"It's like conversing with Bucky!"

Why? You never try to converse, only attack.

Back to your little game; go play with the boys.

Bucky, you're confusing me with someone else.

I try to leave you alone---for that very reason.

Well it is really hard for me to imagine a meaningful solution that puts Jews as a minority in Israel.

Ah, if only it were 2007 again, eh? ZOMG the dems are going to save us from imperial warmongering, impeachment is the answer to all of our prayers!!!!1!!1111!!! lawl....

All this costs money, which in turn must be authorized by Congress, or at least a by few witting members of the intelligence committees. That has not proved a problem. An initial outlay of $300 million to finance implementation of the finding has been swiftly approved with bipartisan support, apparently regardless of the unpopularity of the current war and the perilous condition of the U.S. economy.

Way to fight the War of Terror.

So you did not put "It's like conversing with Bucky!" in the title of your post? Funny it still looks like you did; and I see it when I click on the button that yeilds all your posts.

Odd that so many here will tell tall tales when the posts are so public. When you write, "Bucky, you're confusing me with someone else" you are wrong. Hell son, I am looking at what you wrote as I type this.

Better lies please.

On the eve of 2008, Israel population reached 7.241 million residents. Of this figure, 75.6 percent are Jewish (5.472 million), 20% are Arab (1.449 million) and 4.4% (320,000) are ‘others’ — immigrants who are not registered as Jews in the Interior Ministry, non-Arab Christians and residents without religious classification.

(source)

Seems the problem is rather closer than you suggest.

Again, I firmly believe a negotiated solution that creates a Palestinian state alongside Israel is entirely possible (and necessary if there is to be any kind of peace.) And I believe the substantial majority of Israeli Jews support significant compromise and concession in order to achieve that. It's harder to gauge from this far perspective, but I think a substantial proportion of Palestinians would as well. I don't know if it's a majority or not. but even if it's not presently a majority that situation is not necessarily set in stone.

It's getting to be like a "debate" arranged by the College Republicans in here.

-- DCLaw1

Precisely why I don't respond to that idiot. I don't even like to mention his name. Look what just happened to Baldie!

Jan R.,

If it were up to me and I ruled the world I would step in with a big stick for each side and plenty of carrots. I would mostly use the threat of the stick and apply it equally, if not more so to the Israelis. They do have the nukes they are not supposed to have that we aren't supposed to talk about. The days of Israel dealing with their neighbors in a ham fisted manner while Big Brother USA looks over their shoulders approvingly aren't going to last forever. It will end some time soon and Israel will have achieved isolating themselves from the rest of the world, not unlike America has done today. It's not a comfortable feeling, even for the sole superpower on the planet.

Why not just let Iron Man fly in and save the day?

The technological and accurate killing power of the Military Industrial Complex but with a liberal intervenionist's Midas Touch and bleeding bionic heart. An American War Machine flying in to save some rat hole of a country from itself, without all of the depleted uranium, collateral damage, blowback, cleaning up, pulling out, and bankster morality.

Yeah, well, we won't be the worlds sole superpower forever either. We'll go the way of Britain before too long.

If it were up to me and I ruled the world I would step in with a big stick

A liberal interventionist ready to swing the big stick. Gee. I'm surprised by this.

OK fair enough. I confused the Jewish population of Israel with the total.

I still think there is room to move on "right of return" versus "unrestricted, complete right of return." It strikes me that this is exactly the type of thing that can be achieved through negotiation.

I just can't see a stable solution with a huge number of Palestinians crowded in poverty on the West Bank and Gaza, surrounded. I see nothing "practical" about that.

I'm mystified as to how either of you can read "genuine peace has always been easy to achieve" as anything but "peace is easy to achieve."

I can't say what Rosen was referring to, but if you go way back, peace generally has existed in the Middle East when both sides have agreed to stop killing each other and left the other alone. (I know---childish, isn't it?)

The Turks left the Christians alone within certain restrictions (paying a tax rather than serving in the Caliph's armies) and with certain privileges (like running the empire instead). Similar with the Jews. Each religion or sect had its own town, village, or quarter.

The Crusaders and Seljuks had peace whenever the military leaders on both sides agreed on it. Same with inter-Arab wars.

Only the Romans couldn't leave the Jews alone. They too had a political war machine that, like ours, drove them to attack their neighbors for no better reason than to make money, lay waste to competitors, meddle with politics, and so on, or for no reason at all. And they went out of their way to oppress first the Jews, then the Christians.

(Funny how states can control their behavior toward other states---and their peoples' behavior toward minorities---when they want to.)

So I read Rosen as saying that the solution is blatantly obvious: stop refusing to let people live in autonomy and decent circumstances. Leave each other alone, and there will be no need for fences. Stop encouraging the politicians to prolong the situation just to take advantage of it.

The 2-state approach does not fully deliver on those points, and will always fail as long as the Israelis---or whomever they have put in control of the Palestinian territory---are dishonest with the Arabs and with themselves. A policy of return would cut out the political middlemen on both sides and settle the problem directly. That's my feeling.

And the reason I jumped on your use of the suicide excuse in the first place is that pretending Israelis can't and won't figure this out on their own is a familiar lie. It's analogous to stating that Americans will never stop driving Hummers, so we shouldn't consider giving them other options they might prefer. It's also a well-known dishonesty.