Those bored already by another tale of Middle East tribalism have lost sight of the implications this clash could have in an already dangerously destabilized region.

Sorry, the only Middle East tribalism I'm interested in at this time is the tribalism occurring at the location of American forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.

We hear almost nothing on this website about the fighting going on by American forces while getting constant updates about Israel and Palestine. That strikes me as being extremely unbalanced in regards to foreign or Middle East reporting.

The last time I checked, this was a website "to read about and discuss politics, culture and public life in the United States." It would seem to me more important to people in the United States to focus on American fighting rather than yet another fight between yet another two groups of foreigners.

Gaza is a premier example of the naïve fiasco that so many wise leaders both within and without Israel warned would happen if land was unilaterally handed over to the Palestinians.

Bebe Netanyahu, for instance, predicted two years ago that if Israel traded Gaza in a "land-for-peace" deal, it would only manage to accomplish two things: propel Hamas into power, and increase the terror against Israel.

First, Hamas would be thrust into power because they would be seen by their people as powerful victors in the war to regain Palestine. By convincing Israel to hand over Gaza after constant shellings, suicide bombings and rocket attacks on civilian tergets, the local Palestinians saw Hamas as powerful victors in the terror war. Netanyahu's prediction proved absolutely true as Hamas handily won control of the Palestinian Parliament bragging they had brought Israel to their knees!

And second, as soon as Israel pulled out of the Gaza Strip in the land-for-peace deal, the violence did NOT stop for long as the Palestinians stepped up the terrorism under Hamas since they had successfully used violence against civilians to gain the Gaza in the first place! And they will continue to get whatever they want, now that a precident has been set: Hamas terrorism equals Isreali surrender and unilateral defeat.

The moral of the story? NEVER, NEVER negotiate with terrorists. It only gives them more strength and they only commit even bloodier acts of inhumanity spurred on by gaining victory with the weak willed, wishful thinking politicians whom they intimidate with terror in the first place.

"Wake up, Israel, if you want peace. Otherwise you will eventually reap what you sow."

Everybody has advice for Israel.

How about Palestinians and their leaders?
Can they do better for their people?
Any advice for them?

I can think of several threads dealing with American forces, including some very personal experiences of loss. There have been threads that discuss American national strategy, including but not limited to military aspects. Some of those threads consider the countries neighboring Iraq and Afghanistan.

Why not create a blog entry about something that you want to discuss?

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]

Never negotiate with terrorists - you mean, like in Northern Ireland?

Given that

1. Hamas represents the majority of the people in Gaza (democratically elected)

2. Hamas refuses to recognize Israel

3. Hamas rockets Israeli communities (e.g., Sderot)

4. Several Hamas groups receiving support, financing and training from Syria and Iran actively seek to attack civilians in Israel and continue to call for the destruction of Israel

Why should Israel get involved in the Palestinian civil war in Gaza in any way?

Why don't Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Kuwait, Syria and the UAE - all so eager to get in the middle of the Israeli-Palestinian issue and to present peace proposals - come to help the Palestinians out of their misery?

Why is it that you dont ever see anyone calling for Saudi and Kuwaiti investment in Israel to enlarge the horizons of Israeli society as a means to foster peace, but the US and Israel and Europe are always called to engage and invest an foster economic development in Gaza?

Why is it not OK for Israel to say that it does not want to have anything to do with Gaza? Leave the Palestinians alone! Let them govern themselves. Full self determination! When the Palestinian people elect a set of representatives who recognize Israel, then Israel can go and negotiate economic development, diplomatic and all kinds of ties with them. This would be a step by step, learn-as-you-do model to implement the Oslo accords. They failed because they tried to achieve too much too fast.

When the Plaestinians create a democratic, non violent, non beligerant State in Gaze, living side by side with Israel without threatening Israel's security and attacking its communities, then Israel would have no choice but leave the territories in the West Bank too. Why is it that the Palestinians dont make the establishment of such State in Gaza their number 1 objective?

And if you disagree that leaving Gaza for the Palestinians to manage is in the best interest of Israel, then I suggest you come to Israel, become an Israeli citizen, and run for the Knesset on that platform. The more well intentioned ideas and debate, the better for our society.

Well, once Israel firmly determines what it wants to do, please let us know, because our presidential candidates are anxiously awaiting their instructions on how they can best suck up to Israel.

Given the urgency of the situation, now may be the time to move ahead boldly with low level talks with someone or other, and with meaningless difference-splitting gestures.

Dearest friend Valdron,
Let me ask you a simple question,
Who is today better off, Palestinias in West Bank or in Gaza?

Uh...you've got me. Who is better off today, Hutus in Congo or in the Central African Empire? Pretty crappy all round, no?

If you're pursuing the "they should be grateful to us, we've brought them better administration than they could have on their own" line, I would remind you that this was the Israeli line in the West Bank for 20 years, from 1967 to 1987; and it produced the Intifada. People will decide for themselves whether they think your administration is "better" for them, and if they decide against you, as they usually do, your reward will be a rock in the face. Generally, it's a better idea not to administer other people "for their own good", unless you like rocks in your face.

Accumulating Peripherals

"The wall doesn't work."

It does work, thank you very much. The fence prevented many suicide bombers from killing Israeli.
But I agree, "complete disengagement turns out to be one of the more awful"

The Oslo Agreements made all this inevitable. During the Israeli occupation period before 1993, Gaza Arabs worked in Israel. Money they earned went straight into their pockets. The Oslo Agreements took certain terror gangs and gave the preferential treatment, money was given to their gang leaders (e.g. Arafat, Dahalan, Rajoub) and others were cut out. This caused much resentment, eventually leading to HAMAS' victory in the elections last yeasr. As work in Israel dried up due to the security deterioration Arafat's terror policies created, the Gazan's were then dependent on getting handouts from their clan chieftains (the differences between HAMAS and FATAH have a large tribalistic element that transcends "ideological" considerations).
In order to get otherwise intelligent people to support an insane policy of bringing a terrorist chieftain to Israel, arming him and giving him money, Peres, Mr Levy and others convinced people that "the Palestinians won't DARE cause trouble because we are arranging for them to get money from the EU and others, and they know that the cash flow will be cut if they cause trouble." Of course, the opposite happened, the cash flow INCREASED as the Palestinians increased the terrorism. The Palestinians are now the largest per-capita recipients of aid in the world and the aid TRIPLED since HAMAS won the election last year. The aid FUELS the violence, so increasing the aid will accelerate it BECAUSE THERE IS MORE TO FIGHT OVER.
The chaos is not caused by "hunger" or "poverty", it is because there are tens of thousands of Palestinians on the payroll of the various militias associated with both HAMAS and FATAH. These people do no useful work, and don't contribute to the economy , but they want to get their hands on the cash that is flowing in, and they have the weapons to do something about it.
Thus, the well-meaning people like Mr Levy and the EU are directly contributing to the destruction of Palestinian society. Ultimately, Israel will have to step in as the Ha'aretz article states and take over.

It is interesting how great "statemen" like Shimon Peres who now has the choice of whether to become President or Prime Minister, through imbecilic ideas, can destroy an entire society through his Oslo fantasy (well, it DID get him a Nobel "Peace" Prize so it certainly was worth it for him!)

The Haaretz article you refer to claims the Gazans are sending the message that only an Israeli occupation will "save" them. Save them from what? From a Hamas victory? In what sense do they need to be "saved" from the party they voted into power?

If Hamas is the only party with the integrity, popularity, leadership and momentum to establish a solid government in the Territories, then Israel needs to let Hamas win its civil war and establish such a government. At that point, Hamas can decide whether it wants to run a mini-country in a state of permanent total war with Israel, and without allies, or whether it wants to negotiate. It may take a decade, but sooner or later, those negotiations will start.

Accumulating Peripherals

Since Hamas is an offshoot of the Egyptian Islamic Brotherhood I would think save them from being turned into an Islamic type regime.

This a point that Hosni Murbarak made, also in Haaretz,that Hamas will never sign a peace deal with Israel and that they will not uphold the Mecca agreement.

Daniel A. Greenbaum

" that this is a huge failure,"
Are you saying that Israel is worse off today then 20 years ago ?

I would say that Israel was never stronger then today, so I guess they did something right.

Interesting article in the Forward about the Petra Conference. Snippets:

“What does it mean?” asked Wiesel, one of Israel’s most prominent supporters, after Olmert said that terrorism must stop before negotiations can begin on the terms of peace negotiations. “You are negotiating to negotiate further?” asked the famed Holocaust survivor and Nobel Peace Prize winner, drawing laughter from the audience.

[Wiesel also] contrasted Olmert’s insistence that all the Palestinian factions agree to make peace with Israel with the fact that not all Israeli political parties agree to establish a two-state solution leading to Palestinian statehood.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad warned the opening session of his parliament last week that “weak governments in Israel are capable of launching aggression.” Syria, he said, “should be cautious.”

Employing the same logic used by Israel in its resistance to negotating with the Palestinians, Assad said the Israeli government’s weakness prevents it from implementing a peace agreement.

Three of Israel’s four main intelligence agencies — Military Intelligence, the Shin Bet security service and the Foreign Ministry intelligence service — say that Syria’s calls for renewing the peace process are sincere and that Israel should respond.

“Syria’s call for dialogue with Israel is authentic,” Ilan Mizrahi, chairman of Israel’s National Security Council and former deputy chief of Mossad, told the Knesset Foreign Affairs & Defense Committee last week.

Only the Mossad, the overseas intelligence service, maintains that talks with Syria would do more harm than good. So far, however, Israel has dismissed repeated Syrian appeals for new talks.

http://www.forward.com/articles/foxman-wiesel-upbraid-israel-for-pace-of-peace-ef/

Do you mean economically, socially, security-wise? In terms of security, either the immediate aftermath of '67; or the late '70s, after the peace treaty with Egypt; or around '94, before Rabin was assassinated.

Accumulating Peripherals

Valdron,

But isn't Hamas a Mossad creation?

Right! Because we must presume ahead of everything else that only Israel has any and all control over the circumstances of the conflict.  Arabs, Muslims, Palestinians and everything that overlaps in between are nothing but passive souls who Zionism keeps happening to.

davai,

Everybody has advice for Israel.

How about Palestinians and their leaders?

But they are "brown people."  Giving advice to Palestinians by Western intelligentsia (wanna-bes included) would make them no better than the brutal Zionist occupiers.

Give it up, you're going to beat out Bar Kochba in the irrational self pity sweepstakes.

bar_kochba132 - If you think that the Palestinians and other Arabs are ever going to be satisified with living in "reservations" you are naive and deluded. Do you really think taking away arabs dignity will work? Yours is a recipe for another 1000 years of low grade warfare. Israel will never be secure under this proposal.

Your plan is the same as the one circulating amoung all the settlers. I've seen the proposals and maps with all their fences/walls. Open air prisons are not the answer. If the shoe were on the other foot, do you think Jews would be happy living on reservations, or another Warsaw Ghetto?

The only question I have for you, do you want them eventually become citizens of what country?

And two wrongs make a right?

Suffering and injustice gives you license to inflict suffering and injustice on others.

Not everyone would so easily embrace the views and morals of a particular Austrian who lived in the 30's and 40's.

I almost admire the ruthlessness of your conviction. I'm sure if he'd been alive today, he would be proud of you.

You're so coy, Friend Davai.

Hoping this will be a serious discussion, I have some difficulty in understanding what you consider a critical threat. Please understand that my standards of reference include such things as the Chinese bombardment of the Pescadores Islands (i.e., Quemoy, Matsu, etc.), WWII city bombing, the potential in the Cuban Missile Crisis, and selected other Cold War threats.

You have often cited Hiroshima and Nagasaki as having killed more than the IDF in Lebanon, such that the US is not in a position to criticize Israel about what it does. Parenthetically, I would add that the US killed more people in the (conventional) fire bombing of Tokyo than in either nuclear strike.

If you cite Hiroshima as an extreme, then I am confused how the threat from the West Bank can come remotely close to that standard of being "critical." Harassing, certainly. Perhaps strongly advising that Israeli buildings in the threat area be hardened against such rockets -- US installations in Iraq often are -- and, as available, rocket interceptors and reasonable counterbattery (i.e., artillery to try to kill the launcher) equipment be put in place and used.

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]

The point I have repeatedly tried to make is that questions like the one you asked here are not relevant. There is no PERFECT solution. The question is NOT "what citizenship will the Palestinians have"? The question is "how can the lives of the Arabs be made better without compromising Jewish rights and security"? The Iraqi people have citizenship in a soveriegn state, and they even had truly free elections. Yet they are living in hell. There is more to having a stable society than just having a passport and a flag.
If the Arab world weren't in its current pathological state it would be possible to reach a compromise peace. However, even if some Palestinians were to really want peace and to really stop the violence (and currently there is no organized group that stands for those things, including Abu Mazen's FATAH), too many outside forces, such as Syria or Iran, among others, will interfere to prevent it. During the failed Camp David meetings between Barak and Arafat, Clinton repeatedly tried to get the Saudis and Egyptians to really press Arafat to make an agreement. They went through the motions in order not to antagonize the US, but they really wouldn't weigh in.

You will note that the so many in this group keep babbling about Israel "imposing suffering on the Palestinians". Not one of those who say this seems to realize that Israel doesn't want to cause "suffering" to the Palestinians, and that their suffering is self-inflicted, because it is their leaders who keep maintaining the terror infrastructure and attacks against Israel. If the rocket fire on Sederot would stop and the unceasing attempts to attack the Karni crossing where most of the goods pass in and out of the Gaza Strip, then things would improve immensely for the Arabs in the Strip. Obviously, their own leaders, both FATAH and HAMAS view it as GOOD that their own population is suffering. It keeps their population dependent on handouts from the various militias and it reduces pressure on the various ruling groups to actually provide for the economic well-being of the population. They are doing fine, they are pocketing a large part of the aid being funnneled into the Palestinian Authority, and the population is docile. The perfect situation for them. Why change it as long as the EU is willing to keep coughing up aid (otherwise known as the "dhimmi tax").

And for all the screaming about "the settlements", it was only AFTER Israeli started large-scale building of Jewish communities in Judea/Samaria that the Arabs were willing to begin any sort of dialogue with Israel. They are not the problem.

Again, I ask for some specifics. Under Speer, Nazi production in key industries increased even under heavy bombardment. WWII bombers had comparable precision to the rockets in question, but much heavier explosive load. In many cases, this involved putting factories underground and other passive defenses.

Not liking to use the Nazis as examples for anything, the reality is that others, such as those in the Taiwanese islands or on both sides of the Korean DMZ, had to go underground. They could have abandoned the areas within range of the other side, but chose to accept the risks. An extreme example is Seoul, which could be devastated by North Korean conventional weapons, admittedly in far greater power than anything from the OT.

So, I am puzzled why Israel, with the ingenuity it has shown in many things, would be paralyzed by what, by regular military experience, are light and inaccurate weapons. I simply have not seen any evidence that Israel has been subjected to what I would call devastating fire.

To take your example of halting air travel, US bases in Vietnam were under frequent threat of rocket attack, but they developed techniques that minimized the threat. For example, passenger aircraft did not make the conventional gentle approach to airports, but what are called assault landings. These would be stomach-wrenching dives from a safe altitude, to get to the runway as quickly as possible. They would be warned away if there was active fire. The IDF, for example, used this sort of landing at Entebbe. In Vietnam, the aircraft then taxied or were towed to buildings/hangars either out of rocket range, or reinforced to resist such things as the 122mm Soviet Katyushas of the time.

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]

Howard,
For how long Israel can sustain this ?
What will be the cost ?

"light and inaccurate weapons"
If you fire in Tel Aviv, you don't need inaccurate weapons.

Anyway, I don't don't see any Israeli embracing future, you are describing. I think they woyuld rather control West Bank.

I wonder if this is the result of Cheney's recent Middle East trip, where the unspoken message was a promise to reduce the pressure to democratize in exchange for understanding the USs concessions to Israel?

On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron. H.L. Mencken

But if you have unacceptable numbers of rockets from there, how is it under control?

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]

Interesting point about Cheney, but I uprated for the Mencken quote. 

Know your enemy well, for in the end that is who you become. ~~Old Chinese Proverb

Again, in short, THERE IS NO SOLUTION. The point is to forget trying to find one.
The challenge is to manage this "no peace" situation indefinitely into the future.

Apparteid can't be answer to this challenge.
I'm afraid, this is what you propose.
I'm not agains occupation of West Bank for security reasons, but I'm agains apparteid in West Bank.

Yes, after the bombings, Clinton had a conniption fit and told Arafat that he (yes, he was the one who authorized the attacks) was going to cause Peres to lose the election. The agreement between Arafat and HAMAS was reported openly in the media even before the bombing campaign started.
It was at this point the crackdown that you mentioned against HAMAS was begun. Dahalan was put in charge of it, which is why he is particularly hated by HAMAS to this day. After the bombings ended, there were several weeks of quiet preceding the election.

I am surprised that you and so many others
are willing to cut Arafat so much slack regarding his "good intentions", even though you know full well he started wars in both Jordan and Lebanon before geniuses Peres and Rabin brought him to Israel. Is it really any wonder that he continued his mass-murdering career in Israel once he got there. Shimon Peres was recently on the Jerusalem Post had answered questions sent by readers. I asked him why he brought Arafat to Israel when he knew about all the terror and misery he brought to Lebanon and Jordan. After Oslo was signed Peres said "Arafat is a changed man". Peres replied that Arafat was willing (?) to recognize the pre-67 borders so that made him a Tzadik, but then Peres added the following "however, Arafat was INCAPABLE of ever reaching a final peace agreement due to his zigzagging"!!!!!!!!!. This directly contradicts what MJ says in this blog. His "zigzagging" Peres is referring to his alternately supporting HAMAS and then cracking down on them. This is typical of the shifting alliances he made throughout his terrorist career.