Anti-Semitism in Toronto

While I don't completely buy your assertions regarding the Palestinian culture, I'll put that aside for a moment and ask you, then, what do you see as the solution? What's the end game of this situation, and how do we get there over the near and long term?

It is a pathetic situation. Israel upped the stakes yesterday promising to bring the fight to Hamas,

I fear you're right Roscoe.

When Israel was legitimately acknowledged as a country in 1947, they were given their homeland. At the time there was a large Arab population who were told they could stay or go. Most left, some stayed and became citizens. Those that left went to the Gaza Strip where the UN fed, clothed, funded and provided a first class education.

These Palestinians could never reconcile the fact they [--] up and began to hate with a passion; the results of which we observe daily. Now there exists a hateful and hostile population of Arabs supported by Lebanon, Jordan, Syria and until recently Iraq.

I don't know what the answer is. Expel them from Gaza and take back the land? Possible, but the world would come down hard on Israel.

Take out the high ranking terrorists? Sounds like a good place to start, and those that replace them - we all know Israel will literally go to the ends of the earth.

Time and time again the Palestinians have rejected both overt and covert opportunities for peace which may have to do with their inability to gather together to fight a common foe when they can be back-stabbing each other.

The current leadership has to go - a more rational leadership has to step up and convince their people that peace can be a good thing - for prosperity usually follows.

the probem is this: as long as palestinians and jews live together they will be at war. there is no 2 ways about it. the solution is separation. keep 'em apart and they won't fight. problem with that is that neither wants to leave. i personally believe the palestinians can go to syria and jordan and let the jews have their land but that is just me.

I can't believe that you're suggesting that the global community should create a massive humanitarian crisis, as some kind of "solution" to the problem.

There are currently approximately 3 million people living in the Gaza strip and West Bank. You would cut off aid to this society and then expel them. You've already said that noone wants them. So, you'll have 3 million starving refugees living in sealed border areas of neighbouring Arab states.

And you don't think this will beget more anger, violence and terrorism?

I was actually hoping for a realistic solution. What you have suggested is neither realistic nor a solution. And it is fundamentally unjust. You would hold 3 million people accountable for the action of a minority segment of the population. In dealing with the world, I believe that Canada has a moral obligation to apply it's own standards of right and wrong, and your "solution" would clearly fail that test.

k, i dunno if you were replying to me, but if you were i never said anything about stopping aid to them.

sorry, a little incoherent right now...i'm exhausted from work.

I believe he was replaying to me.

Why shouldn't we cut off aid? The money is being used to A) line Arafat and his cronies pockets B) brainwash the Palestinian youth and C) Finance terrorist attacks that result in the deaths of Israeli civilians. Whats fundementaly unjust is the double standard that is applied to Israel. No other nation, including our own, in a similar situation would be forced to put up with this. Yet Israel has shown incredabil restraint thus far, and what has it gotten them? War and terror. If the other Arabs states don't want them, tough. They seem to be soooo concerned for them and are more then willing to give them money and weapons to slaughter Jewish women and children. There is only one solution for Israel. Victory. When will you people wake up to the fact that the Palestinians DON'T WANT PEACE! They want to see Israel destroyed and every "infidel" they can find dead or enslaved.

What would you do Othello?

You seem to believe that all three million people living in the West Bank and Gaza want to strap a bomb to themselves and kill a few Israelis. I'll grant you that there is a goodly sized number of people who do, but it sure isn't anywhere near three million. And yet, you would tar them all with the same brush, and punish the innocent with the guilty. You would rather assume that all three million are irredeemable, rather than realize that millions are, in fact, just trying to live their lives amid poverty and violence.

What would I do? If I were in Israel's shoes, I would do some of the same things that they are doing with regard to tightening up their "border" with the surrounding Arab states and Palestinian territories. I would work to isolate Yasser Arafat from the international community. I would work with moderate Palestinians to help them communicate to the Palestinian people that there is a road to peace and to nationhood, but that Arafat is directing them down a different road. I would support the international community in freezing the assets of the terror organizations that target Israel. I would avoid escalation of violence, knowing the violence only begets more violence. I would create incentives for the Palenstinian Authority to actually do proper policing.

Complicated problems require complicated solutions, particularly if you actually want them to work in the real world. Looking at these situations with a desire to see only black and white will only make it worse.

Your "solution" has been tried. It only brought more war. Not all Palestinians may want to strap bombs on themselves but they support those who do. They are all guilty to some degree. Hence they all must pay the price.