The Story You Aren't Hearing About Israel

Did you hear about the two policemen who stopped to help a driver stuck with a flat--and were shot to death in the head at point-blank range?

Did you know about the 120-kilogram bomb planted in a parking lot adjacent to a shopping mall where thousands of people were milling about the stores, restaurants, and movie theaters?

No, of course, you didn't. These are just two everyday incidents of the ordeal confronted by people in Israel while the world and the political leaders look away. Outrages like these do not make it into the Western media, which exhibit the familiar phenomenon of monitoring only the conflicts that are the flavor of the month. And when they do turn to Israel, sporadically, it is with the excitement of thinking they can expose Israeli wrongdoing: the New York Times just drummed up a front-page story alleging the deliberate murder of innocent civilians by Israeli soldiers during the Gaza war, a poorly investigated report that turned out to be yet another urban myth and then was shamefully corrected by the Times only on the inside pages and only by blaming Israel for the false report. (Remember another urban myth alleging thousands of citizens massacred in the battle against terrorism in Jenin in 2002 when it turned out no more than 54 died, most of them combatants?)

Ordinary Israelis despair of the cruel bias. The policemen died because Israel eased restrictions on movement in the Nablus area of the West Bank. Hundreds survived in the attack on the mall near Haifa only because a woman reported hearing an explosion. Security found it was a detonator that expired without setting off a car bomb that would have lacerated the crowds with sharp metal and ball bearings.

The willingness to give a free pass to terrorism was, of course, manifest most luridly in the Gaza war. Hamas fired thousands of rockets with the short-term aim of murdering as many innocent civilians as possible in the service of the longer-term ambition to terrorize Israel.

Then, when Israel finally responded (with military restraint and humanitarian aid), it was faced with world demands for an unconditional cease-fire. Ironically, the fiercest criticism in the Arab world about Israel's conduct in Gaza stems from Israel's failure to achieve a decisive victory, for the Arab world rightly perceives not Israel but Hamas as a threat: It knows full well that Hamas is a fifth column for Iranian influence.

Once the cease-fire was achieved, the world lost interest in Israel. Except that now, in a fit of selectively lethal amnesia, it is on the verge of providing the selfsame murderous Hamas with a huge influx of funding that will rebuild the authority of a terrorist organization dedicated to killing Jews.

The tragedy for the Palestinians as much as the Israelis is that they do not have leadership strong enough to make peace. Hamas wants perpetual war: No one can doubt that it aims not to have a two-state solution but to have a "no state" solution--that is, to have the State of Israel stop existing. For its part, "moderate" Fatah is hopelessly corrupt and weak and seemingly incapable of reform or of enforcing law and order on its people. That is why an Israeli-Palestinian peace remains a dream today and why what Israel can offer the Palestinians is less than what any Palestinian politician is willing or able to attempt.

Even the language of peace is eroding. The Palestinians say they support two states for two peoples but refrain from saying that one of those is the Jewish people. Most recently, a major Palestine Liberation Organization figure, Mohammed Dahlan, asserted that the Fatah movement hasn't even recognized Israel thus far and that the Palestinian Authority's apparent "recognition" of Israel is to make the PA "acceptable" to the international community, in order to bring in international aid. Who can trust that?

There is justification for the widespread Israeli concern that if a Palestinian state were established, power in Gaza, and then in the West Bank, would soon fall into the hands of Hamas. After all, Hamas won 44 percent of the vote and the mayoralty in several major cities in the last West Bank election. Another unreported fact that reflects on what would happen if Hamas won: The most credible of the Palestinian-run news operations, the Ma'an News Agency, has posted three listings involving a total of 181 persons--all Fatah people--shot by Hamas in Gaza since December 2008.

The Fatah party is facing an election within a year, which may well be won by Hamas. If the Iranian-supported Hamas ultimately succeeds in its 20-year effort to be the principal voice of Palestinian nationalism, Israel will have a neighbor that truly speaks for Iran's goal of seeing Israel "wiped off the face of the Earth."

In a "unity" government, Hamas would undoubtedly be integrated in the security services, which would end Palestinian-Israeli security cooperation covering the majority of the West Bank cities. Hamas wants Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to stop negotiations with Israel and to embrace the political program that allows for "resistance" -- in other words, violence.

No wonder the Palestinian Reconciliation Conference in Cairo ended in failure. Even the lure of billions of dollars in aid has not brought Fatah Sunnis in Judea and Samaria, i.e., the West Bank, any closer to Shiite supporters of Hamas in Gaza. These are two parallel lines that cannot meet, and this division will persist.

And what of Israeli leadership? Now Israel has Binyamin Netanyhu trying to form a cabinet. The world may be skeptical about the will and political ability of a more conservative Likud government to make historic and dramatic decisions that involve painful concessions to the Palestinians in the interest of a two-state solution, but history suggests otherwise. It was Menachem Begin's Likud government that brought about the Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty. It was Yitzhak Shamir's Likud government that began the peace process at the Madrid Conference in October of 1991. Netanyahu's Likud party and its reservations should not be dismissed lightly, for it was Netanyahu who predicted way back in 1994 that handing over territories to Palestinians would lead to the creation of a fundamental Islamic terrorist base adjacent to Israel.

Israel has taken many risks for peace. The response has been rocket fire, terrorism, more incitement, more vilification, more shedding of Israeli blood, and less security, not to mention an ongoing historic campaign to defame, denounce, denigrate, and delegitimize Israel in every international forum.

Contrary to many reports, Netanyahu has asserted that he is not opposed to a two-state solution, provided it does not put at risk the national security of the Jewish state. The key component would be a record of Palestinian determination and ability to fight terrorism and to live in peace with Israel. Like so many experts, Netanyahu feels that the chances of an enforceable, comprehensive arrangement are low to negligible. In the meantime, as a matter of law and order, he intends to oppose illegal settlements, be they in the West Bank or among Bedouins in Sinai. His major priority would be to promote prosperity on the West Bank, creating an incentive for the Palestinians to make a commitment to peace. He notes that Palestinians in the West Bank remained calm during the fighting in Gaza and didn't engage in mass protests.

Therefore, Netanyahu will focus on improving Palestinian life by lifting roadblocks (100 so far) and reducing checkpoints (they have gone down from 50 to 15) and making other improvements on the ground for the Palestinian community. In this he is supported by dovish Israeli President Shimon Peres, who now has doubts about Israel's unilateral withdrawal from Gaza without first having established a peaceful and democratic Palestinian party to which it could hand the territory. That Palestinian party does not yet exist.

A Palestinian state cannot be created by terrorism. It can be created through the reformation of political and economic institutions so that they reflect democracy, market economics, and real actions to confront terrorism. When there is an effective, Palestinian-based security force with counterterrorism capability in the West Bank, the Israelis will then be prepared to withdraw their defense forces and the Shin Bet from operating there. Hence the importance of the U.S. effort, led by Lt. Gen. Keith Dayton, to develop a decent Palestinian security force. The new units have been enforcing order in the cities of Jenin and Hebron, which had been basically lawless. But it is not enough to target car thieves and robbers. The critical counterterrorism ability of the Palestinian security forces is still limited; above all, they must have the will to target terrorist cells and their networks.

Two modest paramilitary forces have been trained to police crime and enforce public order, but not to uproot terror groups. In fact, the PA has increasingly offered safe haven to terror groups. Brig.-Gen. Radhi Assida, the PA National Security Forces (NSF) commander in Jenin, revealed to the Palestinian website Ma'an on January 24, 2009, that PA Prime Minister Salam Fayyad's NSF had agreed to provide protection to four senior Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) terrorists wanted by Israel. Assida also confirmed that PIJ operatives continue to receive monthly salaries from the PA Interior Ministry, just like their colleagues in the Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades.

In the interim, Israel must not wait on events. Israel would be wise (despite the risks) to allow even freer movement in the West Bank; it should help to create more jobs and a better standard of living. Yes, the West must press Israel on these issues, but it must also press the Arab states. They should underwrite the training of PA security forces and invest sensibly in housing and agriculture.

Peace will come only when the Palestinians are liberated from their age-old hatred of Israel and Jews. As Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has called for many times, there must be teaching, preaching, and celebrating, from childhood on, that hatred, disrespect, violence, terrorism, anti-Semitism, and war against Israelis and Zionists are unacceptable. Today, it is exactly the opposite.

A great Middle East authority, Prof. Bernard Lewis, recently pointed out in Foreign Affairs how easily the West is misled. In contrast to reports in English, he writes, "the discourse in Arabic--in broadcasts, sermons, speeches, and school textbooks--is far less conciliatory, portraying Israel as an illegitimate invader that must be destroyed." Israel cannot make peace with those whose first priority is to blow up Israeli women and children and who deny the nation's right to exist. As Lewis puts it, "There is no compromise position between existence and nonexistence."

The sad but realistic fact is that we are much closer to the establishment of two Palestinian states, one in the West Bank and one in Gaza, than to reaching a two-state solution between Israelis and Palestinians.

Comments

[tony4sure]

I have always supported the state of Israel. Despite everything else, it is the only democracy in the area.

However, it is also true that it is fighting a monster, and in so doing, has become a monster itself.

Mort Zuckerman writes:

“The response has been rocket fire, terrorism ...not to mention an ongoing historic campaign to defame, denounce, denigrate, and delegitimize Israel in every international forum.”

All I can say is that, unfortunately, Israel does seem to be providing a lot of the ammunition its enemies use for free.

When referring to Hamas, he says it is: “…a terrorist organization dedicated to killing Jews”.

I think Hamas is a terrorist organization dedicated to killing people.

Please don’t anybody say only "Jews" die because of Hamas’ actions.

Many Palestinians die because Hamas often hides its members amongst the civilian population.

If, as Mr. Zuckerman says, “we are much closer to the establishment of two Palestinian states” than to reaching a two-state solution then we only have the Palestinians and Israel to blame.

It would be a great mistake if this were to happen. The ensuing desire to unite both Palestinian states henceforth is a tragedy waiting to happen.

I don’t envy Israel’s present situation, but I cannot abide by many of its actions. Unfortunately, they are often as brutal as the actions of those who wish to destroy Israel.

I had a Sociology teacher in Texas who always said “You don’t cover dirt with mud”.

[Sentientbeing09]

Israel is a democracy in name only. There is as much inequality in Israel as there is in other Middle East countries.

[pgmark]

What fantasy world do you live in?

Think womens rights, gay rights and citizens rights.

Israel has them - where else in the middle-east

With their 8yr bold brides and killing gays and those wonderful honor killings

[azbird]

are you crazy? In Israel women can walk the streets without covering their heads , they can drive they go to school. their husbands only have one wife. It is a democracy .

[Catriona]

The ultra-orthodox men stone women if the women appear on the streets in what the religious bullies think is immodest dress. They attack women and girls for being seen talking to boys or men. They stone buses.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/10/04/world/main4501952.shtml?source=mostpop_story

Some democracy!

[tony4sure]

Or in any other Western democracy. Whatever its shortcomings, it is a democratic country. Just like the US was, eventhough Bush jr. was in the White House.

[CarlyHope]

Its explicitly stated in Hamas's charter that is goal is to kill Israelis, Jews worldwide, and Americans.

[tjboyo]

Until all parties quit looking at the past to try and figure out the future there will never be any progress toward peace in this region; that's the problem with shortsighted people. Short of a nuclear war, there is no way to undo the past. Eventually the Palestinians need to acknowledge and accept that a state of Isreal exists and move on toward how they will live in that environment. If they can start to focus on the future, there may be other means to redress the land ownership issues. It's just unfortunate that the majority of Arab populations (save a few rational populations) would rather have a continuation of violence and hatred than to reconcile to the existing realities and go from there. Still, I suppose it takes time for old wounds to heal sufficiently for reason to finally take hold. Maybe by 2060.

[tarryd]

Mr. Zuckerman, you do a great disservice to the Israeli people by denying the obvious. Do you think we do not have eyes? Ears? What the Israeli government has done in Gaza is brutal and racist. I read the Israeli press on line. The stories they tell are much closer to the truth. Why some American Jews persist in defending the Israeli government's action in Gaza is beyond belief. There will be no road to peace without the truth. If you continue to paint Palestinians as evil, if you refuse to see the terrible situation they have been in for generations, then most thinking people will begin to distrust every Israeli statement and your cause will loose support. Both sides must take responsibility. I was first in Israel just after the Six Day War staying on a Kibbutz just north of Gaza. I saw the destruction of Gaza. I also witnessed the death of young Kibutzniks killed by Palestinian land mines planted overnight in the lanes leading to the fields. On arrival in Jerusalem I found that an acre or more of Palestinian homes had just been cleared around the Wailing Wall to provide better access for those Jews who wished to come to pray at the wall. Those who had lived there for generations were given 24 hours to move to internment camps outside the city. So, as Palestine increasingly becomes majority Arab, it is time to speak truth and find a peaceful path to the future.

[Justtellthetruth]

Mort,

If you were not already aware, Israel runs the worlds only violently enforced colonial settler movement.
It is a singular event in the world because such a thing would not be tolerated by any other nation in the world. It is perpetrated by the occupation of IDF and by racist, violent, radical settlers.

It would not continue to exist and grow, as it has every year for more than 40 years, without our help and support, even though we officially condemn it because it violates every principle that the US is characterized by. As the result of our support, we have begun to become targeted by middle eastern terrorists (as in 9/11) for our complicity. I think Bill Clinton put it best when he said during a charlie Rose Interview after 9/11 that the Israeli Palestinian conflict is the "philosophical underpinning of middle eastern terrorist recruitment".

And why is it so effective in inspiring terrorism? Precisely because it IS objectively morally wrong. Every day that the settlements and the occupation exists is a day that Israel wages war with the Palestinians.

Peace and stability for Israel could be SO simply attained; Simply end the settlements, raze them to the ground, pull out the IDF and spend Israels resources on guarding their own 67 borders. Then, send in a mostly Arab UN based peace keeping force to keep both sides honest.

[adelacy]

An excellent post...this insanity must stop!

[Spiritof1982]

"Israel runs the worlds only violently enforced colonial settler movement."

False. China, Russia, Sudan.

"As the result of our support, we have begun to become targeted by middle eastern terrorists (as in 9/11) for our complicity."

Largely false. America's worldwide network of military bases and its intermeddling in other nations' domestic affairs (regime change, anyone?) were central in the stated motivations for 9/11.

[WoodyTanaka]

While the ill feelings towards America in the Arab world, has many causes, only an absolute fool would state that among the top two reasons, if not the top reason itself, is the USA's support of Israel.

[WFTomba]

The area between the Mediterranean and the Jordan River/Dead Sea is to truth what a black hole is to light. Never believe any news you hear from that region, especially if it concerns "peace", a concept no one there really believes in anymore.

[chaos4700]

There is only one state that is at the center of all ongoing conflicts between nations in the Middle East, one would note. I don't think that's a coincidence.

[TrekBear]

I don't see why a Palestinian state can't come through terrorism - Israel did. Check your history on groups like Irgun and the Stern Gang. Also, it was Zionist terrorists who bombed the British Protectorate headquarters at the King David Hotel and conducted ethnic cleansing in Palestinian villiages and cities.

[Spiritof1982]

You should be ashamed of yourself. Israel was an outgrowth of the horrible violence perpetrated against Jews in the Holocaust. Israel came to being because a horribly brutalized people needed a home for itself.

[phute]

Well - if that's the case explain the Zionist settlers from the late 19th century onwards.
And what did the Palestinians have to do with what happened in WW2?

[WoodyTanaka]

Nonsense. The Zionism movement started in the 1800's, it is not a product of the Holocaust, although that did play a role in the formation of the state. But it was not in response to it. Further, the methods used by the Yishuv to establish itself and to establish the state of Israel absolutely included terrorist acts. This is historical fact. You blind yourself to truth if you deny this.

[moflard]

Sorry, but we're not buying tickets on the collective guilt trip any more (and how come collective punishment is ONLY ever good for non-Jews). The Holocaust had nothing to do with the Zionist project which was begun as an exercise in ethnic cleansing long before then. All it did was aid the Zionists in getting the support from guilt ridden national governments for the creation of the terrorist state Israel.

[TrekBear]

You're completely mistaken. The Zionist colonization of Palestine began long before events in 20th century Germany!

[sheilaofmiami]

Does anybody out there know the real history of the region? Neither the pro Israeli or the pro Palestinian side have a clue.

your all wrong.

[PATina]

Would you mind enlightening us, please?

[LeftRight]

Mort,

Your argument might have more weight were it not for the MINOR little fact that ALL that we hear in the MSM about the Israel/Palestinian conflict is how the latest and greatest was caused ONLY by the Palestinians! While I will admit that the Palestinians ARE using terrorism in their fight against Israel, Israel has given PLENTY of cause!

One side needs to step up and stop this whole thing, because all that's going on right now is Israeli military attacks in response to Palestinian terrorists in response to Israeli military attacks in response to Palestinian terrorists in response...... etc ad infinitum!

My two year old granddaughter acts like this. I understand when she does. What I CAN'T understand is if her 27 year old MOTHER were to act like this!

[MaryK2924]

Thank you for the article Mr. Zuckerman, I enjoyed reading it. I hope the dream can come true someday soon. Happy Passover.

[Freenation]

Which dream are we talking about?

[Sentientbeing09]

Removal of all the Palestinians, full occupation and control of milk-and-h­oney-old-t­estament lands and full rebuilding of the temple on the dome of the rock

Right-wing Utopia!

[skialethia]

You mean the pipe dream that if you oppress a people long and hard enough they will eventually surrender to your will?

[missdk]

Right, because being Jewish means you inherently hate Palestinians and wish to continue on the course we are on.

This passover, as we gave thanks for the end of our oppression in Egypt, we talked of all the people across the world who are still oppressed, and prayed for peace in Israel and for a Palestinian state. We said a prayer for the suffering of the Egyptians by the plagues and the death at the Red Sea and dipped our fingers in wine and dropped them as blood. We then dropped blood for the suffering in Israel and Palestine and that next Passover we will all be in "Israel," our guns and our anger tossed aside and our borders opened as free neighbors.

[wndrwrthg]

As long as Israel continues to commit acts of terrorism, the Palestinians will never be able have a homeland.

[pgmark]

As long as Hamas hopes for Israel's to be wiped off the map and continues their terriorism against Israel and innocent Palestinians - there will be no peace

[chaos4700]

Same tired rhetoric. Hamas has tried numerous times to open negotiations with Israel and even conformed to the cease fire until Israel blatantly violated it on November 4th. Hamas is also willing to allow the Arab Peace Plan to move forward and has stated it would abide by recognition of Israel if put before a Palestinian referendum. What exactly has Israel done in the name of peace?

[1stTsar]

how will hamas wipe off israel off the map? who has nuclear weapons ?

[1stTsar]

how will hamas succeed in wiping off israel ?

[skialethia]

Let's be clear: Hamas is fighting Israel and Hamas is responding to state terror. As long as Israel occupies the West Bank, steals Palestinian land, inflicts injustice on the Palestinians and oppresses these people there will be no peace.

Also, do you know how much Israel pays collaborators to spy for them and inflict havoc among Palestinians? Do the research. Israel has a whole program intended for "collaborators".

Unfortunately, the Palestinians and Hamas are well aware of the "collaborators" Israel plants and these people are sometimes discovered and punished. Israel loves to pit Palestinian against Palestinian, and unfortunately some Palestinians were corrupted and worked for the enemy.

[special muppet]

The way to defeat Hamas is to cut off their support. The way to do that is to give the Palestinians their state, as laid out by the UN. Religious extremists don't recruit from happy, hopeful people. They recruit from the hopeless and the desperate.

The harder Israel squeezes the Palestinians, the stronger groups like Hamas become.

Had Israel solved the issue of land with the Palestinians 20 years ago, there never would have been a Hamas in the first place.

[gageeandbaba]

Terrorism is a DIRECT response to Israeli oppression and land colonies Still being built by radical right wing Israeli citizens. Mort Zuckerman, where is your condemnation of those Fundamentalist Israelis who are committing acts of Land terrorism?

[CVN65]

Wow. Israelis build houses in a wasteland and make it better. The Jordanians target their kids and women for death. Yeah, that seems about right. Ask yourself why these former Jordanians were not welcomed into any of the neighboring countries. Or maybe you would like to know why, after 50 years and millions of aid, they have done nothing to improve their cities. Or even consider why they have never recognized the right of normal Israelis to exist-why they hate and destroy and kill. Of course, that never comes up. The Israelis should be roundly commended for not flattening Gaza and expelling all Arabs from their territory.

[chaos4700]

They aren't "former Jordanians" they're Palestinians. You know, Zionist Jews denigrating anyone else's unique cultural heritage is utter hypocrisy in the extreme. I guess that's why "Revisionism" is so popular in Israel.

[phute]

Wasteland? Now that is ignorant.

[DustinTime]

Insisting media coverage in the United States is biased against Israel is just one of the patently ludicrous assertions nullifying Zuckerman's credibility on this issue.

Has our media ever highlighted that Israel used fraud and theft to illegally and secretly develop nuclear weapons--or that Israeli leaders even boasted about deceiving the United States?

Is it ever acknowledged how much Israel spends on powerful public relations firms to shape our news coverage? Zuckerman talks about Hamas as unacceptable, but Israel treated the PLO exactly the same while Israeli intelligence was routinely caught by U.S. intelligence falsely blaming the PLO for crimes. How about the close working relationship that existed between Israel’s Mossad and South Africa's apartheid regime?

Or that Benjamin Netanyahu publicly declared 9/11 was good for Israel? "We are benefiting from one thing,” he said during a speech, “and that is the attack on the Twin Towers and Pentagon, and the American struggle in Iraq." http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/975574.html

Has our media ever portrayed the role of terrorism in the establishment of the Israeli state--including The Lavon Affair, in which Israeli intelligence planted bombs in Egyptian, American, and British-owned targets in Egypt in the summer of 1954? In March 2005, Israel publicly honored the surviving operatives of that criminal mission with a certificate of appreciation for their efforts on behalf of the state—ending decades of official denial by Israel.

Mr. Zuckerman, that's the story Americans are not hearing about Israel.

[chaos4700]

Brilliant post, sir.

[indc]

I suppose you mean as long as there is Israeli terrorism a Palestinian state cannot be created.. makes sense, but is despicable.

[Joseph A. Palermo - Huffpost Blogger]

Mort, you could be probably a million times more useful if you dedicated your time to persuading Bibi and Avigdor to moderate their stands -- the 34-day Lebanon attack and the 22-day Gaza attack made everything worse -- you should work on the Israeli government to move toward using less military force and think about giving up some land -- lecturing the Palestinians really isn't productive, you should be lecturing Bibi and Avigdor.

[Freenation]

Nicely put...Bravo!!!

[MaryK2924]

Maybe you could lecture hamas and hezbollah, that would be more productive. I'm sure they are all for peace for their people, just misunderstood regarding their motives, they love Israel and are very pro-peace, right? That wanting to destroy the jews is just a gross misunderstanding I'm sure.

[Freenation]

You forgot to mention Lieberman (Israel FM), he loves the Palestinians too, by your theory just like Hamas he is misunderstood...

[TheHandyman]

Let me see, how many Jews have been killed by Palestinians? How many Palestinians have been killed by Jews? Can't you understand that Hamas and Hezbollah were created by the Jews continued theft of Palestinian homes and land. They are seen as the protectors of the people because of the continued slaughter of Palestinians by Jews. How many Arab countries have invaded Isreal? How many Arab countries have been invaded by Isreal? If you know the answers to those questions then you should be able to figure out who is the bad guy in this.

[special muppet]

Hamas only came into existence in 1987. Prior to that, the Palestinian cause was represented almost exclusively by secular leftist groups.

The rise of Islamic fundamentalism in Palestine was a direct result of the failure of the PLO to acheive any improvement in the lives of Palestinians by negotiation with Israel.

Had Israel given back the land and stopped settlement activity 20 years ago, there would never have been a Hamas.

[tony4sure]

Do they want to destroy the Jews (you mean all the Jews on planet Earth?), or do they want to create a country called Palestine?

[pgmark]

Please get your facts right.
The 22 day was a response not an attack!

[ObjectiveRealist]

Incorrect. Israel illegally blockaded commerce, including agriculture. In other words, they starved Gazans. The rockets fired from Gaza into Israel *after* Israel's war crime blockade, were defensive counter-attacks.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/israels-economic-blockade-stops-gazas-strawberryfarmers-selling-their-crop-400562.html

[Justeesh]

That's framing. You can call it a 'response' and others can rightfully call it an 'attack' because 'bombs' were 'dropped' on Palestinian 'homes.'

[chaos4700]

A 22 day all-out bombardment was a response to... a rate of rocket fire that had dropped from over a hundred a month to less than three a month during the cease fire? Yeah that's not a credibility gap.

[guayasamin]

Logic and intellectual honesty are far beyond the crowd here, Mr. Zuckerman. The fact that you are Jewish automatically makes you a talking head for AIPAC, according to the HuffPost faithful.

The truth is, most of the people who respond to a pro-Israel article (or to an anti-Israel article for that matter) do so with the pre-disposed intent of minimizing and delegitimizing sound arguments made for the Israeli side. It really didn't matter what you wrote.

History accounts for a Jewish nation and a Jewish presence in the land of Israel for thousands of years.

Leave it to the HuffPost commenters to revise history for us. Now, according to them, the Jews are "occupying" Palestinian land. How unfortunate--for them--is the fact that these Palestinians are actually occupying Jewish land. But that is neither here nor there.

The reality on the ground is that the Palestinians exist next door (and within) Israel. Out of the two sides, only one continuously calls for the destruction and murder of the other.

What gets me though, is that most of the people pointing the finger at Israel are citizens of nations with the most egregious history of colonial oppression, ethnic cleansing, slavery, internment, racism and greedy economic exploitation.

People in glass houses.

Long live Israel and the Jewish People. Against all odds. Against all enemies - on the ground and on the internet.

[Freenation]

I am choked (almost)...people like you, Mort and AIPAC crowd along with Hamas are the 'real' obstacle to true peace...

By justifying illegal occupation in the name of security is not going to work...

Now as you put "Against all enemies - on the ground and on the internet", now you are trying to fight a false war on internet too (Has.bara brigade)...we are ready...

The reality is Long Live HP...who is honestly promoting a health debate on both sides...not unlike rest of the US MSM which tries to feed the people their biased and twisted agenda while saying it is a US concern...

[parkerfly38]

Sure. Because you've been to both Israel and Palestine, you can be so sure you have the complete story. Sorry, friend, I'm glad trolls like you and the rest of the HuffPo anti-Israel crowd are so marginal. You can fool yourselves into believing Hamas is just a misunderstood reaction to occupation, or you can look at their actions and their words and judge them by that.

I think your enlightened understanding of what goes on in Israel is woefully under-informed.

[MaryK2924]

Thank you!!!

[gageeandbaba]

oh please, If someone set up shop in your backyard and claimed it as their own, you would be setting bombs too. Oh wait, didn't Israeli's blow up a hotel that killed British Citizens? Or wait, didn't they attack a US ship? those Israeli Terrorist actions should not be forgotten, not matter the money and Israeli interests here in America.

[special muppet]

Territorial claims from the iron age are not really relevant to bringing justice for the people of the region.

Who has more claim to the land of Palestine, a recent non-Hebrew speaking immigrant from Russia or a Palestinian who has had ten generations of family living there?

If we use your logic, we could say that Iran or Syria has a legitimate territorial claim to most of the Middle East as well.

Thankfully, you're wrong.

The United Nations put forward a fair compromise in 1947. Now all that is necessary is for both sides to abide by their obligations.

[Sentientbeing09]

Wow, Youre not even trying! Zuckerman being or not being Jewish is irrelevant and so is AIPAC in this context.
Please allow me to retort:

"In their 2006 paper The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy, John Mearsheimer, political science professor at the University of Chicago, and Stephen Walt, academic dean of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, named Zuckerman as a member of the media wing of the "Israeli lobby" in the United States.

Zuckerman replied: "I would just say this: The allegations of this disproportionate influence of the Jewish community reminds me of the 92-year-old man sued in a paternity suit. He said he was so proud, he pleaded guilty"

The floor is yours Guayasamin, ha ha!