Needless to say, I quite disagree. Not that military reaction to missiles being fired by Hamas should be off the table, but doing little or nothing for the peace process for four years and then to top it off throwing in a mini-war to get a little boost for the elections, that's terrible.

It would be a more ludicrous idea if, you know, it wasn't already happening more and more. In Israel proper, the climbing percentage of Arab Israelis is bound to force some changes one way or the other in the future; and in the West Bank, the continued existence and even expansion of the settlements means that to an ever increasing degree, Palestinians and settlers are "sharing" the West Bank. I don't think it's so stupid to conclude that as long as the two-state solution is short-shifted or put into the freezer like it has been of late, the situation on the ground slowly but surely moves in the direction of a de facto one-state solution.

There are a lot of true obstacles to agreement, but few of them are as big as the settlement movement. I don't think I need to tell you about how impossible normal social and economic life is for most West Bank inhabitants due to the walls, checkpoints, ultra-stringent regulations and other security measures that are made necessary by all the settlements. If you really think that people in a situation like that are going to conclude that sitting tight and putting a leash on all violent outbursts of their side until at some point by luck or coincidence an Israeli politician who comes along who happens to have both guts and a rock solid Knesset majority, and who might plausibly be convinced to eliminate a good number of settlements and relax the measures in general - well, that sounds rather optimistic to me. Especially if you look at the polls for the next Israeli election. Or at Netanyahu's reaction (or lack thereof) to Abbas' significant statement of a month or so ago.

I don't expect Israel to start dismantling the settlements as a good-will gesture before a new serious round of negotations - although it would be great if it did - but things aren't gonna go anywhere if the politicians keep sucking up to the settlers and pretending Ariel is a normal Israeli city. It has to be clear to all involved that Ariel has got to go, along with most of the other settlements, and that violent resistance to that by settlers will be met as forcefully as it needs to be.


I don't see that. Toppling the regime in Iran will have a significant effect on Hizbollah, agreed, but much less so on Hamas, which can get at least partial support from far more sides than just Iran, and sympathy for the open-air prison that is Gaza. The road to peace with Hamas lies through peace on the West Bank, not through Iran. Of course one can't negotiate much with Hamas (and the toppling of the Iranian regime would only modestly increase the possibilities in that regard, if you ask me), but peace on the West Bank will undermine Hamas' position in Gaza and show the inhabitants of Gaza that peace will give them better lives.