Thread: Peace for Palestine/Isreal.

I have one of those minds that likes to take complicated things and make them simple. If I can't do that, I tend to walk away from it and let it percolate in my mind. I've long been stymied by the problem of bringing peace to the Palestinians and Israelis. I had a break through a few weeks ago.

Here's my solution.

Take the leadership of both countries. Sort each one in descending order by rank and pair them off. Dismiss the low ranking people from whatever country has the largest leadership. That's okay, we're interested in the big fish anyways.

Take people from both sides that have lost loved ones to state sponsored terrorism. And come on people, both sides participate in it.

Now, take the pairs of leaders and have them do one of those cheesy team building races where pairs of people each have one of their legs tied to the other person. I forget what they're called.

Only they're doing it through an aisle in the mixed crowd of bereaved family members and getting pelted with eggs, rotten fruit and vegetables, small amounts of lye, etc. etc. etc.

And the race goes on for marathon length. If there aren't enough family members to line the whole thing, they can just cruise along in the backs of trucks or something. If any of the teams pass out, they get whipped until they wake up and start carrying their asses to the finish line again. If that doesn't work, they get put on a cart and transported slowly along the rest of the course so they don't get out of being pelted with the nasty and or painful stuff.

I've heard this called "crisis bonding". And the bereaved family members get to share in some schadenfreude which seems to contribute to bonding as well.

After that, the leadership can sit down and talk. If the master of ceremony decides that they're being too slow to compromise, or to fast to compromise and missing opportunities to understand each other's situation and find synergistic solutions, then the process can be repeated at whim.

What do you all think? Is this a good idea? Would it work? Should I get a job as a diplomat?

Marathons are a real bitch, even for world class distance runners, so they might have even more hateful associations with each other. However, tripping on LSD while listening to classic folk music in the woods together would probably lead to very positive outcomes. A shared acid trip is worth at least a year of going to parties together.

Originally Posted by Universal Mind

Marathons are a real bitch, even for world class distance runners, so they might have even more hateful associations with each other. However, tripping on LSD while listening to classic folk music in the woods together would probably lead to very positive outcomes. A shared acid trip is worth at least a year of going to parties together.

Meh. Like I said, it's crisis bonding. It would be viewed as something that was being imposed on them by the outside. Another advantage is that a lot of people might decide to leave and the ones that stayed would either really want power or peace. The master of ceremony could sort them out and find creative ways to encourage the ones that wanted power to leave as well.

And tripping on acid with someone you don't know well can get weird. Maybe that could be used later in the process.

One could maybe give them a break every hour so that they have a chance to sympathize with each other. This would increase the crisis bonding. If two people weren't getting along no matter what, they could be removed from their leadership positions.

Except the problem is that it isn't Israel vs. Palestine. It's Israel+superpowerUSA vs. Palestine. Obvious loser.

Originally Posted by nina

Except the problem is that it isn't Israel vs. Palestine. It's Israel+superpowerUSA vs. Palestine. Obvious loser.

That's not a problem. I'll curbstomp the US "leadership" so fast their head will spin. It's a decadent country that has lived past its prime. We have a problem with them here in Hawaii too.

Originally Posted by Seroquel

Palestine isn't, and has never been a country.
/thread

They're a unified people (well, at least as unified as any other people) with a legitimate grievance. Here's from Wikipedia. You'll have to follow the attributions yourself: "The State of Palestine is recognized today by approximately two-thirds of the world's countries, although this status is not recognized by the United Nations, Israel and major Western nations such as the United States."

Hence it's a nation by popular vote. With numbers like that, I imagine that the UN would recognize them if sooooomebody (not pointing any fingers) on the permanent security council didn't unilaterally veto the motion to do so.

Palestine isn't, and has never been a country.
/thread

I am really starting to question why the United States, I mean the United Nations , set up a "Jewish homeland" in an Islamic hornets' nest and has been so dedicated to keeping it afloat. There is something kind of WTF about it. Any ideas?

Originally Posted by Universal Mind

I am really starting to question why the United States, I mean the United Nations , set up a "Jewish homeland" in an Islamic hornets' nest and has been so dedicated to keeping it afloat. There is something kind of WTF about it. Any ideas?

Yeah the British started it and then after the second World War there was, of course, a lot of sympathy for the zionist cause and there were already a lot of jewish immigrants there at the time so they made.. a very stupid decision. And keeping it afloat well.. You can't just say: "hey Israel, Game Over! You tried... You failed, you all go back to wherever you came from, now."

As for your proposition, Philosopher, I know there are people-to-people approaches ongoing, NGOs who are trying to do force some bonding, though, don't think there's any wipping and rotten tomatoes involved (who knows!). But this is interesting 'cause the leadership is involved. They say one of the reasons of the failing of Oslo is that there was no ongoing contact between the leadership of both sides.

Apparently the British kicked off the project, but Israel did not become an actual nation until the U.N. mandate to partition it off as an independent nation became official in 1948. The U.N. took the land that had been called "Palestine" and made 53% of it "Israel." They even forced many of the inhabitants to move out. That was just flat out robbery. Although I have advocated support for Israel in recent years, I have always considered the U.N. stunt of establishing the country to be one of the most insane political moves ever. Next thing you know, Israel and Egypt are at war and others are going at them. We've had their back ever since, and we have made a lot of enemies because of it. I am very much against the civilian targettings that go on in Israel five decades and several generations later, but such things should be expected when you hit a hornets' nest with a baseball bat. I majorly oppose what the hornets do, but everybody knew that it's what hornets do. I am not saying all Arabs and Muslims are hornets. I am just saying that many in that region are.

At this point in time, I think it's too late for the U.N. to suddenly declare Israel not a country. If the establishment happened yesterday, I would have a different view on that. However, I do think we should stop giving aid to Israel. We need to tell them that in x amount of time, they are on their own. I would even say that it is selfish for people to insist on living there and expect the most powerful country in the world to put so much into sustaining their country. If they want to try it on their own, good luck to them. We are facing bankruptcy and are sick of being their bodyguard over the fact that they have a religion which says God gave them the land. That's their religious belief, not mine.

I believe it was the British that provided initial support.

Originally Posted by PhilosopherStoned

I believe it was the British that provided initial support.

1948 if I remember correctly, and they didn't take kindly to it, they hung a bunch of British soldiers.

I think that leaving Israel on their own would be the start of World War Three.

Literally.

There would be nukes flying so fast your head would spin. They'd attack Iran's nuclear project whether it's peaceful or not. That wouldn't go over very well.

I'm of the opinion that any oppressed peoples can end up as a hornets nest. Especially if they're subject to a psychologically unhealthy variant of a religion such as some literalist version of Abrahamism. But it's precisely a hornets nest of oppression to which that kind of religion appeals. So there's a positive feedback loop there towards fundamentalism.

So unless we want a whole lot of people to die I think we have to stay in the mix.

Plus there are now a few generations of Israelis born there so it's their home and they have a right to be there.

The trick is to "encourage" both sides to form a single nation that is financially and politically homogeneous from an ethnic perspective. It may be that the threat of withdrawing our support from the Israelis could be useful towards this end but only if we can counteract their return threat to nuke the rest of the Middle East. I don't think that they believe for a second that we'll actually nuke them unless they nuke us so that's a pretty useless thread.

Letting them get nukes was as bad as creating it in the first place. Maybe we should use special forces to steal their nukes while continuing to defend them in other ways. That seems like a mess waiting to happen though.

Originally Posted by PhilosopherStoned

I'm of the opinion that any oppressed peoples can end up as a hornets nest. Especially if they're subject to a psychologically unhealthy variant of a religion such as some literalist version of Abrahamism. But it's precisely a hornets nest of oppression to which that kind of religion appeals. So there's a positive feedback loop there towards fundamentalism.

I agree. That principle has a lot to do with why we liberated Iraq and Afghanistan.

Originally Posted by PhilosopherStoned

The trick is to "encourage" both sides to form a single nation that is financially and politically homogeneous from an ethnic perspective.

That is exactly what I think they need to do. It is the only way they can ever have peace. They need to have a democracy of equality, and it needs to be secular. However, both sides are a long way from agreeing to something like that. All the more reason for me to think we need to quit giving Israel money and weapons.

Good point about Israel using nukes in the war that follows our withdrawal of support. I don't really know what to do about that part of it. Maybe we could form a deal with the surrounding governments. We could agree to take Israel's nukes in exchange for money to Israel if the surrounding governments agree to keep their troops out of Israel for some number of years, and threaten consequences for violating the agreement. That's one idea. Maybe there are better ones. I wish everybody in the Middle East would just go atheist overnight. That would be problem solved.

I think I should definitely be a diplomat.

Just so no one accuses me of wanton cruelty, the only reason I think that they should be whipped and maced if they collapse is to make sure that they're not faking it. Once that's established, I have no problem with them being humanely carted to the finish line.

I believe that if the leaders of israel or palestina got discrased in a such way by their civilians, i do not think they would start to work towards peace, they would probably take revenge on their people.

You would be the coolest diplomat ever though

Who didn't take kindly to it? And why would they have?

Originally Posted by PhilosopherStoned

Who didn't take kindly to it? And why would they have?

The Irgun, a zionist faction of the Jewish settlers in forming the state of Israel. The British were initially supported in helping the migration of Jews before the 2nd world war but that changed later.

Hmmm. Sadly, meeps's photo disappeared (photo formats are a technical nightmare and it's very difficult to parse them for content without some sort of image recognition (i.e. AI)) but I remember the date of initial British support as being 1948, i.e. after the second world war. Maybe I'm just drunk. Are you sure you have your facts straight?

Originally Posted by PhilosopherStoned

Hmmm. Sadly, meeps's photo disappeared (photo formats are a technical nightmare and it's very difficult to parse them for content without some sort of image recognition (i.e. AI)) but I remember the date of initial British support as being 1948, i.e. after the second world war. Maybe I'm just drunk. Are you sure you have your facts straight?

I think so, it was a long time ago that I read about it, but then you could be too drunk and I could be too tired.