[Above] In the West Bank town of Ramallah, Palestinian police officers clash with activists after they tried to reach the Palestinian Authority president's headquarters during protests against the resumption of the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks
JERUSALEM — The first substantive peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians in years will begin Monday evening in Washington, the Obama administration announced, after Israeli leaders agreed Sunday to release 104 Palestinian prisoners.
State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said the preliminary talks will be led by Israeli Justice Minister Tzipi Livni and chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat. The talks, which will continue Tuesday, are expected to address the framework for full negotiations to follow — the talks about talks that had preceded past attempts at a deal.
The release of Palestinian prisoners was one of the major roadblocks to the peace talks.
There are those who believe that the two-state solution is dead, and it is a race to whether Israel will eventually wear down the Palestinians through land grabs and oppression, or the Palestinians will persistently resist and out-breed the Israelis.
32 comments:
it is a race to whether Israel will eventually wear down the Palestinians through land grabs and oppression, or the Palestinians will persistently resist and out-breed the Israelis.
Deborah -- Is this your comment or part of the article?
JAL, I follow the convention of putting quotations in the indented material. That final line was my statement.
The part about "out-breeding the Israelis" is familiar to me. I heard it back in the days of the Bob Grant Show. Back when Bob Grant had a daily time slot on WABC Radio NY.
The possibility I worry about is a nuclear attack on Israel and the whole Middle East going up in mushroom clouds.
That was no small part of my calculation when I supported the War on Terror and the Iraq War. Historically, all that has kept peace with Muslims without submitting has been superior military force.
If we can get through the next twenty-five years or so, the Muslims will have sold most of their oil and their bumper crop of young men will be graying. Then Islam will go dormant again and we can hope that maybe Islam will finally moderate.
In the meantime, the Two-State Solution is a dream. It is hudna, a cease-fire while Muslims regroup to return later in greater strength for what they really want: a One-State Solution.
creeley23
Are you familiar with that hypothesis and/or theory that if a terrorist group bombs the Saudi Arabia oil fields --China comes to an economic stop in 3 or 5 days. (I'm not going to be able to find a link for that--I think I just heard it but--I remember being shocked by that estimate--3 or 5 days.)
If China becomes destabilized economically...
Not good--nobody wants that.
"land grabs and oppression"
Sounds directly out of the mouth of Jimmy Carter, except he'd add "apartheid".
If this a new headline or something from 25 years ago?
I've seen it before.
Israeli leaders agreed Sunday to release 104 Palestinian prisoners
This is a bad start.
I love it that serious people care about this, so I can care about Big Papi.
madawaskan: I'm aware that much of Europe and China depend on ME oil and that bad things happen in short order if the oil stops flowing. I hadn't heard anything as fine-grained as China coming to a stop in 3-5 days.
Yes, it is very serious. As Frank Herbert said in Dune, "The spice must flow."
A friend of mine, not the blimp-friend, asks in response to "No blood for oil!", "What will you fight for?"
creeley23 said...
madawaskan: I'm aware that much of Europe and China depend on ME oil and that bad things happen in short order if the oil stops flowing. I hadn't heard anything as fine-grained as China coming to a stop in 3-5 days.
Yes, it is very serious. As Frank Herbert said in Dune, "The spice must flow."
A friend of mine, not the blimp-friend, asks in response to "No blood for oil!", "What will you fight for?"
July 29, 2013 at 5:07 PM
***********
OMG!
You are a Dune fan?
I loved that book.
I did not read the rest--because that was the best.
I didn't want to get it mucked up.
Hard to explain.
Lydia, as Machiavelli once said, it's a dog-eat-dog world. What should I have said, please?
"What will you fight for?"
That is a really good question.
deborah, I think maybe I misread your statement, and that you were simply stating the position of those against a two-state solution, like the late Tony Judt. If so, then, of course, they'd use that "land grabs and oppression" rhetoric.
Thanks, Lydia. I think both side are nuts, they've been at it so long. We need an I/P West Side Story.
"What would you fight for?"
The right to party of course.
Yeah, but imagine the negotiations over who'd be Maria and who'd be Tony. :)
Don't agree that both sides are nuts, though. Israel fights for its life.
madawaskan: I read Dune the summer after sixth grade. It was the most complex book I had read up to that age. I didn't follow it all that well, but it made a big impression on me.
Herbert couldn't keep the quality up for the sequels. I didn't bother with his son's versions.
I do recommend "The Dosadi Experiment" by Herbert. It's a similar book, though shorter and more frightening.
Supposedly, these "negotiations" are Lurch's doing, the prisoner release forced on the Israelis.
The US has lotsa oil:
"Oil shale reserves
The United States has the largest known deposits of oil shale in the world, according to the Bureau of Land Management and holds an estimated 2.175 trillion barrels (345.8 km3) of potentially recoverable oil. Oil shale does not actually contain oil, but a waxy oil precursor known as kerogen. There is no significant commercial production of oil from oil shale in the United States."
Wikipedia. Also, "Excluding unconventional reserves (ie shale, tar sands, etc), the Energy Information Administration estimates United States technically recoverable oil reserves to be 218.9 billion barrels."
Ed:
Caving to pressure from Obama and the embarassing John Kerry, Israel 's cabinet approved of the terrorist release in a "deal" to revive Israel's surrender talks.
I don't believe their hand was really forced. This is nothing but kabuki.
Trooper:
""What would you fight for?""
I've been seeing this...what's it from?
Pam Geller's take, but she's pretty credible.
In any case, your sweet lips to God's ears, ma'am.
Dante said...
The US has lotsa oil
If the damned ruling class would get the Hell out of the way and let us get it, we'd be richer than the A-rabs in the last century.
Deborah and Lydia,
I suggest both of you order Ariel Sharon's autobiography, "Warrior," from B&N or Amazon and read it.
You might also get Martin Gilbert's "Israel: A History" at the same time and get free shipping, and a more neutral description of the events that Sharon talks about.
Libya, Syria, and Iraq keep setting new records for pointless deaths and nihilistic savagery. Egypt looks like it will soon join them in their solidarity of misery. Pretty soon the Gaza Strip will be the most peaceful and prosperous state in that neighborhood.
Alwaleed warns of US shale danger to Saudi Arabia
it is a race to whether Israel will eventually wear down the Palestinians through land grabs and oppression, or the Palestinians will persistently resist and out-breed the Israelis
Those are actually the two happiest probably outcomes; there are many that are worse. :(
Ariel Sharon wrote his autobiography (actually ghost-written) to introduce himself - especially to American Jews, I think - and set forth his program in 1986 when he was forced to retire from the IDF and decided to go into politics full-time. It is quite qell-written, and sets forth exactly what he indeed has.
done
Gilbert's "Israel - A History" reads as if he got access to the Jerusalem Post's morgue and just summarized what was on their front page from week to week up to 1996. It is not a personal "interpretation" of history.
JAL:
“We disagree with your excellency on what you said and we see that raising North American shale gas production is an inevitable threat,” Prince Alwaleed said.
Public disagreements among the Saudi royal family are rare, although Prince Alwaleed is no stranger to controversy. Earlier this year he publicly attacked Forbes magazine for underestimating his personal fortune.
lol thanks for the link.
Hagar, thanks for the recommendations.
Here is a slanted pre-unilateral-withdrawal-from-Gaza-Strip article that speculates on Sharon's motives for the withdrawal.
Just so, Rev.
William, they're working on it, I do believe.
From a commenter on another blog, I think this says it all:
"The desire by Israel for peace is well established and undeniable by any fair-minded and knowledgeable observer. The complete rejection by Palestinians and Islam, of Israel’s very right to exist is well established and undeniable by any fair-minded and knowledgeable observer."
Alas, very few "fair-minded and knowledgeable" observers in this world it seems.
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