Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

As for the underground tunnels.

If Israel wants to keep putting its boot to the throat of the Palestinian people then the likelihood of that "Nightmare" scenario of a handful of heavily armed, pissed off, Palestinians emerging in the middle of suburbia will only continue to increase.

This conflict is the poster child of "an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind". Both have legitimate grievances, both have also done horrible things and are in the wrong, and neither will stop anytime soon. An endless cycle of death and conflict perpetuated by both, and each blames the other.

 LordofHats wrote:

But, is there explicit treaty that Israel must withdraw from the West Bank?

The Road to Peace plan called for 2 things as step one; the PLO stops shooting rockets at Israel and Israel stops building settlements. The PLO stopped shooting rockets. Israel kept building settlements. Plan fell apart.

Ignoring the innate problem of taking occupied territory and settling it with your own people, Israel will never secure peace with the Palestinians so long as it continues to build in the West Bank. There is no such thing as a treaty that prevents you from taking land that isn't yours, that's just basic conduct. Israel was did not annex the West Bank in 1967. It's not theirs.

These aren't military installations, they aren't shanty towns;



They're colonizing and pushing the Palestinians off (sometimes using shady means). That tends to agitate people.

Lordy...

Israel did take over Gaza and the West Bank from the '67 war... they just chose NOT to annex them simply because they didn't want to incorporate the Occupied Territories™ with all the Arabs into Israel. Which is known as the one-state solution. I believe Israelis have annexed lands near the Golan Heights for years but recently returned to Syria.

I believe Israel didn't annex the territories it occupied in '67 primarily because it's been hoping to use them as bargaining chips to secure peace treaties with its neighbors... you know, the same neighbors who tried to destroy Israel.

Annexation would not have solved the problem at any time because, by '48, the Palestinians had gotten used to the idea of having their own country. They vigorously resisted the Jordanian effort to annex and incorporate the West Bank, and they would have really resisted any Israeli effort to do the same in '67. Given the resistance it would have faced, that's another good reason why the Israelis didn't bother.

So... how do you combat a militant group of people who refuses to accept Israel's right to exist...even within the pre-'67 borders?

Israel did take over Gaza and the West Bank from the '67 war... they just chose NOT to annex them simply because they didn't want to incorporate the Occupied Territories™ with all the Arabs into Israel.

They didn't incorporate them because the legal status of both territories was unclear for over a decade. It wasn't until the late seventies that the UN stepped in and declared Gaza and the West bank to be territories under a military occupation by Israel. At the time, Israel argued against the designation (sometimes they still do).

I believe Israelis have annexed lands near the Golan Heights for years but recently returned to Syria.

Israel still controls the Golan Heights. Officials in 2010 offered to return them in exchange for peace with Syria but their construction of settlements in the Heights betrays that they knew Syria wouldn't accept and the civil war rendered the issue moot anyway.

I believe Israel didn't annex the territories it occupied in '67 primarily because it's been hoping to use them as bargaining chips to secure peace treaties with its neighbors

Israel recently toyed with the idea of annexing the West Bank recently but turned it down for the same reason they've worked to keep the territories in legal limbo; because it would piss their neighbors off. So yeah, they've never annexed them officially because no one would stand for it. That begs why they're settling their own citizens into permanent residences in territories that aren't theirs. EDIT: it's also hard to have a Jewish state filled with a non-Jewish majority.

So... how do you combat a militant group of people who refuses to accept Israel's right to exist...even within the pre-'67 borders?

Getting past the myth that every Palestinian is a militant is a good start. Another is to minimize reasons to want to take militant action (stop taking their land is also a good start).

 LordofHats wrote:
Getting past the myth that every Palestinian is a militant is a good start.

QFT,



I had people talking to me yesterday trying to rationalize shelling a hospital or 4 kids on a beach. There's a quote in generation kill where the gunnery sgt says "these are PEOPLE in this fething country". You talk to some people who clearly don't like arabs or muslims and that's all it takes to dehumanize 2 million people. Boom, they're all terrorists.

Netenyahu and Kerry's talking points were almost the same verbatim, this is just pathetic.

 LordofHats wrote:

Getting past the myth that every Palestinian is a militant is a good start. Another is to minimize reasons to want to take militant action (stop taking their land is also a good start).

Um... who elected the Hamas?

Do you believe, if Israel did all those things... that, there be peace?

 whembly wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:

Getting past the myth that every Palestinian is a militant is a good start. Another is to minimize reasons to want to take militant action (stop taking their land is also a good start).

Um... who elected the Hamas?

Do you believe, if Israel did all those things... that, there be peace?

A proportion of the Palestinian people.

Though to throw that in context: In the last general election here in the UK, the Tories "won" with 32.4% of the votes. However there was only an election turnout of 65.1%. So actually the Tories only got 21.06% of the eligible populations support.

So we got a government which less than a quarter of the eligible population voted for.

See why the "Palestinians elected Hamas" argument is a bit ridiculous for painting the whole Palestinian population as supporting Hamas?

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 whembly wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:

Getting past the myth that every Palestinian is a militant is a good start. Another is to minimize reasons to want to take militant action (stop taking their land is also a good start).

Um... who elected the Hamas?

Do you believe, if Israel did all those things... that, there be peace?

A proportion of the Palestinian people.

Though to throw that in context: In the last general election here in the UK, the Tories "won" with 32.4% of the votes. However there was only an election turnout of 65.1%. So actually the Tories only got 21.06% of the eligible populations support.

So we got a government which less than a quarter of the eligible population voted for.

See why the "Palestinians elected Hamas" argument is a bit ridiculous for painting the whole Palestinian population as supporting Hamas?

Ever heard of a phrase "Elections has consequences"?

And, yes... sometimes deadly consequences.

You realize that there are no good answers here... right?

Someone is going to lose.

 whembly wrote:

Um... who elected the Hamas?

It's like this hasn't been explained a million times already

Do you believe, if Israel did all those things... that, there be peace?

More than there is now. Hamas I honestly suspect will pucker out on its own. Their cause removed they'd likely collapse as a group. Other groups like Hezbollah are another story (though its hard to tell just how much Hezbollah actually cares about Israel these days). Islamist Jihad is basically where you go when you're too extreme even for Hamas (though, politically Islamist Jihad has more realistic goals than Hamas, it's just that the people who make up the bulk of the group are absolutely insane). But come on. Any status quo is going to be better than the current one at this point.

Constantly throwing bombs and rockets at each other ain't making a more peaceful world over there.

 whembly wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 whembly wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:

Getting past the myth that every Palestinian is a militant is a good start. Another is to minimize reasons to want to take militant action (stop taking their land is also a good start).

Um... who elected the Hamas?

Do you believe, if Israel did all those things... that, there be peace?

A proportion of the Palestinian people.

Though to throw that in context: In the last general election here in the UK, the Tories "won" with 32.4% of the votes. However there was only an election turnout of 65.1%. So actually the Tories only got 21.06% of the eligible populations support.

So we got a government which less than a quarter of the eligible population voted for.

See why the "Palestinians elected Hamas" argument is a bit ridiculous for painting the whole Palestinian population as supporting Hamas?

Ever heard of a phrase "Elections has consequences"?

And, yes... sometimes deadly consequences.

You realize that there are no good answers here... right?

Someone is going to lose.

So children die because some people elected a government. Children who had no say and some of which weren't even alive when the elections took place?

 LordofHats wrote:

 whembly wrote:

Um... who elected the Hamas?

It's like this hasn't been explained a million times already

We'll just have differences in opinions.

Do you believe, if Israel did all those things... that, there be peace?

More than there is now. Hamas I honestly suspect will pucker out on its own. Their cause removed they'd likely collapse as a group. Other groups like Hezbollah are another story (though its hard to tell just how much Hezbollah actually cares about Israel these days). Islamist Jihad is basically where you go when you're too extreme even for Hamas (though, politically Islamist Jihad has more realistic goals than Hamas, it's just that the people who make up the bulk of the group are absolutely insane). But come on. Any status quo is going to be better than the current one at this point.

Again, I'm not so sure if there can be any peace in the region. You basically have two groups that are so diametrically opposed to one another, that it's going to take generations to get over that.

I honestly think the best solution is the One-State solution. Make 'em all Israeli. That way, everyone has a chance to engage the political process. But, the old-school Israeli are afraid that the Arab population will dominate the region (which, recent studies has shown to be unfounded).

*shrug*

A game changer needs to happen... otherwise, this is the status-quo.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

So children die because some people elected a government. Children who had no say and some of which weren't even alive when the elections took place?

Dude... welcome to the real world.

 whembly wrote:
Make 'em all Israeli. That way, everyone has a chance to engage the political process.

It's not totally unfounded. Including Golan Heights, West Bank, and Gaza, we're talking about over 6 million Palestinians and other Arabs. Israel's 8 million population includes another 2,000,000 of Arabic descent. Israel as a 1 state would go from an 80% Jewish population to 40%.

The entire point of Zionism in the first place was to create a Jewish state. Having a Jewish minority defeats that. Even then, the Palestinians in Israel are already marginalized second class citizens in practice. The Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza know this (it's the core principle behind Islamist Jihad's founder's ideology, and in that respect he's factually correct).

A game changer needs to happen... otherwise, this is the status-quo.

Ah yeah. That's what I've been saying

 Crablezworth wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:
Getting past the myth that every Palestinian is a militant is a good start.

You talk to some people who clearly don't like arabs or muslims and that's all it takes to dehumanize 2 million people. Boom, they're all terrorists.

oooh, whembly is a bad man.
I totally agree with this, it really gaks me atm that people are worried about an air plane that got shot down when 3 times as many people have already been killed in this invasion (not counting wounded) and many more will follow. It's just fething weird.

 LordofHats wrote:
The entire point of Zionism in the first place was to create a Jewish state. Having a Jewish minority defeats that. Even then, the Palestinians in Israel are already marginalized second class citizens in practice. The Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza know this (it's the core principle behind Islamist Jihad's founder's ideology, and in that respect he's factually correct).

Yet they still enjoy some of the most liberal rights in the Middle East.

Curious, that.

 Bullockist wrote:

oooh, whembly is a bad man.
I totally agree with this, it really gaks me atm that people are worried about an air plane that got shot down when 3 times as many people have already been killed in this invasion (not counting wounded) and many more will follow. It's just fething weird.

TBF... I'm not "worried" about either... But, in this particular case, I'd hazard a guess and say that it comes down to how long each of these has been going on... I mean, Russia/Ukraine (and Ukraine also) has been going on for about 2 years now? Whereas Israel has been fighting for it's life for 60+ years, and the Palestinians have been using terroristic tactics for 30-40 years now? (in the form of PLO and now Hamas, and prior to that, it was legitimate military actions from the likes of Egypt and Jordan, etc.)


I guess it comes down to a "we're just used to it" sort of mentality. I mean, we half expect there to be a gak ton of violence in the Middle East. Contrast that with how relatively stable Eastern Europe has been over that same span of time, and I think that there's just a bit more in the "shock" factor. Plus, it's really not every day that a jumbo jet gets actually shot down... that's pretty big news, no matter how you cut it.

 Seaward wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:
The entire point of Zionism in the first place was to create a Jewish state. Having a Jewish minority defeats that. Even then, the Palestinians in Israel are already marginalized second class citizens in practice. The Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza know this (it's the core principle behind Islamist Jihad's founder's ideology, and in that respect he's factually correct).

Yet they still enjoy some of the most liberal rights in the Middle East.

Curious, that.

Maybe on paper, but in practice...?

Black people in the US in the 50s officially had similar rights and services as whites (that whole separate but equal thing) but the reality was a whole lot different.

Well I'm sure they enjoy more rights in Israel than Jews do in most Islamic countries. And Christians for that matter.

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:
Well I'm sure they enjoy more rights in Israel than Jews do in most Islamic countries. And Christians for that matter.

I'm not sure that having more rights than the average person in say, Iran, is really all that difficult, or indeed, something that should be boasted as an accomplishment. Israel tends to discriminate horribly against its citizens of Palestinian descent.

 Ketara wrote:

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:
Well I'm sure they enjoy more rights in Israel than Jews do in most Islamic countries. And Christians for that matter.

I'm not sure that having more rights than the average person in say, Iran, is really all that difficult, or indeed, something that should be boasted as an accomplishment. Israel tends to discriminate horribly against its citizens of Palestinian descent.

Considering the high probability of those citizens being literal walking bombs, I'm sure you'll understand why my Give-a-feth-O-meter is barely registering.

Christians in Iraq have to either convert to Islam, pay ungodly amount in taxes, get out of Iraq, or get killed. Courtesy of ISIS

 whembly wrote:

 LordofHats wrote:

Getting past the myth that every Palestinian is a militant is a good start. Another is to minimize reasons to want to take militant action (stop taking their land is also a good start).

Um... who elected the Hamas?

Do you believe, if Israel did all those things... that, there be peace?

You've ignored a few posts pointing out that the previous government was weak and letting Israel walk over treaties, the Hama's weren't exactly 'Bad' to the Palestinian at the time due to the fact that due to the weakness of the former government they were the one's effectively running social services, handing out food, helping out with supplies to the common people.

You know, things that would ensure you are voted in because people like having their garbage taken somewhere, food to eat, and water to drink, considering at the time they weren't doing the things that were hurting the people as well kinda made them a shoo-in for being elected.

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

 Ketara wrote:

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:
Well I'm sure they enjoy more rights in Israel than Jews do in most Islamic countries. And Christians for that matter.

I'm not sure that having more rights than the average person in say, Iran, is really all that difficult, or indeed, something that should be boasted as an accomplishment. Israel tends to discriminate horribly against its citizens of Palestinian descent.

Considering the high probability of those citizens being literal walking bombs, I'm sure you'll understand why my Give-a-feth-O-meter is barely registering.

That's grand. Let's lock up all those black people whilst we're at it, since they're statistically more likely to commit crime. And all those gay men, since they have a higher 'probability' of having aids.

 Ketara wrote:

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

 Ketara wrote:

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:
Well I'm sure they enjoy more rights in Israel than Jews do in most Islamic countries. And Christians for that matter.

I'm not sure that having more rights than the average person in say, Iran, is really all that difficult, or indeed, something that should be boasted as an accomplishment. Israel tends to discriminate horribly against its citizens of Palestinian descent.

Considering the high probability of those citizens being literal walking bombs, I'm sure you'll understand why my Give-a-feth-O-meter is barely registering.

That's grand. Let's lock up all those black people whilst we're at it, since they're statistically more likely to commit crime. And all those gay men, since they have a higher 'probability' of having aids.

also police officers in new york since they are more likely to beat random citizens

 Ketara wrote:

That's grand. Let's lock up all those black people whilst we're at it, since they're statistically more likely to commit crime. And all those gay men, since they have a higher 'probability' of having aids.

Blacks are more statistically likely to get caught committing a crime (I'd bet that it's more even the actual committing the crimes)


The difference is, we're dealing with a religious/societal ideology that glorifies something as absurd as blowing yourself up. And one that has the death of all non-believers written in the very foundation of it... Conversely, all other modern religions preach some form of tolerance and getting by. (yes, I know that at some point it was in Mainstream Christianity that "to kill an infidel is not murder, it is the path to heaven", but that's not the modern belief of the majority of the religion)

 Ketara wrote:

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

 Ketara wrote:

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:
Well I'm sure they enjoy more rights in Israel than Jews do in most Islamic countries. And Christians for that matter.

I'm not sure that having more rights than the average person in say, Iran, is really all that difficult, or indeed, something that should be boasted as an accomplishment. Israel tends to discriminate horribly against its citizens of Palestinian descent.

Considering the high probability of those citizens being literal walking bombs, I'm sure you'll understand why my Give-a-feth-O-meter is barely registering.

That's grand. Let's lock up all those black people whilst we're at it, since they're statistically more likely to commit crime. And all those gay men, since they have a higher 'probability' of having aids.

Black and gay people are strapping,bombs to themselves?

For all,your pompous self proclaimed moral superiority and holier than thou attitude, I highly doubt you could sit on a bus in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem next to a Muslim and not feel the slightest bit of apprehension.

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

Black and gay people are strapping,bombs to themselves?

Yes. That is exactly what I meant.

For all,your pompous self proclaimed moral superiority and holier than thou attitude, I highly doubt you could sit on a bus in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem next to a Muslim and not feel the slightest bit of apprehension.

You ever been to Israel? Because I'm thinking not.

Plus, who claimed moral superiority? Did I touch a nerve there with my (reasonably obvious and self evident) analogy to a bad set of reasoning?

I know quite a few times I "try" to throw a thread off a bit. Bringing in "Blacks" and "gays" into this now more likely going involve temp bans, perma bans, and lock thread.


Back to OT. How many here though would be willing to form a human shield if their government calls on them to? Or stay in place because Hamas tells them to. Or have kids play out in the open when bullet's, missiles, and bombs are dropping into the AO.

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:


Black and gay people are strapping,bombs to themselves?

For all,your pompous self proclaimed moral superiority and holier than thou attitude, I highly doubt you could sit on a bus in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem next to a Muslim and not feel the slightest bit of apprehension.

I've been there done that.

If you're not a bigot, it's not a big deal and I'm so white I glow in the dark.

It's the christians who like bombing things in the US, especially hospitals, and they make up 74% of the prison population, so lets round all of them up and lock them up for our own safety.

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:



The difference is, we're dealing with a religious/societal ideology that glorifies something as absurd as blowing yourself up. And one that has the death of all non-believers written in the very foundation of it... Conversely, all other modern religions preach some form of tolerance and getting by. (yes, I know that at some point it was in Mainstream Christianity that "to kill an infidel is not murder, it is the path to heaven", but that's not the modern belief of the majority of the religion)

Discrimination is generally considered to be a bad thing. Just because you share a skin colour/religion with someone who blew himself up doesn't mean you should be denied rights and opportunities in terms of land ownership, employment, education, and so on. I agree that possibly in a security situation you may end up being scrutinised slightly more intently, and that's unavoidable. But to treat people entirely like second class citizens, as Israel often does, is quite frankly a bad thing.

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:
Well I'm sure they enjoy more rights in Israel than Jews do in most Islamic countries. And Christians for that matter.

No fething gak.

Don't ever fething lose that fact when talking about ... Nevermind. I've had enough bans.