Spare Tyre said:
Why do you say that, Alpe? Ie, Why do you think there is little choice other than to continue as is?
Well of course there are other choices. The problem is finding the political courage and will to make them. This is naturally because of the influence Israel has on the US mideast policies and thus that of the jewish financial lobby upon the Washington politicians. And what we have heard from Obama only reinforces these realities.
Obama was so terrified to not seem pro-arab before the republican opposition, always the staunchest supporters of the Israeli state, that he immediately played down any criminal accusations in regards to Israel, which of course only infurated the Turks (to say nothing of the Arabs) who the US absolutely relies upon as a staging platform for its military actions in the region (not that this, therefore, is an entirely bad thing).
One of the greatest misconceptions in the US is that Israel is merely the victom of arab aggression, when just to the contrary is more often true in the sense that that land had belonged to the arabs since the VII century AD, (and before the arabs to the Byzantines and, before them, it was under Roman control). The other falacy is that if one critisizes Israel for its misdeads one is being anti-semetic. This is, though, a base propagandistic fabrication to "justify" Israel in whatever it does and so placing it beyond reproach, through laying on a sense of Western guilt for its past crimes against the jews that culminated in the horror of the Nazi holocaust. This is pretty much what you get in the American take on things. Naturally the arabs see things differently. The Palestinians have thus been made to bear all the brunt for Western crimes, by having seen Israel established in their land (without, of course, even having been considered worthy enough to be recognized internationally with their own state). Such injustice is all the more abhorant, because perpetrated by a Western civilization which proclaims itself as a beacon of human and civil rights and now has even seen the US establish the insane doctrine of preventative war to "export democracy" to the Middle East. All of which is of course pure hypocrisy and most inconvenient for any lasting peace in the region which the whole world needs. I'm not supporting Arab terrorism, though do feel that it must be said that military actions like this last one by Israel are no less heinous than terrorist strikes and indeed are a form of Israeli state terrorism. That is if we are to look at things objectively and not in light of the propaganda.
The West found it necessary to give the jews back their
biblical (this is important to remember) state following the disaster of WWII evidently to save face, without ever having considered the history in that region over the last 2000 years and, consequently, without any regard for the arabs who had already been living there for centuries. At the same time the West gave itself the support it was looking for in the region by its new Israel based reorganization of the mideast in the post-colonial period, which makes some of its reasoning purely calculated to best accomodate its interests in the region's oil. This was thus not without its cynicism and therefore not merely based on helping the jews. It was as if, however, the arabs' history and ties to the region counted for nothing, but only that which was in connection with the jews even with all the strategic motivations. And this is where all the problems began, because the people in the mighty West at the time weren't thinking objectively. The historical basis for the Jewish State was thus in 1948 built upon the most flimsy (and superstitious, because biblical) of grounds. The damage, though, has already been done and it would be pointless to re-question the legitimacy of Israel. However what has made matters worse, is that in all the time since 48, the so called Palestinian question has never been resolved, which is naturally reprehensible and this largely because of Israeli intransigence in insisting that it has legal claim to all the former biblical land (even if international law has said that it does not). An Israeli intransigence supported 100% by America. If the Arabs in the region have found reason to hate Israel, America and the West in general, the Palestinian question remains a primary reason. It is the arrogant and hypocritcal way in which Israel and the US have organized the territory following the operative command to always recognize the rights of Israel, without ever feeling the need to recognize the Palestinian rights and so always condemning the latter's crimes against Israel without really considering seriously Israel's crimes against them. This has only added insult to injury from the Arab perspective.
Now it has been argued that the arabs have always been against the Jewish state. But how were they supposed to have reacted? Welcome them with open arms? How about if the Americans decided to go beyond their recognized borders and take away some of Mexico keeping it for themselves, against UN international regulations? Or if Germany were to occupy Poland once again? But even worse, when doing so, not even recognizing the Mexicans in terms of their state, or the Poles in terms of their national status, as the Palestinians have been treated by Israel and the West since the very beginning.
So, yes, there are other possiblities which are much preferable to those that have been implemented so far. The real problem is that the arabs themselves have gone way beyond the point of making "friendly" concesions in arriving at a peacable agreement, if they had ever been disposed to do so (though again it was only quite naturally that they would not have been), whereas Israel has become ever more fascist in terms of the political class now leading it and no longer has one with the foresight and wisdom such as a Rabin at the helm to enable it to conceed to the arabs that part they are owed, but which is long overdue. This has only made worse a terrible situation from the beginning. Consequently the pitiful mismanagment, injustice and hypocrisy of the entire affair has made coming to terms quite impossible now, and we don't even get much encouragement that a new stance is being taken from the Obama administration. Which is all very much a shame. To make matters even worse Iran has come over to the arab terrorist cause, whereas had America let the Iranian progressive political processes take their natural course when it had a chance in Mousadeq, instead of assassinating him, perhaps the Islamic revolution wouldn't have come about the way it did and so we would not have the terrible Iranian islamic fundamentalists in power we do now. Certainly Israel would today have been all the better off for it too. Whereas the Israeli terrorism we witnessed the other day has also cost the jewish state a much needed ally in Turkey.
Intransigence, especially when accompanied by grave injustices, gets you nowhere within the political arena. I would hope that the both jews and arabs find their peace and equilibrium in such a troubled land. But to help the jews (and arabs) arrive at the desired outcome, then Israel needs to be given less consideration than it has always enjoyed from the West, and especially the US, and be pressured into giving the arabs that which is justly coming to them. To do anything less is not being a real friend of Israel.
Clever ripost notwithstanding a lot of what rhubar.....I mean rhubroma wrote there is true. I have often thought that we should have given the Israelis the southeastern third of Texas. Hell the climate is similar and nobody there would have the industry or intelligence to fight back as ruthlessly as the arabs have, also this whole latest fiasco down there would have been someone else's headache. 
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