The Israeli way...

Submitted by Chris G. (United States), Jul 11, 2007 at 21:28

Ok...lets look at reality here. Yes, Israel has done a good job at defeating its enemies through three major wars and several smaller ones. However, not spending money on ME oil is only part of the answer. Europe and China will still buy the oil so it will not stop ME regimes from sponsoring Palestinian groups. How do you get them to stop buy ME oil as well? How do we get ourselves to stop buy ME oil?

Personally I think we should be investing gobs of federal money into biodiesel research and production. Why don't we? Because oil corporations can make a hell of a lot more money from ME oil especially when there is conflict in the Middle East. The one good thing about getting off the ME oil tit is that we can't be held hostage by the threat of oil sanctions.

As for Israel however, the current methods of dealing with the Palestinians simply don't work and have not worked since the foundation of the modern state of Israel. Negotiations can work (as they have with Egypt and Jordan) but not with multiple warring Palestinian political factions. If Hamas and Fatah were one and the same, they don't seem to be showing it with all the killing they've been doing of each other's militias and leaders.

The only military way of taking care of the problem is ethnic cleansing and the likely killing of thousands of Palestinian civilians. You may have the hatred to do so, but I've spoken to many Israelis who refuse to act in the manner in which they were treated by the Nazis during WWII or how Mufti Hajj Amin Al Hussaini treated the Jews. Not only that but such an action could very well unravel Israel's peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan and serve to only unify the Islamic world against Israel.

The IDF of today is not the same as it was back in 1973. Hezbollah showed that the IDF has weaknesses such as lack of protection from modern tandem-warhead ATGM's like the Kornet and the latest variants of the RPG such as the RPG-7VR and RPG-29 Vampire. Furthermore, Egypt now fields a highly modernized military and airforce with most of its old Russian hardware replaced with gleaming new M1A1/A2 Abrams tanks, Apache gunships, F-16C fighters, Mirage 2000 fighters, and many other advanced weapons systems. The level of training has also improved substantially thanks to Uncle Sam doing regular joint training exercises with the Egyptian military.

On other fronts you have the Jordanian military with its highly updated military. Check out the typical Jordanian infantry soldier sometime. They are well equipped with modern body armor, digital cammo uniforms, top of the line KADDB kevlar helmets, M4 carbines not to mention their highly modernized airforce and armored forces. They also receive quite a bit of training by American military advisers. By itself, they're not a threat due to the small size of the Jordanian military. But teamed up with the Egyptian military with cannon-fodder provided by the Syrians (and their mostly obsolete military) and you have a very potent enemy.

The one thing that is a massive deterrent to Arab nations is the fact that Israel has nuclear weapons. The other day in a internet discussion with a Hezbollah supporter (possibly a member) in Lebanon, I was able to get them to admit that Arab armies invading Israel would be insane given the high probability that Israel would obliterate Mecca and Medina and the major cities of Muslim nations its last final death throes before being overrun. I explained to him what a Dolphin class submarine is (which the Israelis have) and how it is difficult to detect and how it can launch nuclear armed sea to ground missiles at long ranges. That's not counting the IAF fighter bombers, Israeli cruise missiles, and other means of nuclear weapons delivery.

Eventually he agreed that such a loss of millions on all sides and the destruction of their holiest religious sights was much too high a price to pay for a land squabble and for control over Jerusalem.

Sometimes if you just sit down and get an extremist who hates Israel to rationally look at the likely repercussions of their actions against Israel it makes them think for a bit. I'm not saying that it works with all extremists but sometimes if you know how to do it, you can actually talk some sense into them especially if you back up what you say with stuff from the Qu'ran and/or Hadiths. If this message was done on a large scale all over the internet it might cause some of the "death to Israel" talk to tone down quite a bit.

Chris G.

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