Leaving the West Bank by itself will probably be no more effective at bringing peace than leaving Gaza did. The Israelis made a unilateral withdrawal from Gaza with no agreement with the people in Gaza. Rockets get fired from Gaza into Israel, and the Israeli army periodically goes in and kills a lot of Gazans. If Israel evacuated the West Bank the same thing could and probably would happen.

Dear David F.,

This time it would not be an Israeli initiative as in Gaza. What if on the one hand Israel is forced, kicking and screaming, by the international community to leave the West Bank, but on the other hand, along with that the Palestinians are told unequivocally: "this is your last chance. The area is now yours and you are invited to create your own state there which we will all recognise, but if despite this you still create trouble afterward then we will support Israel in taking your land again and making your life bitter than ever, this time for good"?

Effectively, this is a recognition that the sides are unable to negotiate in good faith and therefore the world does the negotiation for them.

Dear Yuyutsu,

You are recommending coercion. I thought Ahimsa condemns coercion.

Dear David F.,

Ahimsa is non-violence. Coercing someone under threat of physical violence, which is what states do, is a form of violence. If people refuse to obey, then they are physically handled and thrown and locked up in a small cell among violent criminals.

States are not "someone", they are not sentient beings, they cannot suffer, they cannot feel hurt.

The metaphoric "kicking and screaming" does not refer to actual flesh and blood people being hurt. There might of course be some people who would choose to physically scream about the change, but it's not that they would be pushed or pulled in person, only the inanimate body called "The state of Israel" will be affected.

I don't even advocate to remove the settlers out of their homes by force. I think that the way Israel treated them when it evacuated Gaza was despicable. What Israel should have done instead is to tell them: "Listen, in 4 weeks the army is leaving. You can receive a nice compensation package if you come along. If you choose to stay, then whatever happens is all between you and Hamas, we wash our hands".

Mahatma Gandhi successfully employed a range of non-violent passive-resistance measures against the British state, otherwise India would still be a British colony.

Dear Yuyutsu,

It is moot that the British evacuated India because of Gandhi. The feelings of the Indians had been aroused against the English. The Indians seeing what happened to the British in Singapore and other places during the war were no longer in awe of the British. I think that the British were wise enough to see they could not hold on to India any more and left. This was unlike the Dutch who tried to hold what is now Indonesia by force of arms and were forced to leave. Gandhi played a part by inspiring the Indians to resist. I think Gandhi said it is best to resist non-violently, but if you can't do that it is better to resist in any way you can rather than submit.

Dear David F.,

Regardless what Gandhi said or did not say, I do not advocate that international forces should shoot or otherwise harm Israeli soldiers or settlers in the West Bank (unless of course they are being shot at and need to act in self-defence, then only to the extent they need to save their lives).

My point was that the international community can learn from (and teach the Palestinians) some of the non-violent passive-resistance methods employed by Gandhi. Had the stupid Palestinians used those methods rather than terror, they could have gotten all their territory back long ago, releasing Israel itself from that burden of occupation. Nay, the occupation itself would not have occurred in the first place had they not senselessly attacked Israel in 1967.