At least now you spelled out where you are coming from. This is exactly why many people who oppose Israel are called out for the biggots they are. Not because everyone opposed to Israel MUST be a biggot (many are just unaware of the history and true facts, and are confused by all the Saudi funded propaganda and influence, along with the news coverage of ignorant and/or biggots). Its because so many biggots now a days use Israel as their means to spread their biggotry.
Its been answered each time. Because the US is the biggest, the US the most powerful, the US is the most symbolic, and because more than any other country, the US not only PRACTICES freedom and democracy, but the US also PROMOTES it around the world. Keep in mind also, Europe has been the subject of many terrorist attempts. In fact, before 9/11, terrorists had plotted to fly planes into the Eiffel Tower, among other targets. Their intelligence was simply more organized and competent at the time, and they put a stop to it. And wasn't the UN compound in Iraq itself bombed?? Oh, and don't forget that these extremists actually also target the most moderate, usually secular, muslim governments.
Actually, the US did not support Israel in its early days, and the US actually provided weapons for many of Israel's biggest enemies in the past (so if anything, the US has merely help keep a balance of power, and that was after Israel had already won its initial war). But the only question that's really been asked is, why do you focus on Israel and not countries like Egypt that get almost as much?
And this couldn't be farther from the truth. Israel has been more restrained than any other country in its situation. Indeed, other countries (so easy to name scores of them), when confronted by such threats, just wipe out whole towns. Israel regularly sends soldiers in to fight close combat rather than level whole neighborhoods (yes, they sometimes will bomb a street corner to get a group of terrorists, but not a whole neighborhood, let alone city). Yet, Israel is held to a ridiculous double standard compared to anyone else.
WHO put up a good fight against the Nazis, other than Russia, England an dthe US?? And who else was suffering from a "holocaust" during WWII? The only other mass murders that were going on were those by Stalin (political killings, not an ethnic or religious cleansing that threatens the ability of a group to even live almost anywhere without being turned on and killed or expelled periodically), and those committed by the Japanese in Korea and China (at a relatively small scale compared to the Nazis and Stalin). And how exactly did Jews hijack the notion of the holocaust, which is derived from the Greek and describes a great fire. More specifically, it means a "burnt offering", which is what happened to Jews, (they were sent to ovens).
I'll try to explain it to you again. In economics it would be described as a FIXED COST (which, depending on the size of the terriroty, among other things, would also involve additional VARIABLE COSTS). IT TAKES A CERTAIN AMOUNT OF MONEY AND TECHNOLOGY TO DEFEND ANY TERRITORY, REGARDLESS OF THE POPULATION. If China comes a knocking, a country has to have the means to defend itself, whether that country is Sri Lanka, Taiwan, Israel or Canada.
Exactly my point earlier. While some people, for various reasons (usually a lack of understanding) oppose Israel and are not bigots, many (most probably) use Israel as a means to express their bigotry.
Although your references to the UN are not very relevant, given the UN's clear corrupt and biased track record (seen in the ridiculous hijacked conferences, and the fact that Israel is the most investigated country and the subject of the most special sessions in the world by the UN, despite the millions who have been massacred and enslaved around the world), you have a reasonable question about the settlements. And the occupation is anything but illegal. Israel seized it after being attacked, and they tried to give Gaza back to Egypt when they gave Egypt back teh other, oil rich lands, but Egypt didn't want it. Since then, Israel has tried to give it back to the Palestinians, along with tons of aid, and simply asked for peace in return. But with Arafat and a brainwashed mass to negotiate with, the end result was nothing but lies and terrorism. As far as settlements, first keep in mind that settlements can be dismantled. With regard to the road map, the road map never started because the PA never clamped down on terrorism. Also, if a group of countries or peoples attacks another people (multiple times in this case), and each time they attach they lose a piece of land, what is their incentive to stop attacking if they know that they will automatically get the land back that they've lost. In other words, when countries or peoples decide to attack, there is a risk, and it is a total double standard to view this as heads the attackers win, tails the attacked loses. Israel originally was a mere 1/3 of its current, still tiny size. Look at a map and scan the extremely vulnerable security situation Israel is in, both with other countries and with the occupied territories. This is a defacto buffer zone, very much needed until Israel can secure a peace agreement with those lands being occupied. Unfortunately, these are radicalized people, and peace seems very elusive. Let me add one side note. You hit the nail on the head with regard to the "Palestinian" growth rates. At the time of the partition, around 500,000 "Palestinians" left their homes (due to the encouragement or coercion of Arab states, who later would do nothing to help these people). These people now make up around 3.5 million, some 50 plus years later. At the same time, however, Israel took in around 500,000 Arab Jewish refugees. The least the Arab states that massacred or oppressed these Jewish refugees could do is take in or help the "Palestinians" that they encouraged to leave. Half a million Arabs for half a million Arabs sounds pretty fair to me.
as many non-Jews as Jews died in concentration camps. no other individual group suffered the same level of damage - except possibly Romas - but collectively the overall numbers of non-Jews reduced to ashtray dust was staggering.
Thank you for your response I Missed Boat. Re your first paragraph: The UN may be corrupt, I don't know. But you do realize that it is not only the UN condeming the actions of Israel. It is almost everybody but the US; e.g. Russia and EU. Also, your argument of "despite the millions that have been masacred" is of the point; The subject of this thread is the "Bush's Policy Change...". And as far as the occupation not being illegal - I think Israel is the only country in the world the calls the territories "disputed" and not "occupied". You have not addressed my questions: 1) What should the Palestinians do to fight back the illegal occupation? (If your answer is going to be: dismantle the terrorist network, that may not be possible at this point given that the security apparatus, the police, etc was destroyed a few years ago). 2) Israel is entitled to build the security wall for its protection; but why does it not use its own land for that purpose?