Topic: Israel: Operation Protective Edge - page 28. (Read 14700 times)

A two state solution will never work if the Palestinian state is ruled by Islam extremist. Egypt and Jordan should stabilize Gaza and West bank and build a real government.

It's one of the things that especially makes Israeli opinion polls tough to read. Military fervor can swing widely in Israel depending on the current domestic discourse of the day. It can make it difficult to really peg long run trending opinions down.

I think this goes back to the reconciliation issue that Palestinians tend to favor at a little over 60% or even higher given some sort of mutual economic relationship. Overall, yes, we do see the hardline largely youth movement that is very militant and wants to drive Israel into the sea, but the vast majority of Palestinians seem to largely just want to be treated as humans and enjoy basic rights and freedoms that they have been increasingly denied since the late 30's to late 40's.

At first glance perhaps, but that is a matter of ideology and doesn't really have much bearing on peace talks and what is going wrong with them (though it could have the potential but there isn't enough info given to connect the two). The trouble is the poll doesn't offer any meaningful connection between that expressed ideology and how it impacts views on peace talks with Israel; the poll also suffers from a lack of definitions.

It would be nice if they had actually asked Palestinians if they would support a two state solution based on 1967 borders.

That's true, but the question about the main goal for five years is pretty telling..
but your point about reactionism and a true lasting trend is well taken. It would be cool if israel somehow pursued this. but it's not reasonable to expect in the near future.

I'd also have to disagree a bit on their interpretation of the data. They say in one of their slides that a two state solution is 'suddenly in the minority' but their was no two state solution option given as a possible response to the question, nor was the question about the resolution of conflict between Israel and Palestine.

I'm a little wary of polls that offer sudden huge shifts in long standing general opinion. I'd keep watching to see if it is a reactionary spike or a legitimate new emerging long run trend of thought. But Palestinian attitudes are also subject to the politics of the day and with volatile politics opinions are going to change a lot too. I could believe it, but I think it has a lot to do with disillusionment with the peace process since 2005 - 2006. Abbas sitting at the peace table waiting for Israel has really weakened his administration and the idea of a two state solution as nothing gets better. It's honestly one reason why Israeli administrations are so frustrating to those seeking a resolution to the conflict. The opportunity is there and it is being squandered for domestic political gains in Israel proper. Meanwhile a new generation of Palestinians grow up seeing Abbas as an Israeli puppet because he won't fight back against perceived (and rightfully so) abuses to their general population. It easily makes the Israeli-Palestinian conflict one of the most frustrating conflicts in the world to follow even if it isn't the most violent.

Really? I was just looking at polls yesterday at I remember seeing that the majority of Palestinians do not support a two state solution? I need to find the source though.
http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/p...pragmatism-too

I guess if I was israeli i'd feel relatively ok with the status quo (compared to easily foreseeable alternatives) and if i was palestinian i'd feel completely fucked and hopeless, with basically no good moves to make.

Domestic polls have long showed that both sides generally want peace based on a two state solution (it tends to fluctuate a little more in Israel depending on circumstances). I'm more familiar with the Palestinian numbers there (3/4ths two state peace) than I am with the Israeli numbers.

One of the problems of governments past, is that in coalition governments like Israel, you have kingmaker parties: small parties that can make or break coalitions for the larger parties. These kingmaker parties in Israel tend to be highly conservative, which means that if you want to be prime minister you have to do certain things to mollify them like not halt settlement expansion.

What do the people in Palestine and Israel want though? I've heard more than enough of what the leadership thinks. Where do the people stand, in relation to the struggle and their leaderships' inability to deal with it?

First you need to learn to read. Parsing part of a sentence has no value, and in this case, no meaning either. Ask whatever question you want to ask based on what I said, not part of a sentence, and I may answer it. I may not if it's stupid enough, though.

What the fuck are you talking about?Would you be so glad to point me in the direction of an armed conflict which the participating US government had "no particular interest in"?

Seems a bit disingenuous to compare a formal war with an insurgency and terrorist related violence. The two aren't fought in the same way. Nor are they fought with the same weapons. You're stuck on WWII but it isn't the 40's anymore.

I would call those campaigns the continuation of politics by other means. The American and British attack sorties were unequivocally coordinated solely to eviscerate the morale of the enemy and expedite governmental submission. Period. Unfortunately, Imperial Japan's military leadership rejected unconditional surrender and all subsequent demands of the Postdam Declaration, prolonging an already exhausting and lethal conflict. Some persons familiar with the war would cite the success of naval blockade. However, naval blockade did not render other occupied countries and their respective prisoners impervious to Japanese massacre.

Retrospectively, the area bombing and firebombing campaign manifested against Imperial Japan and Germany were enacted as a direct result of the ineffectiveness of precision bombing by radar. There are a myriad of analytical reports pre-dating the area bombing-firebombing incursions which corroborate the technological limitations long-range bombing attacks at the time. Low-altitude thermal, explosive, and incendiary munition attacks on cities were the best means of inflicting significant devastation on an enemy's industrial capabilities.

Common subject literature affirms the malicious and hateful sentiments shared by many in regard to Axis aggression, especially against Imperial Japanese inhumane treatment of combatants and noncombatants alike. Consequently, many unintentionally confuse the fundamental executions of warfare as collective punishment. Max Hastings, the British author of "Retribution, The Battle for Japan 1944-1945" published an archived quote from the mastermind of the Japanese firebombing campaign which solidified America's true intention, "bomb and burn 'em til they quit".

My response is intended to clarify the actions of countries engaged in official declarations of war. These actions should not be diluted or referenced with the actions of one illegitimate state attacking non-state aggressors residing in another illegitimate state.

Hasn't worked too well in over 50 years, seems like a new tactic should be called for.

And your grand strategy for conflict has already been utilized over the course of decades in the Sudan, probably to the best that anyone could hope to realistically utilize it. Bashir literally got away with genocide and ethnic cleansing and has been since 1989. And it has completely failed him. Sure he has been able to stay in power, but he lost the southern half of his country, and is losing control of a half dozen other internal states as well.

It simply doesn't work; and now when Bashir has tried to backtrack he's found the SPLM-N announce today that it is joining forced with the Janjaweed against Khartoum. He ended up losing control of his own monsters.

You also mentioned Sri Lanka? That ended, but it took 26 years. Not really a big win, and even now the harshness of how it ended is causing domestic problems. In fact there were warnings of rising extremism just today within Sri Lanka over clashes which have threatened the country with renewed instability.

The Arabs hate the Jews. That will never change. Israel is going to do whatever is necessary to secure it's sovereignty.

You're contradicting yourself here, Salafists tend to hate the Muslim Brotherhood. Claiming that the Gazan population loves both the Salafists and Hamas doesn't make any sense. It's also dumb to assume that just because a group operates within a territory that 1.) the government likes them and 2.) that the population likes them. I'm pretty sure that the people who suffer from Mayi Mayi attacks in the DRC don't do so with smiles. Nor does it make sense to bomb government forces that are aligned against them if your goal is to see them destroyed. It's pretty dumb to bomb Kinshasa and kill their soldiers while asking them why they aren't able to kill off the M23 rebels.

Irrational is continuing a policy of collective punishment despite the historical fact that it never succeeds long term, and tends to lead to genocide. I suppose if you're sociopathic, you might be ok with that.

The US has had no need and no particular interest in being successful with foreign engagements. It's been unnecessary or too dangerous depending on the time frame in question.

It became impossible to use that sort of all out war after WW2, simply because the repercussions were too hard to control. And generally speaking, US presidents haven't been interested in global annihilation.

That's because they're not rational and have a poor historical perspective.

The US has been unsuccessful in most of its military engagements since World War II precisely because it has a strong insistence on avoiding use of collective punishment and a tendency to adopt overly strict rules of engagement.

What would you call the Allied campaigns of firebombing German and Japanese cities, or using nuclear weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki if not collective punishment? This war was remarkably successful precisely because the US showed a willingness to escalate violence to an unlimited level in order to win. Something which has not been done in any conflict since.