The lessons of Gaza By Andrew J. Bacevich

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http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2009/01/08/the_lessons_of_gaza/

Given the events related to Israel's birth, which involved the displacement of Palestinians and left Israel surrounded by adversaries vowing to destroy it, one can understand this conviction. Perhaps even today in Gaza, given the intransigence of Hamas, Israelis have no choice - or at least none promising any escape from the predicament in which they find themselves. So they fight on, despite the growing sense that the entire Zionist enterprise is inexorably headed toward some tragic denouement.

For the United States, engaged in a struggle against radical Islamists that mirrors Israel's conflict with the Palestinians, the implications of this story are several. Israeli troubles in the West Bank and Gaza over the past 40 years suggest the following:

First, getting in may be easy; getting out is the hard part. Once embraced, a tar baby becomes impossible to release. For this reason, the notion that intervention offers a handy problem solver is an illusion.

Second, occupation by outsiders produces alienation, resistance, and radicalization, nowhere more so than in the Islamic world. The longer the stay, the more severe the reaction.

Third, as instruments of pacification, conventional armies possess modest utility. Rather than facilitating political solutions, coercion only exacerbates the underlying problem.

This approach hasn't worked for Israel and won't work for the United States. Yet this approach describes US policy in the global war on terror, which has been based on expectations of intervention, occupation, and superior military power enabling the United States to dictate the conditions in which Muslims in places as remote as Iraq and Afghanistan should live.

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