Swedish Social Democratic anti-semitism

[DrZoidberg]

Their peace proposals seem to be quite reasonable.

An organisation with the charter they have is not a credible partner for peace. It's like going to the negotiating table and wearing a t-shirt that reads, "I will stab you in the back given my first opportunity". It's also just a 10 year truce. The last thing Israel wants is a 10 year truce if it's only objective is to make Hammas stronger for the coming inevitable war. I'm sorry, but Hammas is not a credible partner for any negotiation. And you are blind if you don't see it.

If they'd gotten 10% of the vote, that would itself be worrying. But winning!?! That's far off the deep end. The choices wasn't Hammas or Fatah. The choices were Fatah, Hammas or some new other party which isn't either kleptocrats or terror-promotors.

how would another party get established when they can't canvass, raise money, or visit the electorate?

If there's a need it'll happen. It can spring from the electorate alone. There's Internet. Right now of course the Palestinian authority does not have a functioning electorial process. They need outside help. But nobody is going to help them set it up if the only people who want it are hell-bent on destroying Israel.

You mentioned an number of points that suggested that you found Hamas to be crazy, insane, evil, etc. And more broadly that the Palestinians didn't want a peace settlement. Since these are simply your ideas of what is going on inside other people's heads, I asked for a source of some kind. Surely this opinion is based on something?

It's all in their charter. The short one.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamas_Covenant

The long one:
http://fas.org/irp/world/para/docs/880818.htm

The Palestinian Authority will have to try harder than what they have done to prove to Israel that they're serious.

In what way?

They need to clamp down harder on the Palestinian terrorists who attack Israel. They have to clamp down harder and harder until it stops. Until it is under control. Of course that will won't be there as long as Israel keeps protecting the idiot fucking settlers. So think the first necessary move is for Israel to clear out their settlement and use the IDF to protect, not only them, but the Palestinians. It is also Israel's to keep Israelis from annoying Palestinians. They are failing to do so. And as the stronger party I think Israel should be the good boy here and lead. But they're not. Which is a shame. Israel is to blame for this. They are not doing so because there is no political will to do so.

This is the reason why my Israeli ex-wife left Israel. When I asked them about her opinions on the Israel-Palestine conflict her only comment was "they deserve eachother". I must say that I share her opinions mostly. Neither side is being gracious and nice. It's basically too huge cunts arguing about who is the most cuntish. I do think Israel is comparatively the winner here. But then again, it's a competition that there's only a point in settling if at least one side isn't a cunt at all.

How can Palestinians 'clamp down' on military brigades when their government isn't even allowed by Israel to maintain their own armed police force?

And how long would such a clamp down need to last. Fatah in the west bank have overseen several years of consecutive peace, and no peace negotiations have started. What do you suppose the hold up is?

The Palestinians have to show political will. So far it's been all words and no action. Israel is ahead here by a lot. Whenever the Palestinians are given a chance to prove themselves they fuck up. I'm not saying there is no political will at all. But the amount of political will can be measured in what actually happens. How cooperative the Palestinians are with the words of their leaders. So far, not at all. Not one bit. That can only mean one thing. The leadership now, their pretty speeches, do not accurately reflect the will of the people of Palestine.

Right now they're at the level of having to prove they can be trusted with guns at all. Step-by-tiny-little-step. First of course any party leading the Palestinians will have to prove that they can get things done, to the Palestinians. Fatah is corrupts like a motherfucker. That is a problem. And it'll poison the peace process. So let's see how this goes. I'm not particularly hopeful this time around either.

 

[angelo]

^^Ît really is mission impossible.

 

[Jokodo]

Sacrifice a few for the good of the majority.

By which you mean, of course, sacrifice Israeli citizens of Arab ethnicity for the good of Jewish settlers in illegal (by international law) settlements.

Don't you guys like to claim that a) Arab citizens of Israel are treated equally, and b) the settlements are not in any way part of a systematic land grab?

 

[laughing dog]

Put simply. Negotiations cannot begin until Fatah etc accept the Jewish state. So far they refuse to do that. They say one thing to Kerry and other leaders and do another. They say what Kerry etc want to hear then do the opposite.

Fatah has accepted the Jewish state. Hamas has not. And there is no logical reason for any preconditions for negotiations.

 

[Arctish]

The total population of Isreal is what, 8 million? [I'll Google it in a min] Only less than 6 million are Jews the rest of the population is mainly Arabs. Are you trying to tell me that these Arabs are somehow second class citizens in Israel?

You confirmed they are when you posted that bit about sacrificing them for the good of the majority aka Israeli Jews.

Israel has gone to great lengths and tremendous expense to support and protect Jewish settlers while continuing to steal land for them to settle, but according to Loren it planned to strip non-Jews of their citizenship by transferring their communities to the West Bank. That is utterly unequal treatment, and a pretty rotten way for a government to treat its citizens. If you want to demonstrate that Jews are treated just as badly in Israel, go right ahead: link to a credible source reporting on Israeli government plans to strip communities of Jews of their Israeli citizenship.

 

[Arctish]

Put simply. Negotiations cannot begin until Fatah etc accept the Jewish state. So far they refuse to do that.

The PLO recognized the State of Israel decades ago. The only thing that changed was the location of a few goalposts.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Put simply. Negotiations cannot begin until Fatah etc accept the Jewish state. So far they refuse to do that.

The PLO recognized the State of Israel decades ago. The only thing that changed was the location of a few goalposts.

Yeah. The problem isn't PLO's or Fatah's acceptance of the Jewish state. The problem is that they don't have the support of the Palestinian people, ie the voters. There's a deep divide between Fatah and Hammas. There's effectively two Palestinian governments. One for Gaza and one for the West Bank. Hammas controls Gaza (and are total dicks). And Fatah controls the West Bank (and are more reasonable). But they're both together the Palestinian National Authority. Any negotiation with Israel will by necessity demand that those two governing bodies can first decide upon a single course of action. They need to get along and agree to shit. But Fatah and Hammas hate each other. Not as much as they hate Israel. But they still hate each other enough to make cooperation impossible. They need to make this work first, or any attempt for a peace proposal will fail (since it won't have the backing of the Palestinian people).

So Hammas unilateral peace proposal isn't really a serious peace proposal. It can't be. It doesn't have Fatah behind it. I think it's fair to say that it's a pure propaganda piece. This piece proposal is intended for us to say, "oh, look at Israel refusing such a reasonable peace proposal. Bad Israel. Bad bad Israel". There's a context which most media will or will not print depending on their bias.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_government
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_National_Authority
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Bank
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatah_government_in_the_West_Bank
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Governance_of_the_Gaza_Strip

 

[4321lynx]

The PLO recognized the State of Israel decades ago. The only thing that changed was the location of a few goalposts.

Yeah. The problem isn't PLO's or Fatah's acceptance of the Jewish state. The problem is that they don't have the support of the Palestinian people, ie the voters. There's a deep divide between Fatah and Hammas. There's effectively two Palestinian governments. One for Gaza and one for the West Bank. Hammas controls Gaza (and are total dicks). And Fatah controls the West Bank (and are more reasonable). But they're both together the Palestinian National Authority. Any negotiation with Israel will by necessity demand that those two governing bodies can first decide upon a single course of action. They need to get along and agree to shit. But Fatah and Hammas hate each other. Not as much as they hate Israel. But they still hate each other enough to make cooperation impossible. They need to make this work first, or any attempt for a peace proposal will fail (since it won't have the backing of the Palestinian people).

So Hammas unilateral peace proposal isn't really a serious peace proposal. It can't be. It doesn't have Fatah behind it. I think it's fair to say that it's a pure propaganda piece. This piece proposal is intended for us to say, "oh, look at Israel refusing such a reasonable peace proposal. Bad Israel. Bad bad Israel". There's a context which most media will or will not print depending on their bias.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_government
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_National_Authority
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Bank
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatah_government_in_the_West_Bank
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Governance_of_the_Gaza_Strip

Yes. And if I were a Jew, I am pretty sure I would back present Israeli policy almost 100%. And if I were Palestinian or other Arab ... etc... etc...

Israeli landgrab justification can be compared to the American idea of Manifest Destiny. The problem for Israel is that this is not the 19th Century and the Arabs are not "Red Indians", and not Mexicans. But their drive for their "Manifest Destiny" is reinforced by the history of their ancestors in the Diaspora, especially in Europe and especially in the 20th Century.

We can pontificate from a distance about 'rational' solutions which do not affect us either practically or, what is more important, emotionally, but our 'rational' solutions have not the slightest chance of success. Invoking solutions in South Africa or in Northern Ireland as examples only serves our own feelings of self-satisfied superiority over "those" people in the Middle East, the cases are similar, but not the same.

So what is the answer? More of the same, the same, the same, for the foreseeable future... Or worse. Probably worse.
And I am an optimist.

 

[Togo]

An organisation with the charter they have is not a credible partner for peace. It's like going to the negotiating table and wearing a t-shirt that reads, "I will stab you in the back given my first opportunity". It's also just a 10 year truce. The last thing Israel wants is a 10 year truce if it's only objective is to make Hammas stronger for the coming inevitable war. I'm sorry, but Hammas is not a credible partner for any negotiation. And you are blind if you don't see it.

Ok, so the main problem is that you don't believe what they say. The identified obstacle is your beliefs about them.

If they'd gotten 10% of the vote, that would itself be worrying. But winning!?! That's far off the deep end. The choices wasn't Hammas or Fatah. The choices were Fatah, Hammas or some new other party which isn't either kleptocrats or terror-promotors.

how would another party get established when they can't canvass, raise money, or visit the electorate?

If there's a need it'll happen. It can spring from the electorate alone. There's Internet. Right now of course the Palestinian authority does not have a functioning electorial process. They need outside help.

Ok, so again, there isn't actually an action they can perform that will help, and again the main barrier is your belief about them.

You mentioned an number of points that suggested that you found Hamas to be crazy, insane, evil, etc. And more broadly that the Palestinians didn't want a peace settlement. Since these are simply your ideas of what is going on inside other people's heads, I asked for a source of some kind. Surely this opinion is based on something?

It's all in their charter. The short one.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamas_Covenant

The long one:
http://fas.org/irp/world/para/docs/880818.htm

The actions of Fatah, and Palestinians in general, are contained in the Hamas charter?

And again, I'll note that the obstacle we're discussing is what you think is going in their heads.

The Palestinian Authority will have to try harder than what they have done to prove to Israel that they're serious.

In what way?

They need to clamp down harder on the Palestinian terrorists who attack Israel.

They don't have any control over Palestinians terrorists. They can't enforce their will because the terrorists have guns and they're not allowed them. They can't withhold money because Israel has ensured they don't control the money. What exactly, and please be specific, do you expect an unarmed, cashless civil authority should do to terrorist organisations that the IDF can not?

More to the point, the attacks from the West Bank (as opposed to Gaza) have stopped. So what's next?

This is the reason why my Israeli ex-wife left Israel. When I asked them about her opinions on the Israel-Palestine conflict her only comment was "they deserve eachother". I must say that I share her opinions mostly. Neither side is being gracious and nice. It's basically too huge cunts arguing about who is the most cuntish.

That's the point I'm not getting. You seem to think that functioning as a sovereign state is somehow a reward that can only be given to people who behave well. I'm not sure why that would be the case.

It's very easy to throw up your hands, call down a plague on both their houses, and say that peace is impossible because neither side will behave the way you want them to. But at some point you actually have to work out what the impediments to peace are and do something about them. And that involves looking at each side, as they are, not as you'd want them to be, and asking what the impediment to peace is. The Palestinians have made repeated peace offers. The Palestinians are not occupying Israeli land. The only impediment to peace talks appears to be Israel's opinion of Palestinians.

It helps to put the two sides in context. Israel is doing it's best to cement the current situation. It's paying people to live in Palestinian territory, and actively supporting those who do so. It's expanding settlements around areas it particularly wants to claim. It's laying down permanent infrastructure, and building fences that keep the Palestinians of the West Bank from moving around in their own land. Palestine, by contrast, is doing it's best to make the present situation as untenable as possible, hence the frequent rocket attacks, appeals to the UN for recognition, proposing peace settlements, etc.

I don't see how two sides can be held equally to blame for a situation, when one side is trying to maintain it, and the other is trying to change it.

How can Palestinians 'clamp down' on military brigades when their government isn't even allowed by Israel to maintain their own armed police force?

And how long would such a clamp down need to last. Fatah in the west bank have overseen several years of consecutive peace, and no peace negotiations have started. What do you suppose the hold up is?

The Palestinians have to show political will. So far it's been all words and no action. Israel is ahead here by a lot. Whenever the Palestinians are given a chance to prove themselves they fuck up. I'm not saying there is no political will at all. But the amount of political will can be measured in what actually happens. How cooperative the Palestinians are with the words of their leaders. So far, not at all. Not one bit. That can only mean one thing. The leadership now, their pretty speeches, do not accurately reflect the will of the people of Palestine.

So again, the impediment is your opinion of what is going in the heads of the Palestinians.

Right now they're at the level of having to prove they can be trusted with guns at all. Step-by-tiny-little-step. First of course any party leading the Palestinians will have to prove that they can get things done, to the Palestinians.

Well, the West Bank have stopped fighting. So what's the next step? Please be specific.

I notice that every time you are asked to describe an obstacle, it turns out to be an attitude you believe is in someone else's head, rather than a practical impediment. And every time you're asked what the next step is, you mention something that has already been done. Does this not suggest there's a problem in your approach?

 

[Togo]

So Hammas unilateral peace proposal isn't really a serious peace proposal. It can't be. It doesn't have Fatah behind it.

Several of the recent peace proposals have had Fatah and Hamas backing.

I think it's fair to say that it's a pure propaganda piece.

In other words, the only impediment is what you believe lies in the heads of the Palestinians.

The problem is what lies in the heads of other people, and we can't overcome that until we do <insert measure that's already been done>. I think I may have found the pattern here.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Ok, so the main problem is that you don't believe what they say. The identified obstacle is your beliefs about them.

Actually, we do believe what they say--when they are talking to other Arabs. When they say that the peace talks are a sham.

 

[laughing dog]

[ When they say that the peace talks are a sham.

Absolutely the case for all parties.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Yeah. The problem isn't PLO's or Fatah's acceptance of the Jewish state. The problem is that they don't have the support of the Palestinian people, ie the voters. There's a deep divide between Fatah and Hammas. There's effectively two Palestinian governments. One for Gaza and one for the West Bank. Hammas controls Gaza (and are total dicks). And Fatah controls the West Bank (and are more reasonable). But they're both together the Palestinian National Authority. Any negotiation with Israel will by necessity demand that those two governing bodies can first decide upon a single course of action. They need to get along and agree to shit. But Fatah and Hammas hate each other. Not as much as they hate Israel. But they still hate each other enough to make cooperation impossible. They need to make this work first, or any attempt for a peace proposal will fail (since it won't have the backing of the Palestinian people).

So Hammas unilateral peace proposal isn't really a serious peace proposal. It can't be. It doesn't have Fatah behind it. I think it's fair to say that it's a pure propaganda piece. This piece proposal is intended for us to say, "oh, look at Israel refusing such a reasonable peace proposal. Bad Israel. Bad bad Israel". There's a context which most media will or will not print depending on their bias.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_government
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palestinian_National_Authority
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Bank
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatah_government_in_the_West_Bank
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Governance_of_the_Gaza_Strip

Yes. And if I were a Jew, I am pretty sure I would back present Israeli policy almost 100%. And if I were Palestinian or other Arab ... etc... etc...

Israeli landgrab justification can be compared to the American idea of Manifest Destiny. The problem for Israel is that this is not the 19th Century and the Arabs are not "Red Indians", and not Mexicans. But their drive for their "Manifest Destiny" is reinforced by the history of their ancestors in the Diaspora, especially in Europe and especially in the 20th Century.

We can pontificate from a distance about 'rational' solutions which do not affect us either practically or, what is more important, emotionally, but our 'rational' solutions have not the slightest chance of success. Invoking solutions in South Africa or in Northern Ireland as examples only serves our own feelings of self-satisfied superiority over "those" people in the Middle East, the cases are similar, but not the same.

So what is the answer? More of the same, the same, the same, for the foreseeable future... Or worse. Probably worse.
And I am an optimist.

Only absolutely retarded Israelis believe in any kind of manifest destiny for Jews. Or so say my ex-wife. She did also call them inbred and said there was a lot of them because they breed like rabbits. But they are far from being in the majority. The ultra orthodox are a tiny, albeit loud, crazy fringe group. These are the type of people who make up the so called "settlers".

Israelis are like most people, of course. This is the country they happen to have ended up in, due to various random reasons beyond their control. And now they just want to make the best of it. The fact that the Palestinians are utterly and completely unreasonable isn't making the average Israeli willing to negotiate with them. Rather the opposite. That's not the same thing as arguing for manifest destiny. It's more like living in a house, but having a rabid dog in your garden. It's just there. There's nothing you can do about it. Best just to keep the door shut and try to ignore it best you can.

 

[laughing dog]

Yes. And if I were a Jew, I am pretty sure I would back present Israeli policy almost 100%. And if I were Palestinian or other Arab ... etc... etc...

Israeli landgrab justification can be compared to the American idea of Manifest Destiny. The problem for Israel is that this is not the 19th Century and the Arabs are not "Red Indians", and not Mexicans. But their drive for their "Manifest Destiny" is reinforced by the history of their ancestors in the Diaspora, especially in Europe and especially in the 20th Century.

We can pontificate from a distance about 'rational' solutions which do not affect us either practically or, what is more important, emotionally, but our 'rational' solutions have not the slightest chance of success. Invoking solutions in South Africa or in Northern Ireland as examples only serves our own feelings of self-satisfied superiority over "those" people in the Middle East, the cases are similar, but not the same.

So what is the answer? More of the same, the same, the same, for the foreseeable future... Or worse. Probably worse.
And I am an optimist.

Only absolutely retarded Israelis believe in any kind of manifest destiny for Jews. Or so say my ex-wife. She did also call them inbred and said there was a lot of them because they breed like rabbits. But they are far from being in the majority. The ultra orthodox are a tiny, albeit loud, crazy fringe group. These are the type of people who make up the so called "settlers".

Israelis are like most people, of course. This is the country they happen to have ended up in, due to various random reasons beyond their control. And now they just want to make the best of it. The fact that the Palestinians are utterly and completely unreasonable isn't making the average Israeli willing to negotiate with them. Rather the opposite. That's not the same thing as arguing for manifest destiny. It's more like living in a house, but having a rabid dog in your garden. It's just there. There's nothing you can do about it. Best just to keep the door shut and try to ignore it best you can.

Except "the Palestinians" are not utterly and completely unreasonable: Hamas is not "the Palestinians".

And, in most places, most people put down rabid dogs ASAP. So, why do the majority Israelis (who are like most people)allow the "absolutely retarded" small minority dictate national policy on this issue?

 

[DrZoidberg]

Ok, so again, there isn't actually an action they can perform that will help, and again the main barrier is your belief about them.

They could change their charter. That's an action they could do that would help. The fact that they're not speaks volumes.

The actions of Fatah, and Palestinians in general, are contained in the Hamas charter?

And again, I'll note that the obstacle we're discussing is what you think is going in their heads.

You're going to have to explain this. I don't understand what you mean.

They don't have any control over Palestinians terrorists. They can't enforce their will because the terrorists have guns and they're not allowed them. They can't withhold money because Israel has ensured they don't control the money. What exactly, and please be specific, do you expect an unarmed, cashless civil authority should do to terrorist organisations that the IDF can not?

First they'll have to convince everybody that they can be trusted with guns. Right now they cannot. Not as long as Hammas insists on exterminating Israel.

More to the point, the attacks from the West Bank (as opposed to Gaza) have stopped. So what's next?

Of course they've stopped.... temporarily. They just got nuked back to the stone age. As is tradition. The big test is if Palestinian terrorists have learned from this or will start attacking Israeli targets. It's too early to say whether or not the Palestinians finally are serious about peace.

That's the point I'm not getting. You seem to think that functioning as a sovereign state is somehow a reward that can only be given to people who behave well. I'm not sure why that would be the case.

Actually it is. Quite a few wars have been fought precisely for this reason. WW2, the second Iraq war, Afghanistan war, the Vietnam war, Korea war, the Napoleonic wars to some extent. I can go on. It's a long long list.

It's very easy to throw up your hands, call down a plague on both their houses, and say that peace is impossible because neither side will behave the way you want them to. But at some point you actually have to work out what the impediments to peace are and do something about them. And that involves looking at each side, as they are, not as you'd want them to be, and asking what the impediment to peace is. The Palestinians have made repeated peace offers. The Palestinians are not occupying Israeli land. The only impediment to peace talks appears to be Israel's opinion of Palestinians.

Then you are naive and/or blind IMHO. But hey, that's just my opinion. You don't have to care about it.

It helps to put the two sides in context. Israel is doing it's best to cement the current situation. It's paying people to live in Palestinian territory, and actively supporting those who do so. It's expanding settlements around areas it particularly wants to claim. It's laying down permanent infrastructure, and building fences that keep the Palestinians of the West Bank from moving around in their own land.

It's rather more like loony Jewish fringe groups are exploiting loopholes in legislature, and plugging these holes are slow. Their goals are to hang onto the land for as long as they can to create some sort of illusion that they have a history there. To make Israeli voters reluctant to kick them out. But they are occasionally kicked off the land. But the Israeli government isn't doing enough nearly fast enough. Most Israelis of course hate the settlers. I'm sure there's Israeli members on this forum who can corroborate that.

Palestine, by contrast, is doing it's best to make the present situation as untenable as possible, hence the frequent rocket attacks, appeals to the UN for recognition, proposing peace settlements, etc.

In what alternative universe are rocket attacks seen as anything other than acts of terrorism? You can't negotiate with people who do that shit. And if you think it's a reasonable reaction by the Palestinians then please stop smoking whatever it is you're smoking. That can't be good for your health.

I don't see how two sides can be held equally to blame for a situation, when one side is trying to maintain it, and the other is trying to change it.

I didn't say they're equally to blame. I think Israel is behaving relatively better than the Palestinians. So I blame the Palestinians more.

So again, the impediment is your opinion of what is going in the heads of the Palestinians.

Well... rather their ability to demonstrate that there are constructive solutions in the heads of Palestinians and that they are willing to work toward them. Unless they demonstrate it somehow nobody is going to listen. It's called politics. This is the same in every country. Politicians need to be credible. Or we stop listening to them. Palestinian politicians have this problem right now. Building trust takes time.

Well, the West Bank have stopped fighting. So what's the next step? Please be specific.

How about waiting a year and see what happens. Now it's a bit early to tell. If within a year there's some new credible initiative by the Palestinians. Then something can happen. But doing nothing ain't going to fix anything.

I notice that every time you are asked to describe an obstacle, it turns out to be an attitude you believe is in someone else's head, rather than a practical impediment. And every time you're asked what the next step is, you mention something that has already been done. Does this not suggest there's a problem in your approach?

You're weird.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Only absolutely retarded Israelis believe in any kind of manifest destiny for Jews. Or so say my ex-wife. She did also call them inbred and said there was a lot of them because they breed like rabbits. But they are far from being in the majority. The ultra orthodox are a tiny, albeit loud, crazy fringe group. These are the type of people who make up the so called "settlers".

Israelis are like most people, of course. This is the country they happen to have ended up in, due to various random reasons beyond their control. And now they just want to make the best of it. The fact that the Palestinians are utterly and completely unreasonable isn't making the average Israeli willing to negotiate with them. Rather the opposite. That's not the same thing as arguing for manifest destiny. It's more like living in a house, but having a rabid dog in your garden. It's just there. There's nothing you can do about it. Best just to keep the door shut and try to ignore it best you can.

Except "the Palestinians" are not utterly and completely unreasonable: Hamas is not "the Palestinians".

If we believe in democracy Hammas has been elected to represent the Palestinians of Gaza. That's the perk of democracy. We can actually assign blame to where it belongs. The Palestinian people of Gaza.

And, in most places, most people put down rabid dogs ASAP. So, why do the majority Israelis (who are like most people)allow the "absolutely retarded" small minority dictate national policy on this issue?

It's down to incentives. Israel doesn't directly benefit for curtailing the Israeli settlers. It only directly benefits Palestinians. It'll only indirectly help Israelis if it leads to a positive reaction from the Palestinians. And since most Israelis are sick and tired of Palestinians they're not going to work all that hard to help them. Of course the Palestinian side are employing the same logic when it comes to stopping Palestinian terror attacks. It's because most people are fucking short sighted and stupid. That's universal for humanity.

 

[Sarpedon]

Israel doesn't directly benefit for curtailing the Israeli settlers.

Wrong. Settlements are an enormous economic burden on Israel. This will become even more pronounced as more sanctions are imposed. Even without sanctions, settlements are monstrously expensive and require massive ongoing subsidies to maintain.

 

[laughing dog]

Except "the Palestinians" are not utterly and completely unreasonable: Hamas is not "the Palestinians".

If we believe in democracy Hammas has been elected to represent the Palestinians of Gaza. That's the perk of democracy. We can actually assign blame to where it belongs. The Palestinian people of Gaza.

But "the Palestinians" lump the West Bank with Gaza. And, of course, Hamas refuses to allow another election, even though their elected mandate ran out years ago.

It's down to incentives. Israel doesn't directly benefit for curtailing the Israeli settlers. It only directly benefits Palestinians. It'll only indirectly help Israelis if it leads to a positive reaction from the Palestinians. And since most Israelis are sick and tired of Palestinians they're not going to work all that hard to help them. Of course the Palestinian side are employing the same logic when it comes to stopping Palestinian terror attacks. It's because most people are fucking short sighted and stupid. That's universal for humanity.

Then it really doesn't make much sense to lay the onus on one side or the other, now does it?

 

[DrZoidberg]

If we believe in democracy Hammas has been elected to represent the Palestinians of Gaza. That's the perk of democracy. We can actually assign blame to where it belongs. The Palestinian people of Gaza.

But "the Palestinians" lump the West Bank with Gaza. And, of course, Hamas refuses to allow another election, even though their elected mandate ran out years ago.

It's down to incentives. Israel doesn't directly benefit for curtailing the Israeli settlers. It only directly benefits Palestinians. It'll only indirectly help Israelis if it leads to a positive reaction from the Palestinians. And since most Israelis are sick and tired of Palestinians they're not going to work all that hard to help them. Of course the Palestinian side are employing the same logic when it comes to stopping Palestinian terror attacks. It's because most people are fucking short sighted and stupid. That's universal for humanity.

Then it really doesn't make much sense to lay the onus on one side or the other, now does it?

I wasn't aware that I had

 

[Jayjay]

Put simply. Negotiations cannot begin until Fatah etc accept the Jewish state. So far they refuse to do that. They say one thing to Kerry and other leaders and do another. They say what Kerry etc want to hear then do the opposite.

Fatah has recognized Israeli state a long time ago. Whether Israel wants to be a Jewish state or not is its internal matter and doesn't need anyone else's acceptance.