YNET calls says annexation is foolish but makes a weak case. Four Likud cabinet members supported the idea but were extremely cautious in their remarks. Rest assured that they got Netanyahu’s consent to their participation in the Annexation/Sovereignty Conference and to their very cautious remarks. This leftist article attempts to ridicule annexation to make it appear non viable. Ted Belman
Op-ed: Electoral threat from Bennett causing Likud to come up with ludicrous ideas
Yoaz Hendel, YNET
The idea of annexing the territories has been living among us for 45 years. No rightist government has ever implemented it, and no leftist government has ever rejected it. In December 1981, six months after the withdrawal from Sinai, Menachem Begin tried to define the border. He annexed the Golan Heights and drew harsh criticism from the world. Reagan’s America created a crisis, but it is in the nature of crises to end. The Golan Heights, however, remained annexed with a clear border.
Since then some prime ministers discussed a compromise on the Golan Heights despite the sovereignty. Netanyahu, for instance, did it twice. When the area in question has a small population, annexation is mainly a declaration. The current situation in Syria proves that despite Washington’s ire, Begin was right. It was better to annex the Golan than to achieve a temporary peace.
In Judea and Samaria, on the other hand, annexation is linked to the question of Palestinian civil rights, Israel’s policy’s Achilles’ heel. Some of those who favor annexation ignore the problem; others deal with it. But most people just talk. You cannot annex without granting blue (Israeli) identification cards to the Arabs who reside there. (Is this true?) Under Naftali Bennett’s plan some 50,000 Palestinians are annexed. This would obviously cause a great deal of damage, (Prove it. There are 50,000 Arabs from J&S currently working in Israel. In part these work permits can be given to them), even without taking the world’s response and the economic difficulty into consideration. Logic tells us that we can’t annex everything without risking a bi-national state – or at least a state that includes millions of Arabs. Those who don’t like the fact that Hanin Zoabi is a member of Knesset should try to imagine 30 more MKs just like her. (This is nonsense. Even if we annexed all of J&S and if everyone was given citizenship, at most there would be 10 new Arab MK’s because the Arab population in J&S is little different from the number of Israeli Arabs. Besides it would take at least a decade before they would all be franchised.)
This week it was the turn of four senior Likud members to annex in theory. The electoral threat from Habayit Hayehudi is forcing the Likud to get creative during the election campaign. One of the most absurd ideas presented was to annex only the Israeli communities. Personally I am in favor of appropriating those areas where there is a Jewish majority – to narrow the dispute. There is enough to fight and negotiate about without the large settlement blocs. On the other hand, the idea to annex selectively according to religion and not according to territory is bad. The map of Israel would look like a fat ladybug with black spots on it.
The problem with the annexation weapon against Bennet is that it is a fabrication. Israelis who live in Judea and Samaria already have blue ID cards and are obligated to obey the State of Israel’s laws. Construction in the region is dependent solely on the approval of the government, which is represented by the aforementioned Likud members. So where’s the annexation? Whose ears is such a declaration supposed to reach? The world will not be convinced, and neither will the Israeli government.
This is how you lose on all fronts. When the ideas are ludicrous, all that remains is the stalemate. Sometimes it is the construction in the communities that is frozen, and other times it is the idea that the national camp is worthy of presenting a diplomatic alternative rather than sing “Ata Totach” at a campaign rally.
@ Bear Klein:
Of course annexation is the best solution..we should have done it back in 1967 and the bloody all of the lands. Some will argue that it is not clever or wise to do it because this and that,international disapproval, demographics, moral dilema of occupation etc. But on the other hand they have no problem giving up their historic, moral,legal rights on the land and their security for exactly nothing in return, just to give it a try..Is that wise? There is no such precedent in world’s history! Only Jews must give the other cheek to be slapped again! Some of our national wise-guys have tried that on several occasions before with the know desastrous consequences. Time for a new approach all with strenght and resolve. Justice and “G” is with us!
The only just solution is to go all the way back to the basics and start all over again from the Ottoman’s defete and their consequences, the unanimous acknowledge of the right of the Jews over “Palestine” and the legalization of it inscribed in international law. If the Arabs complain well let’s examine how and why Lebanon, Iraq, Jordan etc.. were created by the same League of Nations. And by the way, who forgot to implement independence for the Kurds who’s lands are “occupied” by Turkey, Syria, Iraq etc. that to was on the table let them give up land for “peace” and justice as well!
IL can count on the Pal to reject a 2 state solution. Their solution is a one state and I agree, after they are kicked out. In the meantime BB is procrastinating or forced to?
I think it should be incumbent on Palestinian Arabs to sign a peace treaty with Israel before they are granted any more rights or land. They don’t want to sign? Too bad. The historical record is clear. In 1519 the Ottoman Empire invaded the Holy Land and ruled for 400 years. In 1919 they lost the Holy Land in WW I and no longer ruled. All the Pasha’s men and all the Pasha’s horses cannot change this. Other countries which were freed in 1919 have struggled to regain their footing. Look at Greece, the founders of Democracy, struggling to regain its footing after another hundred years of malfeasance. It’s not easy to correct a path that has been sidelined by ne’er-do-wells.
Europe (England?) is responsible for the geographical boundary mistakes that have plagued the Middle East for the last century.. After being promised a state after WW I the Kurds are still struggling to get one. They have also been on their land for thousands of years. Why should anyone pay any attention to the EU when they have a track record of making a huge mess the last time they did it? Butt out, EU. That goes for the U.N. and U.S. too if they have designs for making the Arabs equal in the Holy Land of the Jews and Christians.
The world just sat there while politicized Muslims in the West Bank squeezed the Christians out of there. I’ve read that 80% of Holy Land Christians are Arab, who have more rights than any descendents of the Ottoman occupation.
I hope Israel refuses to take advice from any of you (EU,UN, U.S.) because the reputation of you is an example of ignorance to the 100th power.
Has anyone ever cornered a wild animal? If so, you know that it will fight to the death to defend itself. So is the position of Israel, which is cornered by rabid Arab countries. If Israel is not willing to fight for her life, then Israel will disappear. From the river to the sea, Israel must annex the total territories and dispel all non-Israeli from the areas. So far, Israel has not had the backbone to finish what was started. By not entering Gaza with boots on the ground, this atrocity will live on.
The “union” is desperate my friends. Lieberman is earlier today quoted as dumping the “union” and a couple of hours later he appears supporting Netanyahu’s “two states” shinola. I HEAR LOUD and clear the sound of the Weinstein FILE on Lieberman speaking 🙂
They are so bad off balacne that they are now trolling for votes from Moslems, Meretz, shalom achchchafff, yesh gvul, fringe livni dump material and from novice but honest yet wrong Yehimovich.
The likud gave up trying their “nationalist” veneer cover, nobody in the Jewish side of the growing line buys that anymore and votes from there will not go to Netanyahu.
Peres is also full tilt sabotaging everyone he is not with. Good ole Peresites! The old creep never gives up. He wants more “victims of peace”.
First and foremost the Levy Report must be adopted, following which the Legal Rights of Israel must be declared once and for all by the Government of Israel.
Once it is determined who the land belongs to between the River and the Sea, no Annexation will be necessary.
After all, it is the Jewish People who have the right to the land of Israel! Period!
The best answer to YNET is YNOT.
moderation 4 makes no sense, it is a quote with no contention
here is a YNET poster’s comment entitled HENDEL IS WRONG
Regardless of Jewish hopes for peace with the Arabs in Aretz-Yisrael over some 130 years, this never has been achieved. And such goals will remain nothing more than unrequited dreams as long as the Arabs and most other Muslims think there is any chance of reconquering what they think of as nothing more than a 20th and 21st century embodiment of the 12th century Crusader state. Which probably means no peace ever.
Therefore, as a small country surrounded as it is by hostility of all but endless depth,Israel must expand its borders, its Jewish population; its armed strength; its science-based industries and agricultural base; and find a new set of allies with governments more realistic and ruthless than the present leaderships in the West. Along with that, Israel must undertake a process of elimination of hostile threats borne by the presence of large enemy populations living in the midst of the Jewish nation. So here is the prescription:
1) As soon as possible, begin annexations of tho 72% parts of the administered territories that form the eastern part of Shomron and Yehuda. The numbers of Arabs who live there are relatively small. And once the land is annexed, no possibility will remain of creating a cohesive Palestine state west of the Jordan River, aside from the two such Palestine states that now exist in Gaza and Trans-Jordan.
2) With Egypt now under control of the Salafist Ilkwan, it most likely is only a matter of time before that government breaks James Earl Carter’s negotiated peace treaty with Israel and sends the Egyptian Army in force back into the Sinai. When that happens, it must be treated as a serious threat of war which is only answerable by using Zahal’s armored forces, mechanized infantry and Israel’s air force – all the best in the Middle East – to break that Egyptian Army for the fifth time – the same way it was done in 1949, 1956, 1967 and 1973. But this time, the land must be annexed, preferably as far as the Gulf of Suez and either to the Mitla Pass or to the Suez Canal. Then this next time, large-scale settlement should be undertaken to give the Sinai a predominantly Jewish population.
3) Lebanon south of the Litani River gorge and parts of far southwestern Syria should be taken and annexed. With the present Syrian state likely to break up into separate Alawite, Sun’a Arab and Kurdish states, such a move will be relatively easy to engineer.
4) If the overthrow of Arab dictatorships continues, the Hashemite monarchy of Trans-Jordan will be doomed, and probably accompanied either by another outright civil war as in Libya and Syria, or in all but endless street riots in Amman as were seen in Tahrir Square in Cairo. That will be a clear opportunity — and danger signal not to be ignored — for Zahal to cross the Jordan River to its east bank and take at least military control from the river up to the mountain ridgetops to the east. Most of that encompasses highly tillable lands which can be put to use for Israel’s agricultural needs.
5) Israeli dependence on the West is becoming unsustainable, and the Jewish nation needs a new set of allies. I propose China, Russia, India as the main players, with strong ties to none-Arab nations such as the Kurds, Azerbaijanis, and possibly others. China already is strongly involved with Israel in terms of coming construction of the Eilat-Ashdod high speed freight railway which will give that newly imperial power faster and less expensive transhipment of its manufactured goods and raw materials from the Indian Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea. With China as an ally, reviving a newer and far more deadly version of the home-made Lavi fighter-bomber by Israel will be useful equally for Jerusalem and Beijing. As for Russia, Vladimir Putin has openly admitted that he and most Russians already consider Israel largely a Russian-speaking state, and that connection should be expanded on. The Russians, as always, has once again one of the best organized espionage networks on this planet. Cooperation with them will pay all kinds of dividends in Jerusalem’s favor as well as Moscow’s. India’s connections with Israel are growing, and vital, in that India as a nuclear power has a vested interest in neutralizing Pakistan, which New Delhi regards as its permanent enemy.
6) There is the issue of what to do with the Arab populations left behind with all these annexations. They should never be granted full Israeli citizenship, but only political and religious basis autonomy on a municipal basis. There should be no Jewish prisons maintained for them. Aside from the relatively small number of them who will be shot dead while attempting to kill Jews or each other, the only punishment for serious troublemakers should be permanent expulsion across any of Israel’s borders, with either confiscation or forced buy-out of their property by the State of Israel.
7) There are obvious questions concerning demography. As a serious reader of Yoram Ettinger, I know full well that Israel’s Jewish population has doubled approximately every 35-36 years. If this pace can continue without undue reliance on immigration of the overly-pampered Jews of North America and Western Europe, then the 6+ million Jews in Israel of 2013 will double to about 12-13 million by 2048, the first centennial of the State of Israel, and to about 25 million well before the end of the 21st century. Can that in fact be achieved? As a trained urban and regional planner, I know it takes little more than additional land that is there for the taking, an army to carry out the taking of that land, a reliable water supply enhanced by nuclear desalting plants, and a well-planned policy linking the purposes of Jewish nationalism for purposes of Jewish nationalism.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
Annexation in part or in whole will only come about through a general consensus of the Israel population and political elites. We are miles away from that point.
Area C must be annexed to Israel. It is part of Israel 350,000 Jews live there. It is needed for security for the rest of Israel. Some in Ynet may not seem the obvious wisdom in this but perhaps they are not wise and stuck what is popular in other parts of the world.