UNRWA, considered

Submitted by Solomon2 (United States), Sep 21, 2009 at 15:27

Since changing Palestinian education is important, that means changing the UNRWA's approach of kow-towing to Palestinian militants, most obviously seen in Hamas insistance that the UNRWA refrain from teaching that the Holocaust was anything other than a fable, and the U.N.'s meek acceptance of such.

But for UNRWA to change, its personnel must be free of the threat of murder. Absent a change of heart in the Palestinians, that implies either a substantial U.N. military and police presence - one that not only has teeth, but is willing to chomp - or a foreign military occupation. And such a presence would have to last for at least two generations to be fully effective.

Israel doesn't have the military or economic resources to do this alone - stomping the militants every year or so is cheaper. A UNIFIL-type presence isn't enough, because its personnel are either gutless or have their hands tied.

What could work is a sustained, multi-national approach including interested parties, as in ex-Yugoslavia today. Could Egypt, Jordan, and Israel band together to "fix" Palestine? Not under the current circumstances. And even then, there is no guarantee that educational policies will really change.

So we are back to defeating the Palestinians militarily. For the West, that involves revising the moral and political imperatives that have characterized such things as undesirable. For Israel it boils down to this question : what has to be done to the Arabs so they can see and accept themselves as defeated?

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