That would be nice if the citizens didn't have to worry about being bombed. It's a lofty goal for Israel to develop mass transportation, especially since it's a small country and could link every populated area with high speed trains. They will have to have the airport model with the trains or people will never be safe with buses or trains.

I hate to state the obvious, but I find anything about Israel and sustainability hard to take given the political situation there. I don't really care whether or not Israel so much as recycles their cans. If they can't solve the Palestinian issue then they are NOT sustainable in any remote manner. Get out of the occupied territories, renounce zionism, and make real peace. Then I'll take posts like this seriously...

RAcheman

I don't usually comment more than once but I found your comment to be disheartening. Did you know that the babies born in Israeli hospitals are immediately sized for small baby sized gas mask when they are born? I think the problem with going green isn't "Zionism" but the fact that they can't seem to even go to a pizza place without getting bombed.

Dear mcark, RAcheman.

A. The daily terrorism threat in Israel is not as large as mcark makes it out - I have lots of pizza, and buses have never used the airport model, and I've never stopped using buses even during the worst bus-bombing sprees. Overall, less people die in Israel from conflict than from traffic, though not by much. The train stations, being more centralized, do have security checks at entrance, like almost every large public building - but these are nowhere near being as much of a nuisance as airport security.
B. Environmental sustainability is a huge problem, and it makes social justice issues worse (the weak get polluted more), therefore it intensifies every conflict. So RAcheman, if you care about our local conflicts, you should care also about local progress on environmental fronts. BTW, if you think any one side in this conflict can "solve it", you are ignoring the facts. If (like me on good days) you think both sides, trying hard, can solve it together, you should know that's what us locals call an optimist.

From Israel

I also contest singling out Israel as a shining example of sustainability in these posts. What about posting about how these railway systems will benefit only the jewish israeli population, when the arab population is taxed just as much to finance them? What about posting about the bypass road that they have dug through my neighborhood in east jerusalem, which will serve to connect only jewish israeli settlers, shuttling to and from these illegal and discriminatory residential developments that squander water on green lawns? The tram line in Jerusalem will serve those sttlements as well.

Bus bombings are terrible, but we must remember the pathogenesis and ongoing injustices that led extremist Palestinian terrorists to them.

It's rather laughable that so many posts here try to to laud Israel, more than any other country in the world, for pursuing so-called sustainable projects. Sustainability of the environment is inextricable from social sustainability.

Bus bombings are terrible, but...
Sorry, but when you start out a sentence like that you lose all the sane people for the rest of your message.

David, that's exactly the kind of straight-jacket logic that prevents people from understanding the complexity of the situation, and from finding the solution.

Yes, suicide bombings are bad, and yes, there is a 'but' afterwards.

Tyranny is the absence of complexity, André Gide once said.

celine:

First, about some misconceptions in your comment.

The Jerusalem light rail goes to Shuafat, Sheikh Jarah and Nablus Gate, all Arab neighborhoods, as well as a number of Jewish neighborhoods. There are plans for 7 more light rail lines in the city, one of which will run through exclusively Arab areas. So there's no basis for the claim that this is only meant to serve Jews.

I'm not sure what "bypass road" you are referring to, but it was probably built to avoid a congested street, not a particular ethnicity's neighborhood. You know of course than there are no roadblocks or checkpoints in Jerusalem so any road that can be used by Jews can be used by Arabs and vice versa.

Anyway, saying Israel can't have sustainable transportation until it works out its problems with the Palestinians is like saying the US can't have sustainable transportation until it works out its problems with Iraq. Things just don't work that way.

A wise man once said, "Truly good people do not complain about evil, rather they add justice. They do not complain about heresy, rather they add faith. They do not complain about ignorance, rather they add wisdom." Your comments seem designed to increase hatred rather than to bring about peace. I submit that such an attitude helps nobody, not Israelis and not Palestinians either.

In response to mcark and mattie, I propose that a sustainable solution for Israel is to build a mass transport system to transport their Jihadis back to Jihadistan.