Gaza, Iranian Rockets and J Street
Even the most apolitical tourist in Israel cannot escape noticing the contrast between an openly displayed show of opulence in a world economic crisis -- overcrowded hotels, a healthy currency, expanding exports thanks to the inventiveness of the pioneers of the new technologies -- and an inner bitterness and doubt about the possibility of peace.
A hostile media campaign against Israel in Europe, a wavering of friends and neutrals in the battle against terror and a Palestinian neighbor, though split, politically united in refusal to start serious peace talks -- all this clouds the atmosphere and faith in a peaceful solution.
The Goldstone report on Gaza is almost uniformly condemned. The very fact that European voices failed to make it clear that Hamas is condemned as well as Israel, embitters Israelis. The fact that a country loudest in its condemnations is Saudi Arabia where only recently a female journalist was sentenced to sixty lashes and her male guest in a talk show to five years in prison and a thousand lashes.
A statement by Colonel Kemp, senior British officer and commander in various scenes of fighting in the Middle East, that he thought the moral and ethical behavior of the Israeli fighting forces were the best in the world, was only sparingly reported.
There is a suspicion in Israel that President Obama's foreign policy, far from reassuring the Muslim world, is regarded by most regimes in the area as a smokescreen hiding a policy of withdrawal from the region. Hence it is felt that this is the moment for more and more concessions to be wrung from the United States without the need to reciprocate. That is why more of the players in the region look for cover elsewhere; thus Turkey is in the process of changing its pro-Western policy -- more drastically than is generally assumed.
An Israeli Cabinet minister told me that Iran's rockets can now reach as far as Vienna and in a year's time would be able to reach Great Britain. The Iranian war machine works on all cylinders to be able to reach the Atlantic coast and New York within three years. Simultaneously Iran's vassal, Hezbollah, prepares to use its arsenal of 33,000 rockets to open a second front on Israel.
Finally, a development which at first sight seems fairly harmless depresses politically astute Israelis: the establishment of a second group of American Jews claiming to further U.S./Israel relations and the cause of peace. Its aim is to rival AIPAC, the well-known American Israeli Public Affairs Committee. This new group, known as J Street, contains many names who have for a long time been extremely critical of the Jewish State and in some cases even queried its very legitimacy. They have, however, quite a few eloquent and well-known supporters in American Jewry who accuse AIPAC of pursuing an aggressive pro-Israel policy and act as a potent pressure group in Washington. The Israeli government refused to send its ambassador in Washington to the founding conference of J Street, whereas the leader of the Opposition, Tzipi Livni, decided to send two leading members of her party to find out if J Street could be tamed.
One of the main money sources of J Street is held to be the financial mogul George Soros, who has never made a secret of his criticism of Israeli policy. Such a 'counter lobby' would very probably be used by anti-Israel elements in Congress, the State Department, even the White House, to neutralize the influence of AIPAC. Such a serious schism in its own camp must be considered as yet another front in Israel's existential battle for survival.
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The Israeli government is currently lobbying for the US to attack Iran, as they lobbied for the US to attack Iraq.
Such an attack would not be in US interests.
It would cost US lives. It would embroil the US in yet another conflict. It would set the Middle East in flames. It would make hate and distrust of US grow. It would push Iran into the arms of Russia and China. It would cost a fortune. It would deliver a possibly fatal blow to the world economy. There is no legal justification for it.
And for what?
To protect the 'right' of crazed Zionist extremists to destroy Palestinian olive groves.
To protect the 'right' of Israel to kill > 400 children in the punitive attack on Gaza for 'security' reasons.
To protect the 'right' of Israel to steal land.
To prevent Israel having to negotiate on a level field.
To give Bibi Netanyahu the free room to raise his middle finger at the President of the US.
The premise that this is about “Israel's existential battle for survival” is so outlandish it would be laughable but for the suffering and deaths that this fiction of an Israel willing, but for the refusal of the terrorist Palestinians, to bring about peace in the MIddle East ! Israel, courtesy of Europe and the USA, has the strongest and most advanced military in the entire region including 100-200 nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them. Should any one doubt the willingness of Israel to demonstrate nuclear blackmail then know that in 1973 during the Yom Kippur War Golda “Meir on 8 October authorized the assembling of 13 20-kiloton-of-TNT (84 TJ) atomic bombs. Nuclear-capable Jericho missiles at Hirbat Zachariah and F-4s at Tel Nov were prepared for action against Syrian and Egyptian targets” (Wikipedia). The new Jericho 3 missile is said to be capable of reaching Europe, Asia and most parts of North America. Why does Israel need such weapons or do they see that their existential threats come from Washington, Moscow, Beijing and Delhi? Lord Weidenfeld with his shotgun attack on those who criticize the illegal activities of the Israeli government and Confabulating this as a threat to the existence of the state is not just guilty of misleading people but of shouting fire in a packed theatre!
"How can we protect the people of Israel from existential threats if we hold no concern for the protection of the Palestinians, for their physical security, their right to land, their right to their own homes, their right to water, their right to sustenance, their right to freedom of movement, their right to the human security of jobs, education and health care?
We will have peace only when the plight of both Palestinians and Israelis is brought before this House and given equal consideration in recognition of that principle that all people on this planet have a right to survive and thrive, and it is our responsibility, our duty to see that no individual, no group, no people are barred from this humble human claim." D. K. wose words
"Today we journey from Operation Cast Lead to Operation Cast Doubt. Almost as serious as committing war crimes is covering up war crimes, pretending that war crimes were never committed and did not exist.
Because behind every such deception is the nullification of humanity, the destruction of human dignity, the annihilation of the human spirit, the triumph of Orwellian thinking, the eternal prison of the dark heart of the totalitarian.
The resolution before us today, which would reject all attempts of the Goldstone Report to fix responsibility of all parties to war crimes, including both Hamas and Israel, may as well be called the "Down is Up, Night is Day, Wrong is Right" resolution.
Because if this Congress votes to condemn a report it has not read, concerning events it has totally ignored, about violations of law of which it is unaware, it will have brought shame to this great institution.
How can we ever expect there to be peace in the Middle East if we tacitly approve of violations of international law and international human rights, if we look the other way, or if we close our eyes to the heartbreak of people on both sides by white-washing a legitimate investigation?" D.k.
[2/2]
But all that is one thing and to condemn J Street is quite another. Aside from the fact that in your one page post there isn't a single piece of information which is demonstrable, you purport to defame J Street by arguments which merely show your own proclivities, which, with respect, are frankly shocking in this case. Are we supposed to assess organizations by whether they are endorsed by the Likud government of Netanyahu? Further, you criticize J Street for allegedly being funded by a man, Soros, whom you criticize solely for supposedly being "critical" of Israel? What does that even mean? People who I love have criticized me in the past, but as far as I know they are not anti-me and I would not discredit organizations that they might fund. In fact, I do not share your views on this topic yet you have funded me. All of this leads me to the following: can you think of one bad thing Israel has done other than being too "ethical"? Maybe this question is a good one for all concerned to ask themselves if we are ever to reach any fair outcome (substituting Israel with Palestine where necessary).
M. Shelbaya
Lord Weidenfeld,
While I appreciate your funding of my very recent stint at Oxford, upon reading this post I am appalled at how hawkish you are on all matters Israel. Not only does your post exaggerate, if not wholly fabricate, the "hostility" of European media towards Israel (reporting on one's reprehensible actions is not hostility), but it somehow invokes the appalling actions of the Saudi government to discredit a report commissioned by the UN and prepared under the supervision of a distinguished Jewish South African jurist and in which Saudi Arabia had no hand (nor did a single Saudi person, in fact). Just as audacious is your claim that the report was uniformly condemned (unless you mean by Israel and its advocates, I guess).
I will not comment on your claims regarding the Iranian "rockets". I have no way of knowing if they are true (since I am guessing the same source had confirmed to you that Iraq possessed WMDs) and I honestly do not see their relevance. [1/2]
It's easy to identify with the Palestinians. they are a people without a state, and suffer much, especially those residing in gaza.
Perhaps Lord weidenfeld, unlike other European intellectuals, remembers the course of recent events that led to this dire situation. In 2000, Israeli PM Ehud Barak offered the Palestinians everything they ever dared dream of: A sovereign state inside the 1967 borders, including parts of Jerusalem. The Palestinian response was the Intifada, a series of terrorist attacks than havn't ceased to this day. Later, the Hamas, a fundementalist terrorist organization, took power in Gaza.
Since the 1960's, American support has been vital to Israel's sruggle to survive in this hostile enviorment. The establishment of J-street, in that prespective, is a development dangerous to Israel, and to Israeli-American relations. Most of J-street founders have their heart in the right place. they really do want peace for Palestinians and Israel, and their critism of Israeli policy is off course legitimate, and sometimes just. But they can, and should, express their criticism as Americans. By uniting to this purpose as American jews, the possible consequences of their actions might miss it's purpose.
They should take into considiration, that those who oppose Israel's right to defend itself against the terrorists that threaten It's existence as the only liberal democracy in the middle East, are celebrating the new group. If jewish Americans no longer in support the jewish state, they hope, soon there will be nobody left to stand by it.
JStreet is not a community of jews. Many are Arabs with a pro Palestinian Agenda. As Arabs they have a right to promote the Palestinian Agenda, but they should not pose as jews, or under an umbrella called JStreet. That is deceptive. Some on this thread state that Goldstone condemns the Israelis and that everyone agrees with that. Apparently they have not heard of HRES 867 1H 111th Congress, 1st Session, or of the European and other countries which do not agree with the Goldstone Report.
Actually, the author said, and I quote, "The Goldstone report on Gaza is almost uniformly condemned".
That is simply not true, so don't be claiming ignorance on the part of persons who know that this is not true. There is a certain meaning to universally condemned which does not mean recently adopted by the United Nations.
JStreet does not claim to be a community of Jews. Neither are they an Arab front group. They of course have heard of sources that do not agree with the Goldstone Report, and probably know them much more thoroughly than you seem to.
I think it is even more important to take the issue outside of the Israeli/Palestinian domain. Those who side with the actions of the likes of Hamas, Hezbullah and Al Qaeda, i.e. terrorism, should rethink what they put themselves in league with. IF terrorism is acceptable, and even laudable, and allowed for persons who are in certain circumstances, then it will become acceptable for everyone in similar circumstances to apply those methods. After that, it will just become a normal process, and everyone can just be an outlaw and apply terrorism if one does not get one's way, It has taken millenia to establish law and international laws, and doing away with it because some individual decide they are going to do that, affects everyone.
mommamia526,
You are promoting a logical fallacy. No one is "siding with Hamas, Hezbullah and Al Qaeda" - not Richard Goldstone and his UN Commission nor anyone on the side of peace.
Therefore it can not follow, that everyone will become "terrorists".
In fact you show your naivete in even lumping in the three groups you name. Hamas and Hezbollah are localized resistance groups organized to fight against Israel's various and sundry occupations, most of them quite illegal.
Al Queda is an albatross we put around our own neck here in the US from blowback in the aftermath of the War in Afghanistan, not to be confused with the one we are involved in now that is woefully short of the mark because of Bush junior's sidetrack into Iraq.
Why would you think it more important to take the question of Israel and Palestine outside of the domain of Israel and Palestine? What sense is there to that proposition?
Do you think people will actually follow you to believe that to disagree with your argument defines somebody as a terrorist, or a potential terrorist, or in league with terrorists?
Do you actually think that because I disagree with you I am on the side of terrorists?
bbsnews was partially correct, in a complete absence actual argument you are promoting many an informal fallacy, but there is no logic to your position.
There is a thing known as state-sponsored terrorism as well. Not always a weapon of the weak.
You'd think the year 2000 was ancient history, so that you could get away with a statement like:
"In 2000, Israeli PM Ehud Barak offered the Palestinians everything they ever dared dream of: A sovereign state inside the 1967 borders, including parts of Jerusalem. The Palestinian response was the Intifada, a series of terrorist attacks than havn't ceased to this day."
Do you think such a statement is helpful at all? Do you think most readers here were not alive in 2000?
In 2000, at Camp David, this Israeli offer of everything the Palestinians dared dream of included the following impossible conditions: That Palestine and not Israel would be completely demilitarized, that Palestine would allow Israeli a permanent military presence in Palestine, and the right to deploy further troops at its own initiative, that Israel would control right of passage to and from Palestine and Palestine's airspace, and that a further international force be stationed to contain Palestine.
Now, that might be what Israel wanted, but it was not what Palestine wanted. I dare say when the Palestinians dare dream some dare dream of a world where the above restrictions are placed on Israel, not Palestine.
The Intifada was not started by the failure of the Camp David talks, and it has not continued nonstop to the present day.
Why would you claim otherwise?
Once again the Camp David Myth: 'Barak offered them everything and they turned it down.'
The talks continued at Taba, and it was *Barak* who ended them as he was facing an election. He almost certainly could not have delivered anyway.
Everyone knows the parameters of a Peace Negotiation. This is nothing knew.
A swap of Israeli settlements near the 1967 borders, for a strip of land to make a contiguous Palestinian State between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. The resettling of Palestinian Refugees in a new Palestinian State, instead of Israel. And the Arab area of East Jerusalem as the capital of a new Palestinian State.
All of this is nothing new and has been in talks between the two parties for years. IF the Obama Administration wanted peace they would make that plan public, and gain the support of the entire world including Arab States. Possibly leading to Arab States formalizing diplomatic relations.
But the problem is the same people who failed during the Clinton Administration are the same ones calling the shots in the Obama Administration. Plus Obama is to scared of the political pressure that might follow.
Obama needs to start leading. An American proposal would be good for the Israelis, the Palestinians, the Greater Middle East, YES the United States and the entire world!!
And if Obama somehow forced Israel to accept the above parameters, what/who would stop continued Palestinian attacks, now from deep in Israel's heartland to "liberate all of Holy Palestine"? Why would Egypt, or Syria not attack again in support? Who would force open the way for Jews to visit and pray at their holy sites, once again closed to them by Arab rulers?
The very first step must be the open declaration of acceptance of the historic right of the Jewish people to a Jewish state in part of their ancestral homeland; an end to incitement; and time for that message to sink in.
> The resettling of Palestinian Refugees in a new Palestinian State, instead of Israel.
> All of this is nothing new
Oh yes that is new! Though not surprising.
What shocking racialism, what wildly illegal measures that would bring with it.
There is not a hostile media campaign against the state of Israel; it is the government of Israel that is being criticized.
Palestinians and most countries, including the United States, are united that Israel cannot seriously expect Palestine to undertake peace talks while Israel continues to build in the occupied territories.
The Goldstone report on Gaza is not almost universally condemned, it was recently adopted by the United Nations.
The reporting of Colonel Kemp’s testimony has been accurate and fair.
The US is not hiding its intentions in the region, and does not intend to withdraw.
Turkey is not reacting to US policies, but Israeli policies, in realigning its foreign policy with relation to the current Israel government.
Iran is not a party in peace talks with Palestine, and Hezbollah is not an Iranian vassal.
American Jews or anybody who argues against the policies and positions of the current Israel government is not showing disloyalty to or threatening the State of Israel.
The Israeli government represents the people that elected it. Every government in Israel's history has been elected primarily on the basis of its security platform. Trying to force the Israeli government to lower what it sees as its essential defences risks the entire Israeli population.
Americans, of all religions, political stripes, colors, and creeds are free to lobby their own government to enact whatever policies they may favor, internally or internationally. American Jews, legally, have the same rights.
It is morally reprehensible, however, for them to trade on their Jewish bona fides to lobby their government to enact policies that the Jewish population in Israel fears will cause their deaths, the deaths of their children, and their imminent extermination. If the Israeli electorate are wrong, they are responsible for whatever price they pay. If the American Jews are wrong, it is not they who will pay for their errors. And "Oops! Sorry!" (as many said after thousands died as a result of Oslo) will not make it better.
It is "morally reprehensible" for you to pretend that only your position is supportive of the nation of Israel- and you know it. Get off your high horse- the Jews of Israel have been through turmoil and a Holocaust not far past. They are fearful and but for right-wing extremists that killed Rabin we might have saved them from their current fate. Don't contribute to our brothers' fears by smug support of endless war. We want a solution you have no solution!
I'd normally expect to read this sort of "Israel can can do no wrong" stuff in the Weekly Standard or the National Review, next to a call to start bombing Iran without delay. I've heard enough one-sided diatribes like these from Alan Dershowitz.
Still, at least it proves that the "AIPAC block" of the Israel lobby is seriously worried about the potential influence of J-Street. It means they must be doing something right.
Could you show me where Lord Weidenfeld says anything to the effect of "Israel can can do no wrong"?
I didn't think so.
"A statement by Colonel Kemp, senior British officer and commander in various scenes of fighting in the Middle East, that he thought the moral and ethical behavior of the Israeli fighting forces were the best in the world, was only sparingly reported."
Colonel Richard Kemp works for the conservative think-tank 'Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs'. Hardly an impartial observer then, is he?
"The Goldstone report on Gaza is almost uniformly condemned.
Totally untrue. The Goldstone report has been praised for its accuracy and impartiality in every almost country except Israel and the US.
Does that prove that I am correct?
Yes I think so.
Lord Weidenfeld -
Without going into a point-by-point rebuttal of your post, I have some news for you. J Street seeks to encourage the US government to adopt policies that serve the interest of the US - rather than blindly supporting the Israeli government in whatever actions it might take. Hardly a radical position, I would think, but one that obviously presents some sobering thoughts to the Israeli government.
bobbybee, you may well be right. However, the writer of this article is not speaking about the mood of JStreet, but of the Israeli one, and what causes it. Therefore, your response is off topic.
J Street, CAIR, the Presbyterean Church, etc., are free to " encourage the US government to adopt policies that serve the interest of the US". What Jewish organizations should not do, is use their Jewish status to lobby their own American government to enact policies against the government of the Jewish state, that the Israeli government, and the majority of the people that elected it, consider a risk to their continued survival.
All American citizens, regardless of their ethnic or religious identity, should be loyal to the US and the US only in terms of national identity and concern. Lobbying for that which serves the best interests of the US can be seen as a patriotic action; lobbying for a foreign country in a way that disregards the best interest of the US, no matter what your agenda, can not.
Time, demographics and the thrust of 21st century geo-politics are allies of the Palestinians and other Arabs. Meanwhile, Israeli Jews are emigrating en masse and immigration is less than a trickle. Israel would do well to accept the 2002 Arab League's Beirut Summit Initiative (2002) which calls for a full peace agreement between all members of the Arab League and Israel, i.e., full diplomatic recognition, normalization of relations, exchange of ambassadors and open borders in exchange for Israel's withdrawal to the borders of 4 June 1967 and its agreement to pursue a "just solution" to the Palestinian refugee problem. The Initiative has been offered twice and rejected each time by Israel. As Israeli journalist Bradley Burston observed, the Arab League's offer is "forcing Israel to confront peace terms it has quietly feared for decades." (Ha'aretz, 2 February 2002)
The Arab League's offer, which they have said is non-negotiable, defines the "just solution of the refugee problem" as the settling of millions of Palestinians inside Israel. It is automatically a non-starter.
WBMD,
I can see that you also know nothing about the Arab Peace Initiative or you would not make false claims about it.
Israel is responsible for creating those refugees, therefore it is Israel's responsibility.
The Saudi Plan is being purposely represented by many ill-informed people, or people with an agenda. There was not and is not any intent to give those millions a home within Israel proper.
But you would know that if you had read the outline from then Jordan's Foreign Minister who maintained that a few thousand at most will be able to return to homes they were ethnically cleansed from, the vast majority will be compensated by Israel for being turned into refugees by the creation of the state of Israel and they will be free to live in their new state of Palestine.
Anybody who studies the ebbs and flows of Middle East Peace can see a frightening trend. FORCE on both sides always wins out. Militancy is rewarded, and moderates are humiliated.
In the First Intifada, the PLO gained recognition, the Jordan solution was ruled out. In the Second Intifada, the Palestinians gained the withdrawal of settlers from Gaza. Now Hamas is orchestrating a prisoner exchange for an Israeli held captured. Hamas already managed to get twenty female prisoners released by Israel for a video showing the Israeli is alive.
Peace talks have gained nothing but broken promises on both sides. Abbas has been humiliated over settlement freezes, and the U.S. has shown it can not be an honest broker!! This has been a disaster from a seemingly incompetent U.S. administration, that has managed to alienate the Israelis and the Arabs at the same time!!
Someone reading this post and trying to understand the situation in the region would probably be surprised to find out that most of the suffering in the region is by the Palestinians under Israelis behavior rather than Israelis under behavior by the Iranians, Hezbollah, Saudi Arabia or any of the other groups mentioned here.
This post does a good job of capturing the view of those people who see the situation entirely through an Israeli lens and do not care about any of the other peoples of the region. But otherwise it doesn't seem that helpful.
Might the Israeli insistence to expand settlements in ways that make a two state solution less possible be a source of pessimism about peace? Apparently not to anyone who counts, if this post is taken as explaning the situation.
If "the view of those people who see the situation entirely through an Israeli lens" means those who insist that a Jewish state has the absolute right to exist in peace, within secure and recognized borders, in a part of its ancestral homeland, then you are right.
"Most of the suffering" wouldn't be happening if the Arabs were not still committed to ensuring that that does not happen. The settlements are the result of their failed efforts to realize that goal.
In the end, actions on the part of the Arabs to reverse their "suffering" by ending incitement, ending violence, starting to build their own nation, would quickly prove that the settlements are no impediment to peace.
WBMD,
The "settlements" are not the fault of the Palestinians. They are the result of theft of land and resources from the Palestinians by Israeli religious extremists influencing successive Israeli governments that are no different than the Taliban in method or rhetoric when it comes to the Palestinians.
You are blaming the victim. That's not Kosher in rape cases, and it is not Kosher here in this context.
The Palestinians are willing to accept 22% of the mandate while Israel gets 78%.
The Palestinians have been wronged by Israel (and the United States) long enough.
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