Pleasing the entire Palestinian population is an impossible task. Except possibly by accepting the destruction of Israel. Israel might change policies without a negotiation, but they won't give the Palestinians sovereignty over the West Bank and Gaza without negotiation, and they won't or at least they should not negotiate with someone who is not a credible negotiating partner. All of this means that the problem will probably go on at least another generation. It might simmer down, and rise up again several times during that period but it wont really go away.
If you consider the full region where Palestinians live, (i.e. parts of everything from Egypt to Lebanon and Jordan), you'll find that the Jews are a minority in the area. If you consider the Arabs in general, the Jews are a small minority
And if you consider all of southern Africa the whites where a really small minority. The question is why you should consider the entire region. Israel is a country with territory recognized by most of the world (most of the world doesn't recognize the occupied territories as being part of Israel but they do recognize the pre '67 borders). Yes the borders are somewhat gerrymandered but no more so then those of many other countries. The Jews are a large majority in internationally recognized Israel and still a majority if you consider the entire region under dispute.
If you consider all of the Middle East the Jews are a small minority, but the rest of the Arabs are not living in the disputed area and are not part of the Intifada. They could intervene with their armies but Israel for the moment has military superiority.
Instead of pointless sanctimonious moralizing, simply look at the problem as a practical one. Here's the practical problems with your analogy: (1) Israel isn't in the 19th century. (2) Israel doesn't have the military power to enforce a final solution against the Palestinians (in the face of world reaction). (3) Israel has higher moral standards than to do that. Heck, even the US had qualms about what went on in the Indian wars. Even though these are partly self generated moral restrictions, they are still restrictions.
Your point 3 is why I went through the whole moral argument. Israelis would use a similar argument if the terror attacks did escalate to the extent that we talked about earlier. A number of people in the rest of the world would support them if things did get so bad so that partially counters 2. You seem to recognize that the moral issues are important but then argue against any moral arguments. Your point 1 is in a way a different way of stating 3 and the part of 2 that concerns world reaction. I'm not sure how the part concerning military strength is an issue. Israel has a lot of military strength. Unless you believe the US would stop supporting Israel in the face of 40,000 terrorist cause deaths a year, or unless you believe non Arab states would military intervene against Israel I see Israeli military strength as adiquate to the task.
I don't think the Russian/Soviet Empire is a perfect analogy, but it does show that while atrocities might be needed to keep a hostile civilian population down, the atrocities do not have to rise to the level of genocide. Germany in WWII is another example. It did commit genocide but that was not necessary to, or probably even helpful in the attempt to keep down the conquered populations. Germany did not defeat the various resitance forces but it kept them down to the extent that they where not a threat to German control despite the fact that they where receiving aid from other countries and the fact that Germany was fighting some of the world most power countries simultaneously at the time. Will military force end the resistance to Israel among the Palestinians? No, at least not without genocide or ethnic cleansing, but it can keep a lid on it. Perhaps not a very good lid, it has cracks and doesn't seal right but enough of a lid to prevent the PLO and Hammas from being a threat to Israel's existence.
Iran, (population 66 million)...
All the population figures really are not relevant unless the various countries are mobilizing as large of armies as they can create to send against Israel. But if you want to talk about populations of the outside supporters the US (population 275+ million) sends billions to Israel and sells it advanced heavy weapons.
A few scuds launched from Iraq threaten's Israel less then the suicide bombers. Also it would open Iraq up to heavy retaliation. In any case Israel and the US are working on missile defenses that should be able to handle Iraqi missiles.
What happens when the Palestinian Authority gets ahold of anti aircraft weapons and makes it impossible to fly commercial aircraft into Israel?
I think that unless the PA gets heavy AA weapons they won't be able to do this. Also Arafat would risk losing his support in Europe and possibly even some of it from Arab countries if he starts shooting down loaded jetliners. He likes the money to much. Shoulder fired missiles would be enough to shut down commercial aircraft flights temporarily and make security a lot more expensive and less convenient permanently but I don't think they will enable the PA or Hammas to shut down commercial flight permanently, esp. because decent examples of them are in limited supply. Its not like Iran has a lot of them for its own use let alone tons of them to give the Palestinians.
When you say that Israel is majority Jewish, you're wearing blinders so that you can ignore the situation in the neighboring states.
Unless they are going to intervene militarily there contribution is minor. If they do intervene militarily they will probably lose. If they look like they will win then Israel might go nuclear or the US might intervene. The other Arab countries would rather the Palestinians do the dieing.
You might as well argue that since the British had majority support in Hong Kong, they therefore are still in control of the colony, or by the same reasoning, the Portugese are still in control of Macau, etc.
Hong Kong and Macao both went back to China not because of who the majority supported but because the treaties giving control to Britain and Portugal expired. Neither the UK or Portugal desired to go against International law in this case, and even more so neither of them desired to go up against the Chinese army in a land war in Asia with no strategic depth to fall back on (even less then Israel has). If Israel ever faces the Chinese army in a land war in Asia it might have problems but no Arab country or even a coalition of all of them approaches that level of military power. When the British where more militarily powerful even on the ground in Asia, then China is they where able to enforce the treaty that gave them control of Hong Kong despite the fact that they where enormously outnumbered by the Chinese not just in the area, but even if you include the British subjects back home.
Tim |
