This is a response to both you, Cosmic, and Jimbo, but I don't know how to quote both in this.
I realize this is a polarizing topic with a lot of heat. I don't have any personal stake, but have close friends who do. So I'd just say we should be careful with our terms (I'm just as apt to mistakenly generalize as anyone so if I do so, please call that out).
Jimbo, equating Hamas to the entire nation of Israel is a true false equivalency. Hamas is, by its very charter committed to the destruction of Israel and has a military wing whose sole purpose is to wage armed conflict against Israel. Historically (and this, too, might be in its charter), Hamas has committed to terrorism in its purest form: suicide bombings, kidnappings and torture, firing rockets indiscriminately into civilian Israeli territory. It also attempts to goad Israel into using disproportionate force so that they can generate sympathy across the world in the hopes that it will one day destroy Israel (a tactic, I just learned, that Pancho Villa used in 1916 and that has a very old pedigree among revolutionaries).
With all that said, Hamas is not Palestine and not every Palestinian is Hamas anymore than every American is an imperialist or every Republican is a Trump supporter or every Democrat is a Democratic Socialist. Everyday, non-Hamas Palestinians are in a terrible position.
Israel, on the other hand, is not defined as an organization to eradicate Palestinians or Palestine. It is a nation-state. It has good policies and it has bad policies. It has good people and bad people. It is organized to do a lot of things other than those that Hamas is organized to do (again, by Hamas's own charter).
So by equating Hamas--the worst terrorist part of Palestine--with the entire nation of Israel, I think you are making a mistake of classification. I guess if you want to compare hardline right Israelis to Hamas that would be a closer comparison.
What's more, equating the two nations, Israel and Palestine, isn't a very close comp either. Israel, for all its faults, is a liberal democracy that attempts to honor individual rights and has a functioning and robust court system. Palestine does not. If you or I had a choice to live under either regime, I'm pretty sure we would each pick Israel's as being fairer and more humane.
Stay up to date on the state of human rights in Palestine (State of) with the latest research, campaigns and education material from Amnesty International.
www.amnesty.org
Again, this sucks for the Palestinian people. I truly do feel sorry for them as I do all people living under authoritarian regimes in poor areas of the world. But I also feel sorry for Israelis who have to live under constant threat of the next terrorist attack.
But what is the solution? Do you think any nation state would allow another nation to form next to it whose governing party's charter states it's purpose is the destruction of that other state? And Israel isn't just any nation--it is made up of many people who survived the Holocaust(!!!) and who have been attacked by their neighbors from the first day of the nation's existence. I don't know the answer, I readily admit.
Cosmic, regarding your characterization of my response, I think it unfair. First, I never stated all Arabs were bad or that Israel is always good. Second, I was not taught any of this in history class; I learned it on my own, although it's nice to hear that my conclusions line up with those of mainstream historians.
I actually agree with much of what you wrote. The zealots in the settlements are a big problem for any peace. But that doesn't mean they are morally equivalent to Hamas whose stated purpose is to wipe out Israel, and whose leaders continue to say things like this:
A senior Hamas official has reportedly called on Jerusalem residents to buy “five shekel knives” to “cut off the heads of Jews” in a recent video.
nypost.com
Thanks to both of you for engaging in this discussion without personal attacks.
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