# Obama calls for independent Palestine, 1967 borders **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 19, 2011, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500 "2011-05-19T20:46:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 20
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/381 "2011-05-25T15:14:38Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > Then you are quite wrong. There is no religious requirement on any variety of Jews to support Israel. There is a religious-based _opposition_ to Israel, among the most orthodox minority. I think he just meant that all major sects support Israel’s right to exist, i.e., Reform, Conservative, and the OU. As far as I know, they all have such wording in their statements and charters. edit: In light of what Ali just said, maybe he just thinks that Jews are Israel-loving antipatriots. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/382 "2011-05-25T15:19:24Z")
> [@CitizenPained](#): > > I think he just meant that all major sects support Israel’s right to exist, i.e., Reform, Conservative, and the OU. As far as I know, they all have such wording in their statements and charters. Supporting a country’s right to exist is a far cry from faith-based unqualified support for anything they might do. Certainly, the majority of American Jews have a natural affinity for a country composed of their ethnic and religious counterparts in Israel, and this is reflected in their organizations (with the exception of those ultra-orthodox who have faith-based reasons to oppose Zionism). That is not the same as “unqualified” support. ---
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/383 "2011-05-25T15:25:07Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > Supporting a country’s right to exist is a far cry from faith-based unqualified support for anything they might do. > > Certainly, the majority of American Jews have a natural affinity for a country composed of their ethnic and religious counterparts in Israel, and this is reflected in their organizations (with the exception of those ultra-orthodox who have faith-based reasons to oppose Zionism). That is not the same as “unqualified” support. Agreed. I was attempted to translate for the…er…him. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Sevastopol](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cdc98d/32.png) [@Sevastopol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sevastopol)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/384 "2011-05-25T15:26:26Z")
One Jewish, American congressman or senator who deflects from unqualified support? ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/385 "2011-05-25T15:53:47Z")
> [@Sevastopol](#): > > One Jewish, American congressman or senator who deflects from unqualified support? You’re now shifting the goal posts and completely backing off your earlier claims. Off the top of my head, Barney Frank criticized Israel’s handling of the Gaza Flotilla raid. Furthermore, after Obama’s speech, Abraham Foxman’s ADL released a statement supporting Obama’s speech while it was being criticized by Netanyahu. If American Jews really took their marching orders from Tel Aviv, as you imply, then this wouldn’t have occurred. Sorry dude, but your beliefs are not reality-based. You should try to learn more about Jews. If you did you wouldn’t subscribe to anti-Semitic claptrap like dual-loyalty myth. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/386 "2011-05-25T16:12:01Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > What on earth is “the strengthening variety of American Judaism”? Whichever is Woody Allen’s, I should think. ---
**Author:** ![Lakai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9de0a6/32.png) [@Lakai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lakai)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/387 "2011-05-25T16:21:28Z")
Can someone clarify what Obama means when he talks about the changing demographics of the Palestinians? This is something most people cite as a reason for Israel to negotiate for peace. Is the problem that there will soon be too many Palestinians for Israel to handle? ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/388 "2011-05-25T16:33:02Z")
> [@Lakai](#): > > Can someone clarify what Obama means when he talks about the changing demographics of the Palestinians? This is something most people cite as a reason for Israel to negotiate for peace. > > Is the problem that there will soon be too many Palestinians for Israel to handle? The average Palestinian family has 7 children; when you take modern medicine into consideration, that means that they probably have the highest growth rate of any human population, ever, in the history of the world. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/389 "2011-05-25T16:40:28Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > The average Palestinian family has 7 children; when you take modern medicine into consideration, that means that they probably have the highest growth rate of any human population, ever, in the history of the world. Happens the world over. When people are really, really poor . . . well, the best things in life are free. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/390 "2011-05-25T16:48:56Z")
Yes, it means the Palestinian population is growing at a much faster rate than Israel’s. It would be one thing for Israel to annex a territory with a small Palestinian population. It’s another to annex a territory where the hostile population outnumbers Israel. In the first the original population just becomes a disaffected minority. In the second, it becomes a disaffected majority. When the United States annexed Texas, Arizona, New Mexico and California, those territories were very sparsely populated, and many of those people didn’t consider themselves Mexicans–they were Indios, or Anglo settlers. So we could just declare any Mexicans that happened to find themselves on the wrong side of the border to now be citizens of the United States, with very little demographic or ethnic change. If we tried to annex the areas around Mexico City, we’d be looking at a new population of millions of Spanish speaking catholic mixed race people. And what would we do with them? Let them become citizens? What if they voted for Mexican Independence? They’d have to become subject people and not allowed to vote. Of course we already had a large population of subject people, and look how well that turned out. Now imagine doubling or tripling the problem. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/391 "2011-05-25T16:50:19Z")
> [@Lakai](#): > > Can someone clarify what Obama means when he talks about the changing demographics of the Palestinians? This is something most people cite as a reason for Israel to negotiate for peace. > > Is the problem that there will soon be too many Palestinians for Israel to handle? The demographic argument never made much sense to me - more people doesn’t necessarily mean more power, particularly as very high growth rates in the modern world tend to be associated with poverty. A third world nation with a super high growth rate isn’t posing a _greater_ threat to a first-world nation. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/392 "2011-05-25T16:53:28Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > Yes, it means the Palestinian population is growing at a much faster rate than Israel’s. > > It would be one thing for Israel to annex a territory with a small Palestinian population. It’s another to annex a territory where the hostile population outnumbers Israel. In the first the original population just becomes a disaffected minority. In the second, it becomes a disaffected majority. > > When the United States annexed Texas, Arizona, New Mexico and California, those territories were very sparsely populated, and many of those people didn’t consider themselves Mexicans–they were Indios, or Anglo settlers. So we could just declare any Mexicans that happened to find themselves on the wrong side of the border to now be citizens of the United States, with very little demographic or ethnic change. > > If we tried to annex the areas around Mexico City, we’d be looking at a new population of millions of Spanish speaking catholic mixed race people. And what would we do with them? Let them become citizens? What if they voted for Mexican Independence? They’d have to become subject people and not allowed to vote. Of course we already had a large population of subject people, and look how well that turned out. Now imagine doubling or tripling the problem. The Israelis, even the most right-wing of them, have no intentions of annexing the West Bank or Gaza, complete with its massively-growing Palestinian population. It’s not going to happen, so it isn’t a potential problem. What the Israeli right wants, is to nibble off bits of the WB by populating those bits with Israelis. ---
**Author:** ![Lakai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9de0a6/32.png) [@Lakai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lakai)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/393 "2011-05-25T17:06:15Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > The Israelis, even the most right-wing of them, have no intentions of annexing the West Bank or Gaza, complete with its massively-growing Palestinian population. It’s not going to happen, so it isn’t a potential problem. > > What the Israeli right wants, is to nibble off bits of the WB by populating those bits with Israelis. This is why I don’t understand the argument. The only potential threat I can see from a rising Palestinian population is that it would make occupation more difficult for Israel. A potential uprising would also be more difficult to suppress. Still, if the last Israel military effort in Gaza is any indication, it’s going to be a while before Palestine grows to a size that can threaten Israel. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/394 "2011-05-25T17:09:02Z")
> [@Lakai](#): > > This is why I don’t understand the argument. > > The only potential threat I can see from a rising Palestinian population is that it would make occupation more difficult for Israel. A potential uprising would also be more difficult to suppress. > > Still, if the last Israel military effort in Gaza is any indication, it’s going to be a while before Palestine grows to a size that can threaten Israel. I agree - the demographic argument makes no sense. It presumes that more population equals more power. This is only of concern if that population is within Israel itself - in which case, it is of course more a question of politics. ---
**Author:** ![Dick\_Dastardly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c4cdca/32.png) [@Dick\_Dastardly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dick_Dastardly)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/395 "2011-05-25T18:01:16Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > It damn sure was, and so was Oslo. Neither succeeded, but they both were real attempts. Barak never made any actual concrete offer. here’s what a Clinton administration official who was there had to say : \*Even so, it is hard to state with confidence how far Barak was actually prepared to go. His strategy was predicated on the belief that Israel ought not to reveal its final positions—not even to the United States—unless and until the endgame was in sight. Had any member of the US peace team been asked to describe Barak’s true positions before or even during Camp David—indeed, were any asked that question today—they would be hard-pressed to answer. Barak’s worst fear was that he would put forward Israeli concessions and pay the price domestically, only to see the Palestinians using the concessions as a new point of departure. And his trust in the Americans went only so far, fearing that they might reveal to the Palestinians what he was determined to conceal… The final and largely unnoticed consequence of Barak’s approach is that, strictly speaking, there never was an Israeli offer. Determined to preserve Israel’s position in the event of failure, and resolved not to let the Palestinians take advantage of one-sided compromises, the Israelis always stopped one, if not several, steps short of a proposal. The ideas put forward at Camp David were never stated in writing, but orally conveyed. They generally were presented as US concepts, not Israeli ones; indeed, despite having demanded the opportunity to negotiate face to face with Arafat, Barak refused to hold any substantive meeting with him at Camp David out of fear that the Palestinian leader would seek to put Israeli concessions on the record. Nor were the proposals detailed.\* > **[Camp David: The Tragedy of Errors | Robert Malley, Hussein Agha](https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2001/08/09/camp-david-the-tragedy-of-errors/?pagination=false)** > > Mr. Malley, as Special Assistant to President Clinton for Arab-Israeli Affairs, was a member of the US peace team and participated in the Camp David Barak was fighting an election campaign during the negotiations and couldn’t even afford details of any concessions to be made public because that would lose him the election. That underscores the reality of the Israeli position which is that any israeli leader is leader of a coalition featuring extremist parties who will not accept any concessions and would collapse any government who offered them. That’s why Israel have never made a serious offer. Oslo is a similar story, don’t have time to go into it right now. I haven’t got time to go into Oslo but it’s no different. ---
**Author:** ![Inbred\_Mm\_domesticus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/aca169/32.png) [@Inbred\_Mm\_domesticus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inbred_Mm_domesticus)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/396 "2011-05-25T18:22:04Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > I agree - the demographic argument makes no sense. It presumes that more population equals more power. This is only of concern if that population is within Israel itself - in which case, it is of course more a question of politics. To a small extent, that population will always be “within Israel” because there is no intention of letting the WB and Gaza fully govern itself. Everything I’ve seen that indicates details of an offer includes complete military control over the Palestinian territories. In the worst case this means a Palestinian state will become like the Gaza strip; in the best case this means that the Palestinians will not control their borders and there will always be some type of limitation on their economic and security activities. I think the right-wing of Israel is envisioning something similar to Native American Indian reservations, or somewhere closer to these reservations on the spectrum of independence. The key difference is that none of these Palestinians will have a vote in the entirety of their governance. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/397 "2011-05-25T18:47:05Z")
> [@Inbred\_Mm\_domesticus](#): > > To a small extent, that population will always be “within Israel” because there is no intention of letting the WB and Gaza fully govern itself. Everything I’ve seen that indicates details of an offer includes complete military control over the Palestinian territories. > > In the worst case this means a Palestinian state will become like the Gaza strip; in the best case this means that the Palestinians will not control their borders and there will always be some type of limitation on their economic and security activities. > > I think the right-wing of Israel is envisioning something similar to Native American Indian reservations, or somewhere closer to these reservations on the spectrum of independence. > > The key difference is that none of these Palestinians will have a vote in the entirety of their governance. Israel blockades the Gaza strip, with the co-operation of the Egyptians (or at least, it did - not sure what the Egyptians are up to these days). It most certainly does not police the Gaza strip, like (say) the US or Canadians exercise ultimate police control over a Native American Reservation. Naturally, the Israelis wish to limit access through the Palestinian borders of Gaza - they are at times engaged in a low-level conflict with Hamas, and want to limit the availability of munitions and otherwise put pressure on the Hamas gov’t. Such control won’t really be possible without the cooperation of the neighbours, though - the blocade of Gaza was made possible, for example, by Egyptian cooperation. I doubt it will be practicable without such cooperation, and I doubt such cooperation will be forthcomming from all parties in the future. Which is a bit beside the point - whether or not Israel is able to successfully blockade a new Palestinian entity, or otherwise control its borders, the demographics of Palestine will make little difference to the Israelis. Poor and numerous does not translate well into powerful. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/398 "2011-05-25T19:05:11Z")
> [@Dick\_Dastardly](#): > > Barak never made any actual concrete offer. here’s what a Clinton administration official who was there had to say : What he’s saying is so misleading as to be false. The negotiations didn’t go further than they did because of Arafat’s intransigence. From Dennis Ross’s interview with Brit Hume, April 21, 2002: > **[Mideast Dispatch Archive: Dennis Ross on the “Camp David myths” of the...](http://www.tomgrossmedia.com/mideastdispatches/archives/000555.html)** > [@](#): > > ROSS: Let me give you the sequence, because I think it puts all this in perspective. > > Number one, at Camp David we did not put a comprehensive set of ideas on the table. We put ideas on the table that would have affected the borders and would have affected Jerusalem. > > Arafat could not accept any of that. In fact, during the 15 days there, he never himself raised a single idea. His negotiators did, to be fair to them, but he didn’t. The only new idea he raised at Camp David was that the temple didn’t exist in Jerusalem, it existed in Nablus. > > HUME: This is the temple where Ariel Sharon paid a visit, which was used as a kind of a pre-text for the beginning of the new intifada, correct? > > ROSS: This is the core of the Jewish faith. > > HUME: Right. > > ROSS: So he was denying the core of the Jewish faith there. After the summit, he immediately came back to us and he said, “We need to have another summit,” to which we said, “We just shot our wad. We got a no from you. You’re prepared actually do a deal before we go back to something like that.” > > He agreed to set up a private channel between his people and the Israelis, which I joined at the end of August. And there were serious discussions that went on, and we were poised to present our ideas the end of September, which is when the intifada erupted. He knew we were poised to present the ideas. His own people were telling him they looked good. And we asked him to intervene to ensure there wouldn’t be violence after the Sharon visit, the day after. He said he would. He didn’t lift a finger. > > Now, eventually we were able to get back to a point where private channels between the two sides led each of them to again ask us to present the ideas. This was in early December. We brought the negotiators here. > > HUME: Now, this was a request to the Clinton administration… > > ROSS: Yes. > > HUME: … to formulate a plan. Both sides wanted this? > > ROSS: Absolutely. > > HUME: All right. > > ROSS: Both sides asked us to present these ideas. > > HUME: All right. And they were? > > ROSS: The ideas were presented on December 23 by the president, and they basically said the following: On borders, there would be about a 5 percent annexation in the West Bank for the Israelis and a 2 percent swap. So there would be a net 97 percent of the territory that would go to the Palestinians. > > On Jerusalem, the Arab neighborhoods of East Jerusalem would become the capitol of the Palestinian state. > > On the issue of refugees, there would be a right of return for the refugees to their own state, not to Israel, but there would also be a fund of $30 billion internationally that would be put together for either compensation or to cover repatriation, resettlement, rehabilitation costs. > > And when it came to security, there would be a international presence, in place of the Israelis, in the Jordan Valley. > > These were ideas that were comprehensive, unprecedented, stretched very far, represented a culmination of an effort in our best judgment as to what each side could accept after thousands of hours of debate, discussion with each side. > > BARNES: Now, Palestinian officials say to this day that Arafat said yes. > > ROSS: Arafat came to the White House on January 2. Met with the president, and I was there in the Oval Office. He said yes, and then he added reservations that basically meant he rejected every single one of the things he was supposed to give. > > HUME: What was he supposed to give? > > ROSS: He supposed to give, on Jerusalem, the idea that there would be for the Israelis sovereignty over the Western Wall, which would cover the areas that are of religious significance to Israel. He rejected that. > > HUME: He rejected their being able to have that? > > ROSS: He rejected that. > > He rejected the idea on the refugees. He said we need a whole new formula, as if what we had presented was non-existent. > > He rejected the basic ideas on security. He wouldn’t even countenance the idea that the Israelis would be able to operate in Palestinian airspace. > > You know when you fly into Israel today you go to Ben Gurion. You fly in over the West Bank because you can’t – there’s no space through otherwise. He rejected that. > > So every single one of the ideas that was asked of him he rejected. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/399 "2011-05-25T19:15:26Z")
> [@Dick\_Dastardly](#): > > [Camp David: The Tragedy of Errors | Robert Malley, Hussein Agha | The New York Review of Books](http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2001/aug/09/camp-david-the-tragedy-of-errors/?pagination=false) The article is an explaination of why Arafat turned obstuctionist. Although it sets out to attempt a more “nuanced picture” than that of all (objective) observers - that this was a case of Arafat, once again, missing an opportunity for peace - if read, it actually paints the opposite view: that to Arafat, nothing the Israelis could offer was a “concession” because the Palestinians were already making the greatest “concession” - to Israel’s existence. Again, to an unbiased observer, knowing the relative powers of the two entities involved, this simply isn’t a realistic position. The Israeli offer wasn’t concrete because they were fishing for some willingness, any willingness, on the part of Arafat to deal, in order to hash out the details - but they waited in vain. Arafat was the problem then. ---
**Author:** ![Inbred\_Mm\_domesticus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/aca169/32.png) [@Inbred\_Mm\_domesticus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inbred_Mm_domesticus)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2011, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500/400 "2011-05-25T20:22:26Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > Israel blockades the Gaza strip, with the co-operation of the Egyptians (or at least, it did - not sure what the Egyptians are up to these days). It most certainly does not police the Gaza strip, like (say) the US or Canadians exercise ultimate police control over a Native American Reservation. > > Naturally, the Israelis wish to limit access through the Palestinian borders of Gaza - they are at times engaged in a low-level conflict with Hamas, and want to limit the availability of munitions and otherwise put pressure on the Hamas gov’t. > > Such control won’t really be possible without the cooperation of the neighbours, though - the blocade of Gaza was made possible, for example, by Egyptian cooperation. I doubt it will be practicable without such cooperation, and I doubt such cooperation will be forthcomming from all parties in the future. > > Which is a bit beside the point - whether or not Israel is able to successfully blockade a new Palestinian entity, or otherwise control its borders, the demographics of Palestine will make little difference to the Israelis. Poor and numerous does not translate well into powerful. Most of what you said is no different than what I said. I said military control and made no mention of police. To give a clear prediction regarding the likely arrangement, an ever-increasing population of Palestinians will always view periodic retribution on the part of the Israeli military (retribution for whatever dominant terrorist group does to piss off Israel) as arbitrary and out of proportion. If they decide to rebel against these conditions they will not blame the various terrorist groups in their midst, they will blame Israel. I think if the frustration levels are high enough, and they are focused enough, then there really will not be much Israel, by itself, can do about it. So I guess I do think poor and numerous is more than enough against military force. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500.md?page=19) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-calls-for-independent-palestine-1967-borders/582500.md?page=21)