Israel proposes ceasefire extension; Hamas declines

Two mortars were fired several hours before the scheduled expiration.

Hamas has yet to learn that Iron Dome has fundamentally changed the game. Rocket attacks ARE NOT going to scare the Israelis into negotiation, only outside pressure can do that. But as long as Hamas continues to call for the destruction of Israel by any means necessary (including terrorism) much less to actually ENGAGE IN TERRORISM, the international community will continue to shun them.

Yeah it sucks that they got a shitload of their people killed for nothing, but that happens. They gambled and lost. Now it's time to accept it, do what is best for their people and accept a ceasefire. Followup by denouncing terrorism and acknowledging Israel's right to exit and then sit down at the negotiating table and try to get as much of the pre-67 borders as possible.

Yeah, they'll come out worse than Israel but THAT IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU LOSE WARS!

If we apply the above to other aspects of our lives, can't it be said that no government leader, or group speak for their country since there is not 100% consensus from their respective populations?

A parliamentary democracy with several dozen political parties is a bit different from the U.S. system.

They can speak for the country if there is a country, and a democratically elected government. Neither is currently the case for Palestine.

So it's ok if Hamas kills a boy but not if Israel does? Again, had Hamas not broken the cease fire, that boy would still be alive. Hamas deserves 100% of the blame.

Does it bother anyone when Hamas kills innocent men, women, and children? Or is the anger reserved solely for Israel?

Our local anti-semites pretty much only care if those poor, innocent terro..err Hamas gets killed...

Why do you keep saying this when you are fully aware that people here aren't supporting Hamas?

He may not be fully aware. Has he demonstrated any ability to process information in this thread? Or is he simply repeating a set of talking points over and over, no matter that they have been mostly disproven?

An honest Israeli soldier speaks:

http://stormcloudsgathering.com/an-honest-israeli-soldier-speaks

You should go there and organize them.

That support hasn't appeared because they're were still firing rockets and mortars. As I stated when the Palestinians decide to stop using violence, they'll find a more sympathetic West. Until then they won't, the rockets having been fired almost incessantly since 2001, they stop that, they'll find more ears open to their cause. So the immediate past here holds no water, they were still firing rockets, hell back in March they had such a hard-on for it they unveiled a statue in honour of firing on Israel. If you're that much of a set of pricks you go have a statue made of a missile to celebrate tossing them at civilian areas in the current conflict, you're probably very much part of the problem.

Hungry child > dead child.

Change when dealing with complex issues and embedded views takes time, we'd all like to do a Q and click our fingers, but that isn't happening any time soon.

While all of that might be true, decisions are made by individuals. If the solution you're trying to sell in China demands that the individual sees his kids die in order for peace to arrive for some strangers four generations down the line -- and not his generations, because he and his kids are dead -- , it just isn't a solution, because nobody is going to go for it. Palestine was not firing weapons constantly; the peace never lasted for four generations, but if that's what's needed before anything gets better, it never will -- especially since things do indeed sometimes get better when the violence increases: just sometimes, but only during increased violence, never without.

They don't have to die. Do they have deal with injustice for a while? Yes. They don't need to starve either. They. Have. To. Stop. Firing. Rockets. That's the first step, from then on Israel will have to react positively. Israel's incursions and blockades may have some dubious justifications, but justifications they are. Take those away, stop shipping in rockets, have food shipments instead. If it has to go through Israeli Navy checks for 12 months or so, deal with it. The Palestinians prove they can be good neighbours, Israel is going to find its land grab harder and harder to keep hold of. It'll make concessions, especially with international pressure.

Really? When, since January 2013, have they stopped?

2013
2014

And things aren't getting better for the violence. A quick look at how Gaza is getting wrecked, and the land loss the Palestinians have suffered, indicates that.

How do they do those two things in this plan?

Why since Jan 13?

Why are they dying in the numbers they are now? Might it have something to do with Israel pounding the crap out of them? Why are Israel pounding the crap out of them? Might it have something to do with the rockets they've been firing into Israel almost continuously for the last 13 years?

Now we could go further back to "why are they firing rockets", but that is utterly pointless at this juncture. Hamas fires rockets. Israel responds with disproportionate force. Hamas buys better rockets. Israel increases it's buffer of land inside Gaza.

Very basic math asks the question of who runs out of land and people first. The answer is very plain. The Palestinians have much to gain from stopping firing the rockets, starting with less death.

The blockade is almost entirely predicated on weapons shipments, the buffer zone the Israelis have set up covers some arable land.

It's not hard to figure out the 'how' is it?

You stated they haven't always been firing rockets recently, and that is the last time they weren't firing rockets, there was a ceasefire that lasted a couple of months - although the Palestinians weren't exactly honest in that they kept firing rockets for a while after it was agreed.

No, see, that doesn't work. Either it is pointless to ask what happened to cause something else, or it isn't. If it isn't, then you don't get to say Israel is pounding the crap out of them because...; you simply have to say, Israel is pounding the crap out of them, so what will that lead to? If, on the other hand, you do want to ask why things happen, then you don't get to stop at Israel's perspective; certainly not if you're trying to find a motivation for Palestinians to change their behaviour.

I'm afraid that is not at all clear. It isn't even clear to me, and Palestinians have three generations of death and oppression and the resulting resentment to cloud their view of any such hope even if I in my comfortable office could see it. Of course, in any war, stopping to fight today will mean less death today. But it doesn't mean less death in the long run.

I didn't say "recently". The story starts at least with the creation of modern Israel, more than a half century ago. But what is your point here? In trying to show that there hasn't ever been any short-lived attempts peace, you chose your timeframe because directly before that, there was a few months of peace?

I'll start with this first:

Since my theory you're trying to debunk consists of "if the Palestinians stop firing rockets and use modern media to garner support, they'll achieve more than violence" you can't have it both ways, you can't say "oh but they've not always been firing rockets, where was the support then?" and then, when I display that actually they've firing rockets for a decade plus, state "well, I didn't mean recently" as either fail one condition of my view. We didn't have modern media 50 years back, they've not tried honey over piss and vinegar whilst we've have the modern array of media streams to get messages across, so my point still stands.

It works if you're trying to stop people dying, it only doesn't work if you prefer political point scoring over, say, stopping the shelling and airstrikes. What are we aiming for? A stop to the violence and getting around a negotiation table or finger-pointing? I know which one I prefer.

Hamas rockets stop, Israeli airstrikes stop. Then we can have a try at the jaw-jaw, and the Palestinians can go into "shame Israel" mode instead of "fire rockets and die" mode.

January 2013 isn't 50 years back. Do you really think the international public and media situation has changed so drastically in the last 20 months that Palestinians should expect a 180° change in results for their actions compared to 2012?

I'm asking what motive the Palestinians have to go with that. Look at the perspective you're painting:

"A stop to the violence and getting around a negotiation table"

What does Israel want? A stop to the violence.

What do Palestinians want? Political rights.

You're offering that if one party gets what they want, the other party may (!) talk about (!) whether or not the other party gets what they want. Why should the first party agree to that?

In that scenario, Palestinians keep dying and Israelis stop dying. What hope can Palestinians have for negotiations in that situation? Remember, the previous negotiations resulted in conditions that the Israelis violated, and then refused to talk again. That's what they got without violence.

No, it was a 2 month ceasefire, which was repeatedly broken by the Palestinians and occurred after a suicide bomber took out a bus of civilians.

Tell me, you think that is a good point to play the "we're stopping the violence" card? Do you? Really?

Don't play games, you know damn well that for a group to turn away from violence and gain support for their causes requires a little more than 2 months of playing bad actor.

Less dead Palestinians. Less destroyed buildings.

Not a bad starting point.

You - and they - need to get this very simple fact around your noggins. They're not getting anywhere with the violence. Why should they go with that? The current method isn't just not working, its making things markedly worse.

Israel will bow to international pressure - they already have done given then amount of death in Gaza - and by using that the Palestinians will get closer to what they want. They'll get closer to that two-state solution. But to get that pressure applied they have to stop the violence, otherwise they get minimal support. They need pressure groups that can argue the case without their rationale being drowned out by Hamas rockets.

Because times change. Israel will doubtlessly misbehave again, and that is where you use protests and outrage and getting messages across rather than rockets. Israel knows how to win wars, the Palestinians need to learn how to win the peace, because that is the only way they can get what they want.

You argue a case where we shall see no Palestine state, just an Israel with very bloody hands.

I just don't think that needs be the case in a modern world where imagery and information can have a more devastating effect than rockets is such a case as this.

The video of a screaming child, shocked after an Israeli attack, has seen more people give pause to the Palestinian cause than any Hamas rocket mortar, imagine a different image, equally shocking, but not diluted by the fact the attack was invited.

There is a reason companies advertise rather than frog march people to a store to get them buy at gunpoint - marketing and propaganda are cheaper and more effective than violent means.

What else is there? If you stop the violence, you stop the violence in the reality you're in. You know the PA and Hamas are unable to control all Palestinians; this goes back to the fact that they don't have a functional political structure. So when you call for a stop to the violence without any further political structure up front, that's what you'll get.

The only thing that has ever gotten them anything in the past is violence. It's definitely desperate, yes; but peace has never worked for them before. Violence, sometimes, has.

But we don't get to see that different image; oppression makes far less impressive photo ops than violence, and isn't reported unless there is violence to go along.

Let me ask you this. If you're sure that Palestinians only hurt themselves by continuing violence, and only have anything to gain if they cease their attacks, why, in your world, don't they?

Wow, a vote for the pro-violence group coming from Packard. Didn't see that coming.

As far as what have violence gotten the Palestinians, I'd have to disagree - they've lost repeatedly, their gains have been small. Their position is markedly worse now than it was in the past EXCEPT when it comes to world opinion. That they get through being victims and a rejection of violence and perceived tyranny, not from blowing up bus loads of kids.

To me it always comes back to Black September. Its hard to understand turning on a friend who took you in and trying to overthrow them with violence (Jordan) because they won't let you kills Israelis. Yes, that was a long time ago, but I see the same lack of rationality replayed over and over.

There is a large faction in Palestine that would be very happy to destroy Israel. The fact that they often act outside of larger strictures is indeed a big part of the problem. But then, they've been dealt a propaganda campaign of endless animosity - its ingrained in their culture at this point.

I have sympathy for the Palestinians that live among this mess and are simply trying to go about with their lives. There's definitely a Poland caught between the Nazis and Soviets vibe there.

But I have a hard time seeing how the Palestinians are going to positively end this conflict by continuing to use terrorist tactics. The one possible violent solution they have is if other powers in the region gain parity with Israel, and destroy it by numbers. But then, that loses for everyone - as Israel is a nuclear power.

They are far better served by looking for peace. Which they resolutely refuse to do.

They'd get better control if they focussed on setting up political structures, they can organize well enough to create a very advanced tunnel system laid out with traps, which means they have the capacity to organize and group, Hamas elect to do so for violent means. We saw Fatah direct their efforts into amenities even.

So there are plenty of "else's." They're not some alien race who only understand violence.

That is incorrect, they have gained via peace several times - both the Wye Valley and Hebron Agreements came when they reduced violence as Israel would only go to the table if they did so.

Both sides have failed to hold up agreements, in both those accords Israel dragged their feet, and in the Camp David talks Arafat was blatantly not there to seek peace, hence his lack of the counter-offer to the Israeli one.

Christ, we report on "side boob" entering the dictionary, a tweet can garner all kinds of attention that makes its way into the regular news. Stop thinking so 20th century. An image of a human chain trying to stop Israeli bulldozers would have an effect, a picture of someone beat up by the IDF would have an effect. At the moment these are diluted by the response "well, they're terrorists"

It's a different scale, but 30 years ago at the height of the IRA you'd find shops with signs of "No dogs, no blacks, no Irish", now we go over there for stag nights.

We may not get that if the Palestinians dialled back the violence, but we'd get something.

Lots of reasons. The worlds failure to reign in Fatah and its corruption whilst funding it, the fact Hamas are a terrorist group first and foremost. I don't think the majority of the population wish for violence to continue, but they need to make a stand against it.

They'd get better political structures if they had political rights.

That's just the flip side of the same coin. If ceasefires get you negotiation and peca gets you concessions, then that means that ceasefires end unless the other party is willing to negotiate, and peace doesn't come unless the other side makes concessions. Which is precisely what we're seeing now.

How many boobs have you seen today, and how many pics of Darfur?

Not necessarily. A social structures can exist without rights, and its not as if the IDF are going to roll into town to flatten a purely political group. So that is a false assumption.

How disappointingly binary. We've achieved X, so the only way to achieve Y is more violence? Remind me, how much violence did the Russians engage in to get increased freedoms? Or the Czechoslovakian Velvet Revolution? There are many examples where violence was not necessary to increase freedoms, even when the other party had to be cajoled and pressured to join talks.

Looking at the Israeli concessions, they mostly seem to involve returning 10% back of what has been lost via the violence.

Perhaps, when there is no Gaza Strip or West Bank left they'll consider it "half time"?

False equivalence. Context matters here - how many porn pics do you see here?

We have always elevated leisure over other things, so going off your logic, I'll pop down to the slavers, as - since more people took an interest in leisure than abolition of slavery, it obviously never was abolished...

He's not being blunt about it like Rick Deckard but it's obvious at this point that Packard is part of the Anti-Israeli brigade here at Wordforge.

Ecky is just arguing to a wall. It's excuse after excuse from Packard to defend the Palestinians and blame Israel.

They would win everything they claim to want if they went the non-violent route. Europe, America, the rest of the world would not hesitate to push Israel to make concessions.

But as long as the Palestinians play the terrorism game no one is going to truly stand up to the Israelis and stop them.