#peace process

[alwaysbewoke]

[notwiselybuttoowell]

Recognizing a Palestinian state is a limited but welcome step that addresses an enduring blind spot: Palestinian rights cannot be conditione

Really excellent article that looks at the mentalities that have fostered this conflict and how solutions have failed because they don't take them into account. Informed by people that know: Hussein Agha and Robert Malley, who have participated in past peace processes and recognize why they didn't get anywhere, and who have collaborated on the new book Tomorrow is Yesterday.

[agentfascinateur]

Bravo Malta 👏👏👏

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

From Mosaic Magazine:

How Mistaken Beliefs Led to Oct. 7 -

• The frame of mind that animated the defunct peace process continues to inform Israeli, American, and European political, administrative, and military actions. This is because the peace process is a conceptual framework rooted in a particular worldview.

• At the tactical level, Israel assumed a defensive, rather than offensive, military posture reliant on technological superiority. Like the rest of the West, Israel believed that its technological advantage was a sufficient deterrent. A "small, smart army" would therefore suffice because technology had made large ground wars obsolete. But our enemies were not deterred by our superior technology. They adapted to it and used low tech to subvert it.

• Israel's first choice was negotiations that would establish an agreed-upon border between two nation-states, tired of wars and determined to move toward cooperative coexistence. But peace was not forthcoming, when in 2000, then-prime minister Ehud Barak offered Yasir Arafat all the Israeli public could stomach and then some, only to be turned down and rewarded with the Second Intifada.

• So Israelis chose unilateral partition from Gaza with the 2005 disengagement. It was a trial-run for Palestinian statehood, based on the hope that the Palestinians would come around and realize, after tasting political independence and economic opportunities, the folly of endless war.

• The trial failed almost immediately. Rockets kept raining on Israel's towns after the disengagement and, in 2007, Hamas violently eliminated the PLO in Gaza, establishing a terror quasi-state. A regular, unending influx of international aid rendered economic development unnecessary. Aid flowed in because Israeli intelligence believed a higher standard of living would help pacify the Strip.

• Israel imagined the Palestinian national movement in the image of ours. We assumed that national self-determination was its goal and that Palestinians would seize the opportunity to assume political independence so they could build their political and economic future. But nation-building was never on their agenda. We would have understood this if we had studied their political culture seriously, instead of assuming they share ours.

• It was folly to imagine that of all Arab peoples, the Palestinians would prove the exception that would produce a stable nation-state. The principal grievance of the Palestinian cause is not the absence of a desired nation-state but the existence of another one.

• We also projected our own misconceptions of human nature onto the Palestinians. Contemporary Western elites assume that we all want a decent job, food on the table, and a safe environment to raise our children. But when we conceive of all life in these materialistic terms, we lose the ability to imagine the human capacity for evil.

Encouraged by assumptions from America and Europe, Israelis failed to believe in their neighbors' sinister intentions.

We did not take seriously their theology of hate, their deep-seated racism, and the depth of their barbaric sadism.

[girlactionfigure]

My first encounter with Jews changed my life

Growing up, the term 'Jew' became synonymous with 'monster,' but it wasn't Israel who killed so many of my fellow Syrians

In 2011, I moved from Damascus to Strasbourg, France. After dragging my heavy suitcases up to the fifth floor of an old building, I realized that the family hosting me had several pets, including the world’s largest cat. Finding accommodation in Strasbourg was a nightmare, therefore, I decided to stay with them despite my pet allergy.

In less than 24 hours, I was wheezing and could not open my eyes anymore. The family released me from the leasing contract and the school where I was taking courses offered a solution for my emergency. A room down the road was available due to a last-minute cancellation. The room was in the Jewish quarter. Little did I know that, unlike such neighborhoods in Beirut and Damascus, this one was actually inhabited by Jews.

Read More: Here

[akaashmaharaj]

Senior fellow at U of T speaks on Canada's plan to recognize Palestinian state

CHCH News anchor Matt Ingram spoke with Akaash Maharaj, a senior fellow with the Munk School of Global Affairs, following Canada's plan to r

What Canada’s Recognition of Palestine Means for Global Diplomacy

I enjoyed speaking with Matt Ingram of CHCH News, on Mark Carney's decision to recognise the State of Palestine.

Amidst much bitter debate, critical questions remain unanswered.

Does the Palestinian Authority have any real capacity to meet Carney's conditions before the UN General Assembly convenes this autumn? What will Carney do if they unable or unwilling to comply?

Will the Netanyahu government try to forestall additional countries recognising Palestine, by allowing more water, medicine, and food to reach Gaza's civilians, or will it instead tighten its grip on the region in defiance?

📺 https://via.maharaj.org/chch1

[blacklionroars]

Read/listen to as much Noam Chomsky as you possibly can. @blacklionroars

[eretzyisrael]

When Palestinians are Hopeless, Terror Declines; When Hopeful, Terrorism Increases, By Prof. Hillel Frisch

It is a widespread belief that Palestinian hopelessness feeds terrorism and the prospects for peace decrease it. This has always been false. In fact, the opposite is true: when Palestinians feel hopeless, Palestinian terrorism declines; when they are hopeful of gaining the upper hand, Palestinian terrorism increases. An Israeli iron fist is necessary to save both Israeli and Palestinian lives.

Why does hopelessness lead to less Palestinian terrorism and hopefulness to more? This is not as counterintuitive as it sounds. The tendency to rebel increases not when all appears lost, but when prospects for the rebellious appear to be improving but the improvement does not meet rising expectations.

The same phenomenon occurred during the Iranian revolution and the so-called Arab Spring. The Iranian revolution occurred not after a period of hopelessness, but after a sharp rise in the income level of urban Iranians over at least a decade. Many of those urbanites – the very people who made the revolution a reality – lived to regret their role in the Shah’s downfall.

Similarly, in the Arab Spring, revolutions took place in the two Arab states – Tunisia and Egypt – that had shown the greatest improvement in the Middle East over the three previous decades on the human development index. This index is a composite of three indicators: gross domestic product per capita, educational attainment, and life expectancy. This time span coincided with the rule of Egypt’s Mubarak and Tunisia’s Zein Abidin Bin Ali. Once again, violence was not the product of a lack of improvement. There was plenty of improvement – so much so that expectations rose even more sharply than the human welfare curve.

The same irrational dynamic, incidentally, can be seen in real estate bubbles or in Madoff-style Ponzi schemes, which have ensnared even the most rational and educated.