Risky endeavor not necessary

Submitted by Sam (United States), Jan 3, 2018 at 15:13

The concept of winning a war against a non-state population made up of a culture that only "submits" to supreme leaders or war mongers is too risky, IMO. If there were actually two states with agreed borders where one side committed acts of aggression against the other, then the idea of a defensive war, and victory as we know it, might work.

Buy why declare a war against Palestinians anyway, which wrongly implies that Palestine was never a land where Christians or Jews had lived? Palestine had always been made up of people of all religions and from most neighboring countries. Before 1948 there were Palestinian Jews and Christians. Since then the goal for Muslims has been to keep the Arab population of Palestinian stateless in order to use them as a pretext to fight non-Muslims.

Rather than declare Arafat's fake smile and handshake in 1993 a type of surrender, I'd consider the U.N. creating Israel in 1948 the real point of victory. That moment was equivalent to posting the flag on Iwo Jima. It gave Israel more legitimacy than probably any other country has today. Which means that the state of Israel has an absolute primary right of self-defense, while the stateless and still borderless Palestine region does not. And by refusing to officially acknowledge and act as if Israel exists, it defines itself as a rebel and war culture without a legitimate cause.

If, and only if, Palestinian Arabs accepted the full legitimacy of Israel, which means tearing up its war Charter of 1968, then the concept of a Palestinian state would be possible. But as it is, their existing Charter is a full-scale declaration of war of liberation for all of Palestine for the benefit of Arabs only. Abbas said during an interview in July 2010, "I will never allow a single Israeli to live among us on Palestine's land."

The Geneva Convention, which defines the purpose of and the rights and obligations occupiers during a time of war, is not relevant to the Palestinians. Only nationals of a state, not rebels in an undefined region, can rightfully call anyone occupiers. And if and when Palestinians ever agree to two states, the Israelis would still have a right to occupy land, build walls, or set up protected border-crossings in self defense, if the Palestinians remained at war against it.

The Geneva Convention explains that Israel's rights to occupy another state's land in self defense "shall cease one year after the general close of military operations." No state means no defined occupation by law. And if after 70 years of Arab Palestinians choosing statelessness and denying the existence of a UN declared state, occupation of some areas might need to be permanent to protect Israel's population.

Choosing statelessness and aggression means the Arabs of Palestine willingly forfeit the rights that nationals of a state would have. It means that Israel wins by default.

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