I think you should be a little more positive. I doubt that a real conflict (an open war between Israel and Arab neighbors) is in the cards. In my humble opinion, there are no strategic goals that can be achieved by military conflict. Israel does not want to take any Arab Capital and "force" surrender of the WWI/WWII style. When Sharon crossed the Suez canal in an earlier conflict, the road to Cairo was open. Yet, Cairo was not "taken". Taking an Arab capital would be a situation similar to a dog running after a car, once he caught up with it, what will he do with that car?
The Arab side has no achievable strategic goals to hope for (their old "throw them into the sea" is not achievable). Apart of that it is quite clear that neither Egypt nor Jordan would participate, the only candidate is Syria and Iraq. Iraq does not have a common border nor the logistics of supply lines if they were to be granted "free passage".
Syria, well, they have a new Pres, and I just cannot fathom this nice guy (he was trained as a physician, and his demeanor, if nothing else is as peaceful as can be) exposing his populace to the horror of war. Yes, his advisors and military commanders are still from the old Assad school, but I have a feeling he will reign them in.
All that can happen, and that will be very unfortunate, is that the Palestinian leadership will use thousands of civilians and children as cannon fodder. What will be the strategic goal of that? Forcing Israel to give up Jerusalem as it's Capital? Is there any chance that this will be the result of another three years of Infitada? I doubt it. The longer Arafat wait to get a peace treaty, the less territory he'll end up with. All those "settlements" will not contract they will grow and become "facts in the land". Ten years ago, the Palestinian had a pretty good chance of getting a settlement that would have included removal of most of these settlements. In 20 years, some of these settlements will be the de-facto home of those settlers (most of their population by then would have been born in those settlements and demand they'd be recognized as "home land"). Thus, IMHO, the Palestinian can only lose from extending the conflict.
Their leadership knows that perfectly well, but they lack the backbone to stand before their people and say "it is time to think differently". They lack the guts. The Israeli government assigned to the Palestinian free frequencies for broadcasting, television and radio. Barak made an interesting comment, challenging CNN (I do not know the spelling of her last name), through his interviewer to broadcast some choice segments from these broadcasts. They do not educate peace and mutual understanding, they spew hate. I was given few years back an arithmetic book used in the Gaza strip. No educator in any country would agree to teach from books so infested with hate. Sometimes, the leadership has to step into the breach and do at home what they preach in public.
Zeev |
