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They're not there to humiliate Palestinians. They have that effect but that's not their purpose.Originally Posted by Hazeleyed Honey
Not all of them are on power trips, but some are. You do make good points, also since they are forced to be in the army and it is mandatory for them.Originally Posted by wawaweewa
Do you think that those kids want to be there? Do you know how stressful it is for all recruits in the IDF knowing that any day a major war can break out and death is that much closer.
That's not even taking into account that life in the IDF is not particularly fun to begin with.
I'm not pulling this out of my %@%. I've heard it from every single Israeli that I know who has served or is serving in the IDF (and that includes Family).
It's not as simple as they 'have guns and go on power trips". That may be correct for a small percentage but not for most.
They have orders to keep the checkpoint under control. It's 5 or 6 of them and thousands of angry (rightfully so) Palestinians. They have orders to only let through a certain amount and only for specific reasons. Of course, those that are not let through get angry at the soldiers. However, are the soldiers really to blame? Do they set the policy?
Even if the soldiers tried to explain the situation the Palestinians don't want to hear and that's understandable. What's also understandable is that these young kids are under stress and take that out on those who are angry at them. They have superiors yelling at them constantly. They have Palestinians yelling at them. Who do you think they're going to take it out on?
That actually reminds me of one time when I went over there and a family member was like. "You know. Most foreign Jews who come here think that if they get in trouble the police will take it easy on them because we're all Jews". Then he started chuckling.
It's just a complicated situation over there.
As long as both sides want what they currently are asking for then there is no solution. One side will have to take much less than they're hoping for. That's the only way to solve this conflict.
Neither side is ready accept such a deal so they'll keep on fighting.
Overall, it is the system of checkpoint that has to be fixed.
How it works though, it is purposely made to humiliate Palestinians and these young soldiers are used to do that job.
Checkpoints are historically a military tactic used in active war zones. In this case they are being applied on a foreign population for a prolonged period oftime. Yes, it is horrible and becomes counterproductive after a short period of time. However, there aren't many other solutions. Until this conflict isresolved there will be Palestinians who want to inflict pain on Israeli's (just as Israeli's inflict pain on Palestinians) so Israeli's have toguard against that. It's only rational.
Israel is building a wall and they get %!*% for that too. It really is just very complicated over there.
To be honest, on the Palestinian side it's going to have to take a leader with the balls to say "Look, if we we want a better life than we'regoing to have to take a lot less than we want. A lot of you may not like it but it has to be done."
It's obvious why there is no such leader because it's much easier to have an enemy to scapegoat than to shoulder the responsibility of building aviable society in a land that offers very few resources to help that process along.
Same goes for Israel. In the last few decades Israel has become increasingly corrupt but the political establishment always has an out; the Arabs, our enemy! Alot of Israeli's though are getting tired of that shtick too. Especially knowing that their nation has a modern nuclear arsenal.
In this specific case few Israeli's have sympathy for Hamas for obvious reasons. The vast majority do support the government in this action and rightfullyso.