Persisting with its declared willingness to establish a Palestinian state while being unable to make the perilous concessions this calls for, makes Israel looks disingenuous and devious.
By Martin Sherman, JPOST
Al-Aksa [Mosque on the Temple Mount] is ours… they [the Jews] have no right to defile it with their filthy feet. We will not allow them to
– Mahmoud Abbas, on official PA television, September 16, 2015
The 70th session of the UN General Assembly has come and gone. The problems it was supposed to address remain – undiminished.
The toxic tirade of Mahmoud Abbas, brimming with bile; the abject apologetics of Obama peppered with platitudes, the reproachful rebukes of Putin saturated with scorn and the rousing rhetoric of Netanyahu with all its elevating eloquence, all echoes of the past, offer little in terms of solutions on the ground.
Crumbling columns of conventional wisdom
But that does not mean that the events leading up to the General Assembly, what happened during its deliberations and what took place in the days immediately following them, were totally without value – at least for Israel.
Indeed, for Israel, these events, prior to, during and subsequent to the General Assembly session, should have made its strategic options and strategic imperatives crystal clear, throwing into razor-sharp relief what it can, what it can’t and what it must do.
Even for die-hard adherents to political correctness it is becoming increasingly difficult to deny that crucial pillars of conventional wisdom are severely fractured and in imminent danger of disintegration.
The first – and arguably most significant of these – is that the US is the only superpower in the world. For while it may possess the physical, economic and military resources to assume that role, it has, over the last half-decade, proven that it has nothing remotely approaching the political resolve to do so. Under the stewardship of Barack Obama it has shown itself time and time again to be a paper tiger, with a pronounced propensity for appeasing adversaries and alienating allies. Thus, humiliated by Iran, humbled in Ukraine, embarrassed in Syria, with its foreign policy unraveling across the globe from Kunduz, through Saana to Benghazi, the Obama administration has, whether by unintended debacle or intended design, shredded US stature across the globe, proving that friends cannot trust it and foes need not fear it.
Conventional wisdom: Other canards
The next element (read “canard”) of conventional wisdom that has been definitively exposed as a fabrication is the centrality of the Palestinian issue for wider Mideast stability. An indication of emerging recognition of its irrelevance was the fact that, for the first time since taking office in 2009, President Obama failed to mention the Israeli-Palestinian conflict during his annual General Assembly address, an omission for which he was severely censured by a miffed PLO Secretary-General Saeb Erekat (Jerusalem Post, September 28 & 29).
Indeed, this sense of growing marginalization of the “Palestinian problem” appears to be increasingly apparent to the Palestinian-Arabs themselves. According to a poll conducted mid-September by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research, 80 percent of Palestinians polled stated that “the Arab world is too preoccupied with its own concerns, internal conflicts, and the conflict with Iran and that Palestine is no longer the Arab’s principal or primary issue or cause.”
Another emerging irrelevancy, hitherto deemed by conventional wisdom as crucial to any successful political initiative, is Mahmoud Abbas (aka. Abu Mazen). True, it has often been pointed out by “heretical” dissenters from consensual conventional wisdom that Abbas, now in his 11th year of his four-year elected term as president, has neither the moral authority nor the political clout to enter into binding and durable agreements of any significance. But now irrefutable corroboration of this “inconvenient” prognosis is provided by the previously cited PSR survey, according to which almost 2/3 of the Palestinian public (65%) “want president Abbas to resign” while less than a third (31%) “want him to remain in office.” Significantly the figures do not differ greatly in Gaza, where 67% demand his resignation, and the “West Bank,” where the figure is 63%.
Curtains for a Palestinian state?
Never in my wildest dreams did I ever imagine that I would use obsessive two-state votary, Gershon Baskin, as a corroborating reference. But wonders never cease. Indeed, I could hardly agree more with his assessment of Abu Mazen, as set out in the beginning of his latest Jerusalem Post article (October 7): “Mahmoud Abbas is not popular among his own people. He is way down in the polls and if elections were held now, he would not win. In the eyes of his own people he has lost his legitimacy.”
That, however, is more or less where the agreement between us ends. For astonishingly, although he concedes that even though Abbas has little standing with his public, Israel should still negotiate perilous concessions with him.
It is precisely this kind of torturous illogic of its proponents that has helped expedite the demise of the two-state paradigm.
Earlier this week, former defense and foreign minister Moshe Arens wrote in Haaretz (October 4) that the curtain has fallen on the Palestinian state.
For those who always understood how delusional and dangerous the notion of establishing a homophobic, misogynistic Muslim majority micro-mini tyranny was, this is no more than a welcome recognition of the inevitable.
However, recent events cannot but have made this indelibly obvious to all but the most irrationally fanatic two-staters.
Irrelevant and unacceptable
For not only does the accumulating evidence show that Abbas is irrelevant as a peace partner, but his Judeophobic invective on the official Palestinian media makes him unacceptable as one. His undisguised enmity and unmasked abhorrence toward Jews, as Jews, clearly disqualify him as someone with whom fateful negotiations on the future of the Jewish state can be held.
One can only imagine the storm of outraged protest that would have erupted had, say, Netanyahu expressed anything remotely as derogatory of Arabs/Muslims as Abbas’s blatantly racist remark regarding the very presence of “dirty Jews” defiling Muslim sites. Indeed, one remembers the hullabaloo that followed Netanyahu’s call to his supporters to come to the polls to offset the monolithic vote against him by the Arab electorate – which related to their anti-Zionist political proclivities rather than any disparaging inference regarding their ethnic identity – see my “It’s Arab enmity – not Arab ethnicity,” March 26.
The “righteous” outcry then contrasts jarringly with the stony silence which Abbas’s scandalous rhetoric has elicited – not to mention the risibly transparent fabrications invoked by some (like Baskin) to explain it away, claiming that the allusion to Jews defiling with their filthy feet was actually referring to “the boots of the soldiers and police who entered the holy mosque without taking off their shoes, as required by Islam.”
Yeah, right.
No one to talk to; nothing to talk about
With Abbas clearly no longer a viable interlocutor, Israel is left without the vaguest semblance of a peace partner.
Opponents of the two-state paradigm have been claiming this for years, even decades. But now even naively optimistic supporters of the idea should have their rosy-tinted shutters brusquely removed and be confronted with the stark impracticality of their preferred policy prescription.
But it is not only the manifest absence of some suitably authoritative negotiating partner, who is both willing and able to ensure and enforce a verifiable and durable two-state compliant agreement with Israel, that makes land-for-peace formula unfeasible today.
For in light of the developments in the Mideast, even if there was such a partner, this policy would be unacceptably perilous for Israel.
The Golan Heights provide a salutary lesson for anyone willing to heed it. Had the land-for-peace formula been implemented there, as many in Israel, including senior security experts, urged it to do, claiming that the Western- educated Bashar Assad was a reliable partner who could be trusted, the country would be in a dire – perhaps desperate – position indeed, with affiliates of al-Qaida and ISIS perched on the cliff tops overlooking the Kinneret and the city of Tiberias, and commanding much of the Galilee.
Eyes wide shut?
As the precedent of the Hamas take-over of Gaza, clearly shows, territory relinquished to one party does not guarantee that it would remain under his control for long.
More pointedly in the case of Gaza, territory was abandoned to none other than Abbas himself, who, without having to make a single concession, was given everything he could have demanded in negotiations: Full withdrawal to the pre-1967 lines, razing of settlements and removal of any vestige of Jewish existence, including Jewish graves.
Yet despite this, he was unable to hold onto any of it, being unceremoniously ousted within a matter of days by his brutal Islamist rivals.
Since it is virtually inconceivable that any Israeli government in any foreseeable configuration could offer Abbas more in Judea-Samaria, what possible reason is there to believe that, if he were given less that his full demands, he would be able to resist his rivals any more robustly? Clearly, apart from wishful thinking, obdurate disregard for facts and fanatical adherence to a failed concept, there are none.
Thus, just as if we had withdrawn from the Golan, the most brutal forces on the face of the planet would now be deployed on it, if Israel had given up the highlands of Judea-Samaria, there is no reason to believe similar forces would not be deployed there, overlooking the high-rises of Greater Tel Aviv, the runways of Ben-Gurion and all the vital infrastructure installations (military and civilian) in the Coastal Plain, where 80% of the civilian population reside and 80% of the nation’s commerce is conducted.
Useless fiction; detrimental charade
It should be crystal clear to anyone genuinely concerned with the fate of Israel as the nation-state of the Jews, and with the physical safety of the Jews who reside in it, that the only way to prevent radical Islamist extremists from seizing control of Judea-Samaria, as they have whenever Israel has evacuated land – in Gaza, south Lebanon and much of Sinai – is for Israel to maintain control over it.
This should also be clear to the allegedly “moderate” states in the region – the assorted array of nepotistic, despotic monarchies and military dictatorships – to which advocates of a “regional solution” now ascribe “shared interests” with Israel in confronting the radicals ascendant today. For surely the last thing such “moderates” would wish is to give their radical foes is a bastion from which to operate, destabilize regimes like Jordan and draw off resources Israel might have for helping them fight their “joint enemy” – which is precisely what a Palestinian state would do.
Accordingly, persisting with its declared willingness to establish a Palestinian state while being unable to make the perilous concessions such establishment calls for makes Israel look disingenuous and devious. It creates a situation in which a commitment to minimal security for the country, and minimal safety for its citizens, precludes genuine commitment to its declared policies on the Palestinian issue.
Over almost a quarter-century since Oslo, despite overwhelming international political endorsement and munificent international aid, the Palestinian-Arabs have shown themselves unable/unwilling to establish anything remotely resembling a stable, productive self-governing entity.
Accordingly, the useless fiction of Palestinian statehood must be discarded and the detrimental charade of casting Abbas as an amenable partner, terminated.
What now?
Decades of dereliction with regard to Israel’s public diplomacy have left it severely restricted in regard to it strategic options. Now, while this is a matter that requires urgent redress, this cannot obscure the need to address Israel’s immediate strategic imperatives.
First among these imperatives is jettisoning any notion of Palestinian statehood and of relinquishing sovereignty over any territory between the River and the Sea. The next would be to declare the Palestinian-Arabs what they themselves declare themselves to be – our enemy – and behave accordingly.
In numerous previous columns, I have written extensively of what such behavior would entail, and what is required to generate the diplomatic conditions to facilitate it.
In coming columns I shall revisit those policy prescriptions and demonstrate why their adoption is crucial for the survival of the Jewish nation-state.
Post-script: ‘Rewarding bad behavior’
Sadly, recent government actions bode ill for success in this regard. In his impressive General Assembly speech Netanyahu admonished the international community on Iran for “rewarding bad behavior,” which he rightly claimed “only gets worse when rewarded.” This is also true for the Palestinian issue – yet this is precisely what Netanyahu has done by capitulating to Muslim demands regarding the Temple Mount. Surely he must know that rewarding bad behavior here will only make it worse in the future?
Martin Sherman (www.martinsherman.org) is founder and executive director of the Israel Institute for Strategic Studies (www.strategicisrael.org).
@ honeybee:
In Spain also men refer to it as huevos and cOjones. Cajones is a big box. When writing in a newspaper or in some situations where you do not want to sound crude the word would be bemoles. As for example “tiene bemoles” or another “manda nisperos” intead of manda huevos for a person who wants to say he or she has some nerve.
How are you doing? I’m sick over what is happening in Israel.
Here the elections do not look very promising in the Republican field. I never vote democrat.
Israel needs a new government. A leader with bemoles who is not afraid to act in Israel’s interest and not a wimp who is always considering other factors except Israel.
I pray a strong wind takes away BB and the entertainer Obama.
When are you coming to NY? I need a new hip. As soon as that is done I’m going to Israel. Do you want to come with me? We can leave the men at home and work the museums and other places of interest. The beaches are very attractive.
I love the ocean.
I’m not going to allow a few musloids and even an army of them to change my plans. I have a couple of friends there.
One in Jerusalem and the other in Haifa. If you want to come you are welcome. You probably drive the Israelis crazy with your sense of humor.
@ mar55:
Mexican say huevos and cajones and they are equally touchy. Men are such sensitive creatures.
@ honeybee:
Bemoles and nisperos are words the Spaniards use instead of balls.
Gilipollas is a terrible insult to tell one another. I have not figure out yet what exactly means but I know some people could kill over being called that name. I do not know if it means coward or somebody without bemoles or what exactly means. Be well and write to me any time if it pleases you. I have some recipes to pass to a good friend.
mar55 Said:
Te entiendo, Amigacita. Learned a new word. Some thing new to yell at my computer. Yamit82 is still hiding out in the Sant Elena Mts., but don’t worry, a herd of Mexcanitas are bring him food and flores.
@ honeybee:
I’m very well thank you. Do not treat me as usted. I’m old but not that old for so much deference.
I miss you and miss yamit82 also. I like when you two come in this blog. Warrior yamit82 should look for the rabbis.
There are so much vermin in the Israeli government that at least three of them are needed. See if you can use your influence with yamit82 to get the wise rabbis.
Israel needs new leadership with “bemoles” another word for male genitalia.
@ mar55:
Computer problems, didn’t know I knew so many cuss word in English o Espanol . oy. Como esta Ud.
@ yamit82:
Where are the rabbis who did the “pulsa di nura” for Sharon and company? We could certainly use them now that Netanyahu and his clique are out of control. Can you find them?
@ bernard ross:
Thank you for the Cat Felix cartoon. Old cartoons are very funny. Technology has caught up with the old timers imagination.
@ yamit82:
Nice to see you. Your silence had us thinking you should be safe living in Dimona. At least we know you are well armed and ready for any occasion. Write once in a while
and make some comments of what you can see around town.
@ honeybee:
What comes out of a communist mouth is what they have in their brain. They need to use TP constantly trying to avoid soiling their clothes with what comes out of the orifice below their noses.
SHmuel HaLevi 2 Said:
Houston, to big for him.
@ honeybee:
Lucky TX!
Was watching on Channel 7, Albuquerque the Balloon Fiesta for a while and suddenly got me a bug to find me a Fiesta Chilly special like the ones sold around the Field. Then I woke up and realized that I was some 12000 miles away!.
Does TX know a BBQ restaurant on the way to Houston on a main highway, (Andy)?, where one can buy just about anything that moves BBQ’d. They also sell the most terrific sauce.
Be well HB
@ SHmuel HaLevi 2:
TX says he’ll drive over to NM. We’ll get a hamburger at the Owl Café in San Antonio and pick up some green chill in Hatch Winter is coming. The TV show ” Manhattan” is on for a second season. I didn’t know till now that Physicist participated in ” pissing contest”.
@ honeybee:
Hola!
Too busy completing the building addition in preparation for the times ahead… So far the Islamic hordes are only attacking highway passing traffic on the Acco-Tzefat road. One never knows with the beasts when will they try our city. Civil Guard is out in full readiness.
Felix Quigley Said:
😛 😛 😛 poor felix gone wild, better lay off the poteen
Felix Quigley Said:
apparently you have morphed from selling your prior poison pill to Jews where you demanded that Israel defend Assad and his cronies hezbullah and persia.
You never did answer my question as to why you sought to convince Jews to defend assad, hezbullah and persia…… and now I assume russia who supports and defends the other three.
BB is an emplyee of Israel and if he is not doing his job he should be criticized. I notice that you never offer facts to support your opinions… I suppose you cannot find any.
perhaps this guy can find some in his bag of tricks for you?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amGbBFsiuzc
oldjerry Said:
wasn’t it when he supported sharon retreat from gaza and then pretended that he did not? And lets remember that the DM he has chosen as his right hand hatchet man drew up the techinical details for dragging Jews kicking and screaming from gaza. Apparently those credentials qualified yaalon to oversee YS where obstructing Jewish settlement, incarcerating Jews without evidence, fabricating lynch mob libels against settlers are the prelude to demonizing settlers in order to give up the land to be settled by muslims(the new zionism of the “zionist” union). But dont worry, BB will keep his word NOT to uproot Jews from YS, as was done in gaza, because the plan is to give them the option to leave or remain under the pals.
Best thing Sherman has ever suggested. If one is able to fully accept and internalize that a hostile enemy sits in the middle of the land of Israel then this becomes the premise and measure for all subsequent suggestions and conclusions. when measuring Israels behavior against this factual statement and premise one easily begins to see where it is all going wrong,.
How should one treat an enemy who wants to kill his children?
How does one treat an enemy encapable of coexisting in peace?
How does one treat an enemy who teaches his children that we are sons of apes and pigs?
Everything that Israel does and considers is the opposite of what should be done.
One does not consider soverieginties, states, rights, freedoms, well being, economic growth, stability, happiness for ones enemy.
One instead seeks incarceration, deportation,unhappiness, poverty starvation, blockade,riots, disorder, chaos, suffering for ones enemy.
Folks worry about what would happen if abbas gave back the keys but I am sure the russkies would know what to do. I would take the opportunity to fence them in, cut off all contact with outside world, send in provocatoeurs to create chaos, riots, murder, burning of their cities by themselves… all the “innocent” anti semites would flee for their lives and the rest would be left to be gunned down in the street. No food or goods would enter and selected cooperative arabs would be in charge of distributing all food and goods… UNRWA would be gone and if they want to help them the funds and goods would go only through Israelis. Israel controls all entry and egrees to PA…All Israel has to do to control gaza is take the philadelphi corridor.
Whatever they want to do to riot and destroy their cities is fine, but no rebuilding. When they venture to the line they are shot dead like those at the gaza fence.
I would issue mandatory shoot to kill orders for any terrorist attempting to stab or kill an israeli.
yamit82 Said:
Ah, so that’s why Felix is always cover with horse puckie.
yamit82 Said:
I have that effect on men, or in Felix case, boys.
@ Felix Quigley:
Good Ol’Felix, never in doubt, but always wrong.
@ SHmuel HaLevi 2:
SHmuel HaLevi 2 Said:
If you remember Netanyahu’s first and most significant betrayal of his party and his country was when against the Likud’s platform he advocated a two state solution. That gave the Arabs, Muslims and Jew haters all the ammunition they need to energize their efforts to destroy Israel.
Felix Quigley Said:
Just goes to show how myopically obtuse you are…. 😛
@ Felix Quigley:
@ Felix Quigley:
It is impossible to defend one who willingly concedes and subjugates our national interests and survival to those who actually are the same enemy who wants to destroy us. First Obama but Obama is not behaving much different than all past Presidents since the infamous Rogers Plan was the Bon Ton of the day and all of Americas attempts to force us into our original enclaves has not deviated much from that same Rogers plan. First depose BB because we cannot move to extricating and defending ourselves from America and her willing European Jew Haters until we get a leader who will not subvert our interests and existence to Foreign diktat.
As usual you stupid Commies are always riding the horse backwards……. 🙂
The concept in comment one by Shmuel of equating Abbas and Netanyahu is most dangerous. That loses all perspective and I simply cannot oppose this type of thinking strongly enough. Spoken out of context at not having alternative leadership it is very debilitating to Israel.
If you cannot do that and IN THAT ORDER best for Israel if you be silent
Basic principle…first defend Netanyahu from Obama and Livni then attack him IN THAT ORDER…big difference
Honeybee sadly now and again you fly out not to sting but to nothing….from nothing to nothing
SHmuel HaLevi 2 Said:
I missed this one happened in front of one of our High schools… I posted this item under “Man Bites Dog”
Felix Quigley Said:
Shut-up Felix and crawl back in your hole Euro trash !!!!! Never Ever call HaLevi or Ross traitors to the Jews in my presents.
The conflict has been and is religious.
1. Step One Close off the PA cities as in 2002. We are waiting for the first suicide bomber to do this. Be proactive not reactive.
2. Apply Levy Report. Build wherever practical in Judah/Samaria. Annex all Jewish Towns. Not Arab Towns.
3. Kick all Pal workers in Israel from territories out of Israel.
4. Grab Abbas and all PLO, Islamic Jihad, Hamas leaders and either arrest them or deport them.
5. Any terrorists caught will be sentenced to the maximum penalty and after the sentence is up they will deported. There families will be deported now. Their houses will be boarded up and or blown up.
6. The Islamic Movement inside of Israel will be made illegal. Anyone joining it will be jailed. Its leaders who have been instigating riots will be jailed NOW.
7. Jews will control and access completely to the Temple Mount. Any Arab causing trouble on it will be barred for life. Israeli Jews will be free to pray on the mount. We allow the Muslims to run their mosques on the Mount provided they are not used as weapon and/or attack centers.
The conflict has been and is religious.
Since this morning there have been several further stabbing attacks by Netanyahu’s Islamic peace partners.
One in Jerusalem, one wounded.
One in Kiriat Arba, one wounded.
One attempt to stab in the Afula Central Bus Station. The female terrorist was disarmed.
We just told our son not to go out with his pals as simply since there is no security protection at all.
Netanyahu, Ya’alon and Erdan have no right to remain in office. They betrayed our people in multiple ways and have detained without trials many young and excellent Jews.
We will be in terminal danger if that element remains in office.
Shmuel…by your equating Netanyahu and Abbas as you do above marks you as a TRAITOR to the Jews. You and Ross are crossing that line. Your understandable frustration makes you take leave of your senses, that is becoming mad!
GREAT NEWS!
A Jew finally knifed down four Islamic beasts in Dimona.
Meanwhile the so called “Israeli” government is again expelling Jews from their homes, preventing building near the Kotel… the usual fare from kibbutznik Ya’alon and the MIME Minister.
Go to… Hel en Island Mr. Mime Minister.
Jettisoning. I like the term.
On doing so we could envision bagging into the same jet both Netanyahu and Abbss on their way to Saint Helen Island. There or in Easter Island they can “negotiate” with each other about which rock to hide under.
The two intrinsically paired disgraces will never sever their link so the only way to clear the stage to rational players is to remove them as one.
And perhaps ship out Peres with them to serve as mediator. Livni could be added to the troupe so she can join at times one party and later the other.
It is time to set them free once and for all.
Netanyahu’s face making and speeching is not even funny anymore.
Jettisoning is in order.