Amb Friedman’s NYT interview reflects US interests

While the State Department establishment rejects Friedman’s assessments, its own track record in the Middle East has been systematically flawed.

By Yoram Ettinger, ISRAEL HAYOM

US Ambassador David Friedman’s June 8 interview in The New York Times was inconsistent with the worldview of the State Department establishment but quite consistent with Middle East reality and US national security interests.

Friedman stated: “The absolute last thing the world needs is a failed Palestinian state between Israel and Jordan. … Israel retaining security control in the West Bank should not be an impediment. … Certainly, Israel is entitled to retain some portion of it [the West Bank]. … I think Israel has the right to retain some, but unlikely all, of the West Bank.”

While the State Department establishment (except for Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and National Security Adviser John Bolton) rejects Friedman’s assessments, its own track record in the Middle East has been systematically flawed. For example:

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  • During 1947-48, the State Department opposed the re-establishment of the Jewish state, contending that it would be a pro-Soviet entity, militarily overrun by the Arabs, while undermining US ties with the Arabs. In 2019, Israel is the most effective, unconditional ally of the US, whose ties with all pro-US Arab countries are unprecedented in scope and expanding.
  • In the 1950s, the State Department establishment considered the radical, pro-Soviet President Nasser of Egypt – who attempted to aggressively topple every pro-US Arab regime – a potential ally of the US.
  • From 1977-1979, the State Department betrayed the Shah of Iran, a critical ally of the US, courting the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, whom it considered a warrior for democracy against a tyrant; thus, allowing the creation of a rogue, megalomaniacal regime in Teheran, intensifying regional and global Islamic terrorism, exacerbating instability, while severely injuring the US credibility among its allies.
  • In July 1990, on the eve of Saddam Hussein’s August 2, 1990 invasion of Kuwait, the State Department severely underestimated Saddam’s ruthless determination, providing a glaring green light to the invasion. A message was delivered to the Iraqi despot – who had been considered a potential ally since the 1980-1988 Iraq-Iran war – from Secretary Jim Baker via Ambassador April Glaspie: “The US does not intend to take sides in what it perceives as an intra-Arab border dispute. … Washington has no opinion on the disagreement between Kuwait and Iraq … and does not intend to start an economic war against Iraq.”
  • In 1993, the State Department joined the wishful-thinking party surrounding the Oslo process and transformed archterrorist Yasser Arafat into a Nobel Peace Prize laureate.
  • The December 2010 eruption of the still-raging “Arab tsunami” was welcomed by the State Department as an “Arab Spring” advancing the prospects of democracy on the Arab street. The megamillion Arab refugees, the nearly one million Arab fatalities and the megabillion-dollar damage document the severe detachment of the State Department from Middle East reality.
  • In 2011, the US joined its European allies in the toppling of Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi – who in 2003 transferred his nuclear infrastructure to the US – and conducted a major military campaign against Islamic terrorists, which transformed Libya into the largest platform of anti-Western Islamic terrorism in Africa and beyond.
  • In 2015, the State Department co-led the pro-ayatollah diplomatic orgy, yielding an agreement that expanded the ayatollahs’ global terror and subversion treasury in a monumental manner, bringing the ayatollahs’ machete closer to the neck of each pro-US Arab regime, while (in the best-case-scenario) postponing the nuclearization of the ayatollahs by only 10 years.

In 2019, at variance with the State Department establishment (except for Pompeo and Bolton), Friedman advances US interests against the backdrop of Middle East reality, rather than flirting with wishful thinking, evenhandedness and moral equivalence (between inherent aggressors and intended victims), which have systematically failed, fueling radicalism, wars and terrorism.

In 2019, contrary to the State Department, Friedman recognizes the secondary/tertiary role of the Palestinian issue in feeding regional turbulence and shaping US-Arab and Israel-Arab relations, as evidenced by the dominant regional developments (e.g., the threats of the ayatollahs, Sunni terrorism, inter and intra-Arab upheavals) and the deepening ties between Israel and every pro-US Arab country, while there is no movement on the Palestinian issue. Moreover, the ambassador is aware of the subversive and terroristic Palestinian track record in Egypt (early 1950s), Syria (1966), Jordan (1968-1970), Lebanon (1970-1982) and Kuwait (1990), which has been engraved in the Arab memory, hence the unbridgeable gap between the Arab walk and the Arab talk on the Palestinian issue.

In 2019, unlike the State Department, Friedman realizes the destructive impact of a potential Palestinian state upon the inherently unstable, unpredictable, intolerant and violent Middle East; fueling Islamic terrorism in the Middle East and beyond; threatening the survival of the pro-US Hashemite regime (and the devastating ripple effects into the Arabian Peninsula); undermining US interests in the Middle East, while advancing the interests of Russia, China and possibly Iran, providing them with land, air and sea bases.

In 2019, in contradiction to the State Department, Friedman is aware that Israel’s control of the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria is a prerequisite for Israel’s effective posture of deterrence, which is perceived by Jordan, Saudi Arabia and additional pro-US Arab regimes as the most effective life insurance policy in the face of clear, present and lethal threats posed by the ayatollahs, ISIS and the Muslim Brotherhood.

Furthermore, the ambassador is aware that Israel’s withdrawal from the mountain ridges would transform the Jewish state from a national security asset of the US to a national security liability/burden upon the US, depriving the US of a unique beachhead, which constitutes the largest US aircraft carrier with no US soldiers on board, and a most productive battle-tested laboratory, producing for the US a several hundred percent annual rate-of-return on its annual investment in Israel.

June 14, 2019 | 11 Comments »

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11 Comments / 11 Comments

  1. Felix Quigley Said:

    I called it “Global Warming terror” and that is a mistake, in future I will call it “Global HEATING Terror”.

    Yes, but who are the real terrorists?? You are what your God Lenin said are a commie “useful idiot” chasing after and believing in Fake science and it’s fake conclusions. Pseudoscience pseudo ideologies pseudo conclusions…. If those who follow such weird beliefs were not so dangerous you would be laughable.

  2. Felix Quigley Said:

    You must explain that the “Palestinians” have deserved their great and honourable place in the world, they are the leadership of Jew Hatred.

    From now on no fraternising with your enemy. State the truth the Palestinians are leading in this Islamisation of the world. Every piece of Jewish fraternization with the “Palestinians” promotes Islam world wide.

    THREE WARNINGS FROM THE GOD OF ISRAEL TO THE JEWISH PEOPLE REGARDING THE URGE TO ACCOMODATE OTHER CLAIMANTS TO THE LAND OF ISRAEL:

    “‘Beware of what I command you Today: Behold, I will drive out before you the Amorite, the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Perizzite, the Hivvite, and the Jebusite. Be vigilant not to seal a covenant with the inhabitants of the Land to which you are coming, since they will be a fatal trap for you.'” (Exodus 34:11-12)

    “HaShem spoke to Moses in the plains of Moab, by the Jordan [River], at Jericho, saying, ‘Speak to the Children of Israel and say to them, “When you cross the Jordan [River] to the Land of Canaan, you shall drive out all the inhabitants of the Land from before you; and you shall destroy all their prostration stones; all their molten images shall you destroy; and all their high places shall you demolish. You shall possess the Land, and you shall settle in it; for, to you have I given the Land to possess it. … But if you do not drive out the inhabitants of the Land from before you, those of them whom you leave shall be pins in your eyes and thorns in your sides, and they will harass you upon the Land in which you dwell. And it shall be that what I had meant to do to them, I shall do to you.”‘” (Numbers 33:50-56)

    “They [Children of Israel] provoked Me with a non-god, angered Me with their vanities; so shall I provoke them with a non-people, with a vile nation shall I anger them.” (Deuteronomy 32:21)

  3. Jason Greenblatt at the Jerusalem Post conference confirmed what Ambassador Friedman had said. Meaning the USA would go along with the application of sovereignty in parts of Judea/Samaria.

    Ayelet Shaked stated Israel should pounce on this opportunity NOW to apply sovereignty in Area C of Judea/Samaria or it would perhaps regret this as a missed window of opportunity in the future.

  4. On one very rare occasion Adam told how he researched the Israeli powers that be making a road, then later they decided to cover the road with soil so that they would not be accused of being biased against “Palestinians”. This is what needs to be done Adam. You need to see that precisely this is what is holding Israel back, and essentially making it into a laughing stock.

  5. yamit

    Do not fret your little brain Yamit our agreement will be shortlived.

    I called it “Global Warming terror” and that is a mistake, in future I will call it “Global HEATING Terror”. You have your view, a view it seems to me based on just bias, but your view will not diminish this terror now happening but the future…what a future. The capitalist system is well capable of wrecking our earth. There are many big issues in our world and this is the biggest of all, but I notice that many Jews when they reach Israel they then become smug…But this was the main difference between the real Marxists and Stalin, then later Mao, then later on Castro, and even most lately Chavez. No nation is an island. In this case even more so we have to think of the globe. Trump said “I don’t believe in it” it meaning global warming but in the good old American way he did not elaborate…pragmatism and devoid of theory.

    This paragraph you write is welcome to me but for reasons slightly different:

    I have always opposed Sherman’s plan on the basis that it ignores Israeli Arabs and is predicated on Israel paying for transfer of some Arabs and I say some because if not 90% or more he will have accomplished nothing and set the principle that it is really Arab Land and we are bribing them to give it up to us.

    Israelis on reaching the promised land climb into a little cocoon (it is still a dangerous cocoon but I am talking about an ideological shell) but the big world goes on and one of the issues today is the wide growth of Antisemitism, and Islam, what one speaker in the film “Homelands” refers to Muslims as the “brute squad”, and you are right here also, it gives the Antisemites in New York ammunition. An open goal for them to shoot through. Sherman is insular and so does not see the problem in the rest of the world, but mostly he is not involved there, as I said he is in a cocoon. But as the film Homelands shows well we are all in this Islam thing together. We are all going down the tubes fast.

    You are all in your cocoon. How many times has Adam in his copious writings ever explained what has happened to the left, or given a reasonable and researched explanation of AOC. Such dull dredge is the common fare.

    Palestinianism is the jack hammer at the front of all of these problems, and Israel has never pulled its weight and has been of little help, as I said too many are too smug.

    The biggest blow that Israel has struck against us has been to continue to CONTAIN the “Palestinians” instead of taking immediate and direct action to remove them from Jewish land, and if you decide not to, at least do not provide them with the fruits of the earth and Jewish sweat, because that is such a lie. A very destructive ideological lie.

    You must explain that the “Palestinians” have deserved their great and honourable place in the world, they are the leadership of Jew Hatred.

    From now on no fraternising with your enemy. State the truth the Palestinians are leading in this Islamisation of the world. Every piece of Jewish fraternization with the “Palestinians” promotes Islam world wide.

  6. @ yamit82:

    Keep the King as long as he serves our aims and geopolitical regional purposes. Starve and isolate the Arabs in the West Bank and Gaza and cut them off from most links to include even security, economic cooperation and political ties to Israel. Deny them the use of our ports and air terminals they can use Jordan and Egypt.

    I have always opposed Sherman’s plan on the basis that it ignores Israeli Arabs and is predicated on Israel paying for transfer of some Arabs and I say some because if not 90% or more he will have accomplished nothing and set the principle that it is really Arab Land and we are bribing them to give it up to us.

    Effecting relocation of most WB and Gazan Arabs (Transfer) according to Sherman’s plan viv a vis Palestinians won’t solve Israeli problems – enough Palestinians will survive and stay. Very few Arabs remained in Israel after the 1948 war, but they bred fast. Similarly, even if a civil war breaks out between Fatah and Hamas – an almost impossible event – and many Arabs flee, Israel would still have enough hostile Arabs nearby.

    Deportation is the only solution. The real “occupied territories” are not in the West Bank, but in Galilee, the Negev and core Israeli cities where Arabs constitute a majority. Like it or not, there is no answer but relocation. How many times did Europeans employ it? Greece and Turkey, Germany and Poland live now in relative peace.

    GLOBAL WARMING IS A COMMUNIST AND GLOBALIST HOAX…. MUST BE OPPOSED AND DEBUNKED IN EVERY FORUM AS THE INSIDIOUS FRAUD THAT IT IS!!

  7. @ Felix Quigley:

    It is very important to understand exactly what is meant by this paragraph and I am absolutely certain that Martin Sherman does not understand it fully:

    “The other part of what Sherman advocates is instead what is needed. A major effort to advise the world on who are the “Palestinians” with special emphasis on the Nazis.”

    The way in which Francisco Gil White understood this was by means of himself and others like him sitting on their pedagogical thrones issuing their articles but it is not even remotely like that.

    We are issuing this call in the midst of the total breakdown of the world capitalist system which with terror inducing global heating of the earth, mass extinctions of species including man, whole populations out of control and exploding madly, and the arrival of really evil ideologies, an example being the anti-human “me too”, antisemtism of Galloway types on a massive scale.

    And that is the weakness of Sherman. He issues such calls and does so out of total neglect of these world issues.

    And to bring forward who was Hajj Amin el Husseini and who really are the “Palestinians” is engaging in war on all fronts in the world.

    Belman, and Sherman, and their pokey wee conferences hosting Mudar, are not remotely close.

  8. Right the Ambassador says there cannot be a Palestinian Arab state between Israel and Jordan.

    So from his point of view and also Ettinger the way is clear for Israel to take over Judea and Samaria. Also called by some “The West Bank” for specific antisemitic reasons.

    I repeat what is to stop Israel doing that? This is the point that frustrates.

    One answer is that Israel is a broken state just as Britian post referendum and America post 2016 election and Germany post the Merkel call for immigrants to cross over unhindered. And others. Ireland also broken and betraying fight for its independence 1916 to 1921.

    All the world broken due to impending Global Heating terror.

    Why does Ted Belman not fight for this which is to annex Judea and Samaria, defend the King of Jordan against Islam and his “Palestinians”, refuse to enter into any dangerous and possibly very counter productive aim of overthrowing the King. This means that Belman should be told to break his alliance with a person who seeks to overthrow the King.

    The most straight forward way is the best and will have far less “unintended consequences” which happened when Bush over threw Saddam, even more important than the murdering of Gadhafi by Cameron and others.

    That is the correct way for Israel I am certain. It means that this adventure by Belman must be totally opposed.

    It has nothing whatsoever to do with Israel taking over Judea and Samaria.

    Given his hsitory of dealings with Arafat the King will NEVER accept these Palestinian Arabs.

    Who though will accept them? Who cares? They can stay as they are. The important thing is that Israel will not give them a penny, no schools, no universities, no nothing!

    Sherman was very ill advised to be caught up in that conference in which Mudar spoke by telephone. How awful!

    The other part of what Sherman advocates is instead what is needed. A major effort to advise the world on who are the “Palestinians” with special emphasis on the Nazis.

    But to put that simple operation in motion requires in reality a revolution in Israel.

    This traitorous Israeli ruling cliques will do nothing except drift with the winds.

  9. So reading T.B quote suggests that at sometime there was a successful, self sufficient sodomite state?
    Handouts, begging, ransome seekers, seems to me to be their history.