[Dragon]

I think this could work on a larger scale. Israel and Palestine are not competing over resources or some absolutely vital territory both sides must have, so I believe a decent compromise is possible. Neve Shalom is a proof that Jews and Arabs can coexist in peace, for those who need one. And indeed, proper education instead of shameless propaganda would probably help with that, since now, I imagine that all most Palestinians seen of Israeli people are IDF soldiers (if that), so the only pictures of Israelis they have are whatever propaganda invents. Similarly, it seems likely that most Israelis see Arabs as dirty savages shouting "Jihad!" and launching rockets at them (BTW, how does it look lie in Israeli bootcamps? Are generic "Arabs" portrayed as an enemy?). Whenever it's not the case (for instance, if they live next to each other), they seem to get along.

I think that a larger project like Neve Shalom is needed. Something the size of a city, perhaps. At the start, it should have a similar Arabian and Jewish population, and have a plenty of leeway to ensure it can be fully democratic without running afoul of some biased law. An independent education system is a must. Perhaps some sort of joint Israeli-Palestinian city state. I can imagine warmongers ignoring a village working contrary to what they say, but I don't think they'd be able to disregard a city.

[lostllama]

To my understanding, the West Bank is considered to be fairly important to Israel and the Palestinians due to its aquifers: http://www.mideastweb.org/westbankwater.htm - and as such it is seen as the real "prize". I recall reading a news article back in about 2005 that this was one reason why Israeli settlers were removed from Gaza.

I'm not so sure that there isn't a resource conflict going on. The Council for European-Palestinian Relations has written a memo on the apparent power imbalance between the Palestinian Water Authority and the Joint Water Committee, the latter of which was established following the Oslo Accords to act as a regulator.  I'm not finished reading it all yet, but a few things that caught my notice are below.

“Israel recognizes the Palestinian water rights in the West Bank. These will be negotiated in the permanent status negotiations and settled in the Permanent Status Agreement relating to the various water resources.” - Article 40, Oslo Accords

The operating and decision-making nature of the committee itself is also a subject of power imbalance. At the JWC, Israel has an effective veto over the decisions regarding all water projects. However, the Palestinian side at the same committee is not provided with the equivalent veto.

As a result, high numbers of Palestinian projects were rejected or delayed by JWC since 1995; many water projects are still waiting for JWC approval. In comparison, all Israeli proposed projects, except one, have been approved (Lunat 2010). While the principle of equal representation applies to both sides, in practice, Israel has vetoed the Palestinian development of water resources in the West Bank.

Military Orders

Besides the administrative measures, the complex legal system issued by the Military Commander functions as a codification of control as well as an institutional framework of the occupation. From the beginning of the Israeli occupation, with not more than three Military Orders, Israel has created a “mechanism of total control” over water in the West Bank (Messerschmid 2004: 3). Shortly after the June 1967 War, Military Order 92 transferred full authority over all water concerning issues in West Bank and Gaza Strip from various local utilities to an Israeli official appointed by the area military commander (Mair et al. 2003: 12). Moreover, Military Order 158 introduced a permit system for all water projects. In other words, the law prohibited the construction of any new or reconstruction of old water infrastructure without a permit from an official appointed by the area military commander. The military order also provided this Israeli official with the right to refuse a permit without a justification and no mechanism was established to appeal the official’s decisions (Mair et al. 2003: 12). Lastly, Military Order 291 declared all water resources to be the property of the State of Israel. In this way the military orders ensured full control of state-owned natural resources and built up the legal system for issuing drilling permits and extraction rates for Israel.

Maybe I shouldn't be surprised by this, but I didn't realize the military had such an influence in the permitting process.

I think that a larger project like Neve Shalom is needed. Something the size of a city, perhaps. At the start, it should have a similar Arabian and Jewish population, and have a plenty of leeway to ensure it can be fully democratic without running afoul of some biased law. An independent education system is a must. Perhaps some sort of joint Israeli-Palestinian city state. I can imagine warmongers ignoring a village working contrary to what they say, but I don't think they'd be able to disregard a city.

I too would love to see something on the scale of a shared city-state, however unlikely it may be.

[Sandwich]

(BTW, how does it look lie in Israeli bootcamps? Are generic "Arabs" portrayed as an enemy?)

Not specifically (or generically, I guess), no. If we're in a specific situation, such as the recent Gaza op, the enemy is identified as Hamas. If you're asking on more general terms, well, our cardboard firing range targets are generic soldiers in uniform with helmets. Not very detailed - just a monotone green print on the brown cardboard. I tried to find a picture of one in Google but was shocked that I wasn't able to find any decent pictures. Best I came up with was this: http://www.theblaze.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/range-620x444.png

[Dragon]

Good to know. Looks like ethnic hatred for Arabs isn't being spread as much as I though in Israel. Looking at it now, ethnic hatred between normal people on both sides might be less of an issue than it's commonly believed. Hamas (not sure about Fatah) might be actively teaching Palestinian children hatred for Israel, but it seems that in Gaza Strip, a child is lucky if he gets any education at all. Most people in Gaza likely believe whatever Hamas tells them, because they hardly know anything else. So, maybe this whole war is being fought more or less over stubbornness of a few leaders on both sides. Or water...

To my understanding, the West Bank is considered to be fairly important to Israel and the Palestinians due to its aquifers: http://www.mideastweb.org/westbankwater.htm - and as such it is seen as the real "prize". I recall reading a news article back in about 2005 that this was one reason why Israeli settlers were removed from Gaza.
-snip-

Interesting. A resource conflict could explain (though by no means justify) Israel acting like it does much better than purely ethnic/religious conflict. It makes much more sense to them to want a swatch of desert if there's water under it. If it's also about resources, then it might be much more difficult to find a good, peaceful resolution than I thought. UN dividing the aquifers in half between Palestine and Israel might work, but I have a feeling it wouldn't. I don't think I need to mention how such disputes over natural resources usually ended through history.

[karajorma]

Yeah, the Palestinians already feel aggrieved about Israel taking their land, giving them more of it would solve the problem.

Seriously, there is no simple solution to the problem of Israel and Palestine. You're talking about a complex situation that goes back tens if not hundreds of years with neither side willing to take any of the steps necessary for peace.

[Sandwich]

...with neither side willing to take any of the steps necessary for peace.

Pardon my being blunt, but that's nonsense. Israel has made drastic unilateral sacrifices at least twice - pulling out of south Lebanon and then out of Gaza. What steps did the Hezbollah/Lebanese and the Palestinians respond with? Drastic increases in rocket barrages from the areas we vacated. Israeli prime ministers throughout the years have offered huge territorial concessions - upwards of 90% what was being demanded by the Palestinians - only to be rejected outright. Israel has a standing offer for the Palestinians to come to the negotiating table, but the latter refuse to do so unless Israel agrees to the Palestinian's preconditions... which is what negotiations are all about. In the Sad-But-True dept, it's been said that the Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.

So anyone with an eye to see can tell that it's not actually about the land (if it were, they would have control over far more than they do now), but about their hatred of Jews and their desire to see us pushed into the sea.

[karajorma]

How would you react to a solution proposed by the Palestinians that took 10% of Israel?

[NGTM-1R]

How would you react to a solution proposed by the Palestinians that took 10% of Israel?

That's already been offered once you know. Pretty much everything on the Palestinian wishlist was offered them, at the same time, during the '90s. Like the IRA's splinter factions, some people are just way too invested in the struggle to stop fighting Satan after he repents. Unlike the IRA, they compose a majority.

As has been repeatedly stated earlier in the thread, groups like Hamas and Hezbollah draw most of their support from from their promise to destroy Israel, not from their promise of better life for Palestinians and an independent Palestine. They know it. The PLO was really the only organization that had a reason to lay down its arms in the name of the Palestinian state.

[Sandwich]

How would you react to a solution proposed by the Palestinians that took 10% of Israel?

Again with the assumptions. Let's look at history first... no, not all the way back to Biblical times - modern history.

First of all, the West Bank was captured by Israel in a defensive war in 1967 from Jordan (defensive as stated by the UN at the time). Jordan, for that matter, "acquired" the West Bank illegally, as part of their offensive war fought against the newly-formed state of Israel in 1948. Before that time, the area was known as Judea and Samaria.

So, between 1948 and 1967, Jordan occupied the "West Bank" - an occupation which hardly any other nation recognized as legal, not even by any other Arab nation.

So who did the Judea and Samaria belong to before they were occupied? Going back a bit further, the Turks (Ottoman Empire) had control over the entire region until 1917, when they lost in WWI to the Allies. They gave up control over the territory, and the Allies decided to make countries out of the area. Britain's Lord Balfour recognized the ancient Jewish right to the region and proposed to allocate to the Jews the area equivalent to modern-day Israel and Jordan (minus the Golan heights IIRC). The League of Nations had second thoughts and split off the area we know as Jordan into its own country, the Hashemite Kingdom of TransJordan in 1922, but recognized the Jewish homeland as an area that included Judea and Samaria (the "West Bank") - which was reaffirmed by the UN after WWII.

When the British mandate ended, UN General Assembly resolution 181 recommended splitting the area up yet again, into two states - a Jewish one and an Arab one. The Jews accepted the proposal and went on to establish the modern State of Israel. The Arabs refused and launched the 1948 war to destroy the newly-birthed Jewish state (btw, according to the Wikipedia, "In 2011, Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas stated that the Arab rejection of the partition plan was a mistake he hoped to correct"). This left resolution 181 with no legal authority. When the 1948 war came to a halt due to reaching a ceasefire, the lines demarcated by the fighting were what we currently call the "borders" of the West Bank and Gaza strip. The Arab leaders at the time, being consistently bull-headed, insisted that these lines have no political significance. Let me restate that in case you missed it: what we call the "1967 borders" are not from 1967, but from 1948, and were never recognized as international borders. This left those areas as disputed territories, not "occupied territories".

To recap: Israel's presence in the "West Bank" is the result of a war of self-defence (1967). These areas were not occupied territories, since they did not legally belong to any nation up till then, but disputed territories. These territories were recognized as part of the Jewish homeland internationally, and since resolution 181 has no legal standing, they are at best/worst (depending on your POV) still only disputed territories, and thus the presence of settlements therein is not illegal.

So, to answer your question? The Jewish people reacted to a proposal by the League of Nations / UN to take away huge percentages of their homeland with a positive - so be it, we'll take whatever we can get after the horrors of the Holocaust. The Arab nations lost subsequent wars, and are now whining about it.

[karajorma]

You realise that your declaration that 181 has no legal authority basically makes the entire state of Israel illegal too, right?

[Luis Dias]

If the discussion had been as easily explained and blamed away to a single cause and faction, the conflict would have ended a long time ago.

Here's an interesting piece by Adam Curtis: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/posts/save_your_kisses_for_me

[Dragon]

(btw, according to the Wikipedia, "In 2011, Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas stated that the Arab rejection of the partition plan was a mistake he hoped to correct").

That would be progress. He's still in power, though through a bit questionable way. If he made good on his promise, it'd go a long way towards the situation in the region. Considering recent actions of the PLO, it seems that he's going to. It also seems like Israelis were actually more than willing to give up most of the disputed territory to PA. The question is, what's the current standing? If there was a resolution proposed right now in which PLO would get the entire West Bank and Gaza, with the exception of places where the Jewish population is a majority (the most reasonable layout I can think of), would common Israeli people agree to that?

As for Hamas, I believe that if a free Palestinian state was formed, they'd start looking ridiculous. I think that they'd lose much of their support if Fatah managed to form a functioning country and either die a natural death, or get clobbered by one military or the other.

[karajorma]

Here's an interesting piece by Adam Curtis: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/posts/save_your_kisses_for_me

Thanks for that. It very nicely points out what I have said many times in the past, that Israel created this problem themselves.



I strongly suggest you find and watch Adam Curtis' The Power of Nightmares if you haven't already. It's a brilliant examination of the parallels between the rise of the neo-cons in America and Islamic radicals in Afghanistan.

Seriously, beg, borrow or steal a copy.

[lostllama]

Here's an interesting piece by Adam Curtis: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/posts/save_your_kisses_for_me

Thanks for that. It very nicely points out what I have said many times in the past, that Israel created this problem themselves.



I strongly suggest you find and watch Adam Curtis' The Power of Nightmares if you haven't already. It's a brilliant examination of the parallels between the rise of the neo-cons in America and Islamic radicals in Afghanistan.

Seriously, beg, borrow or steal a copy.

I've actually seen that documentary series. It puts across a very interesting viewpoint: that the end goal of the neo-conservatives and the Islamic radicals is essentially the same: a totalitarian world, albeit one totally secular (and nationalistic) and another based on religious law (i.e. no separation of church and state).

It also puts across the idea that nationalism, or patriotism, is no different than a religion in itself, which is something that I've long thought has a lot of truth to it (the "myth of the nation" concept).