No Linkage Between Iran and Palestinians

Rahm Emanuel is a good man and a good friend of Israel, but in a highly publicized recent statement he linked American efforts to stop Iran from developing nuclear weapons to Israeli efforts toward establishing a Palestinian state. This is a dangerous linkage.

I have long favored the two-state solution, as do most Israelis and American supporters of Israel. I have also long opposed civilian settlements deep into the West Bank. I hope that Israel does make efforts, as it has in the past, to establish a Palestinian state as part of an overall peace between the Jewish state and its Arab and Muslim neighbors.

Israel in 2000-2001 offered the Palestinians a state in the entire Gaza Strip and more than 95% of the West Bank, with its capital in Jerusalem and a $35 billion compensation package for the refugees. Yassir Arafat rejected the offer and instead began the second intifada in which nearly 5,000 people were killed. I hope that Israel once again offers the Palestinians a contiguous, economically-viable, politically independent state, in exchange for a real peace, with security, without terrorism and without any claim to "return" 4 million alleged refugees as a way of destroying Israel by demography rather than violence.

But the threat from a nuclear Iran is existential and immediate for Israel. It also poses dangers to the entire region, as well as to the United States. The dangers come not only from the possibility that a nation directed by suicidal leaders would order a nuclear attack on Israel or its allies, but from the likelihood that nuclear material could end up in the hands of Hezbollah, Hamas or even Al Qaeda. Recall what Hashemi Rifsanjani said to an American journalist:

[Rifsanjani] boast[ed] that an Iranian [nuclear] attack would kill as many as five million Jews. Rafsanjani estimated that even if Israel retaliated by dropping its own nuclear bombs, Iran would probably lose only fifteen million people, which he said would be a small 'sacrifice' from among the billion Muslims in the world.

Israel has the right, indeed the obligation, to take this threat seriously and to consider it as a first priority. It will be far easier for Israel to make peace with the Palestinians if it did not have to worry about the threat of a nuclear attack or a dirty bomb. It will also be easier for Israel to end its occupation of the West Bank if Iran were not arming and inciting Hamas, Hezbollah and other enemies of Israel to terrorize Israel by rockets and suicide bombers. In this respect, Emanuel has it exactly backwards: if there is any linkage, it goes the other way -- defanging Iran will promote the end of the occupation and the two-state solution. Threatening not to help Israel in relation to Iran unless it moves toward a two-state solution first is likely to backfire.

After all, Israel is a democracy and in the end the people decide. A recent poll published in Haaretz concluded that 66% of Israelis favored a preemptive military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities, with 75% of those saying they would still favor such a strike even if the United States were opposed.

Israel's new government will accept a two-state solution if they are persuaded that it will really be a solution -- that it will assure peace and an end to terrorist and nuclear threats to Israeli citizens. I have known Prime Minister Netanyhu for 35 years and I recently had occasion to spend some time with Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman. I am convinced that despite their occasional tough talk, both want to see an end to this conflict.

Israelis have been scarred by what happened in Gaza. Israel ended the occupation, removed all of the settlers, and left behind millions of dollars worth of agricultural and other facilities designed to make the Gaza into an economically-viable democracy. Land for peace is what they sought. Instead they got land for rocket attacks against their children, their women and their elderly. No one wants to see a repeat of this trade-off.

Emanuel's statements were viewed with alarm in Israel because most Israelis, though they want to like President Obama, are nervous about his policies toward Israel. They are prepared to accept pressure regarding the settlements, which are not related to Israel's security, but they worry that the Obama Administration may be ready to compromise, or at least threaten to compromise, Israel's security, if its newly elected government does not submit to pressure on the settlements. Most Israelis strongly believe that these issues must not be linked.

Making peace with the Palestinians will be extremely complicated. It will take time. It may or may not succeed in the end, depending on whether the Palestinians will continue to want their own state less than they want to see the end of the Jewish state. Israel should not be held hostage to the Iranian nuclear threat by the difficulty of making peace with the Palestinians. Recall again that Israel offered such a peace in 2000-2001, only to be rebuffed. It may be rebuffed again, especially if Palestinian radicals believe that such a rebuff will soften American action against Iran. In the meantime, Iran will continue in its efforts to develop nuclear weapons. That cannot be allowed to happen, regardless of progress on the ground toward peace with the Palestinians. These two issues must be delinked if either is to succeed. There are other ways of encouraging Israel to make peace with the Palestinians. Nuclear blackmail is not one of them.

Comments

[Sentientbeing09]

Palestinian statehood is more important to the world than fictitious Iranian superweapons.

The link between Iran and Palestine is this: If Israel wants global support dealing with its paranoid foreign policies, then it should get its own house in order first and stop lecturing the world about threat.

Nobody will take Israel seriously until they stop treating Palestinians like subhuman animals.

[TruthFinderToo]

I will say no more than; please read whaat Nelson Mandela has to say about this subject.

Thanks

"Perhaps it is strange for you to observe the situation in Palestine or more specifically, the structure of political and cultural relationships between Palestinians and Israelis, as an apartheid system....

..and Palestinians would not have an independent state, but would be under Israeli economic domination with Israeli control of borders, land, air, water and sea. .. Israel was not thinking of a "state" but of "separation".... Apartheid is a crime against humanity. Israel has deprived millions of Palestinians of their liberty and property. It has perpetuated a system of gross racial discrimination and inequality. It has systematically incarcerated and tortured thousands of Palestinians, contrary to the rules of international law. It has, in particular, waged a war against a civilian population, in particular children.... If you want peace and democracy, I will support you. If you want formal apartheid, we will not support you. If you want to support racial discrimination and ethnic cleansing, we will oppose you."

full text please see http://www.progressiveaustin.org/mandelap.htm

[BADRALDUJA]

Now people will hate mandela for saying the truth

[algemeen]

Yes I stopped taking this blog seriously when it got racist right about here: ..." any claim to "return" 4 million ALLEGED(!!) refugees as a way of destroying Israel by demography.."

That statement reeks of the kind of hatred/ign­orant/raci­st talk that eminated from white South Africans at the rise of true democracy in SA. This idea that once we become the minority they will take over and destroy us is evident of the disdain that Israel has shown towards the Palestinians from day one(and in Israels case a relatively close minority/majority split).

The image that literally millions of Palestinians worldwide would suddenly in a year or two up and leave the lives they have created for themselves in other countries and flood into Israel and start over is fear mongering at its best. Maybe they don't want to come immediately or ever maybe they want he right have that option to return if they wish.

And another point: to call the Palestinian refugees "alleged" is just as anti-semetic as to say the "alleged" Holocaust!

Really when will Israel take responsibility for the nakba -what could be the considered as the start of the ongoing conflict?

[piul05]

Well said.

[Justtellthetruth]

really good points.

[affinity292]

I don't hate Mandela. I just believe he and comments above are wrong in this instance.
1. the use of alleged is diff because according to the UNRWA, about 1/3 of all those registering as "palestinian refugees" were not really palestinians but from neighboring countries seeking support. And some fled a war zone created by invading Arab armies, some fled at the suggestion Arab armies, and some were forced out.
2. "Palestine" comprised all of Israel + all of Jordan, + some additional land as well. If the issue is "return" to "palestine" this raises the question "where?" Why Israel and not Jordan?
3. Arabs and other Non-Jews comprise about 20% of the population of Israel. They are full citizens, can vote, own property etc...and about 20% of the elected parliament are Arabs and other Non-Jews. (It is a death penalty crime for Jews to own property in Jordan or in "Palestine" under PA law.
4. Arabs who are NOT Israeli citizens don't vote. And the status of nonannexed land is in limbo. Israel keeps offering to trade it for peace, without takers. And they were taken from Jordan (which doesn't want them back) and some land from Egypt in a war started by Jordan and other Arab states...
I just don't see the equivalence.

[WarSkeptic]

"are prepared to accept pressure regarding the settlements, which are not related to Israel's security"

I am glad to see you admit the settlements are not related to israel's security
Why have you supported them for all these years?

[BubbaC33]

The settlements are not linked to Israeli security, but the West Bank certainly is a part of the land that provides strategic depth for Israel. Just as the Golan provides land necessary for the defense of Israel. Without this land we would have been defeated in 1973. What that means is not just losing a war, but the destruction of Israel.

[Sentientbeing09]

You dont provide strategic depth by moving a civilian population and civilian infrastructure closer to the border.

Its a dishonest excuse by israeli settlers to grab more and more land and a blatant and illegal attempt extend Israels borders.

If the occupation was exclusively about defense they wouldnt be building civilian neighborhoods, swimming pools and schools there. The settlements are illegal, a threat to Israeli security and an obstacle to peace.

[skialethia]

Let me pull out a few Avigdor Lieberman quotes:

"If it were up to me I would notify the Palestinian Authority that tomorrow at 10 in the morning we would bomb all their places of business in Ramallah."

"World War Two ended with the Nuremberg trials. The heads of the Nazi regime, along with their collaborators, were executed. I hope this will be the fate of the collaborators in [the Knesset]."

"We'll move the border. We won't have to pay for their unemployment, or health, or education. We won't have to subsidise them any longer."

"When there is a contradiction between democratic and Jewish values, the Jewish and Zionist values are more important."

"A real victory can be achieved only by breaking the will and motivation of Hamas to fight us, as was done to the Japanese in the last days of World War Two."

" his "no loyalty, no citizenship" demand also includes a plan to redraw the country's borders to make more than 100,000 other Israeli Arabs citizens of the West Bank as part of a land "swap" in which Israel would annex the territory occupied by most West Bank settlements"

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/02/06/avigdor-lieberman-hard-ma_n_164585.html

[Justtellthetruth]

This is from Steven Walt at Foreign Policy,

"Meanwhile, from Israel, Uri Avnery of Gush Shalom accuses Shimon Peres of trivializing the Holocaust, explains why Iran is not Nazi Germany, and reminds us that the best way to undermine Iranian influence is to move swiftly to a two-state solution. I wonder what would happen if we had someone like Avnery writing a weekly column for a major U.S. media source like the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal. Avnery was a member of the Irgun, fought in the 1948 war, and served in the Knesset, so his credentials as an Israeli patriot would seem to be well-established. Yet he has also been a tireless and outspoken advocate for peace for decades, sometimes at great costs. Yet for some reason the WSJ op-ed page thinks Americans will be better informed if they hear only from people like Bret Stephens, Bernard Lewis, Elliot Abrams or Fouad Ajami, despite their appalling track record in recent years, instead of someone like Avnery.

Americans wonder why the U.S. position in the Middle East keeps deteriorating, and one reason for their confusion is that elite publications like the Journal feed readers only one side of the story, no matter how discredited it's become. The Journal (and plenty of other U.S. media outlets) could do everyone a public service by promoting a wider range of views on its op-ed page"

[Justtellthetruth]

OK. Now I get it. Dershowitz's supposed "quote" of Rafanjani is actually a butchered and twisted paraphrase, made to make the person in question sound insane.

Here's the actual quote;

"If one day, the Islamic world is also equipped with weapons like those that Israel possesses now, then the imperialists' strategy will reach a standstill because the use of even one nuclear bomb inside Israel will destroy everything. However, it will only harm the Islamic world. It is not irrational to contemplate such an eventuality. Of course, you can see that the Americans have kept their eyes peeled and they are carefully looking for even the slightest hint that technological advances are being made by an independent Islamic country. If an independent Islamic country is thinking about acquiring other kinds of weaponry, then they will do their utmost to prevent it from acquiring them. Well, that is something that almost the entire world is discussing right now."

He's simply talking about the rules that drive the old concept of mutually assured destruction that have informed the relationships between, the US, China, and Russia for many decades.

If Middle eastern nations achieved nuclear status, Israel would always have to consider the fact that despite their huge arsenal, It would only take one bomb to bring Israel to it's knees. I.E. mutually assured destruction with only ONE bomb.

He is NOT saying that Iran would ever strike first.

In fact, of the 2, who has been EXPLICITLY threatening attack?

[Freenation]

seems like twisting the facts are one of his specialties...

[WarSkeptic]

yeah he's bad with facts
At one point he issued a challenge and said he would donate $10,000 to the PLO if someone could find false claims in his book. Norman Finklestein did, live on TV (democracy now). Dershowitz welshed on the bet though

[Justtellthetruth]

The BBC call the person whom Alan D. quoted (with out citing any source) as;

"a "pragmatic conservative", he is part of the religious establishment, but also open to a broader range of views.

"This country must be managed in a non-partisan way," he said before the election, adding that in his earlier terms as president (1989-97) he chose ministers on merit.

On the nuclear issue, he says Iran is ready to negotiate, but "not to accept bullying and imposition". And he has warned Washington that its "threats" are futile.

"Iran is not the place for acts of adventurism," he says. "We advise you to enter through the gate of peace."

Wikipedia sources describe him as;

"Rafsanjani is reportedly associated with the Iranian business class and is hostile to Ahmandinejad and the more ideological tendency in the Islamic Republic. He has been described as a pragmatic and conservative, who supports a centrist position domestically and a moderate position internationally, seeking to avoid conflict with the United States[2]."

I would like to see Alan D.'s source for his threatening Rafsenjani quote. Sounds dubious.

[MotherMiasia]

Israel’s “generous” peace deal proposed establishing a Palestinian state on 85% of the West Bank and Gaza. However, this state would not have any control over its borders, neither its airspace, and nor would it have any access to its major water aquifer resources.

The Palestinian state would remain criss-crossed by Israeli-only roads and settlements that Israel had no intention of dismantling. It also did not offer Palestinians access to their holy sites, nor did it offer a solution to the three million UNRWA documented Palestinian refugees in neighboring countries.

The “generous offer” did not help in dismembering the occupation or alleviating the structural violence, it was only a natural progression from Oslo to consolidate it.

[Justtellthetruth]

The offer would not seem so generous if it were the Palestinians who had small and large settlements that peppered and bisected Israel with connecting roads and planned room for "natural growth"

Furthermore, imagine if the Palestinians engaged in some sort of activity that resulted in the entire population of Israel living in abject poverty, economic purgatory and limited movement, and that on top of all of that, they had increasingly chipped away at the size of Israel every single day for the last forty years. As you might Imagine, it would not be tolerated.

[BubbaC33]

I live in Israel and there are Arabs living across the nation. None are living in poverty or any other sort of fiscal stress. They are shop owners, tradesmen, and business men.

[WoodyTanaka]

"Israel has the right, indeed the obligation, to take this threat seriously and to consider it as a first priority. It will be far easier for Israel to make peace with the Palestinians if it did not have to worry about the threat of a nuclear attack or a dirty bomb."

Baloney. Israel did nothing regarding the Palestinians before the fantasy threat posed by your current boogie-man, Iran, except further grind the native Palestinians under the boot heels of the I'D'F and steal more and more of Palestine. The Iranian "threat" is nothing but an excuse for the Israeli state to not do anything.

"It will also be easier for Israel to end its occupation of the West Bank if Iran were not arming and inciting Hamas, Hezbollah and other enemies of Israel to terrorize Israel by rockets and suicide bombers."

What gibberish. Israel had every opportunity to end its occupation, even before Hamas and Hezbollah came into being, and chose to accelerate the theft of this land. The plain fact is that the Israeli state covets the Palestinians land and resources.

[skialethia]

Thank you...my thoughts, exactly!

[BubbaC33]

If you are referring to the West Bank, it was Jordanian territory when we took it in the course of defending ourselves in 1967. When we took Gaza in 1967 it was Egyptian territory, not a homeland belonging to Palestinians. That Israel left Gaza is mmore than Egypt was ever willing to do for any Palestinians.

[arvay]

"I have long favored the two-state solution, as do most Israelis and American supporters of Israel."

Translation: the two-state solution is impossible, given the settlements that make any Palestinian state an absurd Bantustan, so I now favor it as well as and end to settlements, since they have served their purpose of making a viable Palestinian state impossible.

Absent a single democratic state embracing all, there will be more war, possibly nuclear, and Israel will not survive. Millions may be killed and mangled, but the peoples of the area will one way or another reassert their sovereignty.

[myopinion2]

Tell the truth.

Dershowitz can be grating, but his column affirms Israel's offer at Camp David and Taba to recognize a Palestinian state on 95% of the West Bank, which would be a contiguous area with no settlements. The canard about Bantustan is Palestinian propoganda. Except for 4 urban areas close to the Green Line, Israel has offered to withdraw from every other settlement. Settlements are not the obstacle to peace. The obstacle is Israel ceding the Arab neighborhoods of East Jerusalem, and the PA ceding 5% of the West Bank (for which Israel will provide a territorial swap adjacent to Gaza) and the alleged right to return. (Hamas is a separate complication.)

[skialethia]

Everyone who is "anyone" of intelligence and rational thought believes that that Camp David offer was a conjob Israel intended to pull over on the Palestinians. Thank God that Arafat listened to the Palestinian people and rejected it!

"Settlements are not the obstacle to peace" - Now that's a "canard" if I ever heard one!

Stop playing with percentages! There will be no peace EVER unless Israel gives back EVERYTHING it stole in 1967!!!

[zukervati]

Alan is an unrepentant, card carrying member of AIPAC and will say/do anything to dehumanize the Palestinians. This may have worked in the MSM, but on the new media, he and his ilk have their work cut out for them.

[BubbaC33]

Please provide an example of how he does that in this posting of his.

[Baghooli]

No one fear boogeyman after puberty and it's insulting to treat current US administration and world citizens as a children and not as adults.
Israel have lost a monopoly on what US and world citizen shall know or not know when interactive internet became available for ordinary people, Israel perpetual militaristic policies can no longer be sugar coated with wins and bravados since she lost that monopoly too.
"Cold War" is over and world do not want a old military outpost anymore, either Israel will share a destiny with Yugoslavia or South Africa, never the less status quo is not a option!

[zaz33]

The article states "66% of Israeli's favor a preempted strike against Iran's nuclear facilities"

I came accross this story in Haaretz and tried to ask the question HOW WAS THE QUESTION ASKED ? My question never got posted so we still don't know how the question was asked.

There's no doubt that Israel has moved to the right but I find it hard to believe 66% would favor WAR unless the question indicated a serious threat.

And of course there is no threat.

[KPinSEA]

Well the neat thing about already having nukes yourself is that you can launch a conventional attack on a neighbor and dare them to retaliate with any force, while they know that you've got your finger poised over the I Win button.

[zukervati]

Love the ".... while they know that you've got your finger poised over the I Win button." So true!

[WoodyTanaka]

Which succinctly establishes 1) why a state like Iran would be absolutely reasonable and right in seeking to acquire an atomic weapon as a deterrant to Israel and 2) why Israel will say or do anything to prevent its trump card from being checked. It loves the freedom to make war on all its neighbors for any reason (or none.)

[zaz33]

As I've stated many times on HP.

There is no evidence that Iran has EVER pursued nuclear weapons. NONE

No one has ever challenged my statement because there IS NO EVIDENCE.

It's all propiganda. Thats why Dershowitz DID NOT use the word EVIDENCE.

[WorkingClass]

Thanks 33. Iran is a signatory to the non-proliferation treaty and has no bomb. Israel is not and does.

[BubbaC33]

Neither of you two can say with any certainty if Iran has a nuke or not. I'd be willing to wager you do not have access to the internal workings of the Iranian government. When you declare that Iran has no nukes, does not want a nuke, or is not building a nuke you do not know.

[shekissesfrogs]

"Universal adherence to the NPT itself, including by India, Israel, Pakistan and North Korea... remains a fundamental objective of the United States," Assistant Secretary of State Rose Gottemoeller said..
The comments were met with alarm in some quarters in Israel, which has never officially acknowledged having a nuclear weapons stockpile and has reached agreements on public ambiguity with the US.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1239710874687&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

[BubbaC33]

Unlike Pakistan, North KJorea or India Israel has never threatened to use nuclear weapons. Given the level of security in Israel there is not way you can know for sure if we have nukes or not. Or are you sharing some knowledge of a classified nature?

[phute]

Iran - bogeyman -bla bla - threat - bla bla. Anything but the truth which is it's an existential threat and must be used as a diversion from Israel's ongoing expansionist policies.

[BubbaC33]

The folks on here constantly accusing Israel of following an expansionist policy forget one important fact. Israel is now smaller than it was in 1968

[KPinSEA]

Quite right, American efforts to draw Iran into an arms-limitation and inspection process should only be linked to Israel insofar as it's pointless to make any such attempt unless Israel is part of the same arms limitation regime.