Normal Westerners try to find win-win solutions, and are expected to respond to goodwill with goodwill of their own.
Palestinians look at everything as a zero-sum game and look at any goodwill gestures as proof of weakness, and an opportunity to double down on demands.
The biggest single mistake that Westerners make is thinking that everyone thinks and acts like we do. As a result, for decades, the West has gotten this conflict spectacularly and fatally wrong.
This is why they pressure Israel to always make more concessions, as the stronger party in the conflict. But it doesn't work unless your partner shares the same basic mindset. But the Palestinians and much of the Arab and Muslim world do not.
This year, according to UN-OCHA figures, the supposed "siege" of Gaza effectively ended. Western media didn't report it, but Israel has been loosening restrictions on Gaza for years to the point that the amount of goods and people crossing the borders with Israel are at higher levels since before the Hamas takeover of the area. Israel has given work permits to many thousands of Gaza workers - a couple of years ago it was zero. They have allowed more "dual use" items. August was a record month for Gaza imports of goods. The number of people entering and exiting also have been higher than before 2007. There have been no restrictions on fuel, no restrictions on medicine, no restrictions on food in over a decade (except during wars.) Gaza has luxury car dealerships, high-end hotels and resorts, glittering jewelry stores. Life wasn't wonderful - unemployment was still very high, for example - but things were getting better for average Gazans under every metric.
To Western thinking, this should result in Hamas reacting in kind - or at least wanting the improvements to continue.
Hamas knows the difference in the mindsets between themselves and Israelis - and took advantage. They didn't participate in the Islamic Jihad mini-war earlier this year. They kept rockets mostly quiet. They pretended that they were acting in a western way, and trading the effective end of the closure of Gaza for calm with Israel. A win-win for all.
But all that time while life has been improving in Gaza they were planning this mega-attack on Jews.
Some of the workers Israel allowed in gave intelligence to Hamas to maximize the number of Jews to be murdered. Some of the residents in the towns and kibbutzim attacked recognized the terrorists as people who worked there every day. They murdered their employers and the Jews who considered them friends and co-workers.
Before Saturday, the thinking was that Hamas wants calm and doesn't want to upset the people it rules. The previous military operations in Gaza were waged with a carrot and stick approach, thinking that reminding Hamas they have something to lose would keep things calm and following up with further moves to make the lives of Gazans better.
It was a fatal miscalculation. Hamas never intended for long term calm. It wanted (with its Iranian masters) to take advantage of what they think of as a weak, stupid Western mentality. Arabic media, especially that aligned with Iran (from Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah, Syria, and Yemen) have been filled with articles about how Israel is as weak as a spider web. This intentional slaughter of ordinary Israelis is regarded by Hamas and most Palestinians (yes, most) as the paradigm of regaining honor and dignity and as only the first salvo in the war to ultimately destroy Israel.
There is not even a hint in Palestinian media - whether Fatah or Hamas or independent - that looking into the eyes of a frightened Jewish baby and then slaughtering her is something to be ashamed of. Right now, the Hamas baby killers are more popular than ever. Mahmoud Abbas and PA prime minister Mohamed Shtayyeh didn't make even a pretense of a condemnation of their political rivals this time - they called the murder and rape of innocents "defending the land."
That's why this war has to be different from the previous ones. A limited war that leaves the murderers and rapists in power, and an Iranian-controlled statelet mere meters from Jewish communities, is no longer acceptable or even thinkable The evil cannot be allowed to stay. Israel has to adopt the Hamas mentality of eradicating the enemy, and treat the terrorists like Hamas wants to treat every Israeli man, woman and child.
Israel has to wipe out Hamas and the other terror groups. No matter the cost.
Hamas is embedded in houses, buildings, tunnels, bunkers, all in populated areas. Israel needs to take them all out, not some. It needs to kill or imprison all the terror leaders, not some. It cannot tolerate having these monsters living freely next door.
Being nice was repaid with the worst day in Jewish history since Auschwitz. Israel's entire purpose is to protect Jews. It must eradicate the terror organizations completely and ruthlessly - no matter the cost.
Doing anything less would be immoral.
(This is an expansion on an essay I wrote on X/Twitter.)
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