Posts with the tag 'Palestinians'
More Carteresque by the day:
Democrat Barack Obama misused a “code word” in Middle East politics when he said Jerusalem should be Israel’s “undivided” capital but that does not mean he is naive on foreign policy, a top adviser said on Tuesday.
Addressing a pro-Israel lobby group this month, the Democratic White House hopeful said: “Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel, and it must remain undivided.”
The comment angered Palestinians, who want East Jerusalem, captured by Israel in 1967, as the capital of a future state. “He has closed all doors to peace,” Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said after the June 4 speech.
Obama later said Palestinians and Israelis had to negotiate the status of the city, in line with long-held U.S. presidential policy.
Daniel Kurtzer, who advises Obama on the Middle East, said Tuesday at the Israel Policy Forum that Obama’s comment stemmed from “a picture in his mind of Jerusalem before 1967 with barbed wires and minefields and demilitarized zones.”
“So he used a word to represent what he did not want to see again, and then realized afterwards that that word is a code word in the Middle East,” Kurtzer said.
Whether or not Jerusalem should remain the undivided capitol of Israel is a debatable issue - I think it should be, because anything remotely like a retreat on the part of Israel will just be seen by the Jihadists as another signal to attack. But one can have either view and have a rational foreign policy - but you can’t have both. You can’t, that is, try desperately to mend your fences with America’s Jewish voters who might prove vital in a close November election while at the same time keeping on board your supporters who think that the Palestinians are the good guys in the Israeli-Palestinian war. Pick one, and stick with it.
Obama tried to have it both ways, and now he’s got his advisor out assuring all and sundry that it was a mistake…just a verbal gaffe…but verbal gaffes in such a serious issue can lead to dead people, and the people of the United States need to take this into consideration as they make their choice in November.
Tags: Global War on Terrorism, Israel/Judaism, Palestinians
June 19th, 2008
Yesterday I noted the rather intractable nature of the Israeli-Palestinian war and offered that I would be back later to add some thoughts of my own…well, “later” became a lot later, so I’ve decided to open up a new thread. I’ll start from the same source as originated yesterdays post - NRO’s The Corner:
The irrepressible Caroline Glick pens a scathing critique of Secretary of State Condi Rice in this Jerusalem Post op-ed, obviously written before Thursday’s massacre of eight students — including one American — at the rabbinical seminary in Jerusalem (which atrocity — as Jonah and the AP both observed earlier today, has Palestinians dancing for joy). (Those would be the same Palestinians 70 percent of whom, according to Madam Secretary, just want to live in peace with their neighbors — notwithstanding more scientific polling that shows a percentage even higher than that actually wants their neighbor obliterated).
As always, all of Caroline’s column is worth reading, but I thought the most telling part involved the delusion the State Department and the administration refuse to abandon, regardless of the evidence: that the Arafat party, Fatah, and its Arafat protege, Abbas, are “moderates” who represent the solution rather than a big part of the problem…
At times it is a rather unfortunate thing that we are inheritors of the past - usually, the past is an excellent resource for the education and guidance humanity, but sometimes it is the damndest millstone around our neck. As regards the Israeli-Palestinian issue, “millstone” covers it quite nicely. It would be nice if we could go back in time to when British Colonial Secretary Winston Churchill was crafting the “solution” to the Palestinian issue and whisper in his hear the events of the past 80 years…but, we can’t do that. For good or ill, what has been done in the past is irreversable, and we just have to work ’round it. So, the first thing to do: cease and desist all arguments based on the past. Worthless, pointless exercise which, at any event, only serves to inflame passions.
So, ignoring the past, what have we got? Well, we’ve got on one hand a very modern, wealthy, western-style democracy which is also the only sure safe haven for Jewish people in the world. On the other hand, we’ve got a very backwards, impoverished, Islamic tyranny which is used as a pawn in the cynical ploys of Islamists and tyrants who need an external enemy in order to rally people to their cause. On both sides are sets of people who are determined on the destruction of the other - on the face of it, such people on the Israeli side seem a rarity, while to look at MSM reports, those on the Palestinian side who wish Israel’s destruction are nearly universal. This is not a situation amenable to easy solutions. But solved it must be.
In finding a solution, we must be guided by three things: Justice, mercy and a clear eyed understanding of reality. First and foremost to remember: what you see is not, actually, what you get. In the article quoted above, there is a link to a survey indicating that an overwhleming majority of Palestinians wish Israel destroyed. Such a thing is presented in a conservative publication as if we didn’t have a century’s experience in how tyrants can manufacture whatever public opinion they need for the moment. The crowds dancing in the streets and the people of the survey must be understood in the light of the fact that Hamas will come down very hard on you if you don’t dance in the streets and opine that you wish Israel destroyed. Saddam Hussein got 100% of the vote in the 2002 Iraqi election the same way Hamas gets people into the streets to celebrate the murder of Jews in Israel - by dint of a strongly implied threat that failure to perform will result in severe harm up to and including a horrific death. Once the US Army arrived in Baghdad, we got a truer picture of Saddam’s support when Iraqis starting going out of their way to desecrate Saddam’s monuments. Ignore what is put on the TV in front of you - a picture is worth a thousand words, but each of them is a lie.
We must approach both sides with a sense of mercy - for decades now there has been tremendous suffering, and the people of Israel and the Palestinians have a claim upon us for pity and mercy. Some poor Israeli blown to pieces by a suicide bomber; some Joe Average Palestinian blown to pieces because a Hamas bigwig decided to hide behind him - these people are suffering, and they need our mercy. Never forget that there are flesh and blood human beings - our brothers and sisters - over there who are paying with their lives for whatever solution we decide upon.
Now, for justice - certainly one of the more tricky things for a human being to attempt and we should keep in mind from the start that we not only will not, but cannot make everyone happy and feeling like justice was done. But just because it will be imperct and, also, rejected by some does not in any way excuse us from using justice as a centerpiece of our plan.
As we seek justice, the one thing we must not do is try to redress the past - we can’t obtain justice for a Palestinian who’s grandfather lost his property in Tel Aviv by punshing the grandson of the Israelis who first took over the land 60 years ago. We can’t do it - anymore than we can get, say, Tunsia to compensate the descendents of the Jews who were forced out when the State of Israsel came into being. What is done id done - on to new things.
Come what may, the only way to eventually have peace is for the Palestinians to have a State of their own - but it must be a State freed from the corruption and terror of Hamas. Only a genuinely free Palestinian State can ever sign a peace agreement with Iraeli - without Palestinian democracy, there can’t be Israeli-Palestinian peace. Given this - the need for a Palestinian State ruled by a genuinely democratic government - the whole of US policy should be shaped by a desire for Palestinian freedom as a precursor to an Israeli-Palestinian peace. And this, after all is said and done, is what President Bush is trying to do.
I’m sure President Bush knows that PLO leader Abbas is not the best sort of person - and I’ll bet Bush knows even better than us the sort of creepiness Abbas has engaged in, and continues to engage in. But patience is reqiured here - some of that mercy. This is because absent a US/Israeli invasion of the West Bank and Gaza and an indefinite protectorate over it, we simply must work with what we’ve got - and Abbas is the best of a bad lot. We are engaged, in this War on Terrorism, in a grand design - finding out if a judicious application of power and aid will midwife democracy, which will then find it has better things to do with its time than shout “death to Israel” and plot terrorist attacks. We could be wrong about this - but God help us if we are, because if we can’t figure out a way to make a free Palestnian State, then we’re eventually going to have to either kill or exile all of them. I’d like to avoid that.
So, what to do? Be merciful. Be just. Be realistic - and pray mightily that we can pull it off.
Tags: Israel/Judaism, Palestinians
March 8th, 2008
From Jonah Goldberg over at NRO’s The Corner:
The news over the seminary shooting in Israel broke after I put today’s column to bed. But the slaughter, and the reaction to it, is a perfect illustration of why discussion of Israel is so confused. A Palestinian opens fire on mostly teenage students studying in a library. The Hamas government in Gaza applauds the shooting and Palestinians take to the street to celebrate. Meanwhile, human rights groups say that Israel must continue to supply water, electricity and healthcare to the same Palestinians rejoicing in the street. To do otherwise is “collective punishment.” Propping up an enemy committed to your total destruction just strikes me as total folly. What the best alternative is, I have no idea.
Neatly encapsulates it, if you ask me. I’m off for a bit, but I’ll have something to add later.
Tags: Global War on Terrorism, Israel/Judaism, Palestinians
March 7th, 2008
The headline:
33 Palestinians Killed in Israeli Raid in Gaza
The actual story:
Israel pulled its troops and settlers out of the tiny seaside territory in late 2005, but militants proceeded to fire rockets from the abandoned territory at Israeli communities.
Hamas, which is sworn to Israel’s destruction, took control of Gaza by force from the rival Fatah in June.
Israeli government spokesman David Baker said Israel was ”compelled to continue to take these defensive measures” to protect more than 200,000 Israelis living under the threat of Palestinian rocket barrages.
Militants ”hide behind their own civilians, using them as human shields, while actively targeting Israeli population centers,” Baker said. ”They bear the responsibility for the results.”
The actual story is buried on page two of the report. The headline should read, for mere accuracy, Israelis Respond to Hamas Attacks - but that would be fair and accurate, and the MSM doesn’t allow that in reporting about Israel.
Tags: Global War on Terrorism, Israel/Judaism, media bias, Palestinians
March 1st, 2008
Absolutely impossible, so say a united punditry. And, if you wish, you can pick out of this joint press conference between President Bush and Palestnian President Abbas all you need to “prove” that peace can’t be done - Abbas calls for the barrier wall to be torn down, for Palestinians to move freely and for Jerusalem to be the capital of a Palestinian State. These are three things inconsistent with the survival of the State of Israel - ergo, peace is impossible.
Or is it?
As it turns out, I have a friend who is a Palestinian - a Christian Palestinian, but a Palestinian none the less. Not too long ago, we were discussing the Israel-Palestinian issue and my friend told me something I’d never heard before - from what he understands from friends/relations still living in Palestine, Arafat was ready to make a deal with the Israelis, but was pressed to the Second Intifada by various outside forces; a sort of, “start fighting the Isrealis, or we’ll find someone who will”, with the implicit threat of Arafat dead. Verification? No, I have none - but it always struck me as odd that in 2000 Arafat was offered nearly the whole ball of wax and yet turned down the deal. This was irrational, and I put it down to the irrational behaviour one could expect from a terrorist leader like Arafat. But perhaps I was mistaken…
Things are not always exactly as they seem - as Winston Churchill once put it, dictators ride to and fro on the backs of tigers; whatever might have been the original motivation of any tyrant’s action, by the time it all comes to the end the motivation might be the exact opposite. Certainly, the dream of an Islamist tyrant would be a victorious Islamic army marching to Tel Aviv, slaughtering every Jew it could lay its hands on - but the reality of at least some Islamist tyrants might be a realisation that such a march isn’t going to happen any time soon, and might as well make the best of a poor situation. Perhaps Arafat was just bloody minded - perhaps he was a rat trapped by events; who knows? Abbas might be bloody minded, and he might be a rat trapped by events - but if there is a chance we can work a deal with him and by propping him up de-facto destroy Hamas, then we will have done a good thing for the people of Palestine, the people of Israel and the people of the world.
Abbas will never set up the offices of a Palestinian government in Jerusalem - its just never going to happen. At best, the Israelis might allow an eastern suburb of Jersualem to be incorporated into the city and then ceded to the Palestinians as their “Jerusalem” capital with some sort of quasi-authority over the Temple Mount - but Jerusalem will in all essentials remain the undivided capital of the State of Israel. But in making his statements, he could just be making the expected, pro-forma statement of the Palestinian leadership, meanwhile he’s down to brass tacks off camera and asking how much foreign and military aid he can expect to help him both buy support amongst the Palestinian people, and crush the life out of Hamas (with, perhaps, some selective help from the Israelis in the form of taking out Hamas leadership via airstrikes).
At all events, I’m not sure that President Bush is being unrealistic here - if there is an ounce of sense and courage in Abbas, then peace (at least between Abbas’ people and Israel) is possible. There still might be some fight left in Hamas, but locked into an impoverished enclave, cut off from sources of funding and pounded by Israeli airpower in preparation for Abbas’ troops to return to Gaza, Hamas might feel that Allah ain’t really on their side…
Tags: Global War on Terrorism, Israel/Judaism, Palestinians
January 14th, 2008
Indeed:
Last Sunday, before praying the midday Angelus, Benedict XVI seconded an appeal from the U.S. bishops to pray for the success of the meeting.
In Annapolis, with help from the international community, Israelis and Palestinians will try to relaunch negotiations and aim for a just and definitive solution to the conflict that has bloodied the Holy Land for 60 years, the Holy Father said.
In his appeal, the Pope recalled the many “tears and sufferings” the conflict has caused the two peoples. He asked people to “implore the Spirit of God for peace for that region so dear to us and to give wisdom and courage to all the protagonists in this important meeting.”
The day of prayer marked by the U.S. bishops’ conference is another step in an ongoing plea for peace in the Holy Land, L’Osservatore Romano reported in its Italian edition today.
The Annapolis encounter “offers a lot of hope,” newly elevated Cardinal Daniel DiNardo, archbishop of Galveston-Houston, Texas, told the Vatican newspaper. “I hope that those who are involved in this international conference dedicate themselves with diligence to a resolution that effectively assures peace in the regions of the Middle East.”
Cardinal DiNardo said parishes and Catholics all over the United States “are praying, following the encouragement of the prelates, so that the prospect of peace between the Israeli and Palestinian peoples becomes a concrete reality.” He added that even in a political initiative, such as the Annapolis meeting, prayer “has a great value, also for the future.”
“We are called to persevere in prayer,” the Texas cardinal concluded, “entrusting to God our hope for peace in the coming weeks and months.”
As “jaw jaw’ is better than “war war” (per Winston Churchill), it might also be better to just pray that the men and women gathered in Annapolis listen to the voice of God and figure out a way to make at least some peace. Human beings, of course, are a stubborn lot and pride usually manages to mess up most things we do…but we can hope, and we can pray…and, this time, I think we’ll actually see some moves in the right direction.
We’ve fought a long time and a lot of blood has been spilled - there is still a lot of fighting left to do, and we have not shed all the blood necessary to secure a just and lasting peace…but the amount shed so far is, hopefully, enough for some to start to listen to reason.
This is why, I think, President Bush has called this conference - not out of a hope for a complete fix for what ailes the Arab/Moslem world, but to fix a few things and start down a path where more things can be fixed in the future. The central fact of this peace conference, however, is 130,000 or so US troops in Iraq…still there in spite of a relentless campaign of defeatism in the United States…still there, and thus informing the leaders of the Arab/Moslem world that America, indeed, has the grit to see it out. And it should be kept in mind that this is important on both ends - our enemies know we can take it, and our friends do, too; and that is the more important part of it. There is a reservoir of sense and goodwill in the Arab/Moslem world, but people are wary of sticking their neck out…we’ve now shown them that if they’ll join us, we’ll be there for them. At long last, the stain of our dishonorable surrender in Vietnam has been erased. America’s word is, once again, something people can rely on.
Tags: Annapolis Conference, Islam, Israel/Judaism, Middle East, Palestinians
November 28th, 2007
Some good questions from Bernard Lewis over at the Wall Street Journal:
Herewith some thoughts about tomorrow’s Annapolis peace conference, and the larger problem of how to approach the Israel-Palestine conflict. The first question (one might think it is obvious but apparently not) is, “What is the conflict about?” There are basically two possibilities: that it is about the size of Israel, or about its existence.
If the issue is about the size of Israel, then we have a straightforward border problem, like Alsace-Lorraine or Texas. That is to say, not easy, but possible to solve in the long run, and to live with in the meantime.
If, on the other hand, the issue is the existence of Israel, then clearly it is insoluble by negotiation. There is no compromise position between existing and not existing, and no conceivable government of Israel is going to negotiate on whether that country should or should not exist.
Mr. Lewis, at the end of his piece, asserts that at present it does not seem that the Arab/Moslem leadership is interested in mere negotiations over the size of Israel…at best, they are interested in a temporary, tactical deal as part of a long process to eventually result in the destruction of Israel. Such has been the long-stated position of most leaders of the Arab/Moslem world, and their actions have almost always matched their rhetoric in this area. So, why are we having this conference?
A lot of my fellow conservatives are dismayed by the calling of this conference - and some ask how we who are supporting it would view it if a President Clinton had called it. To me, that expresses a cynical vision of the world I refuse to hold. When President Clinton tried to broker a peace deal in 2000, I thought it wouldn’t work - but I hoped it would. Anything to bring an end to the fighting, as long as it was a good peace. As I expected, it didn’t work - Arafat, offered 99% of what he said he wanted, refused to agree to anything less than 110% of his demands, and the whole conference went down the tubes, and Arafat then instigated the Second Intifada. But here we are now in 2007, and things have changed a lot.
Saddam is no longer in power in Iraq. Iraq has a democratic government - makeshift, to be sure, but functioning all the same; and with military and police forces growing in strength and competance by the day. The United States will not cut-and-run…even if a Democrat wins in 2008, the political realities will prevent a precipitate withdrawal, and even after a withdrawal, we will still be in the middle east, and will still support the Iraqi government. Arafat is dead - and in his place is Mahmous Abbas, a man just about as wicked as Arafat ever was, but also facing the fact that he either makes a deal with Israel and the US, or falls to the Hamas terrorists, who will kill him. Syria has been doing its level best to ruin our efforts in the middle east - but has failed to derail us…and now faces an ever stronger Iraqi democracy, which bears Syria no good will. At bottom, while it may seem on the surface that things are similar to 2000, they have actually undergone a sea change - now is the time for us to hit the diplomatic trail and reap in politics what we have won by war.
It won’t be easy - and there won’t be a comprehensive peace deal worked out in this Annapolis conference, but the fact that so many have agreed to participate shows that under the surface, the leadership of the Arab/Moslem world can see a new day a-dawning, and they’ll want to try and shape its course, and that requires deals with the United States and Israel. Bin Laden said that the Arab/Moslem world should bet on him, as he was the strong horse - what we’ve proved by our dogged persistence in Iraq is that we are the stronger horse, and while a person or nation might loath us, they must also deal with us.
Tags: Iraq Campaign, Islam, Israel/Judaism, Middle East, Palestinians, Peace Talks
November 27th, 2007
