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I’ve been profoundly shocked by the developments of the past few weeks: the negotiations with Syria over the Golan heights, the really disastrous decision to agree to a cease-fire with Hamas in Gaza, the offer to the Hezbollah-dominated government of Lebanon to surrender the Sheba farms area, and who knows what secret proposals made to the Palestinian Authority.

“The Olmert-Livni-Barak-Yishai government’s liquidation sale of Israel’s strategic assets opened officially this week. Iran’s proxies have pounced on the merchandise”, writes Caroline Glick,  and she is entirely correct.

But there’s more than just the practical issue of strategic weakness here. There is a psychological/cultural issue which is hugely damaging to Israel as well. After all, Hamas, Fatah and Hezbollah have gotten to the position they are in today by means of terrorism, by killing Israelis — and, in the case of Hezbollah, by murdering Jews worldwide. Syria has indirectly been responsible for terrorism in Israel by its support of Hezbollah and Hamas, and is threatening mass murder with its chemically armed rocket force.

Israel’s behavior is understood by them and by the world as no more or less than surrender. It doesn’t matter if the Israeli government claims that the deals are actually in Israel’s interest — of course they are not — but even if they were, everyone would understand them as capitulations. Terrorism clearly works, and given that, there is no incentive to try anything else. Combine this with the Arab attitude that compromise is castration, and you have a recipe for continued violence.

Along with the major diplomatic defeats above, there are the smaller but particularly painful ones called ‘prisoner exchanges’, in which numerous convicted terrorist murderers are released in return for kidnapped or dead Israelis. Ami Isseroff writes,

It is not a matter of putting “honor” or “justice” or “revenge” above human compassion. The problem is not the release of prisoners with “blood on their hands.” Rather, it is the blood of our soldiers and civilians that will be spilled in the next kidnapping. The success of the Goldwasser-Regev kidnapping will certainly engender yet another one, just as the success of the previous kidnapping, in which Hezbollah traded the degenerate Elhanan Tannenbaum and some dead soldiers for many live prisoners, was probably the decisive factor in motivating the kidnapping of Goldwasser and Regev. How many people will die because of the next kidnapping, and how many will be kidnapped?

Again, Israel teaches her enemies that the wages of sin are very good indeed. You want land, international recognition and immunity from retaliation? Fire rockets into Israel. You want your operatives freed and various other concessions? Kidnap an Israeli.

When will the ghetto-mentality Jews that are making decisions for the state of Israel learn that — especially in the Middle East, but in reality everywhere — the powerless are treated with contempt, and a nation afraid to use her power is in fact powerless?

Technorati Tags: Israel

Mahmoud Abbas, leader of the Fatah faction and President of the Palestinian Authority (PA), is presently being kept in power in the West Bank by the IDF, which has prevented the popular Hamas from developing a powerful military force there. Now it appears that he thinks that he sees a way to gain an advantage from the truce between Israel and Hamas in Gaza:

Abbas, on a visit to Yemen on Thursday, was quoted as saying he welcomed the Gaza cease-fire and was now open to the formation of a national unity government with Hamas.

Earlier this week, Fatah officials announced that Abbas would soon visit Gaza for the first time since Hamas’s violent takeover of the territory in June 2007, and that a reconciliation between Hamas and Abbas’s Fatah faction was under way.

Two weeks ago, Abbas formed a committee of senior officials to prepare for “national dialogue” with Hamas – spurred by a plan presented a few months ago by Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh. — Jerusalem Post

My guess is that Abbas thinks that the US and Europe are prepared to accept a Hamas presence in the PA, despite the fact that Hamas has not and will not agree to recognize Israel, renounce violence, and accept previous agreements (the Oslo accord) between Israel and the PA. Abbas expects that language will be found to finesse these issues, now that Israel and Hamas are not actually fighting. And Abbas expects that a modus vivendi between Fatah in the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza can be reached which will enable him to remain in control of the West Bank and, at least in title, of the PA.

Hamas for its part will be happy to defer its desire to crush Fatah and take over full control of the Palestinian movement for a while, in return for the international recognition and legitimacy that it will get from this agreement.

It’s quite likely that if Hamas can restrain itself and its allies from restarting violence against Israel we will shortly see a reopening of the crossing between Gaza and Egypt, marking — at least implicitly — the international community’s acceptance of Hamas as something more than an outlaw terrorist group, if less (for now) than a legitimate governing power.

While Israel understands that the truce does not include the West Bank — that is, that it can continue to operate against terrorists from Hamas, Fatah’s al-Aqsa brigades, or other factions — Hamas has said that it will not tolerate IDF actions against its members there. And since the truce agreement did not include the release of kidnapped IDF soldier Gilad Schalit, we can expect many Hamas members currently imprisoned by Israel to be released in the inevitable trade.

It appears that Israel’s effort to isolate Hamas has failed, and the opportunity for a military solution has passed as well. The next confrontation will likely be between a truncated Israel and a Hamas-dominated Palestinian Authority.

This disaster has been accomplished by the Olmert administration that also allowed Hezbollah to survive the Second Lebanon War, a fact which made the recent takeover of the Lebanese government possible. Now Hezbollah appears to be on track to receive the Sheba Farms area and possibly more as part of the fallout from the botched war.

We can say that in many ways Israel’s strategic position is worse than it has been at any time in the past several decades.

At the same time, Hezbollah is reportedly planning to attack Jewish targets throughout the world, demonstrating the truth of the Zionist principle that the security of Jews everywhere depends on the strength of the Jewish state.

Technorati Tags: Israel, Hamas, Hezbollah

News item:

A Hamas spokesman said Tuesday that his organization is committed to an Egyptian-mediated truce deal with Israel set to go into effect Thursday. Sami Abu Zuhri said Hamas will commit to the “zero hour” declared by Egypt…

The MENA agency report cited an unnamed high-level Egyptian official as saying that both sides “have agreed on the first phase” of an Egyptian package to end the violence in the coastal strip.

It said the first phase is a “mutual and simultaneous calm” in the Gaza Strip which will start 6 a.m. Thursday…

 Government spokesman Mark Regev would also not confirm or deny a deal. “What is important is not only words but deeds,” Regev said. “If there is a total absence of terror attacks from Gaza into Israel and if there is an end to arms buildup in Gaza Strip and movement on the hostage Gilad Schalit that will indeed be a new reality.”

This sounds like the “first phase” will include stopping the rocket fire into Israel in exchange for Israel stopping incursions and air activity in Gaza. It may also include opening crossings into Gaza, etc. It will be interesting to see if Hamas will commit to making other factions like Islamic Jihad behave.

Unfortunately it also appears that Schalit’s release is not included. No doubt Hamas will only agree to free him in connection with a huge prisoner release.

Does Israel have the means to verify that arms smuggling has stopped? Probably only partially, if at all. So Hamas will continue to arm, even if an agreement to stop will be part of a later phase. And there are plenty of other things to keep them busy, like training and building fortifications.

What does Israel get? As long as the cease-fire lasts, freedom from rocket and mortar attacks.

What does Hamas get? Time to rebuild, to arm, and to train. Probably more, not less, smuggling. And most importantly, the ability to claim that they are a responsible governing power and to move toward international respectability.

The day that Hamas gets international recognition will be a black day for Israel. The next step will be a takeover of the Palestinian Authority — after all, they won the last election and are far more popular than Fatah, as well as militarily stronger. Such a takeover will put the arms that have been given to Fatah in Hamas hands, and will be analogous to the recent putsch in Lebanon which gave de facto control of the government and army to Hezbollah.

If the IDF is forced to withdraw from most of the West Bank, perhaps in the context of a ‘peace’ agreement, then Israel will be faced with hostile and frankly genocidal Iranian proxy regimes on its northern, southern and eastern borders.

Earlier Tuesday, during a session of the Knesset’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, IDF Chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi said that Israel was on a “collision course” with Hamas and that he adopted the stance of intelligence officials, who believed that a truce would be short and fragile.

“The IDF will respect a cease-fire but is also getting ready for a large-scale military operation in the Gaza Strip,” Ashkenazi added.

The real question is not if Israel will directly confront Hamas, but when. Anything that makes Hamas stronger or deters Israel — such as the improved military capability and increased respectability for Hamas that will result from a cease-fire — will make the inevitable confrontation more costly.

A cease-fire is a very bad idea whose time has apparently come.

Technorati Tags: Israel, Hamas, cease-fire, Gaza

There was a time when people who were in favor of legalized abortion were called ‘pro-abortion’, and those who opposed it ‘anti-abortion’. But ‘pro-abortion’ sounded a little harsh, so the term ‘pro-choice’ was invented. The idea was supposedly that they do not especially like the idea of abortion, but are in favor of allowing women to choose it, if they, er, so choose.

But this was also a  stroke of PR genius, because it makes their opponents ‘anti-choice’, which has very negative, authoritarian connotations. Partly in self-defense and partly to emphasize the fact that they were also opposed to physician-assisted suicide, etc., the previously anti-abortion people became ‘pro-life’.

This was even better than ‘pro-choice’ because it made their opponents either ‘anti-life’ or, better yet, ”pro-death’!

In any event, my head spins when I hear either ‘pro-choice’ or ‘pro-life’, and I have to take a second to translate it back into the much easier-to-understand terminology of pro- and anti-abortion.

Now, why am I talking about this? Because the same thing has happened to the word ‘peace’, which has been appropriated by the Left. In the context of the Mideast, being ‘pro-peace’ means being in favor of Israel making concessions.

Peace Now, Jewish Voice for Peace, Gush Shalom, the “pro-Israel pro-peace” J Street — all call for an Israeli withdrawal from the territories, the return of the Golan to Syria, negotiations with Hamas, etc.

Would these policies bring peace? Probably not. Returning the Golan to Syria, for example, would probably increase the chances of war by improving Syria’s strategic position. Negotiating with Hamas would strengthen Hamas and make it more likely for Hamas to get international recognition without mitigating its commitment to destroy Israel.  Withdrawal from the West Bank would lead to a Hamas takeover there. These events would lead away from peace, not toward it.

But my opposing the policies of the ‘peace camp’ makes me ‘anti-peace’ or even ‘pro-war’. What nonsense! Who gave the Left title to the word ‘peace’?

Those who advocate a posture of strength, not concessions are actually pro-peace. Perhaps the others should be called ‘pro-appeasement’ or even ‘pro-surrender’.

Technorati Tags: Israel, peace

I just watched a History Channel documentary about the Manhattan Project. Leaving aside the feelings evoked by the outcome of it — the atomic bomb and its use in war — I was struck by something else: how American society was able to focus its energy (and that of numerous refugee Jewish scientists, I might add) to accomplish this massive undertaking, in every sense — scientific, technological, and organizational — and to do it in a remarkably short time and in the midst of an all-consuming war.

Could we do something similar in scale today?  I doubt it, although their are plenty of candidates for such a project, like the development of cheap energy sources independent of OPEC. But for various reasons (I have my theories, of course), we as a society seem to have lost whatever we had that made the Manhattan Project possible.

At which point my thoughts turned to Israel, which also achieved almost miraculous successes in the near past, like winning the War of Independence and the 1967 war, absorbing millions of refugees from Hitler and the Arab world, etc.

And yet, today she stands apparently impotent, facing her enemies on her borders and within them. Why? Are today’s threats greater than those in 1948? I don’t think so.

There are several explanations for this. One is the most obvious: the lack of leadership. Every day there is a Cabinet Minister saying there will be a large incursion into Gaza, there will be a cease-fire, there will be a medium incursion, there will be an incursion of unspecified size “to teach Hamas a lesson” followed by a cease-fire, etc. Every day there is something new, and the only common element is that someone is talking about it.

Similar situations exist with respect to policy toward the West Bank, Hezbollah, Syria, Iran, etc.

What is needed is for responsible, competent, dedicated officials to analyze the situation, come up with the best — which does not mean perfect — policy, and then actually execute it. How simple it sounds, and how hard to accomplish! But we know, for example, that the present government is not responsible, competent or dedicated, and nothing will change until this does. Some have suggested that there are structural problems in Israel’s system for choosing leaders which is responsible for this; if so, it has to be changed too.

There is another problem which, if it can be imagined, is even more destructive than the first. This is well illustrated by Barry Rubin’s recent comment about “back channel” negotiations with the Palestinians: “I’ve been to those, the Israelis apologize and the Palestinians blame Israel for everything…”

Israelis need to stop accepting blame, apologizing,  and trying to appease their enemies. The post-Zionist attitudes which appear to infect so many Jews in Israel and elsewhere are no more than the old ghetto mentality which whispers to us to beg the gentile king for our miserable lives. In fact, history shows that the Jewish state has little to apologize for, and that the blame for creating and perpetuating the conflict and the various miseries (e.g., Jewish and Arab refugees) that surround it falls squarely on the Arabs. Sorry for those who demand ‘balance’ but this is true.

Maybe Israel needs a Manhattan Project for political reform, and another one for History. Because no nation, no matter how great, not the US and not Israel, can succeed if its leaders are more concerned with their personal fortunes or legal misfortunes than with the good of the state. And no nation can win an existential struggle by accepting the narratives of its enemies.

Technorati Tags: Manhattan Project, Israel