Calls for "Peace!" won't cut it.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

I have long since lost count of the number of people I have seen posting sentiments along the lines of "I just want to see peace! All sides, stop the killing!" and apparently believing that they are making a useful or meaningful contribution to the debate on the current Israeli/arab conflict. If one were able to control the actions of all sides at once, establishing a peace in the Middle East would be trivial. The problem is that *someone has to move first*.

What I would like to see instead of such posts are people putting forward a series of actions which *one party* (the Israeli government, the heads of Hezbollah, the Palestinian authority, the US government, the Lebanese government etc) could take "unilaterally" (although "ask X to negotiate" is a perfectly good unilateral step in the sense of the word I'm using it) which would be likely lead to a solution you would consider acceptable *if all other parties reacted the way they most probably would, rather than the way that you would like them to*.

For bonus marks, put forward such a plan that the party in question might actually take - suggesting that the US government should intervene to force Israel to the negotiating table is not going to be realistic for another three years at least, I fear.

Simply saying "Stop the killing! Peace! Peace! I disapprove of both Israeli killing and arab killing!" is not a useful comment - almost everyone agrees with it already; there is no chance of it happening.

[Taverner]

1. OK...I have a solution

The US should stop sending money to Israel, Germany should stop supporting the PLO, and the UN should put sanctions on all sides: Hezbollah, the PLO, IDF, Hamas, etc.

No money or weapons should enter that area, period.

[porphyrian]

5. That would hurt everyone but Israel.

As a symbolic gesture, sure. But Israel doesn't require any money from the US to exist, or even to operate comfortably. However, stateless terrorist organizations have very few legitimate sources of income, and removing those makes it more likely that their laundered money can be discovered and taken from them.

[Taverner]

8. I'm not talking about not just sending AID

I'm talking about ALL monies.

[Name removed]

12. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[RB TexLa]

2. And what do you suggest is to be offered to Hezbolla?

if they are going to be at a negotiating table?

[ixion]

3. okay, here's one: let's stop arming the Israelis

it's a start, because they obviously are not mature enough to handle weaponry.

But then again, neither are we, I guess.

[porphyrian]

6. That won't do much, either.

Who do you think makes the Uzi?

[IA_Seth]

9. Great, all the more reason to stop, right? n/t

[porphyrian]

13. Did you mean "not to stop?"

Israel does not need weapons shipments from the US to have an effective military. Thus, cutting off shipments of US weapons to Israel is not an effective solution. That's all I'm saying.

[IA_Seth]

Well, if they don't need them...

Then why the hell should we continue to send them?

Lots of hungry people in the US could use the money that we waste on arming Israel, right?

[Name removed]

32. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[IA_Seth]

28. Well, if they don't need them...

Then why the hell should we continue to send them?

Lots of hungry people in the US could use the money that we waste on arming Israel, right?

[porphyrian]

33. You already said that. - n/t

[IA_Seth]

34. Hey thanks. - n/t

[ixion]

10. it's a start, and it's better than selling arms to them

[porphyrian]

14. Why's that? Because they use them?

Why single out Israel? Virtually everyone we sell weapons to end up using them, usually with a bunch of civilian casualties no one here seems very up in arms about at the moment.

[Swamp Rat]

4. OK, how about YOU GO THERE and stop the killing.

I'll stay here and post peace signs in threads calling for peace.

[niyad]

7. tell that to Dorit, an israeli, and ibitsum, a palestinian, both of whom

say, "it no longer matters who is right or wrong, it must simply stop NOW"

[porphyrian]

15. I agree with Dorit and Ibitsum. - n/t

[Donald Ian Rankin]

22. What do they mean by "must"?

If they mean "it would be far better if it did simply stop now" then I completely agree with them.

If they mean "there is a chance of it simply stopping" then I think they are wrong. There is no such chance, much as I wish there was.

If it's going to stop, it's going to be a long, slow, messy process (slow enough that many more civilian deaths on both sides are inevitable), and one side or the other is going to have to take the lead.

The problem is *not* going to miraculously go away, whether it "must" or not.

[MoseyWalker]

11. My thought

Calls for Peace CAN cut it, if the US doesn't block the calls for a cease fire.

Stop killing people, allow some time for taking a deep breath on everyone's parts, turn over respective "hostages" or "prisoners" and look to the future.

A call for peace by some of the greatest humans who have ever lived on this earth has worked in the past. Once there are no more bombs flying back and forth, peace will find a way, through the actions of the world's leaders who seek it.

Peace can and always will cut it. There could be a very real possibility of it happening if people listened to the voices of reason.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

18. Overidealistic, I fear.

Israel's prisoners are a continuum of people from out-and-out mass-murderers of civilians to those who planned paramilitary acts to politicians who advocated bombings but never had any part in planning them to total innocents; Israel is never going to release all of them and there will always be quarrels about which ones it does and doesn't release. The arabs only hold a few prisoners, nearly all of them soldiers.

Even if the Israelis pull back out of Lebanon, Hezbollah will keep firing rockets into Israel.

Even if Hezbollah stops firing rockets into Israel, Israel will continue with the invasion and bombing of Lebanon.



"Once there are no more bombs flying back and forth, peace will find a way" is like saying "once it stops raining, the weather will be dry", and while I agree that there are all sorts of "if"s that, *if* they happened, would make calls for peace worthwhile, none of those ifs *are* the case.



"A call for peace by some of the greatest humans who have ever lived on this earth has worked in the past."

What cases are you thinking of?

[MoseyWalker]

21. Once one is able to disengage

from a current conflict, and look at it in a historical light, I believe it can be seen that much/most of the damage that was inflicted during the conflict could have been averted if only the idea of peace could remain at the forefront of one's thought processes.

Immediate peace is a cease fire. That's not overly idealistic. That's realistic if one is looking at burned dead people as being not a good thing.

Long term peace comes through whatever is put in place to moderate after the cease fire.

I am not idealistic because I believe in the power of peace, and am far from being naive.

Not everyone is going to love one another, but guess what - they can have peace between one another very easily.

Are you not capable of recalling any great leaders from the past who have called for peace in times of conflict?

[Donald Ian Rankin]

23. I can't recall any great leaders who *successfully* called for peace

except when there were other economic and political factors mitigating for it too, no, and in those cases it wasn't the calling that achieved it.

What brings peace is either one side "winning", i.e. being able to impose terms, or one side or the other realising that peace is more in its interests than continuing war is, and withdrawing its troops from contact with the enemy.

The problem with that in this situation is that because most of the targets of the conflict on both sides are civilians each side can and (I'm afraid) will continue fighting even if the other one stops, and as the Israelis don't trust Hezbollah negotiating to both stop at once is going to be tricky.

[MoseyWalker]

26. The beginning of an education or

whatever..........

http://library.thinkquest.org/TQ0312702/worldleaders.htm

[Donald Ian Rankin]

27. You still haven't given me any examples.

None of the leaders listed there, so far as I know, ever managed to achieve the end of a war simply by calling for it.

[MoseyWalker]

29. I don't think you're paying attention!

They call for peace and justice, and it happens sometimes, because of the enlightenment and actions of those who listen and follow.

Ghandi. Do a search, and actually read some of the results?

One example. How many do you need? If you require, I'll make it a mission to provide you with examples.

Calls for peace, no matter the origination point, are still calls for peace.

I call for peace for the reasons and in the ways I have already written in outline form. I'm just one, but many also do.

How about Kucinich? Read any of his words lately?

[Donald Ian Rankin]

36. And which war did Ghandi stop simply by calling for it?

He got the British out of India by making it impossible for them to hold on to it through civil disobediance (incidentally, a tactic that won't help in the Middle East because neither side cares about civilian suffering).
.

[Warren DeMontague]

16. Calls for "War!" won't cut it, either.

Guess the situation is fairly well fucked.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

20. I'm afraid I think that's a fair summary.

I don't think there is any prospect of peace in the Middle East for the forseeable future, because I can't see any sequence of events that could possibly lead to it.

I posted this thread in the hope that someone might suggest one, but no-one has yet done so.

I think "fairly well fucked" about covers it, alas.

[The Stranger]

Seems to be the new meme: You can't control all sides, so keep killing.

The posts were earlier asking what would happen if Israel stopped bombing. Now this: you cannot control everyone, so forget peace.

Please, I want my PROGRESSIVE DU BACK.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

25. You've misunderstood my point.

"You can't control all sides, so if you want the killing to stop then something that doesn't rely on mutual coordination and trust is going to be necessary".

A practical suggestion for ending the killing has to be either "The Israelis must do this, that and the other" or "Hezbollah must do this, that and the other", not "The Israelis must do this and the other, and Hezbollah must do that at the same time".

I think posts asking what would happen if Israel stopped bombing are an excellent idea; I've posted on at least one such thread. But they are *far* outnumbered by simple "it should all stop at once" posts, and that's not worth discussing, not because it wouldn't be great if it did happen, but because there's no way it will.

[The Stranger]

30. Well, don't forget that the Israelis are in their country.

So they probably won't stop fighting until you get out of their living rooms.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

31. "You"?

I'm not in anybody's living room but my own, thanks, and in as much as I take sides in this conflict I'm "on the arabs' side" (although I think a great deal of what they're doing is unjustifiable and evil).

I don't condone the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, I just don't think that "calling" for it to end will help end it.

[EFerrari]

17. That's about the silliest thing I've read all week.

Tell you what, I'll keep calling for peace and you can keep enabling the Thuggery. But not on my screen.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

19. Simply calling for something seldom helps achieve it.

You go on calling for peace.

I'll go on asking for suggestions as to how it might actually be achieved.

[rucky]

24. Actually, calls for peace are going to have to cut it.

We don't make policy decisions, so it doesn't matter what solutions we come up with.

All we can do is keep putting pressure on the people who are in power to come to a peaceful solution immediately. There have been calls for cease fires which have been ignored by both sides (and the US). This leaves the war with two sides, but they're not Israel and Hezbollah - they are people who want war and people who want peace. If you reject a cease fire option, you want war. If you call for a cease fire, you want peace. If you pressure your leaders to call for a cease fire, you are doing what's little in your power to change this disastarous chain of events. If enough people do it, then they'll at some point be forced to at least address the public pressure.

If you don't call for it, well, there's plenty of other threads to discuss that.

I will be the first to admit that this is not a very effective strategy, and it's damn frustrating not to be able to do more...but shouldn't we all be used to that by now?

[guinivere]

35. If I have such a plan I sure as hell wouldn't be

a) sitting here and posting on DU
b) wouldn't be landscaping for a living.


All I can do is call for peace and hope like hell it lasts.

[Bridget Burke]

37. So--until someone successfully solves your little word game...

Continued death & destruction is just fine with you.

Like Bush--wanting to avoid a "Fake peace." Anyone killed between now and a peace that suits both of you is just another piece on your game board. Mostly pawns....

[Donald Ian Rankin]

38. No, you've completely and utterly misunderstood everything I said.

I don't know what makes you think that "continued death and destruction is just fine with you", but I can't see how anything I said could lead you to that conclusion.

My point is not that everyone simply laying down their arms and being friends wouldn't be desirable, but that there is no way it can happen.

Any peace move is going to have to start on one side or the other.

It would be much easier, and save more lives, if both sides acted simultaneously in concorde, and were therefor able to benefit from the other side doing so, and so a lot of DUers are calling for that, but that isn't how it can actually work, for the reasons I laid out.

By all means call for Israel to stop even though Hezbollah aren't, and separately call for Hezbollah to stop even though Izrael aren't. But calling for both to stop "together" in some way is a fundamental misunderstanding of the game theory of the situation.

(There's also the depressing fact that all the "calls" on DU put together have about as much influence on the middle east as an elephant biting a flea does on sunspot activity, but I chose to ignore that for the purpose of starting this thread).

[otherlander]

39. It's better than being sucked into the sectarian crap

which has sparked countless flame wars already. And discussing future solutions would be a lot more productive than arguing about only the current conflict.