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> They can. They voted in Hamas in Gaza and the PA in the West Bank. They are not Israeli citizens, which is why they don't vote in Israeli elections OK great, what country are they citizens of, then? Are they stateless? Sure seems like it. Like, either the current settler activity in the West Bank is an illegal invasion and occupation of another country, or Judea and Samaria (funnily enough where most of the New Testament happens) are part of Israel, and thus the Palestinians there should get votes in Israeli elections. You can't have it both ways. > Nice summary for wars that were NEVER started by Israel. And before you mention Iran, it has been at war with Israel since 1979, the moment it declared it would erase Israel off the face of the Earth, and has been actively attacking Israel through its proxies (Hamas, Hezbollah) for decades. I'm certainly not going to defend the Iranian regime or Hezbollah. Hamas are assholes, but there are legitimate concerns around what has happened to the Palestinian people since 1948 (well really before that, but 1948 is a convenient date). I don't agree with their violence, but when there is no hope of a negotiated solution, I'm entirely unsurprised that some people choose violence. |
There's a third category you're missing: disputed territory pending final-status negotiations. It's a real thing in international law, not a dodge. Taiwanese don't vote in PRC elections. Western Saharans don't vote in Moroccan ones. Kosovars didn't vote in Serbian elections while the status was unresolved.
Also worth getting the facts straight on who actually controls what:
Gaza isn't occupied. Israel pulled out in 2005, every settler, every soldier. Hamas runs it because they won the 2006 election and then murdered Fatah members in the streets to consolidate power. The blockade started after that, not before.
West Bank Areas A and B (where most Palestinians live) are under Palestinian Authority civil control, with PA security control in A. They vote for the PA. The reason they haven't voted lately is Abbas, who is in year 21 of his 4-year term because he keeps cancelling elections. That's not on Israel.
East Jerusalem Palestinians can apply for Israeli citizenship. Most decline for political reasons, which is their call, but the option exists.
Israeli Arabs (the ones who stayed in 48) are full citizens. They vote, sit in the Knesset, sit on the Supreme Court. An Arab party was in the governing coalition as recently as 2021.
So "stateless people denied votes" doesn't really hold up.
> when there is no hope of a negotiated solution
This is the part I'd push back on hardest because it's just not what happened.
1947 partition: offered a state, Arabs rejected and invaded. 1967 Khartoum: "no peace, no recognition, no negotiations" after losing a war they started. Camp David 2000: Barak offers ~92% of the WB plus Gaza plus East Jerusalem, Arafat walks with no counteroffer and launches the Second Intifada. Taba 2001: same deal sweetened, no agreement. Olmert 2008: 94% plus 1:1 land swaps, shared Jerusalem, refugee compensation framework. Abbas literally never responded. Says so himself in interviews.
Meanwhile every neighbor that actually wanted peace got it. Egypt 1979, Jordan 1994, then UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, Sudan in 2020. Turns out it's pretty achievable when one side shows up.
The PA also still runs the "Martyrs Fund" paying salaries to families of terrorists scaled to how many Israelis they killed. That's a policy choice, not the behavior of people with no options.
> I'm entirely unsurprised that some people choose violence
The thing is nobody actually applies this principle evenly. Kurds have a way better case for statehood and don't fly planes into buildings. Tibetans, Uyghurs, same. The "violence was inevitable" reasoning only ever gets extended to this one conflict, and that should make you suspicious of the reasoning rather than confident in it.