I'll wrap it up there.
And fairly well-wrapped it is.

I was going to say a lot of stuff here... I had it all written down and everything, and then the freaking window close down. So, ask bipper to show you the insight I've given him (bipper, you still haven't responded to it, by the way). I'll also add another anacdote... about the origin of the word 'Palestine', and a few other things, if I can be arsed.

After the great exile of Jews from Israel in 79AD by the Roman empiire, an emperor sought to eliminate the affinity and connection Jews had to their homeland, by changing its name. Seemed wise... through history, the land will be called by a different name, and the Jews will forget it was ever theirs. So, he called upon his advisors, and asked them who where the Israelis' historical empires. The advisors told him the Jewish holy texts (the Old Testament, or the Tanach) spoke of a people that lived in Gaza, called the Plishtim, or Philistines in Roman tongue, and that they have been extinct for centuries, so they wouldn't mind. So, he called on his men, and told them to the change the name of Israel on every map, to 'Palestine'. And so, the land of Israel has been known as Palestine. It didn't change much for the Jews, though.

Now, the Arabs that call themselves Palestinians have no connection to the extinct Biblical people of Gaza, just like the Arabs that now dwell in Egypt have no connection to the ancient Egpytians. They are all Arabs, descendants of the proud and war-like tribes of the Arabian Peninsula, that drove over the Midde East a while ago.

The Palestinians are a poor, misreable and angry people, and for good reasons, too. As Jews began to return to the almost-empty land (barely 35,000 residents) of Israel, neighbouring Arab nations began to get anxious - mostly Jordan. Jordan couldn't engage in war, as the Ottoman empire ruled supreme. Nothing stopped it from flooding the place with immigrants, though. So, Jordan sent its most problematic, poorest citizens into Israel, to fight off the Jewish population, demograhpically at first. They didn't want to be sent their - it wasn't their home, and it has no importance to their Islamic religion.

However, when things broke down in 1948, they served their part well. They fought the Israelis from within, and like all the rest, lost bitterly. Many were driven from their poor temporary villages, and sought to return to Jordan. Jordan wasn't going to welcome them back, though. Neither were Syria, Egypt, or any other Arab country. So, they were stuck in the middle. They formed huge refugee camps - that exist to this day, amazingly enough, almost 60 years after. Some want to go back to Jordan (where their old homes and families are), and some want to get back to the land they occupied in Israel. They can do neither.

Pitiful, really. I'd sympathise, if only they hadn't blown themselves in our streets.

Now, the Arabs and Israelis battle. One has been around for thousands of years and has one of the strongest and most trained armies in the world and packed with the strongest of convictions, and the other is just very very angry and very bitter, at the world and everyone else. No-one is going to give up, or win. The Israelis could drive the Arabs away or wipe them out, but that's hardly the righteous thing to do... and they want a peace the Arabs have no will to attain or keep. So, the two keep on fighting. As soon as the Arabs realise they are fighting a hopeless fight against the wrong enemy, and settle down to talk, nothing will change.