peacefare.net

Here are some bright ideas

This is OPI (other people’s ideas) day:

• Reinventing the Palestinian struggle as a nonviolent protest movement has been a good idea for a long time, but the Arab Spring may make it viable as a mass movement.  It would put the Israelis in a tough spot:  a harsh response would make them look like worse than your garden variety Arab autocrat.  Real democracies don’t shoot at nonviolent protesters.
• Rethinking the war in Afghanistan in light of Osama bin Laden’s death was the subject of an excellent piece this morning:  no evidence yet of changed attitudes among the insurgents (Biddle), but the personal connection with bin Laden was an important factor in the alliance with the Taliban.  And Pakistan might stiffen its attitude toward al Qaeda presence (Khalilzad), if only to prevent further American raids.
• North Africa is Europe’s backyard.  The Bertelsmann Foundation has asked eight North Africans for their views of how Europe can help the political transitions there.  The resulting report makes interesting reading and reminds us that we need to follow the lead of host country nationals in thinking about how to make the Arab spring last into a more democratic summer and fall.

Still, there is a dearth of good ideas on several subjects:  how to manage the U.S./Pakistan relationship in a more productive way (but see Dennis Kux’s blog post yesterday), how to hasten Gaddafi’s exit from Libya and what to do to stop the killing of demonstrators in Yemen and Syria, as well as their mistreatment in Bahrain.  Anyone want to offer thoughts?