Rational Nation States no longer seek empires, at least in the traditional sense. Conflict in the world today is largely the product of non-state actors. Nearly all of these conflicts involve minority groups who cannot identify with the nation state they are supposedly governed by. Catholics in Northern Ireland and Muslims in Leeds are essentially outsiders in their own land. They fight because they do not fit in.

Israel cannot peacefully exist as a Jewish state anymore than Alabama can peacefully exist as "the place for white people." Furthermore, no "two state" solution is going to work anymore than "separate but equal" worked in Alabama.

You could take the whole territory, including the west bank and gaza, and make it a nation state with the same liberal institutions, and it would work, without terrorism, so long as the place was sold as something that both Arabs and Jews could identify with. That means not having a Star of David on your flag. You have to be a place and not a religion. Your diversity has to be a pillar of your identity and not an asterisk.

They say Presidents are a product of their time. Governance is a bit like IT - Sometimes if you are successful, no one notices, because nothing happened. But if you fail in a massively visible way, people pay attention, and if you can't be held directly responsible for the catastrophe you get to "respond" in full view of everyone. You get to be a hero...

Whats interesting about Canada is that they managed to not have the same sort of violence in the 1970's that they had in Ireland. And it wasn't the heavy hand of martial law that prevented it. It was that they genuinely fought to create a country that wasn't English anymore.

That is what Israel must do. But right now they care more about that Star of David on their flag than they do about not seeing children maimed by explosives. If Canadians had the same attitude about the Union Jack, I think they would be just as fucked right now, and just as entrenched in their attitudes.