Via Thinking Meat


Dixie Flatline: Why do I hate?


An extraordinarily well-written entry on the loss of sympathy toward the Palestinians. Well worth reading.

[...]This is the path taken by countless peoples through history. Assimilation is impossible for the Palestinians, fault for this on both sides. But co-existence is possible. The building of a statelet where none existed before is possible. Grudging acceptance is possible.


Of course, there is an alternative to acceptance, the peace of the vanquished, and that is rejection, revolt, war from the shadows. Had the Palestinians taken this path, had Arafat spit in Barak’s face and said: we will meet you on the battlefield, I would have been sympathetic. I am a romantic, and there is something eternally appealing about a conquered peoples rising up and confronting certain defeat, rifles in hand. Had the Palestinians waged honest guerilla warfare, snipers and sappers and saboteurs, targeting the IDF, spilling the blood of Jewish soldiers wherever and whenever they could, I would not have objected. I would have sided with the Israelis, but there would be a measure of respect for the Palestinians, willing to die in honorable resistance. They would not have earned victory, but nobility in defeat, a triumphant memory of valiant struggle, generations of respect for bravery in the face of despair.


But the Palestinians chose a third path, one largely untaken in human history. Oslo rejected, honest war rejected. Instead, Arafat calls them forth: here is your chance to use your enemy’s humanity against them. Demonstrate your might by targeting the weakest of their citizens.


It is at this moment that my sympathy dies.[...]