‘US-Trained Armed Forces Turning PA into Police State’

The United States may have created a Frankenstein in the Palestinian Authority, which human rights groups fear is using U.S.-trained forces to build a police state.

“I feel real concern that we are reaching the level of a police state,” according to Ramallah-based human rights group director Shawan Jabarin, quoted by the Financial Times.

The United States has taken pride in its training PA ”policemen,” avoiding use of the words "armed forces" in order not to violate Oslo agreements. General Keith Dayton, who recently stepped down as director of the training program in the PA, has said the forces have been instrumental in eliminating Arab terror.

It is impossible to move from a situation of violent chaos and poverty to orderly government without a period of strict authoritarianism.

Organized criminals exploit situations of violent chaos and poverty, and become dependent on them, so much so that they will use all their resources to maintain both chaos and poverty. Thus a government must be powerful enough to work on eliminating all three things.

This cannot be done with an orderly society social contract, but only by the exercise of force and coercion, as the means to an end, not as a sustainable means of rule. The end, however, *is* an orderly society social contract.

In a short term sense, this is why an authoritarian regime is created when there is a natural disaster, in the form of martial law. Its intent is to restore order and to mitigate the negative consequences of the disaster, not to perpetuate its authoritarianism after recovery has been achieved.

But the Palestinian territories are not just a short term disaster, but a long term, integrated, generational disaster. Even if today they had an effective government, it would still be generations before it could move to a benign state. But it would be worth it.

>> Just damn! I thought this was about Pennsylvania!

I see I’m not the only one.

It’s confusing to see “PA” all over the place.

We should call them what they ARE: “Philistines”. As in the old times, barbaric, Jew-hating savages.

Yeah, that’s the reason it’s “turned into” a police state. It’s gone from being a contentious, fractious, internally riven, semi-competent corrupt and greedy police state to being a well-trained contentious, fractious, internally riven, semi-competent corrupt and greedy police state. Thanks Nachum.

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That's why we trained them. Gen Jones stated years ago they'd turn their guns on Israel if they didn't get a state to terroize in a hurry.

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