naraburns nihil supernum
6mo ago
(text post)
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Israel-Gaza Megathread #2
This is a refreshed megathread for any posts on the conflict between (so far, and so far as I know) Hamas and the Israeli government, as well as related geopolitics. Culture War thread rules apply.
Suppose you were a moderate leader of the Palestinians. What on Earth could you possibly do to end the suffering and negotiate a lasting peace?
Palestinians appear to feel very strongly about unrestricted right of return. In the failed Camp David talks, Arafat demanded 150,000 Palestinians in the diaspora be allowed to settle Israel per year while Israel pushed back and said 100,000 total, though they offered a $30 billion fund to help Palestinians abroad to attain permanent settlement abroad.
This is pretty far apart. Israel doesn’t want to be demographically obliterated but Palestinians that fled Israel consider it their ancestral home.
How do you reconcile this? Wouldn’t any Palestinian leader that negotiated a peace deal without this be considered illegitimate and probably marked for death?
On the other hand, would the hostilities even end if Israel somehow agreed to unrestricted ROR? There’s so much bad blood that even this is hard to imagine as being the thing that achieves lasting peace.
I’m not sure any concession short of Israel packs up and leaves forever would end the violence.
Is it wrong to demand that Israelis relocate to Florida? It’s not like they can’t move all of their holy buildings. Surely the terra itself isn’t sacred?
Suppose you were a moderate leader of the Palestinians. What on Earth could you possibly do to end the suffering and negotiate a lasting peace?
Honestly, I think if the Palestinians had been led by a charismatic Western-PMC-friendly MLK or Nelson Mandela, rather than by self-enriching despots like Arafat, they could have gotten almost all of what they (claimed to) ask for. They probably could have, given a demonstrable period of peace, made a compelling case for equal rights for non-Jews in Israel! The 2000 and 2008 peace proposals seemed, at least to my eyes, pretty accommodating given the circumstances, but were still declined. At least some of this is, I think, because the Palestinian authorities don't seem to really to run a functioning government: even if Abbas agreed to a given proposal, there are at least a half-dozen Palestinian factions that he can't keep under control that would probably keep fighting. It's quite possible the leaders have to keep declining peace offers because it would expose how little authority they actually hold with their people.
On the other hand, given the events of recent weeks, I can also see how such a the events of earlier this month would be worse if they had successfully played for peace and open(er) borders and waited for a better time to strike. I've heard anecdotes that Gazans with work permits in Israel were involved (exact circumstances unclear) in planning the operation. Given an enemy so dead-set on your destruction at any cost to themselves (martyrdom!), how can you defeat them and win peace in hearts and minds? Or trust that any current peace isn't a quiet prelude to a larger surprise? Also, while there have been moments of hope post-Apartheid South Africa after Mandela, the promised utopian future for all of the late 90s seems to have fractured at the seams, with widespread civil infrastructure failures and emigration of those with better options.
Given an enemy so dead-set on your destruction at any cost to themselves (martyrdom!), how can you defeat them and win peace in hearts and minds?
Right, this is the heart of my question. Is there a path forward besides: wait for Palestinians to undergo a complete spiritual and cultural transformation? ( Or for the international community to give Israel a freebie on genocide)
Or, for that matter, a path forward besides waiting for Israel to undergo a complete spiritual and cultural transformation and then hope the Palestinians follow suit?
Why isn’t it also on Israel to try to find a leader like, I don’t know, a charismatic Jesus kind of guy who loves the Palestinians even though many of them will terrorize?
Is there a path forward besides: wait for Palestinians to undergo a complete spiritual and cultural transformation? ( Or for the international community to give Israel a freebie on genocide)
No, and we should.
Why isn’t it also on Israel to try to find a leader like, I don’t know, a charismatic Jesus kind of guy who loves the Palestinians even though many of them will terrorize?
Because then we would lose 8 Million productive humans so some crazy people can occupy a really cool coastline.
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Notes -
Suppose you were a moderate leader of the Palestinians. What on Earth could you possibly do to end the suffering and negotiate a lasting peace?
Palestinians appear to feel very strongly about unrestricted right of return. In the failed Camp David talks, Arafat demanded 150,000 Palestinians in the diaspora be allowed to settle Israel per year while Israel pushed back and said 100,000 total, though they offered a $30 billion fund to help Palestinians abroad to attain permanent settlement abroad.
This is pretty far apart. Israel doesn’t want to be demographically obliterated but Palestinians that fled Israel consider it their ancestral home.
How do you reconcile this? Wouldn’t any Palestinian leader that negotiated a peace deal without this be considered illegitimate and probably marked for death?
On the other hand, would the hostilities even end if Israel somehow agreed to unrestricted ROR? There’s so much bad blood that even this is hard to imagine as being the thing that achieves lasting peace.
I’m not sure any concession short of Israel packs up and leaves forever would end the violence.
Is it wrong to demand that Israelis relocate to Florida? It’s not like they can’t move all of their holy buildings. Surely the terra itself isn’t sacred?
Honestly, I think if the Palestinians had been led by a charismatic Western-PMC-friendly MLK or Nelson Mandela, rather than by self-enriching despots like Arafat, they could have gotten almost all of what they (claimed to) ask for. They probably could have, given a demonstrable period of peace, made a compelling case for equal rights for non-Jews in Israel! The 2000 and 2008 peace proposals seemed, at least to my eyes, pretty accommodating given the circumstances, but were still declined. At least some of this is, I think, because the Palestinian authorities don't seem to really to run a functioning government: even if Abbas agreed to a given proposal, there are at least a half-dozen Palestinian factions that he can't keep under control that would probably keep fighting. It's quite possible the leaders have to keep declining peace offers because it would expose how little authority they actually hold with their people.
On the other hand, given the events of recent weeks, I can also see how such a the events of earlier this month would be worse if they had successfully played for peace and open(er) borders and waited for a better time to strike. I've heard anecdotes that Gazans with work permits in Israel were involved (exact circumstances unclear) in planning the operation. Given an enemy so dead-set on your destruction at any cost to themselves (martyrdom!), how can you defeat them and win peace in hearts and minds? Or trust that any current peace isn't a quiet prelude to a larger surprise? Also, while there have been moments of hope post-Apartheid South Africa after Mandela, the promised utopian future for all of the late 90s seems to have fractured at the seams, with widespread civil infrastructure failures and emigration of those with better options.
Right, this is the heart of my question. Is there a path forward besides: wait for Palestinians to undergo a complete spiritual and cultural transformation? ( Or for the international community to give Israel a freebie on genocide)
Or, for that matter, a path forward besides waiting for Israel to undergo a complete spiritual and cultural transformation and then hope the Palestinians follow suit?
Why isn’t it also on Israel to try to find a leader like, I don’t know, a charismatic Jesus kind of guy who loves the Palestinians even though many of them will terrorize?
No, and we should.
Because then we would lose 8 Million productive humans so some crazy people can occupy a really cool coastline.
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