# Why won't Israel just defeat Palestine militarily? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [April 9, 2014, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-israel-just-defeat-palestine-militarily/685758 "2014-04-09T22:09:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Ranger\_Jeff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranger_jeff/32/2065_2.png) [@Ranger\_Jeff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranger_Jeff)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2014, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-israel-just-defeat-palestine-militarily/685758/21 "2014-04-10T18:59:10Z")
I’ve read that 90% of Canada’s population lives within 50 miles of the US Northern border. I find this worrysome. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2014, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-israel-just-defeat-palestine-militarily/685758/22 "2014-04-10T21:35:04Z")
> [@PunditLisa](#): > > I’ve often wondered why we don’t just annihilate the Canadians militarily. . . . That’s pretty much what happened in the Mexican-American War. The U.S. coveted a bunch of really primo real estate, and gobbled it up with soldiers and cannon. (It makes Putin in Crimea look like a boy’s school piker! That’s not a land-grab: This is a land-grab!) ---
**Author:** ![BrokenBriton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@BrokenBriton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrokenBriton)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2014, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-israel-just-defeat-palestine-militarily/685758/23 "2014-04-10T21:49:33Z")
There’s a “Palestine”? I’m pretty sure the plan was to never ever allow that to happen. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-israel-just-defeat-palestine-militarily/685758/24 "2014-04-11T00:19:21Z")
> [@Mr\_Quatro](#): > > I was wrong about King Saul … I’m sorry for bringing him up. You right it was the Amalek’s. > > But the Phillstines Israel did hate and now they want the same land known as Palestine. There will be no peace till the Lord comes back. > [http://hope-of-israel.org/whopal.html](http://hope-of-israel.org/whopal.html) Pre-millennial dispensationalism and the confusion of the Church with Israel is bad theology and leads to bad politics. ---
**Author:** ![nevadaexile](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/eb8c5e/32.png) [@nevadaexile](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nevadaexile)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-israel-just-defeat-palestine-militarily/685758/25 "2014-04-11T02:29:21Z")
Because Israel would lose the last shred of sympathy that remains for it and the Holocaust which helped to create the nation. As long as Israel allows the Palestinians to simply live in misery then they look brutal, but not _ **genocidal** _ and that’s a huge difference. In fact, next to Germany, Israel is the only nation on Earth that could never commit ethnic cleansing or a genocide as it was make them in to a greater pariah state than it already is every where except for the US and Western Europe. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2014, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-israel-just-defeat-palestine-militarily/685758/26 "2014-04-11T03:18:23Z")
> [@JerrySTL](#): > > The USA needs someone easy to beat in hockey. A Canadian team hasn’t won the Cup in over 20 years – how much easier do you want it? ---
**Author:** ![Grestarian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grestarian/32/3227_2.png) [@Grestarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grestarian)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2014, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-israel-just-defeat-palestine-militarily/685758/27 "2014-04-14T22:35:51Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > Are you aware of how Israel got that land in the first place? The biblical account & land or the modern historical account & land? The land they now occupy was given to them after World War II – q.v. the Balfour Decision. In a nutshell, Balfour proposed, “Hey, let’s give a new homeland to all these Jews who were displaced by the War.” And lo, the idea was ratified and a ship of settlers was dispatched to the eastern Mediterranean… > [@Marley23](#): > > Occupying an area is usually what you do after you’ve already beaten another country militarily. It was magnanimous of Lord Balfour to offer that land – but it wasn’t his or the UN’s to give and the people already living there were never defeated by Balfour or the other UN participants, nor were they asked their opinion on the matter. This is worse than the typical “Hey, we’re moving in, get outta the way” colonialism; it’s more like “I’m taking your car and giving it to Jeff for being Employee of the Month twice in a row. Of course I’m not compensating you.”\* And the modern conflict would be Jeff saying “Yeah, I was employee of the month a couple decades ago. Thanks for the car. Now I’m taking over your house – yeah, with the same justification. Be glad I’m not taking the back yard, too.” > [@Guinastasia](#): > > A Canadian team hasn’t won the Cup in over 20 years – how much easier do you want it? Well, now you’ve jinxed it! Next year it’s gonna be the MapleLeafs dragging that hunk o’ tin all the way to Ellef Ringnes Island.🆒 —G! \*Or, more historically, “I, the Pope, declare 1/2 of the world can be converted and colonized by the Jesuits and 1/2 the world can be converted and colonized by the Dominicans.” regardless of what the extant populations in those respective hemispheres think (much less want). ---
**Author:** ![BrokenBriton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@BrokenBriton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrokenBriton)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2014, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-israel-just-defeat-palestine-militarily/685758/28 "2014-04-14T22:39:47Z")
> [@Grestarian](#): > > The biblical account & land or the modern historical account & land? > The land they now occupy was given to them after World War II – q.v. the Balfour Decision. > In a nutshell, Balfour proposed, “Hey, let’s give a new homeland to all these Jews who were displaced by the War.” > And lo, the idea was ratified and a ship of settlers was dispatched to the eastern Mediterranean… Well if ‘Balfour’ gave it to these Jews in 1919, that settles it! ---
**Author:** ![BrokenBriton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@BrokenBriton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrokenBriton)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2014, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-israel-just-defeat-palestine-militarily/685758/29 "2014-04-14T22:45:05Z")
> [@Grestarian](#): > > It was magnanimous of Lord Balfour to offer that land – but it wasn’t his or the UN’s to give and the people already living there were never defeated by Balfour or the other UN participants, nor were they asked their opinion on the matter. > This is worse than the typical “Hey, we’re moving in, get outta the way” colonialism; it’s more like “I’m taking your car and giving it to Jeff for being Employee of the Month twice in a row. Of course I’m not compensating you.”\* And the modern conflict would be Jeff saying “Yeah, I was employee of the month a couple decades ago. Thanks for the car. Now I’m taking over your house – yeah, with the same justification. Be glad I’m not taking the back yard, too.” I don’t want to over-reach but I wonder if the word you’re looking for here is ‘theft’. ---
**Author:** ![FoieGrasIsEvil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foiegrasisevil/32/16638_2.png) [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2014, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-israel-just-defeat-palestine-militarily/685758/30 "2014-04-14T23:31:06Z")
> [@Grestarian](#): > > In a nutshell, **Balfour proposed** , “Hey, let’s give a new homeland to all these Jews who were displaced by the War.” > And lo, the idea was ratified and a ship of settlers was dispatched to the eastern Mediterranean… Aha! Another Israel/Canadian hockey connection! ---
**Author:** ![blindboyard](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blindboyard/32/2833_2.png) [@blindboyard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blindboyard)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2014, 9:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-israel-just-defeat-palestine-militarily/685758/31 "2014-04-15T09:33:50Z")
The League of Nations mandate makes it quite clear: that territory is rightfully British. ---
**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:** [April 15, 2014, 11:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-israel-just-defeat-palestine-militarily/685758/32 "2014-04-15T11:20:30Z")
> [@Mr\_Quatro](#): > > But the Phillstines Israel did hate and now they want the same land known as Palestine. Actually, that and “3) The geographical bases of power, international connections, and general orientation of the “Palestinians” are all similar to those of the ancient Philistines.” aren’t true. The ancient Philistines were located in the southwest of what’s now Israel, in a confederacy of five cities; Gaza, Gath, Ashdod, Ekron, and Ashkelon. It’s true that that area includes the Gaza Strip, but also stretches into Israel proper. They had no presence in the West Bank, which is where the majority of the modern Palestinians are now. They were an Indo-European people, a nation of sea-traders and fishermen, originating probably in what’s now Cyprus, and for the most part, they looked west, to the Eastern Mediterranean and Greece. Modern Palestinians, on the other hand, are Arabic speaking, and their political orientation tends to be eastward, towards the Arab world. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-israel-just-defeat-palestine-militarily/685758.md?page=1)