[crote]

So who will be in power? You've got to remember that Hamas was democratically elected back in 2006, and its main rival Fatah isn't exactly pro-Israel either. Given the circumstances, I don't think there could possibly be a democratically elected government in Gaza which is pro-Israel or even neutral-Israel. Your only option is a puppet dictatorship government installed by Israel - but that's not really going to improve the situation, is it?

Besides, you've got to remember that a country is more than its government. What's going to stop its citizens from independently creating their own underground Hamas 2.0 terror group? What's going to stop the kids currently growing up and seeing their parents die due to Israeli actions from wanting revenge?

The situation is too far gone. Either Israel is going to learn how to live with the possibility of an attack (which is going to decrease over time as generations grow up who don't inherently hate Israel with every bone in their body for what it has done to them), or Israel is going to have to kill every single person in Gaza to make sure there's nobody left who could hate them. They should probably continue with Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt - because they all could attack Israel, after all...

France still has to live with the risk of Germany invading. It's fairly unlikely by now, but that risk exists. Germany has invaded multiple times in the not-too-distant past and done some pretty atrocious things while there. Germany still has a pretty large military, and I would be quite surprised if they didn't have some kind of invasion plan lying around in a drawer somewhere. Yet somehow, I don't think the average French citizen in 2025 loses any sleep over it. If they can live with the risk, why does Israel require absolutes?

[BrandoElFollito]

> , I don't think the average French citizen in 2025 loses any sleep over it. If they can live with the risk, why does Israel require absolutes?

No, we do not lose sleep about that. We have also been at war with England, Italy and Spain a lot. Especially England. We keep a close eye on them still that the Hastings battle is not forgotten.

But on the serious side, these concerns are so remote compared with the situation in Israel and Palestine. We do not have any territory claims with Germany. They have their land, we have ours. If you ask a random person in France about territoires we should get back, they would be really confused. The ones historically inclined would consider the 7th and 8th century and Charlemagne's lands.

I guess that this topic in the mind of Israelis and Palestinians is much, much more prevalent.

[bawolff]

In fairness here, germany and france have been at peace for something like 80 years, most of that a fairly friendly peace. The people who remember a time when Germany was the enemy are basically dead by now. 80 years buys a lot of by-gones

Hell, maybe Germany and Israel make a good comparison here. The jews who lived in mandatory palestine during WW2 were certainly afraid of Germany (and rightfully so), but i don't think Israel loses much sleep over the modern state of Germany.

[BrandoElFollito]

Yes, I totally agree. I wanted to make it clear that the analogy for France-Germany simply does not fly.

Our countries have been at war for two millennia (whatever "country" meant across the ages), like the rest of Europe. Then, after WWII, a tremendous effort was made to mend the relationship, and the really good idea was to involve the youth.

When I was a teenager in the 80s, those who had German as a foreign language (sometimes as the first foreign language, before English) had exchanges with peers in Germany (they were coming to us and living with us for a week, and then we were going to them). It was great.

30 years later, my son had the same exchange and I could look at the kids' behaviour more closely. They (the French and the Germans kids) decided to have a football match. I was sure that it would be a Germany vs France one. Not at all: they mixed up, with teams composed of pairs (local and foreign). It was a-ma-zing.

[nradov]

France no longer has to live with the risk of of a conventional invasion by Germany because France has nuclear weapons now and Germany does not. If a terrorist group was using German territory as a base to launch attacks against France and the German government refused to stop them then I'm pretty sure that France would retaliate kinetically, even if that meant some collateral damage. The USA did this in 2001 when Al Qaeda used Afghanistan as a base; France even assisted with that war.

Geography also matters. Israel is tiny compared to France. Israel has zero strategic depth and population centers could be overrun in a matter of hours if defenses failed. This tends to push their strategic planning towards absolutism. And to be clear I'm not trying to justify Israeli actions, just pointing out the strategic calculus at work and the difficulty of negotiating an agreement acceptable to both sides.

[xg15]

Israel also has nuclear weapons...

[nradov]

Yes, but those nuclear weapons are only a deterrent against other nation states. They aren't effective against Palestinian terrorist organizations, so they don't factor into the question of whether Israel should be willing to accept some significant ongoing risk of terrorist attacks.

[tptacek]

Hamas and Fatah are not comparable in their militancy (or, for that matter, their democratic legitimacy; that a plurality of Gazans are not old enough ever to have voted is not an accident on Hamas' part).

[DrNosferatu]

France no longer has to live with the risk of an invasion by Germany *because* the Allies stopped the cycle of violence by deciding to reconstruct Germany rather than erase her off the map.

That’s the reason why.

As abundantly mentioned already, the Palestinian survivors will remember and have their revenge someday.

…unless the plan is: “there will be no survivors”.

Have you noticed how shocking the above “plan” is? Events seem to closely align with it. A literal final solution. Equally shocking is how little people care about actual genocide, and - consequently - how normalized this is in practice.

The international community lets Israel get away with far too much.