli on Palestinian land.”
Conflated with not “having Jews among the NATO forces”, it’s pretty clear what he means.