The West can’t understand the Israelis. During two years of war in the Gaza Strip, countless proposals to end the fighting emerged from Western and Arab capitals. In all of them, the war’s conclusion was understood as a staging ground for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict – and, to a large extent, the entire Israeli-Arab conflict. Yet throughout those two years, the devisers of these proposals kept scratching their heads: Why have the reactions from Israel’s political establishment been so weak – and even negative?
