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Originally Posted by Lazonby
you refuse to accept that Israel is the good guy even in the face of extreme provocation from the 'Palestinians'.
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Ummm... that is a particularly one-sided view of the situation. But letting that slide, I'm not sure it is even relevant any more who is wearing the white hat and who the black.
However it came about, you have around a million (Palestinian) Arabs living in Israel, where they are second-class citizens; 3½ million or so living in fairly serious poverty in the West Bank and Gaza; and about 4 million more Palestinians in other Arab countries where they are more or less unwelcome (in Lebanon many have been living in refugee camps for 40 years). And unfortunately people in this world rarely do the right thing so let's not kid ourselves: no-one would be sparing any of those 8+ million people a second thought if some of them hadn't resorted to violence.
That doesn't make them right and it doesn't mean Israel is wrong for not immediately doing what they want. But in terms of anyone out there having a normal life, it makes the question of who was right and wrong 50-odd years ago irrelevant today.
I don't know how anyone is going to break the cycle, because even if Israel stops retaliating, that doesn't solve the Palestinians' problems, so it won't end the violence. I'm not sure the situation is solvable, because the West Bank is probably incapable of sustaining the population it has now. It certainly couldn't be a home to twice as many people, even if Israel were willing to permit that.
It's hard to imagine the violence going on for decades more. But it's just as hard to imagine why it should stop.