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No. of Recommendations: 4
I found this interesting. A deeper dive than most outlets have done. I wasn't aware that they were pretty close to a peace deal at one point before extremists on both sides derailed it. The current Israeli administration could be numbered among the extremists. A prior one was assassinated by an extremist.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJ9PKQbkJv8(John Oliver)
Evidently there is significant vitriol against "Bibi" and his team
in Israel. Rightly or wrongly, he apparently is getting a lot of the blame.
As a side note, no tunnels so far (under the hospital). Either they just haven't found them yet, or they aren't there. Sort of like the WMD in Iraq. We'll see what comes of it. A major black eye for Israel if they aren't there. We know they do have tunnels in various places, but if there aren't any under the hospital.....
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/11/16/what-has...
No. of Recommendations: 3
As another side note, it seems that the USA isn't the only one facing polarization problems. Apparently most of Israel, and most of Palestine, are OK with a two-state solution. But Hamas isn't, and the extremist Israeli factions (right-wing**) aren't. And apparently they are pulling the strings.
Also note that Hamas was voted-in 17 years ago. There hasn't been an election since, and at least half of the Gaza residents weren't even alive when that vote happened. Hamas campaigned on peace and moderation at the time.
**I'm detecting a pattern here...apparently "right-wing" is a problem everywhere.
No. of Recommendations: 3
I wasn't aware that they were pretty close to a peace deal at one point before extremists on both sides derailed it.
I don't think that's true.
Oh, it's fashionable now to look back at 2000 and claim that they were thiiiiiiiiis close to a deal. But they really weren't, because they never solved the issue of the Right of Return. And that's why polling on these issues is misleading. Because even though most Israelis might support a two-state solution, and most Palestinians would also support a two-state solution, they are likely supporting two different proposals that are inconsistent with each other. The former a two state for two peoples solution, and the latter an Israel that has a full right of return than ends up completely pluralistic and a Palestinian state.
Sadly, the two positions may be forever irreconcilable.
No. of Recommendations: 1
I would be interested in your perspective on Oliver's commentary. His pieces are well-researched, and he often credits actual journalists as the sources for his pieces. He didn't exactly say "thiiiis close", but he did say they were well on the way to something both could agree to (paraphrasing from memory).
The extremist Palestinians want Israel gone, and the extremist Israelis want to take over the whole shebang including Gaza and the West Bank. But apparently both of those groups are significant minorities exercising power beyond their numbers (sort of like the NRA).
You even said a month or so ago that one of the reasons Hamas did this was that Israel was on the verge of reaching accords with other middle east nations, and Hamas wanted to derail that.
No. of Recommendations: 3
I would be interested in your perspective on Oliver's commentary. His pieces are well-researched, and he often credits actual journalists as the sources for his pieces. He didn't exactly say "thiiiis close", but he did say they were well on the way to something both could agree to (paraphrasing from memory).
Oliver's commentary is always sharp....but in this case, it's ahistorical.
Today, the biggest obstacle to a two-state solution is spatial. It's geographic. It's Israel's continued expansion of settlements into the West Bank. It's what everyone is focused on - in part because it's really obvious on the ground, and in part because it's something that has a clear moral answer. Israel should not be expanding its settlements, shouldn't have been expanding their settlements, and needs to stop. And that doesn't require Israel giving up on anything other than the crazy Manifest Destiny-type ideas of the right-wing religious zealots.
So if you look back at 2000 from that frame - the current frame - then 2000 seems like a lost opportunity. The offers on the table regarding borders look more reasonable, and the easiest to resolve. After all, the Palestinians were being offer far more of the West Bank than seems remotely possible today, and since land swaps were being discussed anyway, you could have reached an accommodation on borders.
But that's an inaccurate frame. Because while the 2000 peace talks might have presented a chance to agree on borders, it utterly failed to make any progress on other core Palestinian demands - especially on the right of return and Israel's right to maintain military installations in Palestinian areas (much like the U.S. has military bases in other countries). Both of those were a major sticking points in Oslo, and remained sticking points in Camp David. And the sides never got anywhere close to fixing that, or even coming up with a way of fixing that.
That's why it's ahistorical. Today, no one talks about the right of return much, because the issue of the day is settlements. So it seems to us that an agreement that was close to resolving the issue of settlements is an agreement that was close to solving the overall conflict. But it wasn't.
No. of Recommendations: 0
I believe that peace deal was DOA also because Gaza was not going to be allowed to be self-governing, and a land swap was offered for the west bank settlements already in existence in exchange for a swath of the Negev desert.
