There ARE no good ideas. As long as Israel is there, it will be despised by the Arab nations as a symbol of US meddling (which WAS bad...), and the evil of other cultures (which is just stupid). However, Israel is unusually tough for a small country, and shows no signs of getting wiped except possibly by a concerted effort of the whole Middle East, and then only if Israel had no international aid. Until such an unlikely situation arises, the bloody stalemate will continue.
The problem with the entire area there is it's so damn entrenched. Most of the countries there have been more or less at war since the Middle ages, and have thus become not only EXTREMELY good at repelling invaders, but also very militant (and for a kicker, few have had time between wars to develop their culture beyond mediaeval level). Which means that although they can generally do little or nothing to us (notice how few bombings Bin Laden is actually responsible for, and how hardly any person, group, or country has been nearly so destructive...), when they do pull something off, it would take a miracle to get the perpetrator or win a war. Even with the rest of the Middle Eastern nations giving us free reign, it's like kicking a wall- and it's not like the Afghans in particular haven't turned back greater threats than us, with our desire to keep up appearances and unwillingness to send hundreds of thousands of people to their deaths just to prove a point. These were the very guys who kicked the Soviets' asses, when they had little more than light rifles, fanaticism, and us cheering on the sidelines. What I don't get is why we can't just cut off all access into Afghanistan, letting refugees out (after checking their stuff for anything that could conceivably blow up), and nothing at all in- they're a landlocked country, the Taliban wouldn't last a month, particularly now that they're geared for war, not seige.
