A couple of readers have asked about the state of opinion within Israel, wondering if there's a greater diversity of views among Israelis than the headlines here suggest. In fact, Israel is one of the most fractious political societies on earth. Israelis tend to stand together when they feel threatened, as people in most countries do, but they also love to argue. Consensus is about as common (and lasting) as snowfall. And unlike in many other Middle Eastern countries, Israelis have the freedom to air just about any political opinion they want. For a flavor, check out the columns in Haaretz, where you will find far more pungent criticism of the Israeli government than in the American press.
The recent war might make you think a lot of Israelis have shifted to the right, resigning themselves to the idea that the West Bank and Gaza Strip will be occupied and subjugated forever. But this isn't the case. A majority of Israelis still favor a two-state solution. A great many revile the settlers. The vision of a "Greater Israel" championed by the right for decades keeps losing advocates, and not just on the far left. Last October, in an interview with the newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, once a hard-line member of the Likud, conceded that building settlements and checkpoints will do nothing to bring Israel long-term security:
We must reach an agreement with the Palestinians, meaning a withdrawal from nearly all, if not all, of the [occupied] territories. Some percentage of these territories would remain in our hands, but we must give the Palestinians the same percentage [of territory elsewhere]--without this, there will be no peace."Including Jerusalem?" he was asked. "Including Jerusalem," he said.
Afterwards, the columnist Gideon Levy announced, "With neither sorrow nor grief it may be announced: The Israeli right is dead."
This may be a bit premature. But the right has indeed lost the ideological battle. The problem is that many Israelis on the center and moderate left are conflicted and confused. More and more when I've gone to Israel in recent years, I've spoken to people who unequivocally oppose expending lives and resources to defend illegal settlements, but who also fear withdrawing from the West Bank will only lead to violence and chaos.
The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood 
I'll assume that this is Eyal posting again, because TNC isn't ordinarily so inept.
Let's count the cliches. I come up with four. Curiously absent from this account of Israeli public opinion? Any meaningful assessment of how current events are being received in Israel. No, just cliches.
So let me take the liberty of answering the question for your readers. Israeli society is indeed fractious - that's largely cultural, but on these issues, also an artifact of the parliamentary system. And it is undoubtedly the case that Israeli society has been drifting toward a centrist consensus for the past decade or more. But Eyal only presents half the picture. Yes, many Israelis have abandoned the vision of a single state between the Jordan and the Mediterranean, and turned on the settlements and all they represent. But it's equally true that Israelis have soured on the peace process, finding no viable partner on the other side, and increasingly resigned themselves to a life under attack for the foreseeable future. Understanding that the past decade has driven the bulk of Israeli society away from both extremes, while hardening those who remain in increasing isolation on either end of the spectrum, is the key to interpreting its response to recent events.
In a country in which there is rarely agreement about anything, there was, in point of fact, a virtually unprecedented degree of consensus that some military action needed to be taken against Hamas. I'd say that consensus lasted for 48-72 hours, as the IAF struck its highest-value targets, and those least likely to result in civilian casualties. Many prominent leaders of the "peace camp" within Israel wholeheartedly endorsed these early strikes.
After that, the consensus began to falter. The leftists, along with some realists, began to peel off, feeling that further attacks would do more harm than good. That opposition has grown over the ensuing days, and became a significant factor in the wake of the ground incursion, a red line for many opponents. The debate is vigorous and public; it fills the pages of the nation's newspapers and its popular call-in radio shows. But, at least so far, the dissenters are a vocal minority. The overwhelming majority of the country continues to regard the current military action as both just and necessary, even as it deplores the necessity and braces for the consequences.
I think that's a fairly accurate picture; I'd be interested to hear from other readers who see it differently.
The IDF says that 4 of its 6 combat casualties to date are from ‘friendly fire’, which undermines their claim that the accuracy of their bombing is ‘surgical’.
Pardon my ignorance but, what about just letting Egypt control Gaza?
Eyal seems to be confusing losing the majority with losing a political or ideological battle. Given how split Israeli politics is into small parties jockeying to build coalitions, it's perfectly credible that a technical minority can hold the majority to ransom. See: Bush II, Democratic majority in Congress, FISA, for an example.
When you see a story like this one posted on FoxNews of all places you have to think public opinion is really turning.
http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2009Jan07/0,4670,MLGazaAReporterapossStory,00.html
It humanizes those that have been dehumanized for aa very long time.
Morzer, the fact the two former hard-line Likudniks changed their minds on the settlements (Sharon and Olmert) indicates that there is, in fact, a victory on that battle and not just a rearranging of chairs. Of course there is still Netanyahu waiting out there... in the terrible case that he becomes PM, one has to hope that he would show the same flexibility that Hamas has not. He may not.
@ Eh?:
Because Egypt has made really, really clear that they don't want Gaza, and won't take it. Ditto Jordan.
The post says what Israelis think broadly speaking on the issue of making peace. On the specific case of the Gaza war, can I try to fill that in? Unfortunately, what I know is sketchy in places, so please correct me.
I believe the initial support was around 80%. I don't know if that includes non-Jews, but I assume it does. Jews are 80% of Israelis, but I'd assume many Druze and Bedouins supported the bombing.
So 80% says a lot about how threatened Israelis feel. Even the left-wing Meretz supported it. Hoever, when there was a call for a ceasefire after two days of bombing, the opinion was much more split. Meretz sided with the ceasefire. The longer the ground campaign goes on, of course, the less popular it will be, and I doubt it will be long before there is a palpable lack of support. No one wants to re-occupy Gaza.
'what about just letting Egypt control Gaza?'
For the last two decades, this dispute has been about Israel’s refusal to return to its 1967 borders. The PLO and the entire world, except for US, Israel, and the Marshall Islands, agreed to that outcome (UN Res. 242) 20 years ago.
Meanwhile, Israel is an ‘occupying power’ pursuant to the Fourth Geneva Convention, and must discharge its obligation to prevent physical suffering or extermination, murder, torture, corporal punishments, mutilation, collective punishments, reprisals, and to ensure displaced persons the ‘right of return’ to their homes. Egypt (or Jordan) can’t discharge those obligations for Israel.
I'll reserve judgment till I here from Joe the Plumber.
Brittain33, my point was in response to the idea that the right and far right had been defeated because they no longer had an overall majority. I thought my example made it reasonably clear. One example of a right winger or right wing changing his/its mind doesn't mean that the right wing is dead. If anything, it underscores their continuing impact.
Unfortunately I think it is the left who has lost the battle. While 15 years ago, and even as far as 2000, a two state solution was still a viable alternative, I don't think that is the case now.
Even though the (insufficient and inadequate) Camp David 2000 offer was strongly opposed internally (Barak didn't even have a parliamentary majority), the Israeli public was way more amenable to such a solution back then than it is now. Since then the Israeli left, such that it is, has shrunk to the point where Labor and Meretz together don't even scratch 20% and the Chimera that is Kadima can't really be considered left. I Follow Israeli society and media fairly closely and I have no sense of urgency at all regarding a political solution to this problem. My reading is that as far as Israeli society is concerned the peace route has been tried and it failed. The only solution now is to beat them into submission.
In addition, back in 2000 the Palestinians actually had a national leader who could have conceivably make the concessions required in any sort of agreement. Though reviled by the west, Arafat was generally recognized by Palestinians as the a true representative of their national aspirations and he had enough "star power" to possibly get the majority on board. Currently I can't envision any Palestinian leader giving up whole swaths of the west bank (as any Israeli offer in the forseable future would be less "generous" than the Camp David offer cutting up the west bank) or compromising on the right of return and living to see the next day, at least politically.
The fact that rational people agree that long term a Palestinian state is the desired endgame does not change the fact that there's no current path from here to there. There's absolutely no will on the Israeli side to even get close to the 2000 offer, which itself was not nearly enough to provide the basis for a viable Palestinian state. And that's before we factor the political power of the Likud, the settlement movement, the ultra-orthodox parties and the Russian immigrant parties all of which would torpedo any attempt to dismantle as much as a single settlement or even outpost.
So while perhaps ideologically the right has lost, pragmatically the left has lost (and it'll be a cold day in hell before a one state solution could be mentioned without garnering hysterical laughter)
It seems to me that Israel's real opportunity for peace was effectively assassinated. I don't believe that Rabin's assassin acted independently. Rabin was the one person who would have actually been able to make peace and who wanted to make peace. It was not a case of loving the Palestinians, but of desiring real peace for Israel. That opportunity was taken away and now the world is faced with constant turmoil as the Israeli government makes only PR attempts at "peace."