Wednesday, June 08, 2005

  • Wednesday, June 08, 2005
  • Elder of Ziyon
"Bogey" Ya'alon has been consistently correct in his assessments of Israel's security situation over the years. He has been forced out of his job because he doesn't know how to mask the truth. This is a long interview but it is very much worth reading, because this shows a real road-map of where the war is headed.

Lieutenant General Ya'alon, what was your mission in the past four and a half years?


"I have no doubt that life or fate or history brought me to the boiling point and the point of decision in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It doesn't begin in these four and a half years, in which I served as chief of staff and before that as deputy chief of staff. It begins far before that. I very much wanted to bring about the end of the conflict. Very much so. I did not delude myself during the Oslo period, but I had hope. When I took over as director of Military Intelligence I started to ask questions. And I did not get persuasive replies. Gradually the facts I encountered started to change me. Until at a certain stage I reached the conclusion that we were in a situation of reverse asymmetry. That we were in retreat, whereas the Palestinians were on the offensive. Therefore I thought that our mission was to create a wall in the face of the Palestinians. To prove to them that terrorism does not pay. Yes, to burn that into their consciousness - even if there are some who do not like that term. Because if we do not do that, Israel will be in serious trouble. If the terror is successful, it will continue even more intensively. It is liable to inflict the next war on us and the next stage. Therefore the wall of consciousness is essential.

Were you successful in building that wall?

"In part."

Where were you successful?

"The success lies in the fact that in this violent round we succeeded in making he Palestinians aware of the need to stop the terrorism. We did this by means of the transition from defense to offense, from Operation Defensive Shield [spring 2002] and afterward. You have to understand: a fence does not solve the problem of terrorism. The fence is an important means in the ability to prevent infiltration, but it is not the ultimate means. The ultimate means is the ability to get to the terrorist in his bed.

"Therefore, the freedom of action we acquired as a result of taking control of the territory was what generated the turnabout. It reduced the number of casualties; reinforced our staying power; improved the economic situation; and obtained international legitimization.

"In contrast, it made the situation of the Palestinians go from bad to worse. Losses. Anarchy. The disintegration of the social fabric. Therefore, even before the disengagement plan and even before Arafat's death, they started to do some mental stocktaking. The awareness was forged that terrorism does not pay. That was the great Israeli achievement in this war."

But you say the success was partial; what did not succeed?

"If after all this the Palestinians are talking about the right of return in concrete terms and not just declaratively, that means we did not succeed in building a wall in the political sphere. On the Palestinian side, we still find a viewpoint and thinking in terms of the phased doctrine. The most significant development in this regard is the Cairo agreement between Abu Mazen [Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas] and Hamas. What Abu Mazen said in reference to this agreement shows that he has not given up the right of return. And this is not a symbolic right of return but the right of return as a claim to be realized. To return to the houses, to return to the villages. The implication of this is that there will not be a Jewish state here."

In other words, despite everything, despite four years of war, even Abu Mazen is unwilling to accept the existence of a Jewish state here?

"Even Abu Mazen. Even after four and a half years of war against Palestinian terrorism, we have not succeeded in convincing them to forgo their dreams about the return. All we succeeded in doing is to convince them that terrorism does not pay. From other points of view, too, the Palestinian Authority has not liberated itself from the Arafat era. When it permits Hamas to take part in the elections without abandoning its firearms, is that democracy? It's gangs. Armed gangs playing at pretend democracy. For the Palestinians it is still convenient to maintain a gang-based reality rather than a state foundation."

I will say what you are not saying: In these four years there was a phenomenal Israeli military achievement.

"That is what foreign armies are saying."

But there was a failure in translating the military achievement into a historic political achievement?

"Time will tell. I repeat what I said: we have a situation of reverse asymmetry. The State of Israel is ready to give the Palestinians an independent Palestinian state, but the Palestinians are not ready to give us an independent Jewish state. Thus the situation here is not stable. That is why every agreement that will be made is the point of departure for the next development of irredentism. For the next conflict. The next war. Despite their military weakness, the Palestinians feel that they are making progress. They have a feeling of success. Whereas we are waging a battle of withdrawal and delay."

Are you saying that historically, Israel is in a process of retreat and delay?

"Clearly. Clearly."

We are retreating without achievements?

"We are retreating without our having a narrative. Without our having an agreed story. Look, the whole question is whether your withdrawal is perceived by the other side as an act of choice or an act of flight. If it is perceived as a flight, they will continue to come after you; it is is perceived as a choice, everything looks different. As of today, three months before the disengagement, it is still not clear whether they will treat it as a flight or as a choice."

Are we heading into a dramatic summer?

"There is no doubt that this will be a dramatic summer. Until disengagement the interest will be to maintain calm. What will happen after the disengagement? If there is an Israeli commitment to another move, we will gain another period of quiet. If not, there will be an eruption."

How serious is that eruption liable to be?

"Terrorist attacks of all types: shooting, bombs, suicide bombers, mortars, Qassam rockets. It stands to reason that in the initial stage they will have an interest in demonstrating quiet in the Gaza Strip. But if there is an eruption in Judea and Samaria, Gaza will not remain quiet."

Are you saying that the first violent outburst will come from Judea and Samaria?

"Yes."

Because that is territory we have not yet withdrawn from?

"Correct. Over the years, the Palestinians have been trying to show us that territory we leave becomes quiet. I have no doubt that they will have in interest in demonstrating that after the pullout from Gaza there will be a period of quiet there. You left Gaza? You get quiet. You will leave Judea and Samaria? You will get quiet. Leave Tel Aviv and things will be completely quiet."

Do you see a return of the suicide bombings?

"Definitely. They will not forgo the suicide bombings. The suicide bombings and the Qassam rockets have something in common: they bypass the IDF. They are means of bypassing Israeli military might and striking at the civilian society."

By your logic, the Palestinians will now place Kfar Sava in their sights?

"Of course. It is as clear as day to me. If we get into a confrontation at the political level, if we do not give the Palestinians more and more and more, there will be a violent outburst. It will begin in Judea and Samaria."

So the cities on the border of the West Bank will be in the situation of the Gaza line settlements? Kfar Sava's situation will be that of Sderot?

"And Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, too. There will be suicide bombings wherever they can perpetrate them."

What you are saying, then, is that there is a high probability of the eruption of a third intifada?

"It is not an intifada. We have to stop calling it an intifada. It is a war."

Let me rephrase: there is a high probability of a second war of terror?

"Yes."

Within how much time?

"It depends how the story of this summer is recorded by each side. And whether the disengagement is implemented under fire or not."

Will the disengagement be implemented under fire?

"It is very probable that there will be a trickle of fire. But if the fire is massive, the IDF will distance the threat. Forces have been allocated for that."

Are you saying that in order to leave Gush Katif - the Gaza settlement bloc - we will have to enter Khan Yunis?

"If there is shooting from there? Yes, we are deploying for that."

No stability, everything is open

How long will the evacuation last?

"I don't know."

The chief of the General Staff does not know how long the evacuation of the Gaza District will last?

"The question is whether we evacuate 8,000 residents or 20,000 Israeli citizens or maybe 50,000. If you evacuate 8,000, it could last three weeks. If you have to evacuate more, it could take longer."

A minimum of three weeks and a maximum of three months?

"I treat all the numbers on this subject with a grain of salt."

In other words, we have an open process here?

"In terms of the timetable? Yes. It is not easy to evacuate people from their homes against their will."

As the one behind the operative plan of the evacuation of the settlements, what worries you most?

"A subject that worries me a great deal is that there will be a decision by the elected level in Israel that the army will not be able to carry out."

Could that happen?

"We are readying for all scenarios. The army will implement the mission. Even if takes more time, the army and the police will carry it out. The problem will not be the army's implementation ability, but the combination of things. You start the operation and things happen and the government stops you. In such situations, government decisions can be made during the course of the operation."

Is that a feasible scenario?

"In certain conditions, everything is possible. And a situation in which the government has made a decision that the state is unable to implement is liable to be traumatic."

What you are saying is that the disengagement is not yet a fait accompli?

"If and when we complete the move, we will talk about a fait accompli."

Did you say 'if'?

"I have experience. I live in the ambiguity in which I live. And I live the reality that I live."

Part of that reality is Hamas. Does that organization's strengthening stem from the disengagement?

"There is no doubt that Hamas has appropriated the disengagement. But the reason Hamas is getting stronger is that Fatah is corrupt."

Is it possible that Hamas will take over the Gaza Strip?

"It is."

Is it probable?

"If Fatah continues to behave as it does now, Hamas will eventually take over the Gaza Strip."

So in two or three years we are liable to find ourselves facing a Hamas-led Gaza Strip?

"Yes."

Can Israel allow itself a Gaza Strip that is controlled by Hamas?

"We are strong enough to come up with solutions for everything. But it will not bring stability. It will oblige us to be confrontational."

Do you see the IDF returning to the Gaza Strip?

"I do not rule it out."

Do you see additional operations such as Defensive Shield in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip?

"I do not rule out anything. We are not reaching a situation of stability here. And when the situation is not stable, everything is open."

Do you still think Israel is creating a tailwind for its enemies?

"I do not like the political use that was made of my professional statements. But to say that in regard to certain situations one need not be chief of staff."

Overall, are we headed for a situation of dividing the land?

"In the past decade, the government of Israel and Israeli society decided to divide the land. In the present reality, I see difficulty in producing a stable situation of end-of-conflict within that paradigm."

A story divorced from reality

I am not sure I understand what you mean.

"We are talking about a viable Palestinian state. Those kinds of situations can be created in Europe: Monaco, Andorra, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg. But here the situation is different. The Palestinian side does not harbor a feeling of thus far and no farther - not even in regard to the 1967 borders. They are talking about Safed and Haifa and Tel Aviv. And economically, too, Judea and Samaria and Gaza are not a viable state."

So are you saying that the thought that a two-state solution is within reach, is incompatible with reality?

"That paradigm does not bring about stability, no."

You maintain that the two-state solution cannot work. You maintain that what is agreed by the whole world and a large part of the Israeli public is without foundation.

"It is not relevant. Not relevant. It is a story that the Western world tells with Western eyes. And that story does not comprehend the scale of the gap and the scale of the problem. We too are sweeping it under the carpet."

What will happen if the world nevertheless imposes a two-state solution in the years ahead?

"It is difficult to impose things that have no foundation. Something that is imposed and is unstable blows up."

What alternative paradigm do you posit in place of the two-state paradigm?

"The paradigm of a far longer process. Far longer. One that obliges above all a revolution of values by the other side. Another possibility is to go beyond the paradigm of the Western Land of Israel, to enter into regional solutions."

Are you proposing to give the Palestinians land that is beyond the Western Land of Israel?

"We were in that situation before 1967: the West Bank was connected to Jordan, the Gaza Strip to Egypt. Today it is not relevant. But let us not delude ourselves. I do not see stability in the present paradigm and in the present state of affairs. I do not see a conclusion to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in my generation."

Is the establishment of a Palestinian state in the Gaza Strip and in 85 to 100 percent of the West Bank not feasible?

"That is an idea that does not bring about a stable situation. No. We can go for that, but from there the confrontation will continue."

So the establishment of that Palestinian state will lead to war?

"Yes, at some stage."

Could that war be dangerous for Israel?

"Of course."

Can the establishment of a Palestinian state in the present conditions create a semi-existential threat to Israel?

"If that solution were to be imposed tomorrow morning it would bring about the continuation of the irredentism, the continuation of the conflict."

Is the idea that a Palestinian state can be established during the current term of office of U.S. President Bush, and stability achieved, divorced from reality?

"Divorced from reality."

And dangerous?

"Dangerous, of course."

If a Palestinian state is established now, will it necessarily be a hostile state?

"It will be a state that will try to undermine Israel. As long as there is no internalization of our right to exist as a Jewish state, and as long as there is insistence on concrete elements of the right of return, any such agreement will be like the construction of a house in which you plant a bomb. At some stage, the bomb will explode."

So what you are saying is that the idea of an immediate Palestinian state and of a two-state solution is a mirage.

"We have created a paradigm that generates an illusion. We have to think in long-term historical terms. Think about a lengthy process. Not something that is finished here and now and gives us an end to the conflict. There is no such solution now."

The sword must remain drawn

So the parting words of the outgoing chief of staff are that in this generation and perhaps in the next one, too, the sword will be an integral part of our lives?

"Without a doubt, without a doubt. And let us hope we can make do with a sheathed sword. In the realm of conventional wars, we have succeeded. Our sword is sheathed. Why is it that the army no longer has to fight wars of the 1967 and 1973 type? Because of our might. Because of the advantage we have acquired, which is mostly blue-and-white. The Israeli brain, Israeli technologies, Israeli fighters. That is why the sword is sheathed. But in the sphere of terrorism and in the sphere of the other capabilities which are trying to bypass the army and strike at the civilian population, our sword must remain drawn. It must remain drawn every day."

Is this what Israeli mothers are supposed to tell their sons and daughters?

"Yes. They have to tell them that they were born into a society of struggle. We should be happy that we have a home to defend. I have just returned from a visit to the death camps in Poland: once we did not have that [a home], either. And when we did not have a home, we saw what happened to us there 60 years ago. Not only a home for Israelis. For the whole Jewish people. But we have to continue to struggle for that home. To fight for our independence."

Are we in the midst of this struggle?

"Certainly. It is less intensive than when five countries invaded in the War of Independence, but it is not over."

What are you saying to Israelis as you conclude your term as chief of staff? What hope are you giving them?

"Shortly before the outbreak of the current confrontation I gave a talk to a group of civilians. At the end of the talk, a mother got up and said: `What you are saying is that I deluded my children when I told them they were going to live in a Western society of abundance; what you are saying is that we have not reached a situation of peace and security and we are still a society of struggle.' I told that mother that what she said was my recompense: if that is the conclusion she draw from my remarks, my talk was worthwhile.

"What am I saying to the Israeli public? I am saying that we are still a society of struggle. We have not reached a situation of peace and security. The cup is full. Very full. But it has to be said clearly that we are a society of struggle. With no illusions. Without false beliefs that we will resolve it with one move or another. No. It will not be resolved. And we have to see that with open eyes. It has to be said clearly. We have to prepare for the future with forbearance. With staying power. To broadcast this quiet strength. But under no circumstances to confuse ourselves with hopes that turn into illusions, which people try to translate into working plans that do not connect with reality. And not to immerse ourselves in the obsession that we are always to blame. We have to understand that what is now on the agenda is the question of our right of existence as an independent Jewish state. That is the subject. That is what we are still struggling for."

Do you harbor an existential fear?

"Of course. In the intelligence appraisal I submitted in 1998 I said that the existential threat lies precisely in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Not Iran and not Syria and not Iraq, which still existed then. Those are not existential threats. There is one internal existential threat which concerns me very much, but I will not discuss it as long as I am in uniform. But the external existential threat is the Palestinian threat.

"Not that I am not concerned that Iran will have a nuclear bomb. But I am not worried that the bomb will fall here. I am worried about submerged processes it is liable to foment in the region. Whereas in the Palestinian case, I see that a combination of terrorism and demography, with question marks among us about the rightness of our way are a recipe for a situation in which there will not be a Jewish state here in the end."

Your outlook is exceptional - you are not part of the Israeli consensus.

"That is nothing new. Since November 1999 I have seen the writing on the wall: a war is about to break out. And I have to deploy for war when the situation of the Israeli consciousness is that peace is around the corner, that by summer of 2000 we will have peace. But even afterward, even after the fire erupts, there is a disparity between my conception of the confrontation and that of the people I work with. I remember myself coming to cabinet meetings and meetings of the Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee during the war and asking myself where they are living and where I am living. The gaps are enormous. The feeling is that you are fighting over a hollow arena."

Did you feel alone; that you were not understood?

"Of course. But first of all I felt deep worry. Because when you have to use force you need the backing of Israeli society. It is impossible to activate force without backing. Impossible. I call that intra-Israeli legitimation. I knew how to explain why we have to demolish homes in Rafah in order to prevent Katyushas falling in Ashkelon, but I was stopped because someone saw a photograph of one kind or another and had something to say. I saw those photographs every day. But I came with a deep feeling of the rightness of the way even when I was forced to demolish a house. But when you do not have intra-Israeli backing, you stop. Therefore, because of lack of agreement about the diagnosis, we moved from defense to offense very late. We paid a high price in human life only because of a lack of understanding about what happened to us here. Because of lack of agreement about the story."

That loneliness was a fundamental part of your term, was it not?

"The most difficult moments of the war came during the meetings of the security cabinet. You try to exert influence about a certain matter and find yourself almost alone. You find yourself without agreement about who the enemy is and what the war is about. A commander is always alone. Certainly a chief of staff. But in this case it was far beyond personal loneliness. It is the understanding that you perceive the situation in this way and everyone else perceives it differently. When what is at stake is the fate of your nation and your country, that is hard. Very hard."

Did your ouster pain you?

"This is not the moment to talk about that. Throughout my service I tried to eradicate phenomena of a criminal subculture. As though the law were an off-the-shelf product, ethics an off-the-shelf product. If you want, you use it; if not, you don't. And there is above the table and under the table. And an officer who is vigilant about honesty and integrity is a dolt. An officer who operates by manipulation and speculation is smart.

"In my eyes all this is a sickness, and when a sickness touches senior figures it is already a terminal disease. I tried to fight against that terminal disease. I waged a war of principle against it. Therefore, when the moment you are speaking about arrived, I thought that a very problematic message was being conveyed. But my feeling is that I lost a battle, not a war."

Will Citizen Bogey continue to wage that campaign from the place where Chief of Staff Ya'alon stopped?

"I am still in uniform. I need disengagement."

Tuesday, June 07, 2005

  • Tuesday, June 07, 2005
  • Elder of Ziyon
In my travels through the Palestine Post archives today, I found something astounding (to me, at least.) I saw that someone was arrested for blowing a shofar at the Western Wall at the conclusion of Yom Kippur:



What was this all about? Why should it be illegal for Jews to do a simple and important religious ceremony?



Throughout the '30s I kept seeing similar stories printed.



And it was only at the Wall, not in synagogues or anything like that. So what the hell was going on?


And the penalty - 6 months in prison for blowing a shofar?

Something was seriously wrong, and soon it became apparent what the problem was.



Ah, now it becomes clear.

A Jew does something that is a religious requirement, that takes a couple of seconds, that disturbs nobody - and Arabs rioted in 1929.

Not just rioted, but they murdered 135 Jews, expelling Jews from communities (like Hebron) that they had lived in for centuries.

And the British blamed the Jews. Because one of the riots started in 1929 after a Jew blowed a Shofar at the Kotel.

In the bizarre logic of genteel anti-semitism, Jews must be punished for the murderous actions of Arabs. And the ironic flip-side of such an attitude is that Arabs are treated like savages who cannot be expected to control themselves.

This is a role that we have seen time and time again the Arabs take advantage of - they themselves have now brought up generations that believe that the Arab world has no responsibility for their actions. The gullible West, wracked with guilt over crimes of colonialism and liberal angst that favors the underdog no matter how deadly they are, do not hold them accountable for their actions.

So we have riots in 1929 that were the fault of a Jewish shofar blower, we have an intifada in 2001 that is the fault of a politician taking a walk on a Jewish holy site nearby, we have deadly demonstrations for the supposed desecration of a printed book.

And who can blame Arabs for acting this way? It has been shown to be a successful strategy! The Western fear of the mythical Arab street has fueled brain-dead decisions like the British made in the 1930s. Arabs daily threaten the West with the "power" of their people who can be whipped up into a frenzy with a single word from a sheikh. And the West slavishly decides, whoa, we cannot risk the wrath of a billion Arabs, we'd better force the Jews do make more concessions instead, because Jews are intelligent and can see reason, unlike the Arab savages whom we are scared of.

It is a winning formula. The 1921 riots, the 1929 riots, the 1936 strike and violence, the 1989 intifada, the 2001 intifada - all are cases where violence by Arabs are rewarded by the West rather than punished. And as long as terror and violence is rewarded and the victims perversely blamed, it is a formula that is guaranteed to be repeated far into the future.

The only ray of hope are the people who truly know the difference between good and evil and who will fight for good no matter what the conventional wisdom is. People like those who, every year in the 1930s and after, made sure that the shofar was still blown at the Kotel.

Those are the heroes.
  • Tuesday, June 07, 2005
  • Elder of Ziyon
Besides its usefulness as a resource in researching the early history of Israel, the Palestine Post is also a remarkable (and often shocking) record of the events leading up to the Holocaust, as it had extensive coverage of the situation of Jews in Europe.

What is perhaps surprising is how widespread the knowledge of the persecutions of Jews were prior to the war. It is often assumed that the Nazis hid their crimes during the war and that the world had no idea such things could be happening. But the world apparently didn't care too much when stories like these came out before the war (it was not even the top story in the Palestine Post in this issue.)

Notice how the newspaper assumes without fear of contradiction that Dr. Paul Schott was murdered by the Nazis on the train to Dachau.

In the same issue was the news that 82-year old Sigmund Freud managed to leave Austria to live in England.




  • Tuesday, June 07, 2005
  • Elder of Ziyon
It is interesting that all three of these stories appeared today:

THE former Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord Carey of Clifton, condemned plans by Anglican church leaders to disinvest from companies that do business in Israel yesterday.



Doctors Without Borders founder and former French health minister Dr. Bernard Kouchner lashes out against those who "have no memory" about the Holocaust and what the Jews have been though in the Middle East since then. Kouchner told The Jerusalem Post in an interview on Monday that those who dismiss Israel's right to exist suffer from "historical amnesia." He dismissed out of hand those who support an academic boycott of Israeli institutions of research and higher education. "Boycott science? That's nonsense. They want to hurt Israel but they hurt the Palestinians as well," said Kouchner.



Israel need not pay much attention to Europe, which is using its Middle East policy to separate itself from the US, has a tendency toward appeasement and is largely pro-Palestinian, former Spanish prime minister Jose Maria Aznar told The Jerusalem Post Monday.

"Europe likes appeasement very much; this is one of the most important differences between us and the States," Aznar said in an interview on the Bar-Ilan University campus. "Europeans don't like any problems. They prefer appeasement."
  • Tuesday, June 07, 2005
  • Elder of Ziyon
Due to technical issues, the address of this blog had to be changed to http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com .

Sorry for the inconvenience!

Monday, June 06, 2005

  • Monday, June 06, 2005
  • Elder of Ziyon
From the whining you often hear from Palestinians about their olive groves (68,000 hits on Google), you'd think that they felt that fruit trees were sacred and not meant to be politicized.

Oh well, another Palestinian Arab myth gone.


  • Monday, June 06, 2005
  • Elder of Ziyon
A senior Palestinian official said Israel's 38th annual Jerusalem Day marked a 'black day in Palestinian history,' even as thousands of Israelis celebrated on Monday to mark Israel's reunification of Jerusalem.

Judging from the fact that the most notable days on the Palestinian cultural calendar are Yom Haatzmaut and Yom Yerushalayim, I hereby wish that every day of the year should be equally black for them.

(You'd think that with their purported 2000 year history that they'd have some happy holidays too, wouldn't you?)
  • Monday, June 06, 2005
  • Elder of Ziyon
Nice to see an American newspaper that "gets it."
A peace process in grave danger

Aside from the fact that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas will hold a summit meeting June 21 to coordinate Israel's withdrawal from Gaza, virtually all of the news right now is bleak.
Mr. Abbas's continuing failure to take action against Palestinian terrorist organizations and lawless criminal gangs in PA-controlled areas of the Gaza Strip and West Bank is eroding his credibility as a leader; if the deterioration in the PA is not arrested very soon, Mr. Abbas could be swept aside by the rejectionists, as Hamas and the gangs become dominant forces in Palestinian life. As the situation worsens, a respected Israeli citizen-soldier like outgoing Israel Defense Force Chief of Staff Gen. Moshe Ya'alon (a man who is hardly given to bombast) warns that Mr. Abbas has not abandoned maximalist demands like the "right of return." Yasser Arafat employed this demand five years ago at the Camp David summit to destroy that opportunity for a negotiated peace settlement. According to Gen. Ya'alon, if Mr. Abbas sticks to this position and manages to achieve an independent Palestinian state, he could be setting the state for war with Israel.
To be sure, Mr. Ya'alon is not a disinterested observer. He is being forced into retirement in part because of his political disagreements with Mr. Sharon over disengagement. But in an interview with Ha'aretz last week, the general (whose temperament and overall approach bear a resemblance to the style of former Sen. Sam Nunn) was extraordinarily blunt, warning that Mr. Abbas's Fatah movement is embarked on a course that will permit Hamas to take over Gaza; that if Hamas is permitted to keep its arms when Gaza voters go to the polls, you will have "armed gangs playing at pretend democracy"; and that the Israeli Army may need to go back into Gaza at some point because of the instability there.
A senior officer in one of Mr. Abbas's own Palestinian security services, speaking to the Israeli newspaper Ma'ariv last week, said that the Palestinian political echelon has given no orders to defeat Hamas. The officer, who would not give his name, said that Palestinian security chiefs do not fully accept the authority of the man who is supposed to be their boss, PA Interior Minister Nasser Youssef, adding that Mr. Youssef doesn't give orders anyway. "Hamas is growing stronger in Gaza," the officer said. "It is much more organized than our side [the PA] and more disciplined."
Right now, a continuation of the same vicious cycle that has been in effect since the signing of the first Oslo agreement on September 13, 1993 -- one that has continued under Labor and Likud governments alike -- seems inevitable: Israel's government makes concessions previously thought to be unthinkable. Jerusalem withdraws from territory, grants political recognition to Palestinian national movements and aspirations and releases prisoners jailed for crimes of violence in exchange for Palestinian promises to prevent terrorism against Israel. The Palestinians then pocket the Israeli concessions and proceed to either encourage terrorism or act sporadically and ineffectively to prevent it. Israel spends countless time unsuccessfully pleading with the Palestinians to fulfill their part of the bargain. Eventually things spiral out of control, terrorist attacks become unbearable and Israel responds by assassinating terrorist leaders and reoccupying territory in self-defense.
Consider the situation right now. Although public-opinion polls have shown that Israelis decisively favor Mr. Sharon's plan to leave Gaza, Israeli society is going through a very difficult period, as its people engage in a wrenching public debate over the logistics of how to uproot their fellow countrymen from territory captured in a defensive war, territory many of these people called home for decades. While this is going on, Mr. Sharon has released another 398 Palestinians imprisoned for terrorist activities and other violent attacks from Israeli jails, bringing to approximately 900 the number released since Messrs. Abbas and Sharon held their summit in February. The 900 are overwhelmingly comprised of Palestinians who were involved in unsuccessful attempts to carry out terrorist actions, such as transporting a suicide bomber or shooter to the scene of attack during the past five years. Mr. Sharon is very understandably unenthusiastic about releasing such people, but has agreed to do so in an effort to bolster Mr. Abbas.
Yet it is becoming increasingly difficult for Israel to continue taking extroardinary risks to help Mr. Abbas out of the difficulties he is creating for himself with his ineffectual leadership --particularly as conditions grow more chaotic and lawless in the West Bank and Gaza. On Wednesday, for example, a regional leader of Mr. Abbas's Fatah organization was assassinated by five gunmen near the West Bank town of Nablus. On Saturday, gunmen briefly abducted a Palestinian diplomat in Gaza. Yesterday, gunmen, some of them members of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, which is affiliated with Mr. Abbas' own Fatah organization, took over three government buildings in Nablus to protest their ineligibility to join the Palestinian police.
Meanwhile, Hamas is furious over Mr. Abbas's decision to indefinitely postpone elections that had been scheduled to take place next month. In recent months, when Hamas has had internal political disputes with Mr. Abbas, it has fired rockets and missiles at Israeli communities. If this occurs in the next few weeks without a substantial response from the PA, it will further weaken Mr. Abbas. Also, the IDF said it thwarted an attempt by the Damascus-based Palestinian Islamic Jihad to carry out a suicide bombing in Jerusalem on Thursday.
Mr. Abbas may have the best of intentions, but his failure to take action against the rejectionists and thugs is doing severe damage to his credibility.
  • Monday, June 06, 2005
  • Elder of Ziyon
But I indeed have made it into the latest of the Best of the JBlogosphere Roundup known (this week) as Haveil Havalim #23. And again, two of my posts were mentioned! I'm kvelling! As usual, a stellar job was done by the HH moderator.

And while I do understand that self-nominating is fine, now my ever-growing ego is in play, so I need to see how many weeks I can get into this august publication purely from others nominating me. I think this is five or six in a row - all during Sefirat HaOmer, which may or may not be significant.

Anyway, I'd like to thank all the little people who have helped me attain this esteemed honor, and perhaps if I butter up next week's beautiful and talented hostessMirty I can expect to make it into the next edition as well!
Anti-Semitism at 'Le Monde' and Beyond

A landmark ruling by a French court finds its leading paper guilty of slandering Israel and Jewish people.

By Tom Gross
The Wall Street Journal Europe
June 2, 2005

A French court last week found three writers for Le Monde, as well as the newspaper's publisher, guilty of "racist defamation" against Israel and the Jewish people. In a groundbreaking decision, the Versailles court of appeal ruled that a comment piece published in Le Monde in 2002, "Israel-Palestine: The Cancer," had whipped up anti-Semitic opinion.

The writers of the article, Edgar Morin (a well-known sociologist), Daniele Sallenave (a senior lecturer at Nanterre University) and Sami Nair (a member of the European parliament), as well as Le Monde's publisher, Jean-Marie Colombani, were ordered to pay symbolic damages of one euro to a human-rights group and to the Franco-Israeli association. Le Monde was also ordered to publish a condemnation of the article, which it has yet to do.

It is encouraging to see a French court rule that anti-Semitism should have no place in the media -- even when it is masked as an analysis of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The ruling also makes it clear that the law in this respect applies to extremist Jews (Mr. Morin is Jewish) as much as to non-Jews.

Press freedom is a value to be cherished, but not exploited and abused. In general, European countries have strict laws against such abuse and Europe's mainstream media are in any case usually good at exercising self-censorship. Responsible journalists strenuously avoid libelous characterizations of entire ethnic, national or religious groups. They go out of their way, for example, to avoid suggesting that the massacres in Darfur, which are being carried out by Arab militias, in any way represent an Arab trait.

The exception to this seems to be the coverage of Jews, particularly Israeli ones. This is particularly ironic given the fact that Europe's relatively strict freedom of speech laws (compared to those in the U.S.) were to a large extend drafted as a reaction to the Continent's Nazi occupation. And yet, from Oslo to Athens, from London to Madrid, it has been virtually open season on them in the last few years, especially in supposedly liberal media.

"Israel-Palestine: The Cancer" was a nasty piece of work, replete with lies, slanders and myths about "the chosen people," "the Jenin massacre," describing the Jews as "a contemptuous people taking satisfaction in humiliating others," "imposing their unmerciful rule," and so on.

Yet it is was no worse than thousands of other news reports, editorials, commentaries, letters, cartoons and headlines published throughout Europe in recent years, in the guise of legitimate and reasoned discussion of Israeli policies.

The libels and distortions about Israel in some British media are by now fairly well known: the Guardian's equation of Israel and al Qaeda; the Evening Standard's equation of Israel and the Taliban; the report by the BBC's Middle East correspondent, Orla Guerin, on how "the Israelis stole Christmas." Most notorious of all is the Independent's Middle East correspondent, Robert Fisk, who specializes in such observations as his comment that, "If ever a sword was thrust into a military alliance of East and West, the Israelis wielded that dagger," and who implies that the White House has fallen into the hands of the Jews: "The Perles and the Wolfowitzes and the Cohens ... [the] very sinister people hovering around Bush."

The invective against Israel elsewhere in Europe is less well known. In Spain, for example, on June 4, 2001 (three days after a Palestinian suicide bomber killed 21 young Israelis at a disco, and wounded over 100 others, all in the midst of a unilateral Israeli ceasefire), the liberal daily Cambio 16 published a cartoon of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon (with a hook nose he does not have), wearing a skull cap (which he does not usually wear), sporting a swastika inside a star of David on his chest, and proclaiming: "At least Hitler taught me how to invade a country and destroy every living insect."

The week before, on May 23, El Pais (the "New York Times of Spain") published a cartoon of an allegorical figure carrying a small rectangular-shaped black moustache, flying through the air toward Sharon's upper lip. The caption read: "Clio, the muse of history, puts Hitler's moustache on Ariel Sharon."

Two days later, on May 25, the Catalan daily La Vanguardia published a cartoon showing an imposing building, with a sign outside reading "Museo del Holocausto Judio" (Museum of the Jewish Holocaust), and next to it another building under construction, with a large sign reading "Futuro Museo del Holocausto Palestino" (Future Museum of the Palestinian Holocaust).

Greece's largest newspaper, the leftist daily Eleftherotypia, has run several such cartoons. In April 2002, on its front cover, under the title "Holocaust II," an Israeli soldier was depicted as a Nazi officer and a Palestinian civilian as a Jewish death camp inmate. In September 2002, another cartoon in Eleftherotypia showed an Israeli soldier with a Jewish star telling a Nazi officer next to him "Arafat is not a person the Reich can talk to anymore." The Nazi officer responds "Why? Is he a Jew?"

In Italy, in October 2001, the Web site of one of the country's most respected newspapers, La Repubblica, published the notorious anti-Semitic forgery, "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion," in its entirety, without providing any historical explanation. It did suggest, however, that the work would help readers understand why the U.S. had taken military action in Afghanistan.

In April 2002, the Italian liberal daily La Stampa ran a front-page cartoon showing an Israeli tank, emblazoned with a Jewish star, pointing a large gun at the baby Jesus in a manger, while the baby pleads, "Surely they don't want to kill me again, do they?"

In Corriere Della Sera, another cartoon showed Jesus trapped in his tomb, unable to rise, because Ariel Sharon, rifle in hand, is sitting on the sepulcher.

Sweden's largest morning paper, Dagens Nyheter, ran a caricature of a Hassidic Jew accusing anyone who criticized Israel of anti-Semitism. Another leading Swedish paper, Aftonbladet, used the headline "The Crucifixion of Arafat."

If the misreporting and bias were limited to one or two newspapers or television programs in each country, it might be possible to shrug them off. But they are not. Bashing Israel even extends to local papers that don't usually cover foreign affairs, such as the double-page spread titled "Jews in jackboots" in "Luton on Sunday." (Luton is an industrial town in southern England.) Or the article in Norway's leading regional paper, Stavanger Aftenblad, equating Israel's actions against terrorists in Ramallah with the attacks on the World Trade Center.

Grotesque and utterly false comparisons such as these should have no place in reporting or commenting on the Middle East. Yet although the French court ruling -- the first of its kind in Europe -- is a major landmark, no one in France seems to care. The country's most distinguished newspaper, the paper of record, has been found guilty of anti-Semitism. One would have thought that such a verdict would prompt wide-ranging coverage and lead to extensive soul-searching and public debate. Instead, there has been almost complete silence, and virtually no coverage in the French press.

And few elsewhere will have heard about it. Reuters and Agence France Presse (agencies that have demonstrated particularly marked bias against Israel) ran short stories about the judgment in their French-language wires last week, but chose not to run them on their English news services. The Associated Press didn't run it at all. Instead of triggering the long overdue reassessment of Europe's attitude toward Israel, the media have chosen to ignore it.

(Mr. Gross is a former Jerusalem correspondent of the Sunday Telegraph and the New York Daily News.)
  • Monday, June 06, 2005
  • Elder of Ziyon
Something to show people when they claim that Israel is racist.

Thousands of youth from Druze communities marched in the Galilee Monday afternoon to mark Druze Soldier Day. According to Israel Radio, Druze soldiers who have been honored during their IDF service, bereaved Druze families who have lost soldiers in any fighting, those disabled in their army service, and reserve officers, are all taking part in the march.

There will be a central ceremony Monday night. Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz will participate, as will leaders of the Druze community.
  • Monday, June 06, 2005
  • Elder of Ziyon
When I read that the US is considering shifting its position on Hamas, I was shocked. Although democracy has been a key stated goal of your policies, democracy without freedom is worthless. The Hamas and Islamic Jihad gangs are not interested in freedom one bit: their entire goal is the exact opposite, the creation of a theocratic thugocracy.

Elections will not change this - they will make it worse, by giving these groups a veneer of democratic "legitimacy." Rabid anti-semitism and anti-US hate would continue to be the order of the day. Murderous thugs will not suddenly become peace-loving, no matter what the US does.

Although I have supported you strongly in the "war on terror" (really the war against Islamic terror,) these reports that the US is considering giving Hamas more legitimacy are not only troubling, they go completely against what you are trying to accomplish in other areas of the world. Nobody expected Iraq and Afghanistan to be successful free states immediately, but they are on their way - because they now have basic freedoms. Sharansky, whom you have said you admire, argues these points more forcefully than I can.

Until there are basic freedoms available in the Palestinian territories, elections are a joke. Corrupt politicians who still support terror do not help the Palestinian people in the least. Knowing these facts, it is hard to understand why the US would even consider warming up relations with Hamas.

Supporting freedom before the next round of elections may make the process take a bit longer, but at least there would be the possibility of success.

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