My thoughts on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the prospects for peace in the middle east was always to recognize that both sides were at fault and did not have clean hands. And the only path to peace was for Israel to return some of the land seized in 1967, i.e. the Gaza strip and most of the West Bank, to Palestinian control so that they could have their own state.
But the Palestinians would have to control their own people too. The terrorism would have to stop. And the PLO or PA would have to round up its own citizens who were guilty of terrorism against Israel. That is they had to do in exchange for land and peace. Otherwise what is the incentive for Israel to cede control over Gaza and the West Bank?
None.
So I watched with detached curiousity as the ultra right wing Israeli zealot Ariel Sharon decided to pursue peace unilaterally, and fulfill Israel's obligations under prior peace plans by withdrawing from settlements in Gaza and the Northern West Bank.
I figured this was a grand political move that would bring sympathy and respect to Israel. Israel was doing its part in the peace process. It was giving the land back, ceding it to Palestinian control. The ball was being placed back in the PA's court. Will they drop it? Or will the attacks stop?
Many on the Israeli right, like Benjamin Netanyahu, feared that Sharon would only be giving Palestinian terror groups like Hamas free control over the Gaza strip since the PA is effectively a corrupt and powerless organization. They feared the Gaza strip would simply be nothing more than a launching pad for rockets into Israel.
Lost in the U.S.'s preoccupation with its own twin disasters of the Iraq War and Bush-Katrina, was the fact that those fears have been realized.
There simply can be no peace so long as Hamas and the Islamic Jihad have more power and control over the Palestinian people and territory than the PA has. Israel now has every right to retaliate at will against the Palestinians. The grand hope of peaceful truce between Palestinians and Israelis, with a thriving Palestinian state on the West Bank and Gaza are fading fast, and not because Israel retaliates...but because Hamas and other terror groups like Islamic jihad strike first, with the delusion in their mind that they can drive Israel back into the sea.
Israel is the good guy here. There can be no further dispute on that. They acted in good faith in pulling out of Gaza, and that good faith was returned with rocket attacks.