I will say that it is to laugh to think that the IDF will be routed like Fatah. The Telegraph editorial is absurd. There is simply no comparison.

Hamas, Hezbullah, and Syria are all going to be fighting the last war. The IDF has spent the past year learning from the mistakes of the Second Lebanon War. They will not come down the roads that are already booby-trapped with tank-killing bombs beneath the surface, and tunnels for Hamasniks to run in and out of. They won’t go into the snipers’ nests. They will take a completely unexpected approach if they decide to invade Gaza. Their targets will be Hamas military targets, and they will not be drawn into house-to-house fighting.

The IDF is a thinking army. Fatah is a collection of thugs. Hamas is a collection of thugs with some military training, and no real military leaders. The IDF, if they have truly learned the lessons of Lebanon, will go in, take care of business, and go out, leaving smoking craters where Hamas intelligence and military centers used to be.

And you can pretty much guarantee that no one will be thrown off a building by Israeli soldiers. Nor will they execute teenaged girls.

Those are just my thoughts, gleaned only from what is available to the public to read. If I can figure these things out, I’m guessing the people in the IDF whose job it is to do this have vastly superior plans.

As for Sharon, everybody criticizes him for being a hard-ass. When he was one year old the Arabs massacred the Jewish population of Hebron. While he was a teenager the Nazis murdered nearly the entire Jewish population of Europe, and would have murdered the Jews of Palestine if they had got hold of them. In his twenties five Arab armies invaded the new state of Israel to destroy it and kill all the Jews. He was badly wounded in that war. Througour his adult lifetime he had to fight implacable enemies determined to destroy his country and kill its Jewish inhabitants. If Sharon was a hard-ass, he had reason to be.

The same thing goes for Israel as a whole. Israel has tried withdrawal twice and gotten nothing but murder for its pains. The Arabs carry on with their genocidal war no matter what policies Israel adopts. There is nothing Israel can do to end this war; the initiative is entirely up to the Arabs. It will end only when the Arabs and Muslims sicken of it.

But what particular policies could Israel have engaged in post-1967 that would have led down some completely different road? In what way was Israel the determining factor?

I _think_ what the editors are saying is that if Israel had handled the occupation better and if Sharon had handled the intifada better, then Hamas would not have come to power. But the sentence is rather obtuse.

I’m not arguing that density leads to suicide bombing or hatred or whatever. Just that it is HARD to fight street by street in dense places.

I get the sense that the next round in Gaza against Hamas will not be like Jenin, where the IDF put its men at great risk as a matter of policy. Maybe it won’t be carpet-bombing, either, but there is an address and an enemy at that address, and this is a war of their making. Make of it what you will, but I hope that the Israeli government will decide, finally, to take of the gloves and destroy the enemy’s will to fight. Because that’s what it always takes to really win.

Sorry for the misunderstanding. I’m not challenging what you said. My point was just an: okay, what now? Not a challenge. Just trying to expand out the conversation. I don’t disagree with anything you said.

As for population, I don’t understand your response. I’m not arguing that density leads to suicide bombing or hatred or whatever. Just that it is HARD to fight street by street in dense places.

Mexico City is far more populous than Gaza, and yet, there are no suicide bombers heading into the U.S. from south of the border—even though the southwestern United States was once Mexican territory.

In fact, Hoboken, NJ, is three times as densely populated as Gaza. So, on population density, what exactly is your point?

And again, you are commenting on things I have not said. I did not advocate the reoccupation of Gaza. Kindly ask me to defend statements that I have made, not statements from inside your head, as I am not a mind reader.

Really getting tired of this crap, Eli. REALLY tired of it.