Fred, I think it's pointless to adress those points again, since we're running in circles. So i'll just stick to the Six Day War...
I won't even bother giving you a cold war history lesson on the 6 day war as to why Israel occupied the West Bank, suffice it to say they were not at fault for taking preemptive military action, any country in the world would have done the same.
The thing is that there is absolutely no evidence that the Arab nations were about to invade. Saber rattling is no evidence, neither is the (at that time) usual Arab strong talk or the ongoing low intensity warfare in the border regions. If the Arabs were about to attack, they wouldn't have been so open with their threats and military parading and all.
The only fact that can be perceived is that Israel attacked in a carefully planned and perfectly executed surprise attack and crushed the armies of several nations in six days. Personally, I find it rather hard to belive this was possible if the Arab nations were really on full alert and on the verge of attack within days (as Israel claims). Israel lost less than 800 men - against an Arab force of supposedly 250.000 ready to attack! Yeah, sure.
Syria with their supposed invasion army of 100.000 (including 1000 tanks) managed to shell a whooping 205 houses. That was indeed one mighty invasion army...
More interestingly, Syria did NOT invade when Israel attacked Eqypt. They simply fired artillery with limited success. If they really had 100.000 tropps ready to invade, they would have done so.
There is an interesting interview with an Israeli historian adressing some of those point:
http://www.uncommonknowledge.org/800/806.html
It also adresses the Jordanian actions and the Israeli attack on Syria.
It's just not as simple as official Israeli propaganda would us to believe, in fact, it looks rather unlikely that the Arabs would have fired the first shot.
Even if you give Israel the benefit of doubt and accept that they felt genuinely threatened by an imminent Arab attack... that still leaves open the issue of what happened AFTER the Six Days War.
The military occupation of Golan, West Bank and Gaza was the result of the Six Day War. This placed Israel in the unique position of having a significant bargaining chip. The UNSC resolution (which the USA agreed to) concerning the occupation acknowledged this and called for something which could be seen as the first viable Middle East peace plan:
The Arabs were to accept and acknowledge Israel as a state in exchange for a Palestinian state in the occupied territories. The Arabs were inclined to accept, in fact, Jordan accepted without reservation.
The problem is that Israel never used that bargaining chip. Instead, they moved in. Colonized. That's why some people say that Israel lost the Six Days War on the seventh day. They took absolutely no political advantage of the situation. They sacrificed their bargaining chip in favour of a Greater Israel Zionist ideology instead of using it to to foster a lasting peace with the Arabs who were, after facing crushing defeat, probably for the first time ready to listen.
The acknowledgement of Israel as a state and it's right of existence in the pre-1967 bordern and a Palestinian state would have been a viable compromise. Actually, that is the only viable compromise even today.
Israel failed to act on that chance. And when the peace process was finally initiated in the early 90s, one of the major obstacles was that Israel was expecting the Palestinians to compomise on the comprimise!
Just look at the maps of the two "generous offers". They're ridiculous. Add in the painstaking bargaining about every god damn meter of Palestinian land which was the result of the moronic settlement policy.
And maybe the biggest misconception is that Israel was and is ready to give up the settlements. They are not. They were expecting the Palestinians to compromise on the compromise in which the Palestinians already conceded 60% of what once was Palestine. Even on the height of the peace process there was not one Israeli administatrions that actually agreed to dismantling the settlements, even in the long term. On contrary, they increased the rate of expansion. The Israelis were never ready to give up colonized land and frankly, unless the Israelis begin to stick to the original compromise, no peace process will ever have a chance of success.
Compromise means that both sides give something up. Israel tried to retain what they wanted and just give up what they aren't interested in anyway. Israel thought they could have peace without any painful concessions (i.e. the complete retreat from the occupied territories, including the settlements). What Israel was shooting at was really just a continuation of the occupation with different means. Keep the settlements and control over all important areas in the occupied territorries (inlcuding control over water) and let the Palestinians deal with security in return for some scraps of land and a virtually powerless self-government.
Even at the time during the peace process when terrorism wasn't much of a problem, Israel failed to meet minimum requirements with their proposals. So the notion that it's only terrorism that stands in the way of perpetual peace and bliss in Israel and Palestine is rather misguided.
