Mapleleaf, what is your source on Israel being the 4th most powerful military in the world?

How does one even measure that? In terms of men\tanks\planes\etc, we are far behind most other armies, since we are a relatively small country.

So what is the basis of such a claim? genuinely curious.

Nigee I find your softening of Hamas deplorable. This is a group that bombed several civilian buses to help derail the 90s peace talks (yes ultra right jewish groups did there share as well.)

Nigee, you are misinformed, you are supporting terrorists that are as much war criminals as any Israeli. The success of the iron dome doesn't mean Hamas didn't aim explosives at population centers. I find your stance deplorable and surprising considering how reasonable you were on this topic.

Santa - you pick what you want from what I said. I said we should treat all fundamentalist groups equally but I also went on to say that if I were in Palestine I would be on the side of Hamas because it is now full of people who are fighting for the very existence of the Palestinian people, the Palestinian dead have been made heroes and martyrs by Netanyahus actions.
Of course some of Hamas are as bad as the fascists in the Knesset but many of the newest converts/recruits will be fathers who had their kids/wives/familes killed by the IDF, at the moment in Gaza Hamas are the only show in Town, what other hopes do the Palestinians have .... nobody is coming to rescue them.

What exactly did I "Pick out" Your post was genocidal Hamas rhetoric while placing the onus of the conflict completely on "eranged homicidal maniacs" on the Israeli side, reaching a crescendo when you compared Hamas to the founding fathers, and "the good guys."

What exactly did I "pick" from your post.

According to a composite index of military power, globalfirepower.com ranks Israel 11th, two ranks ahead of Egypt, the next closest military power in the region.

Israel has nearly 4,000 tanks; an active military force of 180,000; reserves numbering 445,000; 680 military aircraft; 140+ attack helicopters; 110 naval ships, 14 submarines.

*Your post was *excusing* genocidal hamas rhetoric, it was not genocidal rhetoric in the least.

@H.H - I've heard/read that from many sources. Here's one, which ranks them 10 overall and 4, in terms of technological capabilities. The U.S.A. is largely responsible, of course, as Israel is a client state of the U.S

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/wap/Item.aspx?type=0&item=176683

I was about to cite the same source as Putin - they're the only one talking about quality of the military power.

It should be noted that Israel's army has a radically different purpose than any other large army on earth. They have virtually zero force projection outside the region. Their tanks are unassailable, but are much heavier than material from other countries since they ever have to be put into a plane, but can drive to all their targets.

Can we stop with this nonsense about the Iron Dome? In 2008, there was no Iron Dome, and a total of three civilians were killed by Hamas rockets during a 22 day assault on Gaza. After 2008, the Iron Dome was installed, and in 2012, four civilians were killed by Hamas rockets in an 8 day conflict. Ted Postol said the Iron Dome works 5% of the time.

http://www.npr.org/2014/07/09/330183774/the-rockets-from-hamas-and-the-iron-dome-that-could-use-patching

mapleleaf: I wouldn't trust the site you quoted. It is the website of an ultra-right wing radio station. They very well might be intentionally inflating the numbers.

Putin: now this looks like a serious source. I'll study it carefully, thanks!

Here's the key quote from that interview:

SIEGEL: How big is the explosive that's usually carried by that rocket?

POSTOL: A typical explosive is 20 to 30 pounds which is quite enough to kill you if it lands near you. But, you know, if you take shelter it's unlikely to cause your house to collapse, and Israelis are set up to take shelter.

The rockets specifically target civilians whether or not the Iron Dome has any effect. It makes the action of firing them a war crime. I don't understand why such war criminal's deserve Nigee's praise.

I echo tendmote's sentiment on the last page - we could tone down on the name calling since nobody here really is the charicature-blind-follower of either faction.

I was struck by both obi and Nigee which basically say the different sides are not justified in their actions, but their actions are understandable. To me, that seems a low ambition for a discussion. I don't think understanding people is all that hard, especially considering the internal mechanisms in both the Gazan population, Egypt and Israel's settler community.

But I'd rather discuss if a JUST solution is remotely possible. To me, any just solution must be political. And any political solution is only hindered by military interventions, let alone disproportional ones such as this one.

One that note, who here supports the notion of a "one state, two peoples"?

It's common knowledge that Israel has a disproportionately large military as compared to their population. 4th, 10th, 22nd...whatever. They're murdering children throwing rocks.

Yes, but this myth that Israeli civilians are under this onslaught of rockets and only the Iron Dome is keeping them safe is a bunch of nonsense used to justify the slaughter of Gaza. They're firing rockets in the general direction of the country that's butchering them. What would you do? It's not like the IDF goes out on a limb and ever dares exposing itself to a fair fight. They avoid the built up areas like the plague.

And it's not like Israeli civilians, all who seem to have reservists in their homes, make themselves very sympathetic by having 4th of July style barbeque parties while watching the massacre like a spectator sport.

@HH: the most two most authoritative sources on military strength are SIPRI and the IISS. However, both of them focus on relatively simple indicators such as Expenditures (SIPRI) and manpower & material (IISS). Quantifying military strenght is more tricky, and more interpretative. GFP is the only one to try, so therefor useful, but take it with a grain of salt.

Also, they didnt include nukes.

Nobody has data on nukes though.

I guess that's true, I cant think of any. IAEA possibly.
The US and Russia are pretty well documented, but the others I don't think I've seen quantified.

"one state, two peoples"

One State will fail, for many reasons but the foremost being Israelis would not accept being a minority in any state, which they would become in a one state solution. I don't know the numbers but if they weren't the minority immediately, it would be within a couple generations due to the higher birthrate among Palestinians. I doubt that Palestinians themselves would accept being placed under the "protection" of a nearly all Jewish Army in the early yeas of such a merger. And what would it solve? It would just take the same fights from the streets into the political realm and back into the streets.

I think a two state solution is the only possible solution.

Oh, and the University of Beijing was working on a Comprehensive Power Index some years ago, which included military strength but many other indicators as well. It seemed like a megalomaniac plan to me then, don't know how it progressed.

It is impossible to take nukes into consideration. As far as I know, governments are usually not that forthcoming about the sizes of their nuclear arsenals.

I believe the US and Russia are the exception due to past treaties and attempts to diminish their arsenal.

Also, the use of a hydrogen bomb of enough size can't be taken into consideration since it is a game changer of such epic proportions as to completely alter the course of human history, if not to end it entirely.
To quote Samuel L. Jackson (cleaned up somewhat, I'm not sure what's the policy here about swearing): "It ain't the same ballpark, it ain't the same league, it ain't even the same sport."

If you cut out the hired killers and middle-men (the IDF and the Knesset) this is effectively the US Govt paying for the destruction of Palestine, why does the US govt want to see the Palestinian nation destroyed, I don't get this .... is the average US Citizen ok funding these brutal right-wing mercenaries?

Israel is never going to accept a two-state settlement. This Gaza war I think is the end of the two-state settlement. There are no non-hardline parties in Israel that have any electorate. And it's not going to change anytime soon. With the Arab states essentially sitting back and backing Israel, with the western countries cheering Israel on, allowing Gaza to be pummeled to death, there is absolutely no political pressure on Israel to do anything except what they're doing.

So the status quo is going to be with us for a long time, and Israel is just going to continue destroying Gaza every couple of years, suffocating it with a blockade, while the world does nothing.

And Santa is right, Israel will surely never accept a one-state, two people's arrangement either.That's even more of a pipe dream than the two-state settlement. Israel is going to become a permanent apartheid state. A hyper-militarized South Africa, with Gaza being its Namibia and West Bank being its Transkei.

"is the average US Citizen ok funding these brutal right-wing mercenaries?"

The old fogies are ok with it. Younger Americans much less so.

http://reason.com/blog/2014/07/29/millennials-less-sympathetic-to-israel-t

I don't know the numbers but are lots of people in US politics Jewish, if not why would they support the atrocities such a right-wing Jewish regime thousands of miles away.
What is in it for the average Joe in the states, whether young or old?
What is in this for Obama .... he seems to be loving it, what a useless President he turned out to be, couldn't even close Gitmo.

All great questions, surely as puzzling as how Blair managed to get the UK into Iraq despite 90% opposition from the public. I guess democracy doesn't work in the UK.

The media is unanimously pro-Israel. So we only get news that portrays Palestinians as genocidal bloodthirsty savages and Israelis as innocent victims. Also, it's much easier to "sympathize" with a country that portrays itself as a democracy and seems to look like the United States than Gazans. How often we're told that Israel is the "only" democracy in the region (I guess Lebanon's elections are all frauds?). Also liberals are able to pink-wash Israel so that Israel is given a blank check because they're friendlier to gays than Hamas. This is the same tactic that has convinced people like you that Russia is a savage monster state because they don't like gays as much as NATO. It works like a charm.

As for Obama, believe it or not his admin doesn't get along with Netanyahu. Kerry was spied on by the Israelis, as the German media reports. Netanyahu screamed to Shapiro to "not second guess him". Nonetheless our political class feels the need to genuflect for Israel in public because if they don't, AIPAC will go nuts and call them anti-semites and like the gun lobby, they're very effective at mobilizing votes even if few agree with their cause.

"One State will fail, for many reasons but the foremost being Israelis would not accept being a minority in any state, which they would become in a one state solution. I don't know the numbers but if they weren't the minority immediately, it would be within a couple generations due to the higher birthrate among Palestinians. I doubt that Palestinians themselves would accept being placed under the "protection" of a nearly all Jewish Army in the early yeas of such a merger. And what would it solve? It would just take the same fights from the streets into the political realm and back into the streets."

Bingo.

The whole point of this endeavor was a free state for the Jewish people...Jews would immediately become a minority within a single state, and you'd see brutal clashes in the streets that would make this latest war in Gaza look like a kitten batting around a ball of yarn by comparison.

"Israel is never going to accept a two-state settlement. This Gaza war I think is the end of the two-state settlement."

I once again disagree with you entirely, Putin.

Indeed, this war in Gaza shows why their MUST be two states...because whether Hamas is eventually destroyed or demilitarized or not, there are going to be hostile factions on both sides, and the one thing both parties would hate more than a two-state solution--there really is no solution that will satisfy both parties equally on all things--is a one-state solution where Jews are suddenly a minority in their own homeland and the Palestinians are more numerous but still have a lower standard of living and virtually no military presence (fat chance Israel gives either of those advantages up, they're their greatest weapons in such a scenario as their being outnumbered that way.)

What's more, Putin--

Israel has OFFERED two-state solutions. Multiple times.

It's the Palestinians who have turned them down, in part because of radical hardliners such as (wait for it) Hamas and previous like-minded groups.