Posted on 05/23/2005 9:53:18 PM PDT by Nachum
Mr. Paranoia speaks.
The Soviet Union had 'elections'. Saddam had 'elections'. He was such a succesful politician, in fact, he got 100% of the vote!
The fact is, the PA is a dictatorship. One that was once a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Father of Modern Terrorism, Yasser Arafat, and which is now run exclusively by his minion for fifty years, Abu Mazen.
Sharon and Bush and Rice and Co. should be ashamed negotiating with these people and their Hamas foot soldiers.
Nowhere else in the world is it acceptable to negotiate with terrorists.
America gets to say it is successfully promoting legitimate Muslim and Arab interests. Hopefully, this will buy enough time in the short term for us to conclude most of our military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan without having to fight elsewhere at the same time. The Left, of course, sees this as this first step in the peace process. The Right - the realists - don't. Or rather they consider that outcome to be only a remote possibility.
Israel is trading Gaza and the northern West Bank for Jerusalem and the settlement blocks around it. The Arabs certainly don't like that...but that's what they're going to get. That and the Wall. The rest of the world will agree to the trade...which is crucial. The fighting will then be over the remainder of the West Bank. In the short term it will become a Palestinian state...but, as I've said, it will not be viable and there's a good chance the Israelis will get it back, evicting the Arabs in the process.
As to the specifics:
Nobody's leaving Al Queda in control anywhere. Hamas will try to control Gaza but it will fail. Have you looked at Gaza? It's a giant slum without resources of any kind, filled with furious, bitter, emotional outcasts breeding like vermin. Israel is dumping it on Egypt...which has neither the resources or the will to deal with it. But they do have the political freedom to slaughter the Palestinians. Nobody will complain just as nobody complained when the Jordanians did it.
We'll be in Iraq for more than a year or two but the Iraqi government may have stabilized somewhat by then, our bases will be fully operational, and we'll be ready to deal with either Iran or Saudi Arabia.
The Arabs will call the Gaza withdrawal a victory. That's one of the reasons why I think the strategy will work.
The agreement isn't written down. But governments are loath to try to undo facts on the ground. Israel is not going to be forced to move 200,000 settlers, the Wall will soon be in place and it is to include the major settlement blocks, the American government - and Bush in particular - has several times indicated that it would approve of the situation, nobody is going to be able to stop Israel from completing the encirclement of Jerusalem with settlements.
The Arabs will escalate their attacks. I'm counting on it. That's part of the genius of the strategy. But their position is not improved. Gaza will prove to be ungovernable and possessing it will be a curse rather than a blessing. The Wall has already proved it's worth. And lessening the burden of policing is a blessing.
There is no place called Eurabia. It's not worth replying to someone who thinks there is.
Ditto to someone who thinks he knows about the real homeland of the Arabs while saying nothing about the real homeland of European Jews...and even more so about some moron who calls Sharon and Barak traitors while claiming to know "Israelis in the know".
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