[Ledgem]

Originally Posted by WanderingKnight

@Ledgem:

I agree that this is a very complex situation, but bombing civilians is not the way to solve it. Neither Israel nor Hamas are saints, and neither are fully responsible for this situation.

I agree, but there is a distinction between Israel and Hamas here. Hamas is intentionally targeting civilians. They could try to minimize casualties and target Israeli infrastructure (like the Weather Underground, an American terrorist group that attempted to avoid human casualties while carrying out attacks against infrastructure to make a statement). Hell, they could even carry out attacks against the government and/or the military - as long as they're killing anyone they're not going to get much sympathy, but we could at least say that they weren't dragging in your average person into the conflict. (Of course, Israel has mandatory military service, so I suppose that attacks on the military make that debatable.)

On the other hand, Israel is not specifically targeting Palestinian citizens. I'm not going to claim that everyone in the Israeli government or chain of military command tries their hardest to avoid civilian casualties, or that there aren't some who feel gleeful about it. I'm sure there are. But in general they do what they can to minimize casualties. If Israel responded to rocket attacks by randomly bombing apartments and schools then we could make a comparison. They're doing a crappy job at precision revenge killings (which is a ridiculous concept in itself), but that's what they're attempting to do. I also think that Hamas knows this. I don't believe it's a coincidence that rockets aren't fired from deserted areas. They know that Israel will likely clumsily respond with too much force, and as a result civilians will become involved. Having more people against Israel generally translates to more power and support for Hamas. Why wouldn't Hamas want that?

Originally Posted by WanderingKnight

Palestina should have been granted their place. Israel should have never started the Six Days War. Hamas should have never been born. There are tons of ways to explain what happened to reach this situation, and there are tons of ways to see that it's not a very easy one. But as soon as everyone starts pointing fingers and trying to seek "guilty" people, the rest of us will start digging in the mud and find shit on both sides.

Right, and this is why I say that who "should" be where is no longer important. In a just world Israel probably would exist elsewhere, but similarly the United States of America wouldn't exist, the Native Americans would have their land, and so on. What matters here and now is that there are many people living in that region, and they're killing each other.

What for? Is it worth it? Will it lead to anything? Israel isn't saintly to be certain, but they're not actively going out and killing people - not unprovoked, anyway. Maybe they are attempting to muscle the Palestinians out, but that should be dealt with in a more civilized manner (if possible). It seems that the demand for the Palestinian side is that Israel practically remove itself from the region entirely - an unreasonable demand, and not something that any amount of fighting is likely to accomplish. Not without genocide occurring.

Perhaps the fighting started because the "civilized" manners of Palestinian protest were ignored. Fine, Palestine has showed that it's upset and that it's willing to use force to get what it wants. It's been showing that for some time now, and it's drawn both Israelis and Palestinians into a cycle of violence and suffering. Stop the violence, and attempt negotiations again. Get more people involved if necessary. And if the negotiations continue to fail, consider whether the demands being made are unreasonable.

Originally Posted by aohige

Palestanians are not the only ones that needs to be making social changes before any type of unification can even be attempted.
Both sides have a LOT of work cut out.

Agreed.

Originally Posted by mg1942

This situation is going to get out of control. The damned Palestinians are a people that knows nothing but violence. They continually show that they can not abide by a cease fire as Hamas continually shelled Israel with thousands of rockets during a truce they signed.

Blanket statements like that are all too ignorant. Of course the Palestinians know more than violence. They're poisoning their own society by teaching their children to hate Israel, but they're not a group of savages who aspire to blow themselves up in a crowded market place. Even though I defend Israel on this one, I still respect the Palestinians. Neither side is acting responsibly, and I'm only sorry that the Palestinian people feel that they're being treated so unfairly that they're motivated to take up arms over it.