ETA: Please read Nedra’s very thoughtful response to this in the comments. She’s on the ground and doing the work in Jerusalem and has a far clearer view of these things than I do.
Again, I’m writing from the perspective of profound ignorance that blights all of us who choose our media bubbles and stick to them. (Disclaimer: My preferred news sources include the BBC, The Guardian, The Washington Post, and Rachel Maddow. If I get my act together this year, I hope to add nu.nl, NOS Journaal, and at least one other Dutch source.)
In response to my last post, my mother referred to a friend of the family, a liberal Jewish woman who made aliyah (Note to the goyim: To make aliyah as a Jew is to emigrate to Israel) and lives in one of the settlements. Mum’s wish is that I get in touch with this friend who has on the ground experience and for a variety of reasons doesn’t fit the stereotypes, but ‘says things like “Palestinians teach their children to hate”‘.
This phrase has always struck a nerve with me. Yes, among the Palestinians are those who attack Israeli settlers and soldiers and who fire explosives from Gaza into those settlements. And the entire population suffers IDF (Israeli Defence Force) response far out of scale with the initial attack.
And it has happened over and over and over again.
We Jews have an interesting history with occupying powers that predates our history as one. By the (hundreds of?) thousands we endeavoured to escape the pogroms of the late 19th century. We all know what happened to those who didn’t escape, but with almost the regularity with which we tell the story of Passover, we retell the story of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. We tell of how the Jews of Warsaw were forced into smaller and smaller spaces and had their resources systematically cut off, and of how valiantly the Jews of the ghetto fought against the Nazis. ‘One shudders to think that it required a quarter of a million Jews to give their lives, for the remainder to understand the reality of the situation and come to the right conclusions,’ wrote one Shmuel Winter as documented on the Yad Vashem web site dedicated to the uprising (http://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/exhibitions/warsaw_ghetto_testimonies/index.asp).
This is the crux of the matter. When we were systematically restricted in World War II, we finally rose up. We glorify those who finally rose up and shudder through the tears of 20/20 hindsight at the meekness with which we suffered the slow approach of our destruction. I don’t have my copy of Night to hand, but Eli Wiesel described the situation in the Romanian village in which he was raised similarly. The villagers could see what was happening and talked about emigrating (to Palestine, generally), but few made the leap because that village had been their home for a thousand years.
I know I’m simplifying the matter, but wasn’t Palestine the home of these people for a thousand years before the Zionist movement and the establishment of Israel? Yes, their children are taught to hate the occupying power. We glorify our meekness, but wish we had hated sooner. Perhaps something could have been done. One of the problems is that Israel insists on the right to the territory that comes from greater military strength rather than the might that derives from diplomacy and its attendant hard work.
Colonial histories, from the liberal perspective, often berate the colonising power for the length of time it took it to leave. Britain’s long occupation of India and Rhodesia (and, for that matter, Palestine) are cases in point. France in Algeria, Belgium in the Congo, the US in any great number of places – North Dakota at the moment comes to mind. And I berate Israel for the same reason. It’s long since been time to make a solution. Blaming the occupied population for their resistance isn’t productive.
Joe Jots 
Sorry, but I have to correct your facts and assumptions. (Given who you cite as your sources of information, this is not surprising. They tend not to look very critically at claims made by the Palestinians and are not known for being objective when it comes to Israel.)
Palestine was NOT the home of most of the current Arab residents of Judea, Samaria and Gaza for 1000 years. The name “Palestine” comes from the Romans, who renamed the land to try to erase the Jewish connection, and it only came back into use under the British mandate (back then when people referred to “Palestinians” they were talking about Jews). The “Palestinian people” only took on that name as a political movement around 1964 – before that they were just Arabs. And there is no connection to the Philistines, who were a seafaring people who invaded the land thousands of years ago and then disappeared from history. (This is a good explanation of the history – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7W91OcTXrWk)
In fact, for much of its history, the land of Israel was very sparsely populated and did not have a large Arab population. Under various Muslim conquerers, Jerusalem was pretty much ignored despite claims of it being Islam’s 3rd holiest city. There has always been a Jewish presence in Israel, and it wasn’t until Jews started returning in larger numbers in the 20th century or so that the Arabs from the surrounding countries started moving there too, attracted by the commerce and opportunities that the Jews brought with them. But long before Israel was created in 1948, there were many instances of massacres of Jews by Arabs (way before “settlements” existed or the Jews had any control over the land).
Those who say that Israel is a colonialist power don’t know the history of what came before the current situation. The majority of Jews in Israel are not actually from Europe. About 60% of Israeli Jews are of Mizrachi descent, most of whom were refugees from the surrounding Arab countries at the time of the founding of Israel. Here’s an excellent article that an Australian newspaper just published, talking about the Jews of Israel as an aboriginal people, which makes a good case against the idea of Israel as a colonial power: http://spectator.com.au/2017/01/israel-is-jewish/.
There have been many opportunities for the Palestinian Arabs to establish their own state, if that were actually their ultimate goal. Not least of which is when Jordan and Egypt controlled the territory until 1967 and nothing happened. “Trans-Jordan” was supposed to be the Arab state that would have been the counterpart to Israel if they had accepted the opportunity in 1948 instead of waging war against Israel. And many many offers were made between then and now that would have given them something like 95% of what they demanded, and all were rejected and led to terror campaigns. Unfortunately, what they want is nothing less than all of Israel (with no Jews in it – which, by the way, is basically one of the big problems with what to do in Judea and Samaria. Millions of Arabs live in Israel as citizens with equal rights, but the Arabs will not accept the idea of a single Jew living in their territory – essentially “ethnic cleansing.”)
And when Israel totally pulled out of Gaza in 2005 – no Jews left, no army, no control inside its borders, what happened was an all-out war against Israel. That experiment shows what would likely happen if they pulled out of Judea and Samaria, which would leave all of Israel’s main cities completely exposed (and the country would be only 8 miles wide at some points). So, as long as they continue to incite violence and remain unwilling to live peacefully as neighbors, Israel is in a bind. The current situation is untenable. But just pulling out is not viable either.
Surveys have found that half of Palestinians living in East Jerusalem and a not insubstantial number of those living elsewhere would actually prefer to be living under Israeli authority than the PA. There may be ways to live together peacefully, but it’s not going to happen as long as (as you heard from your family friend) “Palestinians teach their children to hate.” The level of incitement is unbelievable – in school curricula, on TV, at sports games, etc. While here in Israel, the schools are starting to require that the students learn Arabic to increase cultural understanding, and if anything, the news media tends to lean leftward. There is no comparison between the two sides on that point.
Sadly, there is not much chance of the hate ending any time soon. The Palestinian leaders continually tell their people lies to rile them up and encourage them to direct their anger against Israel and Jews, so they don’t pay attention to the fact that Abbas and his comrades are multimillionaires from the money they siphon off the international aid they receive rather than directing it to making life better for their people.
There is so much more to say, but I need to get to work. But given that we both were in Israel for the first time together, way back when, I wanted to make sure that you have a clearer understanding of the situation. I hope this is helpful and am happy to provide pointers to useful resources. There is so much misinformation out there – both deliberate and unintentional. Living here in Jerusalem I am able to understand what’s going on better than I could before I moved here and I think it’s important for me to share that when I can.
Thank you, Nedra for this excellent response. I know I write from a position of ignorance much of the time (hence the disclaimer). I’m glad you replied and will discuss resources under separate cover.