No. of Recommendations: 5
The politics of people who say "bbbut they're manufacturing terrorists" are those of the bullied kid hoping that the bully picks on them last. That's not how you deal with bullies.
There are plenty of rational arguments on both sides, which is why it's such an intractable problem. There are plenty of irrational arguments on both sides, too, though. Which is why it can be so comforting to just imagine that the people who disagree with you are only doing so based on the irrational argument, rather than a rational one.
The rational argument against Israel's current policy is to draw parallels to nationalist disputes like The Troubles in Northern Ireland, which were ended not by treating the opposing side as a "bully," but reaching an accord. Or by looking at the Partition of India, which resulted in a lot of trauma and loss and death on both sides, but resulted in an unsteady but enduring level of peace between the two national peoples.
Israel has "punched the bully" over and over and over again....but the "bully" hasn't given up. It hasn't worked. It might never work. It may be that the nationalist forces that are generating opposition to Israel's policies in the West Bank and Gaza isn't analogous to a bully - that they're not like a person that picks on other kids, but will stop doing it if people stand up to them. They may instead by more like the nationalist impulses of a people that will not stop fighting until they achieve autonomy, even if it takes centuries, and that the only way to end the conflict is to either reach an accord or exterminate them. The latter is an unacceptable outcome, both for the Palestinians and Israel. Therefore the former is the only possible end result.
Advocating for an accord is therefore not the "bullied kid hoping the bully picks on them last," but an observer realizing that the Palestinians aren't a schoolyard bully that can be dealt with by schoolyard bully tactics. If you stand up to this "bully," they won't stop bullying. You can get into a fistfight with them - you might even win that fistfight - but they'll be back tomorrow, with friends. And you can get into another fistfight with them again....and they'll be back the next day. You will never stop fighting - the bully will never back down. And since you can't pull out a gun and kill the schoolyard bully and all their friends, you have to find another way.
Which is very frustrating - but it's reality. Fighting back against a "bully" only works if doing so resolves the problem, if the person you're fighting is in fact like a schoolyard bully. If not, then it won't work.
