Wont the situation settle in, perhaps, a century or two?

Israel can continue defending herself with limited raids in the Arab-populated territories, and wait for the things to eventually calm down. Many states lived in hostility until they eventually settled. It is not certain, however, that any border disputes are settled forever. Alsace and Lorraine are the famous example of recurring dispute. Still less are the chances of settlement when the entire country is disputed, and the fifth column (of Israeli Arabs) props the dispute. Border issues hold a chance of being settled when the cost of fighting them is unreasonable. Limited raids, on the contrary, limit the cost of fighting. The West Bank Arabs feel the IDF presence only at the checkpoints, and targeted raids leave the locals unaffected. Sending suicide bombers into Israel creates no inconvenience for the mainstream Arab population. Israeli-Palestinian situation is most reminiscent of the Mexican gangs attacks on the United States, which were only ended when the US annexed the lawless parts of Mexico. It is important to realize that no peace process or even economic development would end the Arab terrorist attacks on Israel. It is unrealistic to imagine several successive Palestinian governments conducting Ataturk-like propaganda to make a generation of Palestinian Arabs accept Jewish state on the land they consider theirs, and even Ataturks reforms eventually failed, as can be seen in the Islamization of modern Turkey. The returning Palestinian refugees are so heavily indoctrinated than no amount of the contrary propaganda would make them forfeit their grievances against Jews. Unless Israel crashes any hope of return to the pre-1948 situation, Palestinians would hope to return to it. What suffers a faster attrition: Palestinian hopes or Jewish patience? The passing time diminishes Palestinian hopes of reclaiming their entire land, but it also wears down the patience of Jews who expect terrorist attacks daily. Arabs are in the way better position: hope can be sparked while patience cannot. Any signs of Israeli weakness, whether military, ideological, or political encourage the Arabs. And a democratic country has no shortage of political swings which encourage her enemies. This analysis bears out historically. Thirty years ago, even the left Jews rejected Palestinian statehood, but now many conservatives accept it. Polls indicate that the support for Palestinian state among the Jews increases after major terrorist acts. Palestinian Arabs, submissive in 1970s, now overwhelmingly demand statehood and achieved it de facto. Israel cannot bear the political attrition. Modern Jews, unlike ancient Romans, dont accept war as a permanent state of affairs. Rome fought our Carthaginian relatives for centuries, but Jews today are unwilling to fight for our core lands for decades. Crushing military response is not an option. No elected Israeli government would bomb the real terrorist nests: the refugee camps. Sending Jewish soldiers there without artillery cover, as in Lebanon, to control the Arab civilian death toll at the expense of Jewish corpses, is an option too immoral to advocate for even indirectly. Egypt wisely abandoned Gaza to Israel; arm every person in Harlem with automatic rifle, and you would still get a Switzerland there compared to Gaza. Palestinian guerrillas need to take a single step to turn the tables: develop Qassam rockets with reliable tenmile range. They already had successful launches of that type. Such technological advance would allow them to launch rockets at Ashkelon from Jabaliya refugee camps. Though Israel conducts routine raids into Jabaliya, she wont be able politically to massively retaliate for continued attacks from the camp. Likewise, Israel cannot occupy Jabaliya because of the sniper fire. Cleansing the place of terrorists and leaving is also impossible because new terrorists are easily recruited from the jobless Arabs. Employing all the Arabs in Gaza is impossible. The place is overcrowded, lacks resources, and Arabs are anyway unsuitable for productive activities. Four generations lived in Gaza on the UNRWA handouts. The place is a hopeless slum without a hope of rebound. It is possible that Gazas population would grow hostile to the guerrillas. Such outcome, however, requires continuous Israeli retaliation against Gazas population centers and the hope of considerable improvement should they drive the guerrillas out. Neither proposition is true. Moreover, guerrillas are deeply entrenched in Gaza. They buy loyalty with Iranian-funded charities and threaten the population into loyalty by exemplary punishments of non-complying civilians. Though the popular mood in Gaza can change, no preconditions for it are observed. The only way to end the Gazas problem is to end Gaza. Israel punishes Gazans by restricting emigration. On the contrary, let them go. The young Gazans wont return home after attending universities in Egypt.

Ban any Gazans from entering Israel, except possible in transit to the West Bank; Jews need not give jobs to Gazans. Retaliate for the terrorist attacks against civil infrastructure, preventing Gaza from developing any industries which it is unlikely to develop, anyway and to show the Gazans sheer hopelessness of building anything. In thirty years, Gaza could be reduced to the network of dying villages. In a generation, Gaza would be empty. And safe for Jews. Leftists concentrate their efforts on the Avodah party, but conservatives are dispersed among many parties. That situation reflects differences in mindset. Leftists are oriented toward immediate goals, while rightwingers look to high-flown ideals. Leftists join party lists and government coalitions based on the common current agenda; fringe conservatives refuse to join those with slightly different religious ideas. Thus, Israel sports several ultra-conservative religious parties. Feiglin wrongly decided to subvert Likud instead of forming his own party. Feiglins choice was circumstantial: he needed to quickly join a party list in order to gain immunity from politically motivated prosecution. Likud offered only a dead end to Feiglin. Most of Likud voters are anti-Labor rather than right; few subscribe to Feiglins policy of holding on to Judea and Samaria. Likud also moderated Feiglin, particularly on the issue of transferring Israeli Arabs to Jordan; such moderation cost Feiglin a great number of right-wing votes. Feiglin has little chance to rise through Likuds hierarchy. There are many ways to shut him up. For example, the proposed merger with Israel Beitenu pushes Feiglins candidates to the bottom of Likuds list. Even if Feiglin surprisingly rises to Likuds leadership and makes the party right-wing, he would only see Likuds electorate switching to other centrist parties. Partys brand is a great asset in huge mature democracies like the US; launching a new party is prohibitively expensive. Small, new democracies like Israel typically have a fluid party composition, with parties continuously entering and leaving the political scene. That trend is especially pronounced in a country of credulous, dreaming, messianically minded Jews who jump on every savior media ads proclaim to them. Hijacking Likud makes no sense for Feiglin. Can the right wing form a winning coalition? Voter turnout is fairly high among Israels 19% Arabs; they vote Jewish left (which is Arab right). Slavs and Jews-by-grandfather form about 15% of Israeli population. They often stand for strong measures against Arabs, but rarely support truly conservative ideas like the annexed Judea and Samaria, expelled Arabs, and even united Jerusalem; they are decent soldiers, but its just not their war. They fought equally courageously in Afghanistan and Chechnya. Close to 10% of Israeli Jewish citizens reside abroad and dont vote. Not less than a third of Jews are hard-core leftists who embrace Arabs in the Jewish state and dont consider Judea the Jewish land. Israeli conservatives cannot hope for a majority. Even if they do form the Knesset majority, the leftist Supreme Court would quash their racist moves, and Israeli security establishment based on the MAPAI core will enforce the lefts law. Murders of Kahane family and Zeevi showed that Israeli establishment wont risk ideological competitors. They will be bought like Lieberman, subverted into political mainstream like Feiglin, or killed like Kahane. Government propaganda machine didnt yet try on Feiglin a fraction of its facilities mobilized against Kahane or Sharon.