To All The Jew-Hating Jews Out There

Matt Yglesias is of course right here, but he doesn't take it quite far enough.

There is a wonderfully symmetric insanity to the Palestinian 'situation' in Israel. Namely, this is that the hawks in Israel insist on tit-for-tat, force-on-force responses to attacks on Israeli property and people. While this is an eminently sensible policy from a simple, but satisfying, worldview, the net result of these attacks, which invariably result in civilian casualties and damage, is to continue the anger at the Israelis among the Palestinians.

As a result, Hamas continues to enjoy support, both as a government and as a resistance movement, among the Palestinian people. This means that attacks into Israel will continue, which means that the hawks get to stay in power by saying "see? You can't trust those Arabs. You need to keep electing me, because I am the only one strong enough on homeland defense to keep you safe." And this shit keeps working.

Likewise, Hamas continues lobbing rockets into Israel, which means Israel will keep retaliating, which maintains support for Hamas, which means that Hamas, essentially, sacrifices the lives of Palestinians in order to maintain their hold on power.

Since neither side actually cares much about the lives of the Palestinians (Israel being mostly indifferent, Hamas seeing them as actual pawns to be sacrificed in the larger goal of maintaining their political support), they end up kind of, well, screwed by the whole affair. But still, because they are angry, and they'd rather be angry at those damn well-to-do Jews on the other side of the border, they keep supporting and electing people who keep doing things that lead to more of them being killed.

And the Middle East Merry-Go-Round of Death rolls on...