Violence in Gaza escalates significantly as Israel contemplates an invasion - 1-Mar-08 - Generational Dynamics

Israel/Gaza

Gaza war heads toward cease-fire, while violence surges in Sri Lanka: Thousands of civilians' lives are at risk by army attacking terrorists responsible for suicide bombings.... (19-Jan-2009)

In Gaza and Sri Lanka, war slides into genocide.: Both wars are getting increasingly meaner and nastier.... (6-Jan-2009)

Israel begins ground invasion into Gaza: The region appears to be teetering on the edge of wider war... (3-Jan-2009)

Israel declares "war to the bitter end" and "all-out war" against Hamas in Gaza: The rhetoric indicates an extremely dangerous situation.... (30-Dec-2008)

Israel's rocket attack on Gaza opens continues a week of sharp escalation: Hundreds of Palestinians were killed or injured Saturday,... (27-Dec-2008)

Palestinian opinion shifts toward greater confrontation with Israel: A Khalil Shikaki poll shows increasing acceptance of violence against Israel... (24-Mar-08)

Violence in Gaza escalates significantly as Israel contemplates an invasion: American warships are off the Lebanon coast to promote "regional stability."... (1-Mar-08)

Suicide bombing in Israel blamed on the Gaza border opening: Although Egypt finally closed the border on Sunday,... (5-Feb-08)

Egypt's failure to close the Gaza border further destabilizes the region.: Changing events brings Israelis, Palestinians and Egyptians into further confrontation and conflict.... (26-Jan-08)

In dramatic scene, 60,000 Gazans pour into Egypt through holes blasted through border wall: Euphoric Gazans go shopping, bring back food, fuel and fertilizer.... (24-Jan-08)

Israeli blockade of Gaza triggers protests against Egypt: Angry Gazans stormed the Rafah crossing into Egypt on Tuesday,... (22-Jan-08)

Violence continues in Gaza as Israel kills 18 to stop rocket attacks: President Bush's new Mideast peace initiative has a zero chance of success.... (17-Jan-08)

Tony Blair compares the Mideast peace process to the Northern Ireland peace process: Generational Dynamics illuminates when such historical comparisons are valid and when they are not.... (30-Nov-07)

Mideast summit in Annapolis has feel of act of desperation: No one appears to have any expectations whatsoever -- talking just to talk.... (27-Nov-07)

Hamas fires on civilian Palestinian crowd commemorating Yasser Arafat: Eight people were killed when Hamas gunmen fired into the crowd.... (13-Nov-07)

Pressure is building in Israel for a new invasion of Gaza: Surprisingly, many Palestinians are allying with Israel against Hamas.... (12-Sep-07)

Hamas' stunning Gaza victory shocks entire Mideast: A major realignment of unknown proportions is occurring throughout the Mideast.... (22-Jun-07)

Abbas dissolves the Palestinian Authority as Hamas overpowers Fatah in Gaza: There are now effectively two Palestinian Authorities,... (15-Jun-07)

Hamas presses for control in Gaza, Fatah gets revenge in West Bank: The U.N. is considering deployment of a multinational force in Gaza,... (14-Jun-07)

Palestinian road to civil war escalates another step: Gunfights escalated to larger military actions in northern Gaza... (13-Jun-07)

Jordan's King Abdullah renews stark warnings about Palestinian problem: Both Israelis and Palestinians are becoming increasingly furious at each other,... (22-May-07)

Gaza close to state of emergency as Israel tries to avoid getting pulled in: The streets of Gaza are clear except for gunmen today,... (16-May-07)

Palestinian Interior Minister resigns as escalated Gaza violence threatens civil war: Six people were killed and dozens wounded over the weekend... (15-May-07)

Palestinian "unity government" leading soon to new crisis with Israel: As the young generation of Palestinians become increasingly "lost and desperate,"... (14-Mar-07)

Jordan's King Abdullah tells Congress that Palestinian issue is the core issue: Unfortunately few in Congress know what he's talking about.... (8-Mar-07)

"Palestinians don't deserve a state": Even the most optimistic Palestinians are despairing that their dream is slipping away.... (4-Feb-07)

Fatah storms Hamas stronghold in Gaza: Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas appears to be carrying out his ultimatum to Hamas,... (1-Feb-07)

Palestinian civil war between Hamas and Fatah now seems inevitable: Peace talks and ceasefires seem close to being over for good.... (29-Jan-07)

Palestinians' Fatah/Hamas crisis increases as Israeli government is close to anarchy: The possibility of a Hamas vs Fatah civil war in the Palestinian territories appears to be increasing by the day.... (7-Jan-07)

In desperation gamble, Mahmoud Abbas calls for new Palestinian elections: Hoping to end political deadlock and head off a Palestinian civil war,... (16-Dec-06)

Will Mohammed Dahlan trigger a Palestinian civil war?: Hamas blames the young Fatah terrorist for the near-assassination of Prime Minister Haniyeh.... (16-Dec-06)

Interviews with young Gazans spotlight road to war: For these young fighters, attacking Israel is an end, rather than a means to a political end.... (10-Dec-06)

Can we "Flip Syria" and solve all the Mideast problems?: Even by Washington standards, Wednesday was possibly the most bizarre day on record.... (7-Dec-06)

Jordan's King Abdullah warns of explosions in Palestine and Lebanon: Abdullah repeatedly chided the ABC News interviewer Stephanopolous, who remained completely oblivious... (26-Nov-06)

Israel and Palestinians agree to a cease-fire in Gaza Strip: Is it a ploy?... (25-Nov-06)

Level of loathing between Israelis and Palestinians increases: According to an online correspondent with contacts in the Israeli government,... (27-Sep-06)

Tony Blair commits the rest of his term to solving the Mideast problem: Meanwhile, the Palestinians announce a unity government -- with a condition.... (12-Sep-06)

Israel re-occupies Gaza and abandons West Bank "convergence": Lawlessness has gotten so bad in Gaza that even Hamas apologized... (8-Sep-06)

Aftermath of Lebanese war: The winners and losers: Everyone seemed to follow his generational archetype, as if hypnotized to do so.... (6-Sep-06)

Some random notes on the Mideast crisis: First off, dislodging Hizbollah from the Israeli border is almost impossible.... (21-Jul-06)

Mideast war now centers around Hizbollah's Hassan Nasrallah: Nasrallah splits the Arab world and draws international support for Israel... (17-Jul-06)

The European Union is "extremely concerned" about Mideast tensions: But guess what the EU politicians express "particular concern" about!... (3-Jul-06)

Israeli armed forces mass on Gaza border after soldier's kidnapping: Egyptian mediators are attempting to head off a "large scale military offensive"... (26-Jun-06)

Tensions reaching the boiling point among Palestinians and Israelis: So-called "pinpoint" Israeli missile strikes have killed several civilians, including children... (21-Jun-06)

Ex-CIA chief James Woolsey says Gaza pullout was "Worst result possible": Five bystanders, including a pregnant woman, were killed by Palestinian gunmen... (5-Jun-06)

Hamas and Fatah armies gearing up for major confrontation in Gaza Strip: Egypt and Lebanon are also being increasingly threatened by the escalating violence.... (23-May-06)

Palestinian Authority and Hamas deploy rival armies in Gaza: In open defiance of PA president Mahmoud Abbas, Hamas mounted an illegal 3,000 man militia force... (17-May-06)

Saudi and other Mideast stock markets appear to be crashing: While Wall Street is rocketing toward a historic new high,... (7-May-06)

International game of "chicken" leading to disaster in Gaza: Mideast envoy James Wolfensohn quits in disgust with all participants in the so-called "peace process."... (5-May-06)

Crunch time for Hamas, as American and European aid is cut off to Palestinians.: Will they "cry uncle" and recognize Israel in exchange for financial aid?... (10-Apr-06)

International political chaos grips Israel, Palestine, and everyone else, as Hamas takes over on Saturday: No one, not even Hamas itself, has any idea what to do next, except to let events play out as they will.... (18-Feb-06)

Hamas victory and cartoon controversy significantly affect chances of Mideast war: It's time to change to the world conflict risk graphic.... (10-Feb-06)

Hamas victory throws Mideast 'peace process' into disarray and turmoil: What struck me most, seeing the cheering Hamas supporters on TV yesterday,... (27-Jan-06)

Sudden generational shift puts Palestinian "Young Guard" threatening "Old Guard": Younger generations in control in Palestine and Israel bring war closer.... (16-Dec-05)

Gaza violence spiking up as Israel launches "crushing response" to rocket attacks: Hamas promised to stop attacking Israel from Gaza, to prevent spiraling out of control.... (26-Sep-05)

Gaza strip descending into further chaos and lawlessness following Israeli withdrawal: Black market prices for weapons have been falling sharply in Gaza,... (14-Sep-05)

With Israelis almost gone, Gaza is becoming increasingly violent and unstable: Especially ominous is the planned intervention by Egypt as border guards.... (8-Sep-05)

Israel withdraws from Gaza amid hopes for peace and fears of instability: Here's what you should watch for in the weeks ahead.... (16-Aug-05)

Ariel Sharon and Mahmoud Abbas meet as Mideast cease-fire unravels: Like Britain vs France, Israel vs Palestinian Authority meetings are becoming increasingly confrontational.... (22-Jun-05)

Abbas is increasingly losing control of Gaza and the West Bank: Palestinian militants are infuriated by Abbas' unilateral cancellation of parliamentary elections.... (6-Jun-05)

Some notes on current news in Darfur, Palestine and Ukraine: It appears that the genocidal crisis war in Darfur, Sudan, may be ending.... (24-Jan-05)

NY Post: "Arafat Dead - And he won't be missed.": I look at Arafat's life very, very differently.... (14-Nov-04)

Top Israeli aide says that Israel has abandoned the American-sponsored 'Road Map to Peace': The plan to create a Palestinian state has effectively been scuttled... (7-Oct-04)

Israel makes it official: The American-backed "road map to peace" is dead.: In fact, Israel itself is in enormous turmoil today because of Ariel Sharon's disengagement plan.... (16-Sep-04)

A dramatic shift in Palestinian opinion, as Arafat retains control: Major violence has not yet spread from Gaza to West Bank, but the question of whether things will "spiral out of control"... (1-Aug-04)

Beheadings part of increasing conflict level throughout Mideast: The level of conflict is increasing throughout the Mideast, from Gaza to Pakistan, from Saudi Arabia to Uzbekistan. (23-Jun-2004)

"Mideast Roadmap" - Will it bring peace?: Generational Dynamics predicts something quite different for the Mideast. (01-May-03)

Israeli air strikes have killed 32 Palestinians in the last couple of days. There are presumably many Hamas militants among the 30, but there were also four Palestinian children.

At the same time, the massive rocket barrages from Gaza have grown much larger, hundreds every day, and are reaching further into Israel. One person has been killed, and several people have been wounded, including two Israeli children.

Some top Israeli officials are calling for "massive intervention" in Gaza. Matan Vilnai, the deputy defense minister called for a "catastrophic" response, and a top Knesset chairman says that Israel should reoccupy parts of Gaza and topple the Hamas government.

The rhetoric has been going over the top. Vilnai's word for "catastrophic" is the same Hebrew word that refers to the 1940s Holocaust, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said that the deaths of 32 Palestinians is already "more than a Holocaust."

Whatever the rhetoric, the IDF (Israeli Defense Forces) do appear to be massing on the border with Gaza for some kind of major intervention in Gaza, but whether it's a pinpoint invasion or a full-scale occupation is not yet known.

US warships and Lebanon

In a surprise related development, three US warships left Malta for Lebanon on Tuesday, and are remaining off the Lebanese coast in international waters.

The reasons given by the Pentagon include a "concern about the situation in Lebanon" and support for "regional stability." Lebanon's political crisis, that we last wrote about in November, has not abated, and the country has not yet found a way to select a new President. The US warships are seen by Hizbollah and some Lebanese political groups as being directed at them and Syria.

However, according to an article by Debka, which has contacts within Israeli intelligence but often gets things wrong, the US warships are there in anticipation of an Israeli ground action -- not only into Gaza (directed at Hamas), but also into southern Lebanon (directed at Hizbollah). Debka adds that there's another front as well: "The quarrel between Saudi King Abdullah and Syrian president Bashar Assad, which is nearing boiling point, threatens to be fought out in Lebanon, their main bone of contention. Both are sending quantities of arms and ammo to the Lebanese militias under their respective wings."

Memories of 2006

The extreme state of anxiety that caused Israel to panic in 2006 still exists, because of the increasingly relentless barrage of rockets from Gaza into Israeli cities.

Thus today, calls by Israeli politicians for an overwhelming "catastrophic" response by the IDF are being tempered by fears of another panicked disaster.

News reports that I've read indicate that most analysts today believe that some kind of IDF response is coming soon, because the Israeli public will not tolerate the current situation much longer.

Generational Dynamics perspective

My first major Generational Dynamics prediction on this web site was in the May 1, 2003, article, "Mideast Roadmap - Will it bring peace?" In that article, I said that the Roadmap would fail, and that the deaths of Yasser Arafat and Ariel Sharon would be part of a generational change that would lead to all out war between Arabs and Jews, re-fighting the genocidal war that occurred in 1948 after the partitioning of Palestine and the creation of the state of Israel. Last month, in the article, "Violence continues in Gaza as Israel kills 18 to stop rocket attacks," I summarized all the events that have occurred since then.

I recently was engaged in a discussion with some online correspondents on how the coming Mideast war would "start."

There's some semantic confusion here about what we mean by "starting a war." That concept is very fluid, and can change retroactively. For example, it's possible that historians, looking back at this decade, may decide that the Mideast war began in Lebanon in 2006, or even that the World War began on 9/11/2001.

But from the point of view of Generational Dynamics, I mean something quite specific by the start of war -- it's a point of time defined in generational theory and known as the "regeneracy." The regeneracy is the point in time where an event, or series of events (like the Pearl Harbor attack and the Bataan death march in World War II or the Battle of Bull Run in the Civil War) unify a country or society behind its leader, and the survival of the country and its way of life become the highest priority, higher than the value of an individual life. This change opens the door to genocidal acts, since an individual human life has little value any more.

When a country goes through a crisis war (like WW II for the US), the survivors are very unified. But for children born after the war (like Baby Boomers after WW II), the austere rules imposed by the survivors become unbearable, and they rebel, creating a "generation gap" and an Awakening era (60s-70s in US). By the time another generation after that has been born and grown, all the austere rules have unraveled (1990s), and individual rights are all that matter, creating a social and civil climate of political bickering. The regeneracy is the point where the political bickering ends, and the people unite behind their leader. It's called the "regeneracy" because civic unity is regenerated for the first time since the end of the previous crisis war.

So from the point of view of Generational Dynamics, I'm trying to figure out where the regeneracy is coming from in the Mideast, and how it will lead to the renewed war between Jews and Arabs.

The regeneracy can't come from Lebanon, Syria, Iraq or Iran, because those countries are still in generational Awakening eras. (The last crisis war for each occurred in the 1980s: The Lebanon/Syria war, the Lebanese civil war, and the Iran/Iraq war.)

The regeneracy could come from the Palestinians, who are in a generational Crisis era, but here's where the semantic confusion occurs. It's true that the Gazans could launch a few thousand missiles, but that's what Hizbollah did in 2006, as part of a war that fizzled. A militant group within Gaza shooting off missiles into Israel is a terrible thing, but it's nothing like what the Gazans would do when a real crisis war begins.

That's why I keep saying that I'm waiting for signs that the Palestinians get so furious that they're ready to smash through the security wall and start killing Israelis in their homes. Until that fury grows to the point where an ordinary Gazan is ready, willing and able to do that, there is no regeneracy from the Gazan side.

Other countries in the region are in generational Crisis eras. Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia are in Crisis eras, but their current governments are pro-Western, and so a massive attack from any of these countries at this time will not happen. However, if a palace coup occurred in any of these countries, then any one of these countries might follow with a massive attack on Israel of the kind that we're describing.

And so, absent a coup or some similar chaotic earthquake in the Arab world, the only place I can see a genocidal war being launched right now is from Israel. They've already panicked and done it once -- in 2006 in Lebanon. That war fizzled because Lebanon is in a generational Awakening era and is highly war-averse, in reaction to the Sabra and Shatila massacre; if Lebanon had been in a generational Crisis era, then the Israeli invasion would most likely have spiraled into a full-fledged crisis war, but not in a Lebanese Awakening era.

But the point is that Israel could panic and do something like that again, even though the Israeli government has learned severe lessons from the 2006 experience, and doesn't want to see a repeat.

However, some kind of massive attack by Israel could be triggered by some chaotic shock/surprise event that's currently unknown, or even by too long a continuation of the current barrage of rockets.

For Generational Dynamics, this would lead to an interesting situation: Israel would say that some other country or group started the war (depending on the triggering event), but from the Generational Dynamics point of view (and depending on the triggering event) it would be Israel that panicked and started the genocidal crisis war. Thus, it's possible that Generational Dynamics may hold a different view on the question of who started the war than historians and politicians do.

And so we're in a familiar situation with Generational Dynamics predictions: We know what the final destination is, but we don't know how we're going to get there -- although in this case, we've done some analysis to at least eliminate a few possibilities. However, the final destination is 100% certain: There WILL be a new massively genocidal crisis war between Jews and Arabs. There's no way to predict what will trigger it or when it will begin, but with the violence escalating on both sides in the Gaza / Israeli dispute, and with US warships waiting off the coast of Lebanon, it could begin soon. (1-Mar-08) Permanent Link
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Generational Dynamics Web Log for 1-Mar-08
Violence in Gaza escalates significantly as Israel contemplates an invasion

US warships and Lebanon

Memories of 2006

Generational Dynamics perspective

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Generational Dynamics Web Log for 1-Mar-08 Violence in Gaza escalates significantly as Israel contemplates an invasion

US warships and Lebanon

Memories of 2006

Generational Dynamics perspective

Web Log Pages

Generational Dynamics Web Log for 1-Mar-08
Violence in Gaza escalates significantly as Israel contemplates an invasion