War Must Be Won
Reader comment on item: "A Shot at Peace": Can the U.S. Enforce the "Road Map"

Submitted by L.J. Meyer (United States), Jul 8, 2003 at 10:44

As always, your articles are a light in the darkness.

I am actually quite pessimistic about prospects for peace. As you so eloquently pointed out in a previous article, wars end when a vanquished participant sues the other side for peace on the winner's terms. This is how WWII ended, and how the peace in Europe reigns unto today.

If "peace" is achieved by any other means, such as happened after WWI, then that "peace" only invites further hostilities in the future. I greatly fear that the "road map" is just this sort of halfway "peace" and is therefore doomed to failure.

The "Palestinians" need to be vanquished. And come, literally, on their knees to Israel and accept whatever terms Israel imposes upon them. Israel must completely smash all of the terrorist organizations (negotiations are fruitless, given their unshakable commitment to the destruction of the Jewish state), and kill the leaders and the followers. Then, and only then, Israel will have a chance to remake school curricula, and decisively end the on-going incitement of the population.

Occupation of the "Palestinian" territories will probably have to continue for quite some time, perhaps even a generation or two, just as occured in Germany and Japan. The very essence of the "Palestinian" society must be completely changed, again as was the case in Germany and Japan.

Harsh words, but with the proper economic development of the area, and perhaps eventual granting of statehood (where there never was a state, but no matter...), Peace (note the capital letter and absence of quotation marks) might have a chance.
But dealing from overwhelming strength is the only answer.

---

Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened for relevance, substance, and tone, and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome, but comments are rejected if scurrilous, off-topic, vulgar, ad hominem, or otherwise viewed as inappropriate. For complete regulations, see the Guidelines for Comments. For informational purposes, we identify countries from which comments are sent.