Quote:
| If the hardliners stepped down and stopped attacking Palestinian settlements, many would look for the Palestinians to take the initiative for peace. |
Which is where and how the US's big stick should be wielded -- to achieve that end.
The media is certainly part of the polarisation of the debate -- each side seeing the other as being all terrorists or opressors or wanting everyone from the other side dead. The actions and attrocities on either side provide the raw material. Mix that with an effective propaganda machine on both sides, and you have the ground work for a very strong 'us' vs 'them' debate. When you consider the immediate history of the Jewish nation when Israel was formed, you can understand their attitudes. They'd been the target of an attempt to wipe their race out and you can be sure that once they were given a country, they were not going to give it up without a fight.
(As a side note, when Israel and Palestine were formed, the British and/or the UN should have remained there to establish stable Governments in each country and then guaranteed protection to both against their neighbours beyond that; the nations would have taken longer to form, but the result would have been a lot more stable rather than based on fighting for their survival. Should have beens are easy to see but have not practical application, but looking at how a problem could have been prevented sometimes helps you find solutions).
The key issue to go forward is trust. One of the key problems is the primary force for Israel is the military; for Palestine, they are largely independant groups such as Hamas. Israel can stop most of the violence it initiates by giving clear executive orders to the military; Palestine can tell Hamas to stop and try to enforce that, but given that Hamas is not under the direct control of the Palestinian authority, they cannot guarantee their success. This will mean that it is likely to be imperfect, and there will be some attacks. It's also likely that there will be cases of Israeli settlers acting independantly, but this is less common (because the IDF usually takes care of it).
The problem then is that Israeli Government trusts neither the intention nor the ability of the PA to stop all terrorist attacks, so it makes this a non-negotiable requirement of any peace talks. The PA lacks the ability to guarantee a complete ceasation of violence, even if they have the intention (something I am not entirely convinced of, either). On the Israali side, their continued policy of extra-judicial killings (in clear violation of the human rights accords) breeds hatred and resentment amoung the Palestinians. Their methods (military strikes to eliminate targets, with little concern for 'collatoral damage') fuel this enemity.
I think if I were Israeli, it would be hard for me not to hate Palestinians; if I were Palestinian, it would be hard for me not to hate Israelis. I think that statement, better than anything else, sums up the problem in Israel and the Occupied Terroritories.
A genuine co-operative effort between the PA and the IDF could probably eliminate
most (but not all) of the threat against Israel. But the distrust and the political realities make this impossible -- no Government on either side would survive such a decision at their next election. This is why I think an international force will almost certainly be required -- to achieve a degree of neutrality.