Word: golan
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Professor Galia Golan, Professor of Government at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya believes that, for the moment, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert will have widespread popular support to launch a strong response, since the attack was unprovoked and will naturally heighten the sense of a nation that will never be accepted by its neighbors...
...still young and untested administration, Golan added, "this is a political nightmare." Olmert himself is operating in the still formidable shadow of his predecessor, Ariel Sharon, and Defense Minister Amir Peretz is working amid great skepticism that he, a man with no previous military leadership experience, is up to the task...
...They have to reestablish the power of deterrence of the Israeli military, some of which has been lost," says Golan. In Gaza, Olmert, Peretz and the generals are authoring a harsh script; early indications are that they have the same in mind for Lebanon. With reservists in the Israeli military being mobilized, it's clear they are preparing for more than just a few aerial attacks...
...Clearly, whatever Israel does to respond, time is of the essence. Golan says that if a campaign in Lebanon began to drag and people started thinking they were looking at a reprise of 1982 - or that they'd "been dragged into a trap by Hamas and Hizballah"- the current strong support could evaporate. Some opinion polls taken during the Gaza soldier kidnapping standoff, but before the Hizballah attack, had already shown that Israelis want the government to negotiate some sort of solution, releasing prisoners if need be, as it has done in the past. Olmert has vowed determination and perseverance...
...Hamas leaders is not enough for some Israelis. Senior military figures have repeatedly floated the idea of invading Gaza, an option Defense Minister Amir Peretz is loathe to embrace because it would mean reoccupying hostile territory without resolving the causes of the conflict. "They could go in," says Galia Golan, Professor of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya, "but how would they get out?" Golan believes that Defense Minister Peretz, leader of the Labor Party, sees a negotiated political solution as the only chance for long-term stability. That's a difficult argument to sustain...