Israel Goes Right: Makes It Easier for Obama
Next week's Israeli election will be viewed as delivering a blow, perhaps fatal, to the peace process. Powerful showings by both the Likud and the neo-fascist Yisrael Beteinu party will be read as indicating that Israel has decided to embrace extremist ideology with a vengeance.
That may be true. But it's really not our business. As Americans, our job is to promote policies that are best for America. And Israel, a country that values its special relationship with the United States, is in no position to ignore the American government's wishes.
That is especially true when the President is remarkably popular both in this country and throughout the world. No matter who heads Israel's next government, it is President Obama who holds 51 cards in the deck.
Israelis understand that. The last prime minister who went head-to-head with the President of the United States was Yitzhak Shamir. When President George H.W. Bush demanded a settlements freeze as a condition for aid, Shamir said "no." Within months he was out of office, replaced by Yitzhak Rabin with the furtive help of the Bush administration. Not surprisingly, Rabin quickly reversed Shamir's policy.
Israeli politics are not as simple as they appear. The Israeli voter tends to see no inconsistency between voting for a right-winger and simultaneously favoring the two-state solution.
Next week, many Israelis will vote for the right out of fury at Hamas and the desire to have leadership that will stand up to it.
That does not mean that they like the settlers or that they do not want the West Bank returned to the Palestinians. They simply want security. At such time as they believe - and US persuasion can help here - that they can have a deal that provides security, they will give up the West Bank and its settlements.
Despite what the extremists say, the not-very-timid IDF will remove the settlers in days if not hours. That is because Israelis understand that retaining the West Bank ensures the loss of either Israel's Jewish identity -- or its democratic form of government, or both - within a generation.
Also not simple in Israeli politics is determining which of the candidates will be most amenable to diplomacy and which will dig in and say "no" to any ideas the United States will offer.
Certainly, Avigdor Lieberman, the Russian-born and raised leader of the Yisrael Beteinu party, will oppose peace moves. His answer to, what he views as, the Arab problem is making Arabs' lives in Israel so miserable that they flee. He is a modern incarnation of Meir Kahane, whose party was so racist that it was banned from participating in Israeli elections. His current plan - to make every Arab sign a loyalty oath - is a prelude to "ethnic cleansing" and everyone knows it. (Lieberman is a more malevovent version of Joe McCarthy. Imagine if Joe McCarthy used the "loyalty" issue to target Jews or African-Americans with the goal of forcing them out of the country).
But Lieberman is not going to be prime minister. The next prime minister will be Binyamin Netanyahu, Tzipi Livni, or Ehud Barak. Netanyahu is the farthest right of the three but not significantly so. During the Gaza war, each of the three emphatically supported military action and demonstrated little sympathy for the Palestinian civilians - innocent bystanders - who were killed, including 400 kids. Simply put, all three are hawks. As George Wallace liked to say, there is "not a dime's worth of difference" between them.
It is easy to compare Barak and Netanyahu because each of them served as prime minister. Although Barak is famous for the "offer" he made to Arafat at Camp David (Palestinians say there was no offer), he proudly touts the fact that he made no territorial concessions to the Palestinians during his term in office.
He refused even to live up to withdrawals to which Israel previously agreed. Not so with Netanyahu. He actually withdrew from territory and agreed to yield more at the Wye River summit in 1998 (it was his agreement to do so that caused his government to collapse).
It can be argued that a rightwing prime minister like Netanyahu has a more difficult time resisting the United States than a prime minister perceived as moderate like a Barak or a Livni.
Golda Meir was, along with Yitzhak Shamir, the most inflexible leader Israel ever had. But she consistently managed to outfox President Nixon (to the detriment of both Israel and the United States) by looking and sounding moderate. Her successor, Menachem Begin, a right-winger, did not have Meir's advantage. When President Carter put on the pressure, he caved (to the benefit of Israel and the United States).
Dovish types prepared to go into mourning over the likely Netanyahu victory should bear this history in mind when the election results come in next week. Things aren't always what they seem.
We might be closer to peace today if Netanyahu kept his job in 1999, rather than losing to Barak. After all, President Clinton knew how to handle Netanyahu while he was thoroughly snowed by Barak. He "treated me like a goddam wooden Indian," Clinton said of Barak. Clinton was referring to Barak's penchant for acting as if he, not Clinton, was head of the Free World.
But in the Truth About Camp David by Clayton Swisher, the best book about why Camp David collapsed, Clinton's press secretary Joe Lockhart recalls that Clinton vehemently disliked Netanyahu: "Netanyahu was one of the single most obnoxious individuals you're going to come into....He would open his mouth and you would have no confidence that anything that came out of it was the truth."
To put it politely, either of these two would be hobbled in dealing with President Obama or Secretary Hillary Clinton. It is no surprise that official Washington is hoping (against hope?) for Livni.
But, as I said, the Israeli election is not our business just as our election wasn't theirs. (They preferred McCain while Americans, overwhelmingly, did not).
Obama, Clinton, and Mitchell need to keep doing what they are doing, regardless of who wins. That is to push hard to re-start the diplomatic process with the goal of ending the occupation and achieving Israeli security and a viable, contiguous and independent Palestinian state. Determined American leadership can produce that result. If it can't, or won't, the fault will not be the new Israeli prime minister. It will be ours.
But a President cannot do the job alone. He needs the American people behind him, and he needs Congress. Unfortunately, Congress tends to view the Israeli-Palestinian conflict not so much as a problem but rather as a cash cow for fundraising. Democrats, Republicans, liberals and conservatives tend to come together as one when it comes to telling the pro-Israel community what it thinks we want to hear (and will reward).
That has changed some in recent years thanks to efforts by organizations like Israel Policy Forum and our allies.
Last week 61 House Members wrote to President Obama urging immediate action by the United States to end the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. Judging from our phone calls to Capitol Hill, a clear majority would have signed the letter but feared antagonizing the the lobby. In that context, 61 is a good number - especially when, in writing to Obama, we are preaching to the converted.
Next week we will be gathering co-sponsors for H. Res 130, a resolution offered by Rep. Bill Delahunt (D-MA), offering strong support for George Mitchell's efforts to resolve the conflict.
Israel Policy Forum has joined with J Street, the Religious Action Center for Reform Judaism, Americans for Peace Now, Brit Tzedek v' Shalom, Churches for Middle East Peace, and the Arab American Institute to push the resolution. If you want to know if your Representative is a co-sponsor, just e-mail us to ask. You can then call the Capitol at 202-225-3121, ask for your Representative, and urge him or her to back Obama and Mitchell by co-sponsoring H. Res. 130. Or do this. As Barack Obama told me ,"You can't expect me to respond to you if I can't hear you." Let's make sure he hears us loud and clear.
He's on our side. But a little reinforcement can only help.
How can they live like that ? The two peoples despise each other and live all jammed in together ...
Does the average citizen there just ignore the millions of 'others' stuffed into Gaza ? What is it like to see 'others' every day that are enemies, more or less ?
I imagine a high incidence of ulcers, headaches, insomnia ...
The guy you hire to do yard work is also the guy you shoot at the next day ... how does that work ?
Help me understand this.
February 6, 2009 11:16 AM | Reply | Permalink
Sad to say, they simply ignore it. They live in a bubble.
February 6, 2009 11:28 AM | Reply | Permalink
Wow. Thank You MJ.
I should go see for myself - I do not know what we are talking about, really, having never seen it.
So the civilians that got burned and killed : well, what the heck. They deserved it ... let's eat lunch ...
February 6, 2009 11:40 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, but, of course, we are no different -- although Gaza is 30 miles from Tel Aviv and Laujah is 6000 miles from here.
February 6, 2009 11:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
Absolutely.
And racism really helps make it go down smooth - when the victims are poor brown people, well ... change the channel.
February 6, 2009 11:54 AM | Reply | Permalink
You need to understand more clearly, MJ, that Gentile Americans generally don't have the same interest in Israel as Jewish Americans.
For Jewish Americans to continue to force support for Israel, at great cost to the US, is asking a lot. If the average American ever wakes up to just how high that cost is, support for Israel will be gone.
February 6, 2009 11:42 AM | Reply | Permalink
I know that. My gentile friends and relatives would cut aid out tomorrow.
February 6, 2009 11:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'd be interested in what polls say about this, because there are the rather fanatical Christian Zionists to consider (one is a good friend of mine). But I don't know what percentage of the population they represent.
February 6, 2009 1:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
Fanatical Christians are many in number and their support has been energetically sought by right wing Israelis. That's a deal made by the devil. American Christians on the right are anti-Semites.
February 6, 2009 6:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, this gentile wouldn't cut aid and I think the commenter's remark is a bit careless or perhaps uninformed. It depends what is meant by supporting Israel. The best support for Israel is as discussed by you and others, a certain kind of tough love to both Israelis and Palestinians to make them solve their problems. If we get that, monetary support more than pays dividends. But if by support we include kneejerk excesses like the time W. called Ariel Sharon a "man of peace," that's unhelpful. Also, Americans have some crazy ideas in general that (1) Palestinians are somehow bad people, (2) that the relatively simple dynamic of not stealing their land anymore is somehow incredibly complicated, and (3)that their fight is not only unjustified but indeed downright wickedness. They mostly don't understand the basic land issues (in part having been treating to Mossad disinformation like "a people without land to a land without people"), and if they did, they'd expect more progress for their money. But it's not the same thing as cutting off aid.
Also, you and the poster need to please bear in mind that Catholics and Protestants generally are positively disposed toward Israel (ever since bible lessons) and most don't much notice or care whether a given Israel government is moderate, rightist, or even neo-fascist, and especially not our Talebangelicals. That last group is too stupid to understand the issues and too pigheaded to care -- they vote, too, and Sarah Palin will is already rightly counting on their blind support. So Sarah and a lot of red-state legislators will always back blind support, as opposed to rational policy. Which means that you've been a bit glib.
February 6, 2009 2:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
I like to spread the responsibility around to include arms dealers, defense contractors, millenial christians ...
It is normal for a person to support his co-religionist - I have no problem with that.
But the guys really supercharging the conflict are NOT co-religionists ... they have their own interests.
February 6, 2009 12:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
From your comments, it sounds like the Israeli voter is possibly more ignorant then we are, and I don't see how anyone could be more ignorant than the adverage Joe Six Pack! We put phantom security above the law and what did that get us but more repression and scoffing at the rule of law, yet we are less secure than before 9/11. How an average Israeli, who I thought were better educated, more thoughtful and discerning can believe segregating, repressing and attacking Palestinians will make Israel a safer, better place to live is beyond me. I guess it's asking too much to expect voters anywhere to look to strategic versus tactical politics.
Lord, Take me now!
February 6, 2009 11:57 AM | Reply | Permalink
Good assessment, frank and yet justifiably optimistic when it is generally hard to be so.
One thing I wonder is how much is the concept of eventually (but as you note, likely within a generation) splitting the West Bank and somehow getting Jordan to take responsibility for the Palestinian population with whatever land and other incentives make it possible? I'm not asking if you think it's a likely outcome, but rather has it become the only outcome envisioned some or even most of the major actors?
February 6, 2009 12:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sorry to tell you guys but the one consistent way to explain Israel's behavior is that their tactic is land grab by creeping annexation. It will take a complete reversal of policy and a load of pressure from the US to effect any change.
They have no plan to hand back any land except what they don't want. They can't afford to give up the water rights they control to their benefit and the sacrifice of the West Bank Palestinians. They're just sitting it out, even if it takes 100 years.
And that is their miscalculation.
Wish I could be more optimistic but US pressure will also only come after a complete change in attitude in Washington, too. It doesn't matter that long-term this impasse is not in the interests of the US.
February 6, 2009 12:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
I wasn't at all prepared for my reaction to the West Bank Segment, last Sunday, on 60 Minutes. I was embarrassed by my ignorance and angry with those who facilitate it. The story and the visuals was a gut punch. Contrary to my prior impressions, this wasn't just some random injustices, being administered ad hoc in ramshackle suburbs and ghettos, this was an Apartheid. Surely I'm not alone. I think a wide viewing by Americans of that one segment, would change the discussion overnight.
February 6, 2009 1:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
"Netanyahu was one of the single most obnoxious individuals you're going to come into....He would open his mouth and you would have no confidence that anything that came out of it was the truth."
This from Bill Clinton??
Incredible.
February 6, 2009 1:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
Between clinton and Netenyahau --it takes one to know one!!!! Camp David fell apart because clinton waited till he needed to redeem his presidency and then he pushed someone who saw him for what he is!!!! Arafat played him like a fiddle--he knew clinton was weak and needy!
This next round will play out on a totally different field---with the World not dependent on biased media [American and Israeli] for information and truth!
February 6, 2009 7:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
a pleasure to read a fair and balenced article concerning anything israel.
February 6, 2009 2:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
Clearly, this country must begin distancing itself from Israel. A growing number of Americans realize the unnatually close strategic and political relationship in which the U.S. has trapped itself with Israel is sustained at our own detriment. The interests and goals of the two countries in this volatile but vital region have been verging apart for years now. Israel's last two ugly, murderous tantrums leave appalled and disgusted the rest of the globe - and Americans not buffalo'd by the endless yap of the Levantine titan's relentless lobbies here at home.
At least since the 1950s, Israel has enjoyed unique benefits of endless American largesse, not the least of which is avoiding the responsibilities that should come with possession of nuclear weapons. Even though it's the world's worst-kept secret, it has amassed a daunting arsenal of these nightmare devices, although, alone among such nuclear powers, Israel is signatory to no nuclear agreements or treaties, and, in fact, has never admitted it maintains the weapons - and means to deliver them.
Israel's special status among nations is, especially with its military potency and productive economy, now utterly unaccountable, impossible to prop up any further.
For lack of a better term, it's way past time for a clean break.
February 6, 2009 2:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
This is an incredible assertion to make, one that has no basis in evidence, or even logic.
Make no mistake. A total evacuation of the West Bank without a clear shift in the fundamental nature of the Arabs' attitude towards Israel beforehand, would plunge Israel into chaos. It could never be muscled through the Knesset the way the Gaza evacuation was. IT is not something that could just be dictated by the US.
Now to be sure, it is certainly possible to get serious about halting settlement expansion and stopping some of the more egregious military practices. It might even be possible to evacuate some of the more far-flung settlements. But an uprooting of 400,000 people by the IDF won't happen any time in the foreseeable future, pressure or no pressure from Obama.
February 6, 2009 3:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
I have to agree with Brad's pessimistic take, though not his prescription, and challenge MJ's assurances and bravado.
MJ is putting his faith in an IDF that is now deeply penetrated by right wing religious zealots, and that just conducted a murderous Jewish jihad in Gaza. The IDF's chief Rabbi, Brigadier General Avichai Ronsky, is himself a West Bank colonist. Mikhael Manekin of Breaking the Silence, a soldiers' project seeking to expose the IDF's behavior against Palestinians, says "the army has been effectively subcontracted to promote the views of the extremist settlers to its soldiers."
Brad, like many other supporters of Israel, says that before Israel can leave the West Bank, Arabs must do X, Y and Z first. There is always an X, Y and Z. But it really doesn't matter what the Palestinian Arabs do. The Palestinians and Arafat made some very significant moves with the Oslo accords. But the settlements grew rapidly during the period of the peace process, even under Saint Rabin. The colonization movement isn't just some fringe movement made up of a few kooky settlers. It is mainstream business. The population of the settlements compared to the population of Israel is roughly the same as the population of Florida compared to the population of the US. You want to guess what would happen if the US Army tried to evacuate permanently the state of Florida, and if Florida's people were determined not to go?
Even those Israelis who aren't personally invested in colonizing and annexing the West Bank will never find the stomach to drive a half a million crying and wailing and Molotov cocktail-wielding and gun-toting Jews out of their homes in what many of the colonists, and even more ordinary Israelis, regard as the Land of Israel.
And do you think those IDF soldiers, a large proportion of whom deeply sympathize with colonists' attitudes and aims, are going to be able to load hundreds of thousands of Jews onto buses, trucks or trains while their tear-streaked countrymen and coreligionists shout "Nazi!" and "Geobbels!" at them, while pleading "How could a Jew do this to Jews!" And the crying to soldiers is only what will happen before the settlers start shooting at soldiers.
Recall how stressful and turbulent was the Israeli evacuation of the Jewish settlers from Gaza in 2005. That was for 8500 settlers. By the time this supposed West Bank evacuation begins, there will probably be half a million colonists in the West Bank, almost 60 times the number in Gaza. The IDF has about 175,000 active personnel.
Israel will never leave their colonies in the West Bank until they are literally forced to do so. This will require extreme pressure in the form of very strong sanctions, if even that will work. It might also be necessary to start clamping down on Jewish charities around the world. Many of those charities are funneling millions of dollars to Israel for what is in effect the the financial support of ethnic cleansing. It's outrageous that these charities are permitted to operate legally in this country. They should be shut down.
February 6, 2009 7:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
The war crimes investigations of IDF forces in Gaza are presenting evidence of white phosphorus used on civilian homes and captured prisoners used as shields and scouts. That's from Christian Science Monitor and McClatchy news.
Do these charges and investigations (Israel is carrying out its own) have any effect on the majority of Israeli voters? or shall I accept "they live in a bubble" as MJ says.
I have idealized Israel all my life and I brushed away reports of settlements and racism. Now I am devastated at what I am learning.
To: Peorgle
There was a big reaction to the '60 minutes' segment in discussions of I/P on Daily Kos. There is something about a bird's eye view that really has an impact.
February 6, 2009 3:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
The IDF has just demonstrated its bility to deal with people who get in their way.
I believe the settlers saw that on television (cheering every act of violence).
I would expect they would not want to be on the receiving end, although they delight at being on the delivering end!
1-2-3. And the settlers are back in Israel and then Brooklyn.
February 6, 2009 3:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
The IDF has just demonstrated its ability to deal with people who get in their way.
Oh, c'mon MJ. They just demonstrated their ability to deal with Arabs who get in their way - not Jews. Anyway, how many IDF soldiers regard the settlers as "in their way"?
February 6, 2009 7:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
Look, from what I read, and from what I hear (when I don't cover my ears) most Americans think the Palestinians are occupying land that belongs to the Israelis not the other way around! Yes, and those were college students in that poll>
The also think that this territory is much bigger than Israel, and it's inhabitants have free sovereignty to import arms and recruit soldiers! And is allied with all the other Arab countries for Israel's "defeat"
The equivalency canard is the Zionists most useful possesion.
Just start with the two words, "missles" and "rockets" for instance. American conceptions of "rockets" and "missles" have nothing at all to do with the projectiles the Palestinians launch in the general direction of their occupiers.
And oh Lord, please don't bring the settlers back to Brooklyn! There aren't that many Jews in American jails and I'd rather that didn't change.
Besides, they won't like it here, they're prayers don't work as well when they don't come from a Jewish State (oh yes, I have had that line taken by Zionists!)
But now I'm getting upset. Gosh, won't it be grand when we can add the honorific "destroyers of the Palestinians" as an honorific to Jewish.
February 6, 2009 5:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
"But an uprooting of 400,000 people by..."
Brad, they've been ther for how long, a hot second or two? Where they shouldn't have been?
Why don't you take that "uprooted" and shove it.
February 6, 2009 5:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
Uprooted. Like a thief who takes over my house and is uprooted by the police.
Uprooted? What is the word for the Palestinians? They decided to relocate to refugee camps.
Or my relatives in Poland? They took a vacation in the East?
My God, these people are amazing. Brad knows NOTHING about the Middle East he didn't learn in Hebrew school. And he was a bad Hebrew school.
February 6, 2009 6:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
>But it's really not our business ...
Whether or not the state of Israel, (supported and financed as she is through the dollars of the American tax payer), becomes even more obdurate and aggressive - is absolutely the business of the US electorate!
It would not be in a position, either politically or economically, to exacerbate conflict and kill 400 children in cold blood were it not for the billions of dollars in military and civil aid, received annually.
Is this apparently perverse strategy in the US interest? Answer: it is not. Israel has no real strategic importance. Its significance lies in a biblical story that promises the coming of the Messiah when all Jews return to the Holy Land - a religious belief of perhaps 40 million Christian Zionists, who are certainly entitled to that belief, notwithstanding its patent impossibility. The majority of Jews voluntarily wish NOT to live in Israel - that is why they choose to live in NY, LA, Paris, Florida, London and Belgium etc.
So on the basis of a flawed religious belief, hundreds of innocent civilians have just been killed with US supplied weapons: cluster bombs, missiles and white phosphorus delivered by US supplied F16 bombers and helicopter warships.
Does this sound reasonable, logical, sensible, morally correct, civilized, democratic or just?
Even if we were to factor in the continued firing of rockets by Hamas into southern Israel - does that change the basic validity of the argument?
By constantly arming Israel, America ensures that the conflict will last for another 60 years, whereas what we should be doing is knocking heads together, very hard! The US should no longer be in a position whereby she is seen by the international community as a lapdog of the Israel state: to sit in the UNSC and vote down any and every resolution that is critical of Israel. That brings both the UN and the US into continual disrepute.
February 6, 2009 6:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
It is doubtful that Ms. clinton will fair well with either Netenyahau or Livini but Obama will be fine, considering his recent steely nature!
The Palestinian slaughter and theft of their land will no longer go un noticed by the World...The maps and pictures are out there now!
By the By, this is not the actions of the Israeli people but the overbearing leaders in the Israeli Gov't and the blocked biased press!
February 6, 2009 6:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
Brad knows NOTHING about the Middle East he didn't learn in Hebrew school.
MJ, please don't blame Jewish religious education for Zionist propaganda. I remember Hebrew school, we learned Hebrew, so we could read our Haftorah at Bar Mitzvah.
I had a very hard time with Hebrew, so I was only given a quarter-Torah.
Anyway, when it's all said and done, the real revelation will be how little Judaism as a religion had to do with Zionism and its projects.
Don't help Zionism hijack Judaism by implying that Brad's tribalism (my apologies to all self-respecting actual tribes) was imbibed in Hebrew school. I doubt that it was. But things may have changed since I was Bar Mitzvah, since that was pre-67.
February 6, 2009 7:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
The maps and pictures are out there...
Every blog post on Israel and it's actions should start with a map of the area involved. That alone would put paid to most of the equivalency canards used by Hasbarists.
Ask an American who supports Zionism to draw you a map not accurate, but just ashowing the relative size and position of Israel and the Occupied territories. Most of the ones I know, especially if they are not Jewish, have the proportions and positions backwards.
February 6, 2009 7:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
IT is not something that could just be dictated by the US.
Say, Brad, why don't we (the US, in case you forget) cut off funds to Israel, and then see what we can dictate. You might be surprised!
But I can't imagine any other Israeli response to having its emoluments cut off than hurling a few atomic bombs at neighboring countries, you know, in self-defense.
No, that's not anti-semetism. What the hell else am I supposed to think Israel would do, when they conformed to none of the legal strictures concerning atomic weapons?
February 6, 2009 7:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
But Lieberman is not going to be prime minister.
But Netanyahu has pledged to give Avigdor Lieberman a prominent position in the Israeli government. Yisrael Beiteinu is going to be the third place party, and send the party of David Ben-Gurion into obscurity. Lieberman might end up being the next Israeli defense minister, foreign affairs minister or finance minister.
Imagine those wondertful photo-ops, with Hillary Clinton, Bob Gates or Tim Geithner smiling and shaking hands with the ultrantionalist Lieberman! Imagine Joementum and Avigdorable having a verbal anti-Arab pissing contest to establish quien es el mas Lieberman.
My predictions: Within a couple of days, FOX News and Lou Dobbs will be saying, "This guy Lieberman has the right idea." Within six months, the New York Times will be saying, "It must be admitted that several of Mr. Lieberman's innovative ideas have much to be said for them." Within one year, the US government will be pledging money to Israel to help with the transfer.
February 6, 2009 9:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
A RELATED ARTICLE-
NETANYAHU AND LIEBERMAN RULE ELECTION POLLS, BUT IT’S OBAMA THAT REALLY MATTERS
by Richard Silverstein @ "Tikun Olam", 02/06/09
It’s becoming clearer and clearer that far from aiding their election prospects as they had calculated, the Gaza adventure has torpedoed the chances of Tzipi Livni and Ehud Barak. In Livni’s case she has lost the job of prime minister and sentenced Kadima to the opposition and possibly oblivion if her colleagues abandon her for their former roles in the pre-Sharon Likud. In Barak’s case, he not only hasn’t a hope in hell of being prime minister, he may’ve sentenced his party to the ignominy of being the fourth or fifth largest party in Knesset. This may be an outcome that will also consign Labor to an oblivion it so richly deserves.....
ENTIRE ARTICLE - http://www.richardsilverstein.com/tikun_olam/2009/02/06/netanyahu-and-lieberman-rule-election-polls-but-its-obama-that-really-matters/
February 6, 2009 9:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
FRIDAY NITE VIDEOS
What you see: Avigdor Lieberman campaign ad
What you get: The Department of Examination of Israeli Arab Loyalty
February 6, 2009 10:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
that video is an anti-lieberman campaign ad
February 6, 2009 10:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
I may have been to hard on Marty Peretz. For the most part, I make it a point to let others tell me what if anything TNR has to offer on Middle East issues
Somehow, I guess the headline caught my eye, I read and was SHOCKED to read this
A frightening article
http://www.tnr.com/politics/story.html?id=1cd265cf-3d9e-43d8-ae46-5b0ac0b2f8ea
House Party by Arik Ben-Zvi
The alarming rise of radical nationalism in Israel.
February 6, 2009 10:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
That J Street campaign for HRes 130 is SLICK!
I responded to their email yesterday. Put in your contact information, they find your representative, then DIAL the Washington office and pay for the call
All you need to do is pick up the phone, read the script and fill in the contact form
Cool
February 6, 2009 10:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
1-2-3. And the settlers are back in Israel and then Brooklyn.
Sorry MJ, but every time I read "and then Brooklyn" it scares the hell out of me.
Wouldn't they do better out in Tombstone Arizona, or wherever it is they have the shoot-outs at the Ho-kay corral? You know, somewhere in the vild vast?
February 7, 2009 2:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
"The IDF has just demonstrated its bility [sic]to deal with people who get in their way." Just what has been demonstrated to whom? The IDF has certainly demonstrated that with a total monopoly on bombers and tanks it can kill many, many more women and children than can the Palestinians. And the Palestinians have demonstrated, once again, that no matter how many women and children the IDF kills, the IDF cannot defeat the Palestinians. I don't have any idea how any of this translates to matters involving people occupying other peoples' land, but the discussion is of necessity complicated enought -- it would be a good idea at least to keep the metaphors straight.
February 7, 2009 5:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
Hafrada (separation, apartheid, ethnic cleansing) is the necessary consequence of Israel being a Jewish state when much of the population it controls is Arab. Until the Israelis and their American supporters, left and right, renounce Jewish ethno-centrism, hafrada must continue. If you want peace, give up the idea of a Jewish state and adopt pluralism. Otherwise, all of this talk of peace is just useless babble.
February 7, 2009 8:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
Excellent commentary, MJ. It also seems like there is a now solid plan, overdue but nonetheless very welcome, for turning around US policy towards Israel (e.g. creating a real policy to replace what had been a rubberstamp under AWOL W. Bush). The problem remains, however: where is there anything like a viable strategy, within the chaos of Israeli politics, for bringing the Israeli government back to common sense and the civilized world?
"They simply want security" speaks volumes. It explains to me how the Israelis could end up with an election choice between three inept hawks and a one demagogical bigot. As though America had a presidential race between Phil Gramm, Sarah Palin, Daniel Pipes and David Duke.
Wanting something impossible is not a good basis for a healthy body politic. Not in Revolutionary France, not in Weimar Germany, not in 1950s Alabama.
"Simply wanting security" seems like a reasonable desire in most of the civilized world most of the time. Israel and Palestine is not now part of that majority of time-places. It has not been for many decades and for all we know may not be for many decades to come.
Israelis can have the world's respect for their courage, vision, skill and willingness to accept sacrifice, as was largely the case before the 1980s, or the world's disgust at their cowardice, clumsiness, and pointless brutality, as in the recent Gaza massacres. But security, in the usually thought of sense of zero violent attacks on it, is nowhere near any real world radar screen. And there seems to be no Israel Obama ready to stand up and tell voters there to put aside childishness, and to work sensibly instead towards realistic relative security, rather than exploit the lack of absolute security for all sorts of mischievous and morally bankrupt reasons.
February 7, 2009 4:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
Its refreshing to know that im not the only one who sees issues with our close relationship to Israel..
Ive always wondered how they can manage to pull as much US aid money out of us as they do.. any ideas?
MJ, You might be interested in this article by Melissa Rossi, she has clearly misquoted you and has challenged you to an open debate...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/melissa-rossi/this-just-in-israel-is-in_b_164805.html
February 8, 2009 7:01 AM | Reply | Permalink
Melissa Rossi's piece makes a few valid points, but completely barks up the wrong tree due to the reckless, if not plain stupid, misquote of MJ, altering his words
"As Americans, our job is to promote policies that are best for America. And Israel, a country that values its special relationship with the United States, is in no position to ignore the American government's wishes."
into:
"As Americans, our job is to promote policies that are best for America, and for Israel."
February 8, 2009 8:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
http://www.spectator.co.uk/melaniephillips/3329296/the-jihad-against-britains-jews.thtml
The jihad against Britain's Jews
In addition to the record number of attacks upon Jewish individuals and institutions and murderous incitement displayed on the anti-Israel demonstrations and riots as reported by the Community Security Trust, Jewish parents report that their children – some as young as eight – are now running a gauntlet of attack from their Muslim classmates at school who accuse them of ‘killing Palestinian children’. Comments by adults about ‘Jews controlling all the money/the media/the BBC’ (yes, really! All because it allowed Israel’s spokesman to put the case for Israel from time to time) are now commonplace in both private and public discourse. Today’s Jewish Chronicle reports that a 12 year-old Birmingham schoolgirl was terrorised by a mob of 20 youths chanting ‘Kill all Jews’ and ‘Death to Jews’ on her way home from school last week...
...Meanwhile, of course, as Sky’s Tim Marshall pointed out the other day on his blog, the government of Sri Lanka is also attempting to eradicate terrorism by a military campaign in which, according to the UN, ‘many civilians are being killed’, thousands made homeless, hundreds of thousands trapped, and to which, as food shortages grow, the government refuses to allow access to journalists. Yet there are no sit-ins on campus against the Sri Lankans, no violent riots outside its High Commission, no calls to boycott Orange Pekoe tea. As Marshall observed:
And yet somehow the lives of the 1,300 Palestinians killed by the Israelis causes far more outrage, in certain quarters, than the 2 million dead in Congo, the tens of thousands of Iraqis killed by Sunni and Shia terrorists, or the growing number of Sri Lankan dead to add to the 70,000 killed over the past 25 years (far more than the number of Palestinians and Israelis killed in the same period).
Of course – because the protests in Britain have nothing to do with humanitarian concerns for the innocent. They are part of the jihad against the Jews – and those in the universities and other parts of the establishment who are capitulating to or even endorsing this are accomplices to a great evil that is now consuming British public life.
February 8, 2009 12:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Likudnik m8srv93's amorality: Somehow the killings in Congo, Sri Lanka and Iraq justify last month's Gaza massacres by the IDF. These third world hell-holes now provide the standards that the once-civilized country of Israel judges itself, at least according to this prevalent form of paranoid propaganda for the West Bank settlers, their fellow-travellers, tools and dupes.
February 8, 2009 1:14 PM | Reply | Permalink