MickityMike

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6775311/

I'm getting increasingly optimistic about the Israeli-Palestinian War. Although I still worry that a Palestinian civil war will be necessary in order for the Palestinians to make peace with Israel:

"However, the road map also calls on the Palestinians to disarm militants, a step Abbas is unwilling to take. He has said he would try to persuade, but not coerce, the armed groups to halt attacks. After the Gaza crossing attack, Israel warned that Abbas is quickly running out of time."

I think Abbas is eventually going to have to fight the militants in order to neuter them politically. It remains to see whether he has the means or the will to do so.

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I'd be delighted to live in a country where happily married gay couples had closets full of assault weapons. - Glenn Reynolds

goldberry

I agree with Israel supporters that Arafat wasn't a good leader, but it's for different reasons.

Hopefully Abbas can take a new approach to matters by exposing the truth about Israel through non-violence. I think Arafat's militant approach, just like bin-Laden's is horribly ineffective because the focus shifts to the violent act itself rather than what caused it in the first place. Headlines of "Palestinians marching to former homes get shot by IDF" would be much more effective because then people would be asking "Why can't they go home? Why are unarmed civilians being shot at?" instead of "Why did they blow a bus up?" ... however organizing such an event is difficult as it takes a leader who can give the majority enough courage (and I can only imagine that it would take a lot of it) to put themselves in harms way w/o fighting back and I don't think Abbas has the charisma to do that.

Abbas fighting militants is not the solution, convincing them to take a different approach is. For the past 100 years foreigners have imposed themselves on indigenous Palestinians, and until that wrong is righted nothing will stop the conflict.

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"Is our children learning?" George W. Bush

MickityMike

Unfortunately, I don't see much hope in Abbas being able to "convince" the militants with anything short of violence.