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PaperclipPerfector  5mo ago (text post)   28012 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of May 27, 2024

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I think at this point the Palestinians (or at least some of their leaders) think if they just hold out for another generation and keep things stirred up so they can accuse the Israelis of genocide, Israel will have lost the PR war and will lose foreign (including US) support. At that point we can get a repeat of the 1948 Arab-Israeli war only with Iran helping out, and then Israel will be destroyed and the Palestinians can spend a few months leisurely hunting down and killing any survivors. It might be a good strategy except for two things

  1. Israel might win anyway.

  2. The Samson Option. The Israelis are at least as stubborn as the Palestinians, and if they think they're losing a war for their existence they will use the nukes. Which is not going to turn out well for anyone.

Also, #3, Israel no longer appears willing to let the current situation fester for another generation.

They don't have a choice; they can't genocide the Palestnians and they can't expel them, so the best they can do is put them under military occupation.

Yeah. They can also try to negotiate with a third country for their expulsion.

Nobody wants the Palestinians.

It may not work. But I bet Israel could offer a lot in exchange, especially to a country that doesn't have much to begin with. There were reports that Netanyahu was negotiating with Congo, for example.

The Palestinians would quickly take over the Congo (a few thousand Lebanese dominate several sectors of Nigeria’s economy already, and of course Arabs are highly powerful in Central America) and then use tens of billions of dollars made from resource sales to fund jihadist efforts in the homeland. Doesn’t seem smart from the Israeli perspective.

The only real ‘solution’ along population transfer lines was for them to all move to Egypt/Syria etc in the late 40s and early 50s, with no special UN refugee rights, and that obviously didn’t happen.

The Samson Option. The Israelis are at least as stubborn as the Palestinians, and if they think they're losing a war for their existence they will use the nukes. Which is not going to turn out well for anyone.

If you're playing the long game there's a future where some Middle Eastern Muslim state gets nukes. This makes Israel just genociding the Palestinians and/or its other enemies a much more fraught endeavor. Such a nation might not have a choice but to signal it'd intervene, or its leadership could be overthrown.

That still leads to a nuclear war in the Middle East, just a less one-sided one. The Palestinians still lose, though they may not care; they'd probably prefer for their remnant population to live in the radioactive ruins of Jerusalem dominated by Iranians than to live in the West Bank dominated by Jews.

As 2rafa said, the line is that Israelis are colonists and will fold and "go home"...somewhere. How much people believe that line or it's just the best PR position, I dunno. They walk around carrying keys to houses they've never seen. Who knows how many drunk the Koolaid?

I doubt Palestinians outright want to burn. But are they willing to gamble on burning if they believe that, when Israel no longer has the ability to act with impunity and has to choose between mutual annihilation and backing down, it will fold?

Israelis are colonists and will fold and "go home"...somewhere.

Do Palestinians actually say this? I’ve definitely heard it from their Hajnali groupies. But it seems like Palestinians miss the days of Hitler.

As 2rafa said, the line is that Israelis are colonists and will fold and "go home"...somewhere.

That's just a line used because it ties in with the progressive project. My read is that the Palestinians would accept the Jews leaving, but they'd prefer them dead.

I doubt Palestinians outright want to burn. But are they willing to gamble on burning if they believe that, when Israel no longer has the ability to act with impunity and has to choose between mutual annihilation and backing down, it will fold?

The choice they would give the Israeli Jews is between mutual annihilation and unilateral elimination, and the Jews are going to pick mutual every time.

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