Because they’re used to it. They have been bargaining, when not fighting, with all their hostile, expressly anti-Zionist neighbors since 1948; it is a condition of their national existence, to deal with people opposed to it. What’s one more hostile neighbor?
In exchange for getting rid of it and not having to police it any more. In the long run, that’s the best use Israel is ever going to get out of that land. I dunno what the Israelis were thinking when they grabbed the WB and decided to keep it and colonize it, but they’ll never outnumber the Palestinians there, not if they plant settlements for 50 years more, and it will never really be theirs. (And why should it be? The Palestinians are not a bunch of squatters who moved in while the Jews were away, they are the Jews, the ones who never left and eventually yielded to conversion pressure; they’re also the Canaanites, the Philistines, the Arabs, the Turks, everybody who has ever lived in Canaan/Palestine/Wherever; and they’re just living where their ancestors have always lived.)
[QUOTE=BrainGlutton;14566684
In exchange for getting rid of it and not having to police it any more. In the long run, that’s the best use Israel is ever going to get out of that land. I dunno what the Israelis were thinking when they grabbed the WB and decided to keep it and colonize it, but they’ll never outnumber the Palestinians there, not if they plant settlements for 50 years more, and it will never really be theirs. [/QUOTE]
Israel took the West Bank because that was where the Jordanian army was; they simply pushed their enemy back until the reached a natural (and internationally recognized) border at the Jordan River. After that, they held it simply because nobody was willing to negotiate with them for its return.
As for the settlements - you’re making the mistake of assuming some master strategy, when no such thing existed. The Israeli Knesset is no more capable of implementing long-term plans than the U.S. Congress is. Read Tuchman’s “The March of Folly” if you haven’t yet; its central thesis is pertinent to the situation. The settlements, in a way, are a lot like America’s involvement in Vietnam - one damn thing leading to another, with no-one in power seeing the forest for the trees.
I think the PA might have paid lip service to Israel’s existence at some point but they routinely engage in double talk depending on their audience. PA’s ambassador to India denies that Israel has a right to exist. In a more muted speech, a close Fatah associate of Abbas said that Fatah has never recognized Israel’s right to exist.
The very term “land for peace” implies appeasement. The US has had, in recent memory, an attitude of appeasement in any peace deal. Obama just went further down that road by formally stating that the 1967 line should be the starting point. Offering land in order for the other side to stop bombing your civilians is appeasement.
Both the West bank and Gaza strip are strategically important to Israel. The plan has always been to wipe Israel off of the map. Negotiating a slimmed down Israel only starts this process.
When my brother worked for an Israeli company, an Israeli once remarked to him, “wanting to expand your territory so you can have more territory is like wanting to get cancer so you can have more cells.”
Just out of curiosity…was the Israeli just referring to expansion for the sake of expansion versus strategic need or was he opposed to Israel occupying these areas at all?
I’ve known a few Israelis personally through the years and all of them had the opposite view of your brother’s acquaintance. No question there is a diversity of opinion on even this topic in Israel.
Frankly, Scarlet, the Special Olympians could make fun of the Republican candidates this cycle. So, I’ll thank you to keep your “dear leader” jibes to yourself.
Yeah…the Palestinians should stop the fucking bombing of civilian population centers as a prerequisite to starting negotiations. Otherwise you are doing nothing more than appeasing terrorists.
Sure - but who has enough control over all of the Palestinians to make that happen? And I think the Palestinians might have a word or two about bombing of their civilians. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is not only terrible in itself, but it’s used as the driving excuse for much other strife and violence all over the world. Are we going to try to get the two warring factions to the table to attempt to end it peacefully, or are we going to call every single attempt “appeasement” and let it be derailed?
You and I are just talking on the Internet. For political leaders this matters, and lives are in the balance.
Was the “land for peace” deal between Egypt and Israel appeasement? Egypt got the Sinai back and Israel retreated to the 1967 borders in that area, Egypt and Israel have not been at war since. Where was the American right-wing angst over that? Oh that’s right, the president was white at the time.
Groups within the Palestinian territories, including Fatah, are shooting missiles into population centers where civilians live. If that cannot be controlled by those who want statehood then they should not be allowed to even sit at the table.
Ah, the last tactic of someone losing an argument. Actually you bowed out some time ago but, I guess, you thought you would pop back in to call your opponents racist. No big surprise. Very intelligent. :rolleyes:
I just read thru this thread, and I cannot understand how you can make the claim that Bush is saying they are not a realistic starting point when the very words quoted from the speech clearly indicate that it is a starting point. If it is not a starting point, how is it that both sides should agree to adjustments to it?
I know this point was being made awhile ago, but I can’t understand the leap that yorick73 seems to be making.
More to the point - until such time as you have a “strong”, viable, internationally accepted country, with a govt that has broad based local and international support - how is that ever going to change?