A very important source for my understanding of this conflict today (as opposed to conflicting histories) is the Ask Project youtube channel.

With this channel which has been operated for several years, both Israelis and Palestinians are asked very probing uncomfortable questions about the conflict.

I have watched countless hours of their responses and though the people selected are random (so it is not a scientific sampling) I feel much more can be learned from the sum of all those interviews than surveys and polls. In an emotional sense as opposed to just stats.

For reference the founder of the channel Corey Gil-Shuster (who is a secular Canadian Israeli professor) has concluded based on all his interviewing work that it is COMPLETELY HOPELESS situation.

He sees no path to peace whatsoever.

I totally get where he's coming from and he's probably right, but I do see one very very remote path of potential opportunity.for peace.

First lets go over general outcomes that are possible (in my opinion of course)

-- Status quo more or less of the current miserable situation. Israel loses U.S. support but finds other avenues in other countries for the next decades and longer. I consider this the most likely.

-- Israel demonizers pipe dream. US cuts off Israel entirely, mass self deportation of Jews, Palestinians take over and force all or most all of the Jews to leave or if not, murder them. I consider this possible but very unlikely.

-- One state solution which would be majority Arab in my view that would just be a first step to option above. I consider this very very unlikely.

-- Full genocide of all Palestinians by Israel. Israel demonizers think that is a real threat. It really isn't. Israel would never do that. They may be bad but they're not that bad. I consider this outcome almost impossible.

-- The one chance.

The US applies heavy pressure on Israel to begin a real process of compromise with a long term goal of a two state solution and Israelis out of the west bank. So instead of cutting off Israel, use the real possibility of that as strong leverage. Because Israel holds most of the power relative to the Palestinians, Israel would need to take the first steps to try to establish a basis of TRUST. Once that happens if it ever does, then both sides must put leaders into power that are fully dedicated to mutual compromise and peace. From Israel there could be Trumpian ideas of promises to help make Palestine rich as part of the carrot not stick plan. Such a path even best case scenario would take several years as it would need to be step by step. I know many wish for a quick and easy answer. It doesn't exist so forget about it.

Appendix --

My conclusions based on watching the Ask Project videos

The Palestinian side is significantly more hawkish especially among the YOUNGER ones and the YOUNGER ones count more. The consensus of their opinion is NO COMPROMISE. No two state solution,. We must take it all back and the Jews can go wherever we don't care they're the evil occupiers or if not, kill them. They can't stay. PERIOD, So for a chance of peace Palestine will need leadership that rather than reflects their people, is strong enough to LEAD them in a better more realistic direction. Chances are such leaders would be murdered though.

From the Jewish Israelu side, Israelis experienced the music festival massacre as a modern pogrom.

They were truly shocked, and fear was massively increased, and there is a strong consensus to make sure that never happens again. As we all know the psychology of that has led to overkill in Gaza.

Not making an excuse for that, the Israeli government is guilty of doing that.

They're more hawkish than ever but other than a minority of extremists they have no interest in taking over all of west bank, Gaza, and or forcing all the Arabs out (or killing them all). There still remains a feeling among Israelis that if only the Arabs demonstrated a real will for peace, giving up on taking over all of Israel, fully accepting the nation state of Israel as legit and permanent, then they could be open to compromises for peace. So the key is building TRUST on both sides. Obviously at this point in time, there is no trust on either side, thus no rational reason for optimism.

I realize the Israel demonizers will say, no, you're wrong. the Jews are just as inflexible or more so than the Arabs. Think what you want but I think that is not the case.

All this said, i wouldn't bet 10 dollars the path towards peace that I've descibed will actually happen.

Too bad about that because anything other than something close to that, and the misery goes on indefinitely.

'

--

Edited May 13May 13 by Jingthing

If you're interested in the Ask Project which I highly recommend to those interested in the conflict here's the link.

www.youtube.com/@CoreyGilShusterAskProject

I think I've learned a lot from it. However, you won't learn much by watching one or a few videos. On the other hand, nobody is going to watch ALL of their over 1,400 videos! Founded in 2010.

That said, this recent video is very spot on to this topic, so here goes:

Edited May 13May 13 by Jingthing

You are trying to change the minds of jew haters who would happily toss you alive and screaming into a pit of burning corpses. There is no convincing, appealing to reason, conversations or discussion. They are unsalvagable. The only neccessary thing is to identify them.

The jew haters started this existential war. Uncle Sam made a sad effort to eradicate it with the bullet and rope, but the events got in the way. Now its up to the jews (whoever and wherever they are) or judeo-chrisitians to finish the job. As an American, I would be happy to join them like my kin did 80 years ago and give whatever support I could give as an old fat man.

Maybe I could buy some Halloween Hasid garb and walk past a terrorist supporting gathering with a 1911 IWB SOB

Edited May 13May 13 by Yagoda
damn left out a word again

Seems like just about every other neighbor has accepted Israel in their region, though some of them grudgingly.

The exception is Iran, who is funding a lot of the fight against Israel. Scratch below the surface of just about every attack on Israel, and you'll find Iranian money and support. Until there's regime change in Iran (bringing back moderate government), there will be no peace in the region.

Sucks, I know. But that's the reality.

6 minutes ago, impulse said:

Seems like just about every other neighbor has accepted Israel in their region, though some of them grudgingly.

The exception is Iran, who is funding a lot of the fight against Israel. Scratch below the surface of just about every attack on Israel, and you'll find Iranian money and support. Until there's regime change in Iran (bringing back moderate government), there will be no peace in the region.

Sucks, I know. But that's the reality.

Yes, of course, proxy terror groups funded by Iran.

In the very unlikely event that peace breaks out between Israel and the Palestinians, and considering Iran's internal issues, maybe that kind of thing could quiet down.

Expanding a bit on my OP, what's different now and going forward is rapidly decreasing support for military help for Israel from the US.

Israelis surely know about this and understand it is a very serious matter for them,

So this is a new and growing crisis for Israel. It's irrelevant that this is largely self inflicted by Israel, the cause doesn't change the reality.

So in the classic sense, crisis can mean new oppotunity.

The new opportunity is that Israel assuming an eventual new US president is more vulnerable than ever to US pressure.

As noted the first step would need to be heavy US pressure.

Much heavier than Obama tried to.

22 hours ago, Jingthing said:

A very important source for my understanding of this conflict today (as opposed to conflicting histories) is the Ask Project youtube channel.

With this channel which has been operated for several years, both Israelis and Palestinians are asked very probing uncomfortable questions about the conflict.

I have watched countless hours of their responses and though the people selected are random (so it is not a scientific sampling) I feel much more can be learned from the sum of all those interviews than surveys and polls. In an emotional sense as opposed to just stats.

For reference the founder of the channel Corey Gil-Shuster (who is a secular Canadian Israeli professor) has concluded based on all his interviewing work that it is COMPLETELY HOPELESS situation.

He sees no path to peace whatsoever.

I totally get where he's coming from and he's probably right, but I do see one very very remote path of potential opportunity.for peace.

First lets go over general outcomes that are possible (in my opinion of course)

-- Status quo more or less of the current miserable situation. Israel loses U.S. support but finds other avenues in other countries for the next decades and longer. I consider this the most likely.

-- Israel demonizers pipe dream. US cuts off Israel entirely, mass self deportation of Jews, Palestinians take over and force all or most all of the Jews to leave or if not, murder them. I consider this possible but very unlikely.

-- One state solution which would be majority Arab in my view that would just be a first step to option above. I consider this very very unlikely.

-- Full genocide of all Palestinians by Israel. Israel demonizers think that is a real threat. It really isn't. Israel would never do that. They may be bad but they're not that bad. I consider this outcome almost impossible.

-- The one chance.

The US applies heavy pressure on Israel to begin a real process of compromise with a long term goal of a two state solution and Israelis out of the west bank. So instead of cutting off Israel, use the real possibility of that as strong leverage. Because Israel holds most of the power relative to the Palestinians, Israel would need to take the first steps to try to establish a basis of TRUST. Once that happens if it ever does, then both sides must put leaders into power that are fully dedicated to mutual compromise and peace. From Israel there could be Trumpian ideas of promises to help make Palestine rich as part of the carrot not stick plan. Such a path even best case scenario would take several years as it would need to be step by step. I know many wish for a quick and easy answer. It doesn't exist so forget about it.

Appendix --

My conclusions based on watching the Ask Project videos

The Palestinian side is significantly more hawkish especially among the YOUNGER ones and the YOUNGER ones count more. The consensus of their opinion is NO COMPROMISE. No two state solution,. We must take it all back and the Jews can go wherever we don't care they're the evil occupiers or if not, kill them. They can't stay. PERIOD, So for a chance of peace Palestine will need leadership that rather than reflects their people, is strong enough to LEAD them in a better more realistic direction. Chances are such leaders would be murdered though.

From the Jewish Israelu side, Israelis experienced the music festival massacre as a modern pogrom.

They were truly shocked, and fear was massively increased, and there is a strong consensus to make sure that never happens again. As we all know the psychology of that has led to overkill in Gaza.

Not making an excuse for that, the Israeli government is guilty of doing that.

They're more hawkish than ever but other than a minority of extremists they have no interest in taking over all of west bank, Gaza, and or forcing all the Arabs out (or killing them all). There still remains a feeling among Israelis that if only the Arabs demonstrated a real will for peace, giving up on taking over all of Israel, fully accepting the nation state of Israel as legit and permanent, then they could be open to compromises for peace. So the key is building TRUST on both sides. Obviously at this point in time, there is no trust on either side, thus no rational reason for optimism.

I realize the Israel demonizers will say, no, you're wrong. the Jews are just as inflexible or more so than the Arabs. Think what you want but I think that is not the case.

All this said, i wouldn't bet 10 dollars the path towards peace that I've descibed will actually happen.

Too bad about that because anything other than something close to that, and the misery goes on indefinitely.

'

--

There's already a widely adopted path at the UN, and in particular by Arab states.

https://www.un.org/unispal/document/annex-new-york-declaration-06aug25/

It's not going to happen, as the US and Israel are against it. Would a Dem administration support it?

Edited May 14May 14 by candide

As I've made clear, something very big has changed

Support for Israel in the US is now a partisan issue.

Cut off or major restrictions is now probable with a future democratic president.

No democrat can eveh get nominated now without voicing a strong criticism of Israel narrative

Obama hated Netanyahu but he didn’t do much to pressure Israel.

A future democratic president will be able to do much more.

But in my view US pressure is only the first step.

2 hours ago, Jingthing said:

As I've made clear, something very big has changed

Support for Israel in the US is now a partisan issue.

Cut off or major restrictions is now probable with a future democratic president.

No democrat can eveh get nominated now without voicing a strong criticism of Israel narrative

Obama hated Netanyahu but he didn’t do much to pressure Israel.

A future democratic president will be able to do much more.

But in my view US pressure is only the first step.

You're right, this is a major shift. Netanyahu has single-handedly managed to erase what was left of the enormous pool of goodwill Israelis gained based on the Holocaust the world over, and in the US that seems to have resulted in Dem candidates not having to fall all over themselves declaring their blind support for Israel.

I think this is progress, because what we've seen in Gaza was not much better than what the Nazis were doing.

35 minutes ago, BLMFem said:

You're right, this is a major shift. Netanyahu has single-handedly managed to erase what was left of the enormous pool of goodwill Israelis gained based on the Holocaust the world over, and in the US that seems to have resulted in Dem candidates not having to fall all over themselves declaring their blind support for Israel.

I think this is progress, because what we've seen in Gaza was not much better than what the Nazis were doing.

It's progress if it leads to a reasonable OK peaceful outcome for both peoples.

Personally, as I've detailed all the unlikely things that need to happen to get there, I wouldn't bet 10 dollars on success. Not impossible, but not likely either as it's not only Israel that would need to change -- the Palestinians also need to change and give up on maximalist River to the sea demands.

In my view, if it leads to the expulsion and massacre of Israeli Jews, that is not progress except for racist Jew haters.

Israel may or may not have alternative cards to play. Some gulf states, certainly India, and who knows maybe Russia someday as there are so many Russian Israelis.

It's not necessarily game over for Israel if there is cut off from the U.S. but it certainly is a new kind of dangerous game.

Edited May 14May 14 by Jingthing