Agreed except......

Submitted by Soloview (Canada), Nov 14, 2014 at 10:50

I am agreed with Daniel on all points except one. I believe that extending settlements at this point in time is an extremely risky, and frankly stupid, undertaking on the part of Israeli government.

From the perspective of Israel's security, the best approach IMHO, would be to freeze the expansion into the West Bank. In effect, that would be saying to Abbas and the PA, if you want two states, we are ready when you are. I would say that at this point there is no chance at the present time that any political movement in Palestine would accept a Jewish state. But to think that Israel can profit from the "unilateral" plans to dismantle Israel by asserting its own "one-state plan" does exactly what Israel does not want at this point. Israel no longer faces "the Arabs" but the whole Islamic caboodle - it is not a situation that Israel wants to be in, especially not when the support of the US is questionable at best.

To expand the settlements will be seen as provocative by everyone (except Canada, and even that is not certain after 2015), and encourage the mayhem against Israel, Bibi does stupid things. He should have taken Gaza back and then get the US (after Obama) to push Egypt to take it over. As a consequence of not finishing the job, you have now Arab Israleis vowing in mosques that Jerusalem will be the capital of the new caliphate.

So, I don't think that at this point you would want to exacerbate tensions from within and without that will surely further erode security. Especially you don't want to do that within weeks of allowing yourself to look like chickensh*t.

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