I often wish the UN could be stronger here. But you are right, the solution cannot be imposed from the outside; it has to come from within, from the hearts.

I feel very uncomfortable in my comfy chair.

Now you cant even undo the damage. To remove the Israelis would be to do to them what was done to the palestinians. Two wrongs dont make a right. The Israelis do have a habit of overreacting and over-retaliation. However Palestinians are also largely known to bear a grudge and feel wronged in a disproportionate amount.

Unfortunately, these two groups have almost zero chances of reconciling their differences alone. The US have clearly taken sides (long before the current middle-east situation) and the UN have long proven themselves to be an ineffectual patsy. Not only are there no other bodies currently in a position to step in and assist, both sides would see that as an unwelcome intrusion.

It may seem harsh, unfortunately reality often is, but the only solution is for long-held intrinsic values on both sides to be given up by those who hold them, for human nature itself to change. Not a likely scenario.

Some people on each side are capable of putting the greater good above their own personal situation, and can refrain from the “eye for an eye” mentality. This is the same throughout all society, some can, some cant (or wont). Peace will only happen when the vast majority on BOTH sides value it more than they feel their pain and losses. When they can rise above the natural and understandable human reaction of retaliation, when they can rise above the “poor me” emotions of what has happened today and in the past. When enough people decide that enough is enough.

When enough people can accept the hurt, the loss, and the blame for all that has happened, and decide that its time to move on, to make the best of a bad situation, to cut their losses and carve out a new, better future for themselves, and LET GO.

Surely this is one of the hardest things for any individual to do, and here it is needed for individuals to do the same en masse and in unison. Perhaps in the mean time there are lessons we can all learn from? The situation needs humanity as a whole to rise up. And shouldn’t that involve each of us in our comfy chair too?

Re that book. To attribute a simple motivation to anybody (Mossad in this case… “eliberately provoke conflict because while it continues, so does their material support from the US”) is too simplistic.

The book describes one such incident… remember Kurt Waldheim - president of Austria or some such, who was suddenly and surprisingly found to be an ex-Nazi. His denials were ignored. Turns out it was all a fabrication. To what end… hard to say.

Organisations tend to acquire groups who like having power and don’t want to lose it. Whether used for good or bad is a separate matter, and the motivation behind decisions can be plain or obscure, important or unimportant.

There are too many simple solutions being suggested for a complex problem. Sadly, I have no answers, only observations.

Did mass bombings of Berlin / England residential areas to demoralise them encourage the people to hand over their leadership and despair? or did it rally them… firing indescriminately into an area kills the innocent. The ratbags always seem to wriggle away. It is just not an effective excuse / and method of attack. Most people do not want retaliation against innocent people. They want to get the ratbags.

The thing is the rockets are never fired anywhere near where they are made, or the rocket makers are based. they are transported into highly concentrated residential areas, assembled and fired… so the retaliation strike at the firing site kills innocents. WAKE UP!!

Talking settles disputes… not guns… the way to peace is to allow Pallestinians to form a strong leadership which can weed out its own militants. Israel must turn away from its hatred, as many of its people have. A puppet Pallestinian government will not gain the respect of the people of Palestine, so Israel and the USA must back off and let the Palestinians find their way. If that happens, then Palestine will emerge into a self sustaining system. Every one outside must stay outside and let it come together, however it comes together. There are some really really smart people in there, who if left to it will find the way.

Pallestinians will rally together, as a people. The militants will be driven out, by sheer weight of numbers wanting peace. Leaders must earn respect, and in Palestine, that will be hard won. But won it will be, and when it is, it will be upheld, and pushed like tar over potholes across the disputes and bitterness. It will not be any one man, but it will be a committee charged with respecting each other first.

Every post here has said retaliation is bad… the addage is those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Peace will be won with words.

That is my main emotion about Israel and Palestine.

I spend some time being ear bashed by both sides of this conflict. I am now watching the effectiveness of the Israel lobby at the Federal Government level. Cringeworthy is the only way to describe most material available on this conflict, as it is clearly riddled with the baggage of decades of bitter warfare.

We do what we can to pull humanity in a positive direction, but our own nature fights us every inch of the way. Fear. Revenge. Greed. Group think. Occasionally, I stare into our own nature, and it terrifies me. Peace is always an illusion, a delicate balance that could descend into anarchy in the bat of an eyelid.

I am still thinking about how to make de Bono’s voting concept to work. Perhaps it is suited to a Senate like upper house, the weight of half of the votes irrespective of population.

“An eye for an eye, and soon the whole world is blind.”
- Mahatma Gandhi

So I gather from some of this that Mossad deliberately provoke conflict because while it continues, so does their material support from the US.

Subsequent to your comment, I’ve updated the post with my recent communications with Sana. As Sana says How can you can forgive someone who attacks and kills you every day?

While Israel continues to respond with disproportionate force, Peace is “just an elusion” - elusive and illusionary.

This is so polarising. I’ve not written anything about it because, frankly, you need a pretty thick skin to take some of the abuse that will be hurled at you irrespective of what position you take.

For interest, though, try and get hold of “The other side of deception” (amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Other-Side-Deception-Exposes-Mossads/dp/0060176350 ). Then follow up some of the stuff you will find about this guy on the web.

There seems to be a completely disproportionate response by the Israelis: the Palestinian death toll is typically 3 to 10 times higher, and has been this way for many years. It seems “an eye for an eye” has become “3 to 10 eyes for an eye”. Similarly, the subjugation of the Palestinians, the long waiting at border checkpoints, the cutting off of food and electricity. All these things are designed to “put pressure on”, but what they achieve is to ramp up the hatred and intolerance, through desperation.

Look around a bit more and you will find that there seem to be deep rooted Israeli attitudes (I’m not making this up, search a bit and you will find it), that the Palestinians are somehow sub-human. And as a consequence, they can be treated like animals. Fine for brain-washing, not so good for trying to find harmony.

Until attitudes change on both sides (and the US takes a genuinely neutral point of view) there will be no improvement. This will take a long, long time. Constant rockets fired into Israel provoke responses that are degrading and de-humanising, if not just killing many more people.

A wall won’t end the madness.

I think, in Israel/Gaza, the strong need to stop oppressing the weak.