Oh really??

BTW - the disparaging remarks are getting old again. I think you are due for your 2 week break about now.

Well then talk to the source and instigator - TheMercenary. I am not the one so low class as to routinely post profanity and remarks completely irrelevant to the topic. Meanwhile, "Oh really" is your usual way of personally attacking another. If classicman was being honest, then classicman posted facts in reply - or posted nothing. Passive aggressive on your part will eventually start another flame war. Your choice.

Meanwhile, one effective solution to conflicts - because the objective of all wars is to take the conflct back to the negotiation table - is massive death rates. Suddenly the glory hyped by extremist quickly loses credibility. A 10% death rate of all Palestinians and Israelis would quickly make Likud and Hamas extremists unpopular. No way around that potential solution - which may be the only one left in a region where being a moderate is almost impossible.

WTF?

Cite.

That was the theory of Sun Tzu, what it would take to achieve the ultimate goal of driving the enemy to the bargaining table. When wars ground on for years, until attrition forced bargaining, it was true. But that went the way of sword fighting and knickers.

We have the technology for a relative handful of people to obliterate a continent, so now it's unconditional surrender of the entire nation.

I think the Hamas may be at a disadvantage in this one unless it goes on for an extended period of time. Israel may have learned it's lesson with the last incursion into Lebanon.

An important question is which lesson Israel learned. For example, if the purpose in Lebanon was to attack Hezbollah, then why were Israeli warplanes attacking non-Hezbollah targets even in the most northern Lebanon cities?

Whereas Israel clearly got their asses kicked in Lebanon, the reasons why are not entirely clear. Maybe Israel listened to their Air Force foolishly insist the Air Force could force the release of kidnapped Israeli soldiers. Or maybe Israel foolishly thought they would force the release by attacking even the Lebanon army and UN observers. Or maybe Israel had no strategic objective until a last minute decision caused a sudden and underplanned attack on Lebanon.

The common theme was serious management failures. Was that management failure the only reason that Israel failed so miserably in Lebanon? Or maybe Israeli extremists were losing control over the moderates? Or maybe Hezbollah had more military strength than Israel was willing to admit. Without answers to those questions and others, then any prediction in Gaza will only be wild speculation more akin to total fiction.

Long before anyone can speculate on Gaza, first, what is Israel's strategic objective? To clean out militants and withdrawal? To completely occupy Gaza like Israel did in Lebanon? Until such questions can be answered, then nothing can be speculated about Hamas' future in Gaza.

Okay I see your point now Bruce.

Israel stated that they plan an occupation that will last a long time. They want to completely wipe out Hamas, which I would think is impossible. Even if they do, its likely that an even more extreme group will take over.

Why do you say that?

Two reasons, one history, the other is social conditions.

History of Israeli resistant groups:
PLO -> Fatah -> Hamas

Each group more extreme than the last

Social Conditions:
As of now, there have been over 500 deaths in Gaza, 200 of them being civilians. A blockade on Gaza by Israel is leaving very few medical supplies and is one of possible reasons behind the rockets fired by Hamas.

As more civilians die, see family members and neighbors die or get injured, get hungry, go without medical supplies and electricity for extended periods of time, the anti-Israeli feeling will grow even further and allow for a more extreme resistance group to take over.


Have you seen the Dark Knight classicman? This analogy can be applied to both Palestine and Israel. As both sides get pushed and feels like they are being trapped, they will go to more and more extremes to rid themselves of the situation.

Yeh I saw it, thought it was a terrible movie too.

At some point they gotta realize that isn't the way to go. Israel, for all its faults isn't going anywhere and they gotta get used to it.

47 devastating seconds... devastates your post at 0:40. Required viewing.

Did you read the article I posted Classicman?

See how both Hamas and the population supporting Hamas are reactionary. That goes with what I have been saying this entire time. Both sides are working on the defensive, which means it isn't as simple as "realize that this isn't the way to go. Israel, for all its faults isn't going anywhere and they gotta get used to".

What did this prove? It proved that one Palestinian child, who we have no history of, thinks Hamas is at fault. It wouldn't be hard to find quotes of Jewish Israelis that find Israel at fault either. This topic will hold views from all over the spectrum and it would not be surprising at all to find that some Palestinians are against Hamas and some Israelis are against Israel. If you could find a report of the majority of Gazans thinking that Hamas is at fault, then it would devastate my post, but not one out of the millions that live in Gaza.

Take a look at this Undertoad:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/05/wo...html?ref=world

Israel has a right to defend itself. It does not havea right to rain down death, destruction and overwhelming might upon a subject and physically trapped populace.

I suspect the British news reports on this are very different to the American news reports. From the reports I have seen, Hamas represents a relatively minor threat to Israel, in terms of rockets launched. The level of response is out of all proportion with the level of threat. There is seemingly little to no effort made to avoid civilian casualties and indeed some evidence that non-civilians are being targetted (such as the two young boys who were killed whilst playing on the supposedly safer roof top of a known safe house (a house where children and women hole up for the duration.)

I have a friend/colleague who is over there at the moment. She and her group are there trying to offer humanitarian aid and moral support to the Palestinians. Her group includes Christians, Moslems and Jews. She's been over there many times and brought back video coverage of some of her earlier experiences.

Having seen some of the footage she captured last time, and heard her stories and the stories of other people who've been there (including last month my good friend L) the only surprise to me is that the Palestinians ever put down their weapons at all.