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Originally Posted by Tactitus
I'm curious how you're going to achieve this. Especially stopping the rocket attacks and suicide bombings. The Israelis, with equipment as good as NATOs and twice the motivation, haven't been able to do it. What carrots and sticks do you think will be effective, and why? Peacekeeping forces also risk becoming targets themselves (see U.S. Marines, Beirut) which is why I think few, if any, countries will be stepping up to offer their troops for such a mission.
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By investing more than the piddling amounts usually invested, by moving more than the token troops usually given to these things, by giving them broader powers than the usually restricted ones they're currently given and mostly by making it clear that they are a temporary short-term presence until a workable peace is constructed. Your analogy to the beirut bombings is silly and off-base. The lessons learned since and because of it are vast.
Firstly the sensible thing to do is to establish an exclusion zone a certain number of kilometres in width, something like a similar number of kilometres on either side of the border would have a nice symmetry but that's rather unnecessary realistically speaking. It is made clear that movement through this area will, unfortunately, not be subject to normal rights of passage laws for the term of the stay of the peacekeeping force. Secondly you establish an aerial exclusion zone over the area. Third you construct sensibly placed barracks, adequately defended with appropriate search measures employed for people moving within a certain distance of the relevant bases. Fourth you make it clear that you are there for the people, on both sides, and that attacking them is counter-productive. You make this clear to the leaders of the movements as well. Maybe an attack will occur, maybe it will work, but if you have the leaders and the people convinced that it's a mistake eventually terrorism dies away. If you don't do this it won't. Finally you urge your soldiers to be responsible, to treat the locals with respect and as human beings, to avoid interfering with unnecessarily and to avoid insults to the local populace, their religion, their leaders and their culture.
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Also, the UN has been in the middle east before. They maintained a buffer zone between Israeli and Egyptian forces from 1956 to 1967 and from 1973 to 1979. They were not able to stop terrorist attacks (or for that matter, the Six Days War). Hell, there are UN peacekeepers along the Lebanese/Israeli border right now. They didn't stop Hezbollah from attacking across the border and capturing two Israeli soldiers. All they can/will do is watch Hezbollah missiles and Israeli jets fly by overhead and wave at the troops going by.
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So? That's not an army in the middle east separating two factions. That's a ****ing poor joke, an excuse passed off by the leaders of the western world to soothe our concerns over the fact that so many people are dying unnecessarily in a part of the world where our previous leaders put them.