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Israeli/Palestinian conflict: will it ever end?

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David Libra

I dare you to try


Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda

PostPosted: Tue Sep 02, 2014 9:20 pm
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You just need to use a bit more imagination. Fatah has strong support amongst all Palestinians, and has been a moderate force for two decades or more. Gazans had many reasons to dislike Hamas, who are essentially militarist totalitarians—at least, that is, until they effectively became heroes thanks to Israeli bombing. In fact, the treaty between Fatah and Hamas earlier this year could have led to a much less belligerent government in the Gaza Strip, but Israel's paranoid, aggressive response pretty much scuppered any chance of that happening.

A certain degree of social change is always possible; it simply needs the right conditions. That is, peace, prosperity, and intellectual freedom. Extreme, violent times play into the hands of extremists. I'd love to say that I wish Netanyahu had thought of all this before his bombing campaign, but I suspect that he knew all too well. He's an extremist himself, after all.

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stui magpie Gemini

Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.


Joined: 03 May 2005
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 02, 2014 9:31 pm
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See, lines like this "Israel's paranoid, aggressive response " suggest to me that you're totally not unbiased in this scenario and therefore have your own solutions pre determined.
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David Libra

I dare you to try


Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda

PostPosted: Tue Sep 02, 2014 9:39 pm
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^ You're right, I'm probably biased in some way or other. But who isn't? You have your own biases on this issue, as does everyone. The difference is that I'm actually trying to propose some kind of reasonable compromise, whereas many (too many) on each side will only settle for one of your two options: either Jews out of Israel, or Israel to annex the Palestinian Territories. Unless you support one of those two options (and, surely, most thinking people don't), then you can and should be looking for alternatives.
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stui magpie Gemini

Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.


Joined: 03 May 2005
Location: In flagrante delicto

PostPosted: Tue Sep 02, 2014 9:48 pm
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We all have our biases, only the smart ones of us are able to acknowledge them. Wink

For mine the key is the muslim attitude to Israels presence. As long as there are islamic movements like Hamas that want Israel destroyed, Israel is on a war footing and will retaliate as hard as it can.

If you can somehow conjure up a way to disempower all the different muslim leaders who preach the destruction of Israel and keep the terrorists and extremists out of Gaza and the Westbank so that both areas legitimately want peace, nothing's going to change.

israel turning the other cheek will only result in them getting belted in it, and they aint going to let that happen. Right wrong or indifferent.

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David Libra

I dare you to try


Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda

PostPosted: Tue Sep 02, 2014 10:06 pm
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Don't forget though that there are plenty of right-wing Israelis who want all Palestinians out of Gaza, the West Bank and the rest of the country. I think Netanyahu's said as much in the past before he was prime minister. So it's far from one way traffic.

I think one of the keys to understanding this conflict is to realise that there's more than one aggressor. Israel doesn't just retaliate.

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stui magpie Gemini

Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.


Joined: 03 May 2005
Location: In flagrante delicto

PostPosted: Tue Sep 02, 2014 10:18 pm
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Correct, Israel doesn't just retaliate, but to risk laboring a point, while you have a neighbor who has publically stated they want to kill you as Hamas has, you have the right to be a tad jittery.

One side has to put the guns down first, I can't see a mutual thing happening largely because Israel will not be trusting (and with good reason)

So, if hamas and anyone else wants the moral high ground, stop firing rockets and pull a Ghandi, say and demonstrate that they want to live in peace. Israel will come into line as long as the actions match the words.

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David Libra

I dare you to try


Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda

PostPosted: Tue Sep 02, 2014 10:36 pm
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^ I don't think it's fair or reasonable to put it all on one side, particularly when Israel is the one with much greater technology and the support of much of the international community. How about the government stops allowing Israeli settlers to illegally build on Palestinian land? How about the government lifts the siege on Gaza? How about they stop actively blocking any attempt to achieve or recognise an independent Palestinian state?

I think it's terribly naive to presume that all this conflict needs is for Hamas to take the Gandhi approach—as if that's ever going to happen anyway—and Israel will suddenly play nicely. That's the narrative the Israeli government would like us to believe, but the facts tell a very different story.

Both sides need to make concessions. Whatever your take on the situation, everyone has to at least accept that.

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Mugwump 



Joined: 28 Jul 2007
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 03, 2014 3:43 am
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^ it's a fair question - what is aggression, exactly ? When someone takes over your people's homeland, leaving you a rump of land called the West Bank, then takes that over after a war and starts to settle many of its own virulently racist supporters there - that's a kind of sustained, permanent aggression, too, even if it does not involve letting off fireworks.

The key point about Hamas is not that it has an ideology I dislike (though I do dislike it)... it's that it is achieving a worse outcome for an already beleaguered people.

The intifada which commenced in the 1980s and continued through suicide bombings and rocket attacks has been hopelessly counter-productive and politically inimical to the interests of the Palestinian people for nearly 30 years or more. Those interests would surely have been far better served by patient, if resentful, participation in civil society and a civil rights alliance with the conscientious Israeli Left - a chance that is now gone, at least for a very long time. As WH Auden wrote, "I and the public know / What all schoolchildren learn ; Those to whom evil is done / do evil in return".

I agree with David, too, that Gandhi woudl not have got near cracking this one - he had a colonist that was exhausted by war and growing sick of its sin. His fine example would not have worked with an imperialist determined to hang on and sure of its superiority.

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Last edited by Mugwump on Wed Sep 03, 2014 8:15 am; edited 1 time in total
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pietillidie 



Joined: 07 Jan 2005


PostPosted: Wed Sep 03, 2014 7:45 am
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stui magpie wrote:
Please find me some moderates on the Gaza side who are actually there, not on the outside throwing rocks, and I'll support them.

In the newspapers, or in the actual community concerned?

I think you're right to empathise with the threat Israel faces, but that's a hell of a lot of people we know nothing about to dismiss in one fell swoop.

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Wokko Pisces

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Joined: 04 Oct 2005


PostPosted: Wed Sep 03, 2014 10:40 am
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Straight after this, Israel bolsters the peace process by further colonizing the West Bank.

http://rt.com/news/184564-israel-settlements-plan-condemnation/
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David Libra

I dare you to try


Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda

PostPosted: Wed Sep 03, 2014 3:21 pm
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From that article:

Quote:
Finance Minister Yair Lapid was scathing of Israel’s decision to take over the land, slamming Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, saying the move will damage Israel.

"We need more measured policy conduct, and not to generate unnecessary disputes with the United States and the world," he said at the Calcalist conference in Tel Aviv, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported. The decision to nationalize the land raised the question, "What is this good for, of all times, now?”


If anyone was still doubting that Netanyahu is a $£$%^%%$ lunatic, doubt no more.

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HAL 

Please don't shout at me - I can't help it.


Joined: 17 Mar 2003


PostPosted: Wed Sep 03, 2014 3:24 pm
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Right now? What specifically brings this good for of all times to mind?
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