Israel Decides on Big Settlement Expansion...What Will Obama Do?
Did you ever consider what the State of Israel could accomplish if it didn't dedicate its resources to security (legitimate) and maintaining the occupation (illegitimate)?
Here's a clue. Today's Israeli media reports that the Technion, Israel's MIT, has developed a breathalyzer device that can detect cancer in any organ at a stage far earlier than any existing method.
The device is now in clinical trial but it has already not only distinguished the healthy from the ill "but can detect precisely the kind of tumor" in 92% of the cases. It has successfully detected lung, breast, colon, prostate and brain cancer, all before the subject or his physician had any reason to suspect he or she had cancer at all.
Imagine the implications. Almost all cancers are curable with early detection. If this breakthrough pans out, the cancer scourge could be eliminated.
Of course, scientific research in Israel takes a back seat to politics. Until peace is reached with the Palestinians, Israel will spend most of its financial resources on defense. And on the opposite of defense.
Today's Washington Post reports that Israel is expanding the West Bank settlement of Efrat by 423 acres to enable the increase in settlers from 9000 to 30,000. Efrat is led by Rabbi Steve (Shlomo) Riskin, formerly of Manhattan, a major activist in the effort to retain settlements at all costs.
I don't know how much money is wasted by expanding Efrat. I do know that every settlement expansion contributes to the death of the chances for peace and shortens Israel's life expectancy. As Congressman Gary Ackerman said last week the "downward spiral" to war is produced by "terrorism and the march of settlements."
Less than a month into the Obama administration, the settlers are sticking it to the new President by expanding Efrat. It's a test for Obama and for Special Envoy George Mitchell. Let's see if they pass.
As for Israel, the test is more profound. Is it to be "the light on to the nations" as the Bible mandates by leading in science, medicine and life saving technology or will it continue the "downward spiral" of land seizures and settlements?
The settlement enterprise will, if it continues, be the death of Israel and all its promise. What are we going to do about it? As the AIDS activists aptly said: "Silence = Death."
ALSO, CHECK OUT THIS NEW MIDEAST BLOG FOR DAILY UPDATES AND DEBATE ON THIS ISSUE AND MORE.
He will delegate this stupid waste of time to Mitchell.
He has many more important things to work on.
There will be no 'peace' there - what a joke.
February 17, 2009 11:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, it's dumb. We have how many thousand of our troops in Iraq? We have a whole Arab world that hates us? We have an ally, Israel, that can go down the tube without our help...not to mention Jordan and Saudi Arabia.
Yeah, pretty irrelevant. So is oil.
February 17, 2009 11:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
How about a wager ?
Let us bet a coke that one year from now, no matter what the American president does or says, there will be no progress whatsoever in this conflict. Zero, or worse.
My thesis : this conflict is aggravated by outsiders (us and others) paying too much attention to it.
There is also the Lucy-Charlie Brown-Football scenario that I am bored with.
Peace would be swell - just extremely unlikely.
February 17, 2009 11:53 AM | Reply | Permalink
MJ, my friend: Isn't this final proof that Abbas has no peace partner? Please tell your contacts on Capitol Hill.
February 17, 2009 2:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
There seems to be an momentum in government policies that some of us hoped Obama would stop. It looks like we were wrong.
February 17, 2009 12:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
Oh, please. Obama has been President for four weeks and two hours as I write this. Imagine you were suddenly given a new job -- in Administration when your previous experience was in policy making -- which requires you to move, settle in to a new home -- including settling your family in -- find replacements for the entire office you are now overseeing, whose policies were the reason you go the job, and to issue new policies reversing the old ones. What percentage of the job would you have accomplished in a month -- and you wouldn't have had every news outlet and blog commengting on your every action.
If you can say the same in three more months, maybe I'll agree with you.
February 17, 2009 2:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
This is a policy decision. It doesn't seem to me to have anything to do with the pressures of settling into the White House etc.
February 17, 2009 4:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
If I knew Obama would actually take this on, I'd take the bet. We can end the conflict 1-2-3. It's Obama's choice and I don't know what he'll do, obviously.
February 17, 2009 12:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
Of course the Americans could end the nonsense over there TODAY ! We could pull the plug and it would stop.
But the Americans WILL NOT do it. The mystery is why we will not do it. Thus we are stuck spinning our wheels.
Very frustrating.
Meanwhile, the problems in Pakistan are far more alarming - a war that is spreading fast toward Central Asia, the mother and father of war, with India now sucked in and China right over the horizon. Talk about a barnburner ...
February 17, 2009 12:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't approve of this unilateral designation of this hill as "state land" and thus eligible for confiscation. And I also don't approve of this fairly transparent "testing" of Obama at this stage.
But it is also worth pointing out that not all settlements, should there ever be a deal, will be dismantled. This is what I would call the myth of the Judenrein West Bank. It ain't happening folks, and the smart Palestinians are aware of this. The largest settlement blocs (Ma'ale Adumim, Ari'el etc.) would be retained and annexed. I don't know if Efrat would qualify - presumably that's a negotiating point.
February 17, 2009 12:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
Might = right, is that it?
February 17, 2009 3:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Brad - What do you propose should be done about the proposed expansion of Ma'ale Adumim along E-1 to Jerusalem. If Ma'ale Adumim is kept under these circumstances the southern west bank is cur off from the north. What about Ariel's expansion to the east to meet up with Eli and Shilo to block Ramallah from the rest of the west bank. How does anyone explain Adam East?
How will the 10,000 crazies in Kiryat Arba fit into your proposed slimmer Israel?
Brad - You made a statement "I don't know if Efrat would qualify - presumably that's a negotiating point." Somehow many of the settlements have turned from being "negotiating points" into facts on the ground. Israel banks these facts and continues to up the ante by expanding and building new settlements from which new facts on the ground are created. It's been going on this way for 40 years with the full consent of every Israeli government and the people of Israel.
This constant expansion has acted like a feel good drug for Israel and she is now addicted. Without strong intervention and decisive treatment Israel will go the way of all addicts - to her death as a Jewsih homeland.
February 17, 2009 8:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
Just saying, early detection doesn't make it easier to cure cancer, it just makes it more likely that the person will live for more than five years after the cancer is detected.
In other words they know that they have cancer for a longer period of time but they still die at the same age.
February 17, 2009 1:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
You know not of what you speak.
I was early detected 10+ years ago. There was a surgical intervention by a Jew and a Japanese doctor. I walked out fine. Yearly tests show no hint of recurrence. I may die of cancer, but not likely that particular one (that is, by the same exact cause of the first one)
Is it just possible the Jews in Israel who have invented this device, upsets you? You can be honest with us. Just about everyone will agree with you.
February 17, 2009 4:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
"The settlement enterprise will, if it continues, be the death of Israel and all its promise."
The settler enterprise is aimed at making partition impossible, in my opinion, and so far it is doing a pretty good job. Likud supports 2 states? Bull.
Without partition, without a viable Palestinian state, Israel cannot survive as a Jewish and democratic state.
Ironically, I do believe that the Arab states of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the Emirates, and 1/2 of Syria's mind do support a 2 states and that their willingness to accept Israel is genuine because of...Iran and allies.
MJ, I know your position on Lieberman and Livni; do you have any comments on the idea of a non-religious bloc? It seems to me that the religious/secular divide in Israel is nearly -- nearly -- as important as the 2-state issue.
February 17, 2009 1:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
Let's see:
1. Start war against Iran, setting rest of ME on fire.
2. Use the War with Iran as excuse to attack Syria and grap land beyond Golan.
3. Claim that Iranian elements are in the West Bank and Palestinians need to be expelled for security reasons.
4. Claim that the Palestinian issue can only be solved in context of learger ME with the USA and Europe throwing some lousy aid to the surviving Arab states.
5. American and Israeli leaders head to Stockholm to collect their "peace" prizes for finally ending the Arab-Israeli conflict.
February 17, 2009 2:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
only three things will move the peace process forward. without any of the three occuring, israel is not budging.
1. obama gets real tough with israel
2. israel starts a war and suffers a big defeat
3. world boycott, divestment, and sanction
February 17, 2009 3:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
"What Will Obama Do?"
Same as he's done so far: nothing of consequence.
Obama has yet to surpass your worst nightmares. He sprinted past mine even before he was elected.
I've cheered for America to do the right things for decades. That time is over. The sooner the empire collapses, the sooner America gets out of the rest of the world's way, the better.
February 17, 2009 6:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
Israel Decides on Big Settlement Expansion...What Will Obama Do?
I don't know.
What should Obama do?
Absolutely nothing. He should take the Ron Paul approach, and say "none of our business." Anything we do makes it worse for both sides.
February 17, 2009 7:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
Does that include pulling the plug on all aid, financial, military, and diplomatic (such as vetoing UNSC resolutions critical of Israel)?
February 18, 2009 4:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
We should pull all monetary aid.
We should get out of the U.N., so the issue of vetoing the U.N.'s resolutions ought to be moot.
February 23, 2009 8:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
Israel isn't going to leave the West Bank. It's too late. The question is what they're going to do with the Palestinians. An indefinite apartheid state, or mass forced displacement into Jordan.
Israel isn't leaving the West Bank ever. They aren't any more capable of peace than the Palestinians.
And our endless stream of money and weapons have bought us zero influence. They lecture us and tell us to hurry the next check.
I feel sorry for the MJs and Phil Weiss of the world. You want to believe, but your people have moved on. They aren't coming back for you.
February 17, 2009 7:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
Pull the plug. Zero US Aid.
February 17, 2009 9:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
It is an amazing coincidence: with the whole world condemning Israel for its massacre of Gaza, they suddenly announce that they have discovered the cure for cancer. If they attack Iran, will they announce a cure for baldness?
February 18, 2009 2:08 AM | Reply | Permalink
And don't forget the flood of Holocaust stories that sprouting up. Holocaust remembrance. Holocaust denial. Holocaust 24/7....until we get those images of 400 Gazan children out of our heads.
February 18, 2009 9:59 AM | Reply | Permalink