FresnoZionism.org — ציונות פרסנו

Ze’ev Schiff, respected military correspondent for Ha’aretz, writes:

Israel is experiencing something in Sderot that it has not experienced since the War of Independence, if ever: The enemy has silenced an entire city and brought normal life there to a halt. The despair of Sderot’s mayor is one sign of what is happening. The sight of the town’s elderly residents returning from a “rest and relaxation” trip and refusing to alight from the bus and go home is additional proof that what is happening in Sderot is a national disgrace.

Schiff adds that the defeat in Sderot is “a serious national failure, which in my opinion is worse than the failure of the Second Lebanon War”.

Unlike the US, Israel’s parliamentary system allows for a simple majority vote of the Knesset to force the government to resign and bring about early elections. How can the government which lost both the Lebanon War and the battle of Sderot, whose Prime Minister had an approval rating of 3% among the public, and which is now talking about beginning negotiations to return the Golan to Syria while Syria prepares for war — how can this government remain in power?

The explanation is two-fold. First, new elections would result in many current Knesset members being removed, and they would prefer to keep their seats. Second, apparently not enough members are convinced that there is a better alternative.

The problem is that the government has lost its ability to lead the people, any respect that it may have had in the international arena, and its power of deterrence over Israel’s enemies. It’s time for democracy to do its work, and the political chips must fall where they may.

Technorati Tags: Israel, Sderot

Brit Tzedek v’Shalom (BTvS), the “Jewish Alliance for Justice and Peace” wishes to promote dialogue among American Jews about US policy towards Israel.

National Advocacy Chair Diane Balser has published a manifesto called “‘Let’s Talk!’ Wrestling with the Conversation about Israel“.

There are almost as many points along the political spectrum about Israel as there are Jews. Most (but certainly not all) of these represent positions that are pro-Israel, although they may have very disparate areas of emphasis and promote entirely different strategies. BTvS claims to be in this part of the spectrum, but there is much in Balser’s manifesto that I found disturbing, and which brings this claim into question.

(more…)

Is Hamas going soft?

Palestinian group Hamas is sending some “not unhelpful” signals about the Middle East peace process but should be clearer on where it stands, British Prime Minister Tony Blair said in an interview broadcast on [al-Jazeera] Friday — YNet

Blair did not make a specific reference, but:

The Palestinians are united in seeking a state in the West Bank, Gaza and Jerusalem, a senior Hamas leader said in an unusually enthusiastic endorsement of an idea the extremist Islamic movement long opposed.

Moussa Abu Marzouk, a deputy to Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal (residing in Damascus), made the comment in an interview published Saturday in the Hamas-linked newspaper “Palestine.”

Hamas was founded on a pledge to seek Israel’s destruction, but some in the movement have softened their stance as part of coalition talks with the Fatah movement of Palestinian Authority Chariman Mahmoud Abbas. The Hamas-Fatah government’s platform calls for the establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem, the lands Israel captured in the 1967 Six Day War.

In the coalition talks, Hamas had presented its acquiescence to the idea as a major concession.

However, in his interview, Abu Marzouk presented a state alongside Israel as an achievement for the Palestinians.

“Now there is one team, one program, one united government … so there is a big chance to reach the goal we agreed upon at this stage, which is a Palestinian state in the West Bank, Gaza and Jerusalem,” he said. [my emphasis] — Jerusalem Post

Is there indeed anything new here? Only in a public relations sense.

Hamas has traditionally favored the total replacement of Israel by a Palestinian state. Here is Abu Marzouk last December:

It is not impossible, Abu Marzouk, emphasized, to establish a viable state on the whole territory of Palestine from the river (Jordan) to the (Mediterranean) sea. Not thinking to establish the state in that form represented the first mistake by the PLO when it thought that Palestine could accommodate two states. As to Hamas’s approach, it states that Arabs, Muslims and Palestinians have a historical right in Palestine, and that all Palestinians must be able to return to their homeland . — Ikhwanweb.com (Muslim Brotherhood website)

Arafat’s PLO did suggest, for public consumption, that it would accept a state alongside Israel and end the conflict, although on terms that were always designed to be unacceptable to Israel, such as inclusion of a right of return for refugees and their descendants to Israel, full control of East Jerusalem, etc. However, there is plenty of evidence that the intent of Arafat and the PLO leadership was to consider any Palestinian state that did not stretch from the river to the sea as an intermediate stage, a platform that would make the final re-conquest possible.

The Hamas leadership, unlike Arafat, does not generally lie about their goals, but relies on indirection and Western/Israeli wishful thinking to distract attention from them. So note Abu Marzouk’s inclusion of the phrase “at this stage” in the first quotation above, which I interpret to mean that Hamas would view a Palestinian state in the territories as temporary, and not an end to the conflict.

And indeed, in the Muslim Brotherhood article Abu Marzouk also said,

Even if a Palestinian state comes into existence this doesn’t mean that Israel has become legitimate, because there remain rights for the Palestinians that they must restore, notably the right to return to their homes.

An even more explict statement was made by Hamas co-founder and Palestinian Authority Foreign Minister Mahmoud al-Zahar in July of 2005:

Speaking to the Corriere Della Sera newspaper, al-Zahar said Hamas would “definitely not” be prepared for coexistence with Israel should the IDF retreat to its 1967 borders.

“It can be a temporary solution, for a maximum of 5 to 10 years. But in the end Palestine must return to become Muslim, and in the long term Israel will disappear from the face of the earth.” —YNet

It’s highly unlikely that Hamas has suddenly taken a 180-degree turn and is now even more moderate than Arafat’s PLO, actually prepared to offer peace in return for a state in the territories.

Rather, the statement seems to say that Hamas will go along with its other coalition partners in seeking a state alongside Israel — as a ‘stage’, a short-term goal. It does not negate the longer-term aim, expressed in the Hamas covenant, of replacing Israel with an Arab state.

Technorati Tags: Hamas, Israel, Abu Marzouk

Paradoxically, the talk about possible war between Israel and Syria has been mixed with suggestions that a peace deal might be possible:

JERUSALEM, June 8 (Reuters) – Israel has told Syria it is willing to trade land for peace and is waiting to hear whether President Bashar al-Assad would cut ties with Iran and hostile guerrilla groups in return, Israeli officials said on Friday.

One said Syrian officials had so far indicated a willingness to conduct discreet contacts that might lead to a resumption of formal peace talks after a seven-year hiatus. In two weeks, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is due to meet U.S. President George W. Bush, who would play a crucial role in any such process.

Israel may well talk to Syria because it does not wish to miss (or be perceived as rejecting) any opportunity for peace. But although Assad would certainly like the Golan back, In an interview with Michael J. Totten, Barry Rubin, author of The Truth About Syria, thinks that it is unlikely that he wants it in the framework of a peace agreement:

It is commonplace to say that Syria wants back the Golan Heights. But one need merely ask the simple question: what happens if Syria gets it back? If Syria’s regime made peace with Israel it has no excuse for having a big military, a dictatorship, and a terrible economy. The day after the deal the Syrian people will start demanding change. The regime knows that.

Indeed, Rubin sees Syria’s leadership as heavily invested in quite the opposite of peace:

While the Syrian regime poses as being desirous of peace and engagement with the West, in fact its institutions, ideology, propaganda, and activities go in the exact opposite direction. To survive, the minority-dominated, dictatorial, and economically incompetent government needs radicalism, control over Lebanon, regional instability, anti-Americanism, and using Israel as a scapegoat.

Syria is sponsoring a terror war against Iraqi civilians and American forces in Iraq; it is subverting Lebanon, not even stopping at killing the most popular political leaders there; playing the leading role in being the patron of radical Palestinian forces against Israel; promoting anti-Americanism; formulating the new “resistance” strategy which combines radical Arab nationalism and Islamism; being Iran’s main Arab ally; and even being the main Arab state sponsor of revolutionary Islamism.

American plans to drive a wedge between Syria and Iran — which may include awarding the Golan to Syria — are not likely to be successful, says Rubin, because there is little we can offer the regime compared to Iran:

Iran supplies Syria with a strategic ally and protector, a lot of money, an Islamist and Islamic cover, and much more. The two countries may not have identical interests but they are close: making Iraq into a member of their alliance; dominating Lebanon; driving out U.S. and Western influence; destroying Israel; backing Hizballah and Hamas; and so on. What can the West possibly offer Syria to replace that? High-tech military weapons? Lebanon and Iraq as satellites? To discuss the issues is to show how ridiculous the idea of splitting the alliance is in practice.

The whole Totten interview is worth reading (and probably so is Rubin’s book).

Technorati Tags: Israel, Syria, Rubin

Hizbullah in Lebanon continues to rearm:

Lebanese troops have seized a truckload of rockets and ammunition belonging to the Hizbullah guerrillas in eastern Lebanon, security officials said Wednesday.

The shipment of Grad rockets and ammunition for automatic rifles and machine guns was seized late Tuesday at a random army checkpoint near the town of Baalbek, a stronghold for the Shi’ite Muslim militant group.

Six Hizbullah members in the truck were let go but the confiscated weapons were taken to army barracks nearby. — Jerusalem Post

Here is a Russian-made BM-21 Grad rocket launcher (sometimes incorrectly called ‘Katyusha’, which was an earlier version, dating back to WWII). It is capable of firing 40 122mm rockets in 20 seconds, striking targets up to 32 km away (20 miles, varies with rocket type). Once loaded, the launcher can be driven to the launch location where it can be prepared and fired in seconds, and then quickly removed to a hiding place. While Israel destroyed quite a number of these from the air during the war last summer, it’s not easy to catch them and even harder to do it before they launch.

The US and Israel are developing laser-type weapons to destroy these rockets in the air. An American system is available and expensive. Israel has not deployed any such system as yet, as far as I know.

The Grad rocket is 9 feet long and can deliver a 45-pound payload. It can be used to deliver explosives or chemical weapons. Although it’s old technology, it’s still deadly and — because of the lack of countermeasures — represents one of Hizbullah’s greatest threats.

Technorati Tags: Hizbullah, Grad rocket