Friday, June 11, 2010

Common sense and Israel....compatible?

I finally found somebody who puts my thoughts into print better than I can. The American Security Project's Dr Bernard Finel writes about Egypt's decision to keep the border with Gaza open permanently:

I am not sure if there is something in common between American and Israeli politics that leads to an inability to think strategically, but here is a nice example of what happens when you elevate tactics over strategy.

So, the raid was necessary to enforce the blockade, but the raid caused the blockade to collapse. But the blockade in any case was a means to the end of weakening Hamas, and instead was strengthening it and now have given them yet another major victory.

The point isn’t that Israel is fundamentally in the wrong vis-a-vis Hamas. Hamas remains committed to the destruction of Israel and it has not demonstrated restraint, and certainly asking Israel to either trust or negotiate with Hamas is problematic. But that isn’t the point. The point is that nothing Israel is doing is either weakening Hamas nor strengthening their own position. The problem isn’t Israel’s goal, per se, but rather that it is incompetent in the pursuit of its own national interest, and that this incompetence is have negative repercussions on the United States as well.

Being in sympathy with someones goals does not mean you have to be supportive of every half-baked scheme they come up with.

4 comments:

  1. To sum it up, nothing Israel does will make a difference?

    On the other hand, Israel's been in exsistence since 1947 and the Middle east is still there. Something is going right. Russia didn't nuke em. Israel hasn't nuked anyone.


    Let's just keep doing what we're doing and hopefully nobody will get nuked for another 50 or 60 years.


    I'm not trying to be profound by any means. I, like everyone else has no freaking clue what to do short of hoping Jesus really does come back and fix everything.

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  2. I don't think the Palestinians should have to suffer due to Hamas. They elected them after all.

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  3. I'm done giving a shit what happens to Israel and the rest of the Middle East. I'd like to drop off fundie settlers, rapture Christians and Islamic militants into a football field and let Darwin sort them out.

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  4. 5,000 years of demostrated idiocy and hatred from the Middle-East isn't likely to change in my lifetime. Unfortunately.

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