God's monkey house

I can't recall who used that phrase to refer to the Middle East, but it's apt. The recent rounds of low-grade warfare and violence are just Part 8,963 of a movie serial that never ends.

Perhaps you'll be surprised to learn that I side with the Israelis on this one. First of all, millenia of people trying to wipe them off the face of the earth entitles them to be a little paranoid, even brutal, and focused on preserving their existence at all costs. Second, their enemies, including Hamas, have never wavered from their stated goal of wiping out Israel and killing all Jews. I don't think I would be inclined to try to live peacefully next to a neighbor who constantly vowed to kill me. Third, they've shown great restraint IMHO and were the situation reversed, the Palestinians would make the Nazis look gentle by comparison.

So what's to be done? Unfortunately, Trump's and the RepubliQ party's support of israel has had the exact opposite of its intended effect: world opinion is decisively arrayed against Israel. Anything or anyone Trump supports, so goes the reasoning, must be bad. This has in turn emboldened Israel's enemies. (It certainly didn't help that Trump made the stupid, inflammatory gesture of moving the US embassy to Jerusalem.)

The only viable solution would be for the Palestinians to become Israeli citizens and for Palestinian territory to be incorporated into Israel. The Israelis have in fact offered that, but they have been adamantly refused. But the existing fragmented Palestinian territory is not a viable independent state.

There are times where I think the best solution would be to send massive quantities of high-grade weapons to both sides and then step back quickly and put our fingers in our ears. I mean, I'd like to see diplomacy take the place of rockets and artillery strikes as a means to settle disputes, but violence is so ingrained in the social fabric of the Middle East, I doubt that sitting down to engage in rational discussion is something anyone even seriously considers.

Historically I would agree that the Palestinians were worse actors.    It didnt help that Palestinians democtatically elected a terrorist group to run their government.

But here's some facts in recent years that make Israel look increasingly worse under the leadership of Benjamin the Yahoo.

- In order for Netanyahu to get enough votes to form a government he had to hold hands with an extremist group in Israel....they're kinda like the Proud-Boys of Israel except they like Jews and hate everyone else.

Much like Trump legitimized the alt-right in AMerica, Netenyahu has done the same in Israel.

- Many citizens of Israel are  Palestinian...these aren't the ones they are fighting in the West Bank.  These are people who live in Tel Avivi and Jerusalem and are citizens of the state of Israel.   They have been systematically chased down by the aforementioned group and beaten, killed, and harrassed for the last several years with little to no response from law enforcement.   They have become seond class citizens in a country whose ancestors used to be forced to wear the star of David on their clothes.

Arab-Israeli's lynched

-The current "resettlement" process is beyond abhorant.   The Israeli armed forces are litterally walking into neighborhoods and throwing people out of their homes in which they have lived for generations so as to hand them over to Israel settlers.   This is not a new process but it is more aggressive the last couple years.

It should be noted that many people in Israel do not condone the current government or any of these activities -much like many people did not approve of Donald Trump during his tenure.   But make no mistake - Israel is a bad actor in that region right now.   Palestine's government is worse...but we've always held Israel to a higher standard as it is suppossed to be a modern democracy that values human rights.   The current government is failing on that second front.     We should not reward them for it.

Sure, both sides are assholes here, but the Palestinians have never tried to resolve their situation peacefully. They've been resorting to blowing up school buses and hijacking airliners (etc. etc. etc.) for five decades now. And that makes the Israelis even less tractable and more unwilling to live with them.

What needs to happen is that the Palestinians need to reject that Hamas-fueled fantasy that one day they will rise up and wipe out the Jewish infidels. That ain't gonna happen. Furthermore, the Israelis need to accept that the region they govern has to be transformed into a state where Palestinians and Jews have equal rights---nothing less will work.

The current situation is emblematic of the problem. Prayers from a mosque were being broadcast at the same time a ceremony was being held at the Wailing Wall. The mosque was asked to stop; they refused. Israeli soldiers then marched into the mosque and cut the cables to the loudspeakers. Riots followed, then Hamas started firing rockets, then the Israelis responded with airstrikes and artillery...every situation in that place escalates ridiculously quickly. If the mosque had simple refrained from the broadcast, or stopped when asked, none of the current shit would have happened--but each side thinks its religious ceremonies should take priority over everything else, even when they conflict or overlap.

So I view this entire grenades-in-a-monkey-house situation as the fault of fucking religion, and not regular religion, but fanaticial, hyper-orthodox, unbending, uncompromising, irrational religion. On BOTH sides. Got news for you guys, the way all of you are behaving, NONE of you are going to heaven or Paradise or Valhalla or the Naked Harem Suite at Caesars.

Wait a minute ! ! !

Caesars  has  a  "Naked Harem Suite" ?     

Deleted scene from "Rain Man."

You did leave out the fact that some Arab nations actually reconised Israel's right to exist during the Trump administration. 

The song remains the same, 2 kids thinking they own the playground and don't want the other to use it. The issue is people and space. Too many people and not enough space for the jews, and there is plenty of housing available... in the Palestinian area.

That happened long before Trump. I wasn't referring to Arab nations, anyway. I was referring to the terrorist organizations Hamas, Hezbollah, etc.

There's plenty of space for both peoples if they can coexist. If they refuse to, not so much.

Undeleted scene from "Rain Man" :

Uh Oh !

Hamas wants to kill Jews and won't take no for an answer, and coexisting is not in their playbook. 

They do have 1,400 years of practice but these kids don't remember how to play nice.