I also choose peace over war, but the whole Middle East mess has been going on since the end of WW2 (or several thousand years earlier, depending on how you look at it). No one has been able to come up with a solution. “What if they gave a war...and nobody came?” is a nice idea, but probably is never going to apply to this situation.
Shortly after Oct.7, I listened to an interview with Condoleeza Rice regarding the Hamas attack. She made the point that Israel has been making concessions, in exchange for promised peace, to various Palestinian groups for decades - but has not received the promised peace. Now Hamas has made this horrific attack, starting a war, and Israel is forced to fight for it’s very survival. There is now no way for Israel to make concessions without ‘rewarding’ terrorist aggression, thus endangering itself further.
So, what do you think, Peter? Do you see a pathway by which Israel can accept a ‘two state’ solution - politically, and without weakening itself militarily? (And yes, if you do you could win the Nobel Peace Prize - but I still ask because you are wise and insightful.)
The only thought I have is that the players in the Middle East would do well to study the Belfast Agreement which ended The Troubles in Northern Ireland.
That was not an easy agreement to make, nor to keep. It took several years to hammer out and several more years to fully implement. Yet here we are over 25 years down the road and Sinn Fein--the political arm of the IRA terrorist group--now has the First Minister slot. Yet even though Sinn Fein's political platform has always been reunification of Northern Ireland to the rest of Ireland, the reality on the ground today is that both Catholics and Protestants are generally more supportive of remaining in the UK.
Which I think is the larger lesson of the Belfast Agreement (aka The Good Friday Accords). When peoples with decades and even centuries of sectarian strife choose to live in peace, they can have peace.
Moreover, there are more than a few parallels between Northern Ireland and Israel/Gaza/West Bank. Two peoples locked in hatred and conflict, with crimes and wrongdoings on both sides.
Whether the ultimate solution is a single state or two state solution is, in the end, just a detail. What is needed is for both the Arabs in Gaza and in the West Bank to choose alongside the Israelis to live in peace--and then to figure out how to implement that peace.
Until then, all sides are sowing winds of war and reaping the whirlwind of perpetual war.
Peter, looking at the Belfast Agreement for a solution is a really good idea! Are you aware if anyone at the appropriate levels of authority have ever studied this?
I did a search engine dig on ‘Belfast Agreement Hamas Israel’ and a few articles came up. Some were behind paywalls, and all were written previous to the current outbreak of war.
But that’s cause for optimism! Policy-wonk people are probably revisiting these studies now, seeing if there’s a way for the lessons of the Troubles to work, now that the threat level for WW3 has been elevated. As you - wisely -say, they have to want and CHOOSE peace. If it looks like a choice between the near-total destruction of WW3 and peace, heavens, won’t they (please) choose peace?
Policy "wonks" love to reinvent the wheel. I'm an engineer. I look for what's already worked and see how to make use of that.
Also, given the levels of historical illiteracy that infect governments at seemingly every level and in every country today, I doubt if any of the current crop of policy wonks even remember that Northern Ireland used to be a hotbed of terrorism and low-intensity civil war since the 1950s.
Our "experts" are seemingly universally blithering idiots.
I also choose peace over war, but the whole Middle East mess has been going on since the end of WW2 (or several thousand years earlier, depending on how you look at it). No one has been able to come up with a solution. “What if they gave a war...and nobody came?” is a nice idea, but probably is never going to apply to this situation.
Shortly after Oct.7, I listened to an interview with Condoleeza Rice regarding the Hamas attack. She made the point that Israel has been making concessions, in exchange for promised peace, to various Palestinian groups for decades - but has not received the promised peace. Now Hamas has made this horrific attack, starting a war, and Israel is forced to fight for it’s very survival. There is now no way for Israel to make concessions without ‘rewarding’ terrorist aggression, thus endangering itself further.
So, what do you think, Peter? Do you see a pathway by which Israel can accept a ‘two state’ solution - politically, and without weakening itself militarily? (And yes, if you do you could win the Nobel Peace Prize - but I still ask because you are wise and insightful.)
The only thought I have is that the players in the Middle East would do well to study the Belfast Agreement which ended The Troubles in Northern Ireland.
That was not an easy agreement to make, nor to keep. It took several years to hammer out and several more years to fully implement. Yet here we are over 25 years down the road and Sinn Fein--the political arm of the IRA terrorist group--now has the First Minister slot. Yet even though Sinn Fein's political platform has always been reunification of Northern Ireland to the rest of Ireland, the reality on the ground today is that both Catholics and Protestants are generally more supportive of remaining in the UK.
Which I think is the larger lesson of the Belfast Agreement (aka The Good Friday Accords). When peoples with decades and even centuries of sectarian strife choose to live in peace, they can have peace.
Moreover, there are more than a few parallels between Northern Ireland and Israel/Gaza/West Bank. Two peoples locked in hatred and conflict, with crimes and wrongdoings on both sides.
Whether the ultimate solution is a single state or two state solution is, in the end, just a detail. What is needed is for both the Arabs in Gaza and in the West Bank to choose alongside the Israelis to live in peace--and then to figure out how to implement that peace.
Until then, all sides are sowing winds of war and reaping the whirlwind of perpetual war.
Peter, looking at the Belfast Agreement for a solution is a really good idea! Are you aware if anyone at the appropriate levels of authority have ever studied this?
I did a search engine dig on ‘Belfast Agreement Hamas Israel’ and a few articles came up. Some were behind paywalls, and all were written previous to the current outbreak of war.
But that’s cause for optimism! Policy-wonk people are probably revisiting these studies now, seeing if there’s a way for the lessons of the Troubles to work, now that the threat level for WW3 has been elevated. As you - wisely -say, they have to want and CHOOSE peace. If it looks like a choice between the near-total destruction of WW3 and peace, heavens, won’t they (please) choose peace?
No, but I doubt it.
Policy "wonks" love to reinvent the wheel. I'm an engineer. I look for what's already worked and see how to make use of that.
Also, given the levels of historical illiteracy that infect governments at seemingly every level and in every country today, I doubt if any of the current crop of policy wonks even remember that Northern Ireland used to be a hotbed of terrorism and low-intensity civil war since the 1950s.
Our "experts" are seemingly universally blithering idiots.
I’m trying to come up with an optimistic response - but I’m drawing a blank.
They ARE blithering idiots.
Peace, the concept seems to be failing right now, and when the Chinese Communists start their 'operations' here, it will be really seen as failing.