By Ted Belman
An epic battle took place a week ago in Washington at the Saban Forum on the Middle East, Israel-US relations and the Arab-Israeli conflict. You probably never learned about it because American media virtually ignored it.
The battle occurred in a conversation between Martin Indyk, and Naftali Bennett.
Bennett is the Chairman of Jewish Home Party which was part of Israel’s governing coalition until it was ended a couple of days later. He served as Minister of Economy and Minister of Religious Services, Jerusalem and Diaspora Affairs. Prior to starting his career in politics in 2006 he co-founded a technology company and sold his interest to an American company for $145 million. He is adamantly opposed to the two state solution and a very strong proponent of the settler movement.
Indyk has spent the last two decades trying to get agreement on a two-state solution (TSS). First as part of the State Department’s Mideast team under Bill Clinton, then as ambassador to Israel (twice), and more recently as President Obama’s envoy to the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, Indyk has always pursued his goal of forcing Israel to make concessions to the Palestinians.
It should be noted that there is considerable animosity in Israel towards Indyk because he has a record of blaming Israel for the failure of the peace negotiations and particularly blaming the proponents of the settler movement. He has been very disparaging.
To add fuel to the fire, Indyk is the vice president of the Brookings Institution, who hosted the conference. Recently it was disclosed that Brookings receives $14.8 million from Qatar, who is also a major financier of Hamas. Because of this, Indyk has been accused of bias in his role as peace mediator for the US. Jan Sokolovsky in American Thinker questioned whether Brookings was in violation of the Foreign Agent’s Registration Act by not registering as a foreign agent.
Indyk started the conversation off by jokingly reporting on his earlier discussion with Bennett in which Bennett said, with a smile on his face, “I am going to kick your ass.” and he replied, “I am going to kick yours.”
In early November, the New York Times published an Op-Ed by Bennett under the title, For Israel, Two-State Is No Solution and Indyk started by referring to it. In it Bennett had nixed the TSS as not achievable and laid out his plan, which included annexing Area C and giving citizenship to the 80,000 Arabs living there. The Oslo Accords agreed to by both Arafat and Israel in 1995 divided Judea and Samaria (West Bank) into three areas, namely A, B and C. Israel retained complete control of Area C which is about 60% of the land and contains over 350,0000 Israelis and 80,000 Arabs. It does not include Jerusalem which Israel annexed after the ’67 war.
Bennett started his answer by attacking the TSS and those who support it. He said “the reality is, it’s not working”, “face reality”, “wishing a plan doesn’t make it real” and “not every plan (problem) in life has a solution.” Instead of having all these peace conferences we should be focused on making life better for both Jews and Arabs living there.
Indyk responded with: “What do you do about the price tag settlers and the burning of the olive trees and the attacks on the Palestinian villages? I mean, life isn’t exactly hunky dory for the Palestinians. How do you propose to deal with that?” Price tag settlers is the name given to Israelis who exact a price for Arab terror attacks. This happens very little and entails a very small price.
Bennett didn’t take issue with this but he should have. While there have been price tag events and allegations of settlers burning olive trees, they pale into insignificance compared to the Arab terror attacks and Arab theft of Area C land. Proponents of the TSS, including Indyk, always point out Israel’s minor transgressions while ignoring the context and the major Arab transgressions. This is wrong.
Indyk stated:
“And then, in Jerusalem, you never mentioned Jerusalem in your op-ed piece, but what are you going to do there? Jerusalem at the moment is kind of burning and you’ve got 300,000 Palestinians there, and you’ve declared, in another place, I think you said ‘1967 lines means the division of Jerusalem. We will never agree to give up a united Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and only Israel’.
“And so what exactly is the plan that you have to deal with the situation that Palestinians don’t want to be under your rule, that Jerusalem today is actually divided? It’s as if you’ve waved a magic wand and dismissed all of the problems that come from the fact that the Palestinians don’t want to live under Israeli rule.”
Bennett replied by saying he was against all violence and continued
“I think we’ve not treated Jerusalem enough as part and parcel of Israel. The quality of life for the Arabs living there has not been good enough.”
“We need to be providing all services to them, but, at the same time, the second prong is have zero tolerance for lawlessness”.
Indyk interrupted him to ask how he defines Jerusalem and asked, “Why do you need them (300,000 Arabs who live there) as part of Jewish Jerusalem. They clearly don’t want to be there — “
Bennett said he strongly disagreed and “the last thing they want — is to be under the corrupt Palestinian Authority.”
“By no means ever will I agree to divide Jerusalem. By no means will I ever agree to share the sovereignty of Jerusalem.” To drive this point home he recalled that a few months before proclaiming Israel’s Declaration of Independence in 1948, Ben Gurion, a secular Jew, upon hearing the advice of his rational generals that Jerusalem had to be abandoned to save Israel, rejected their advice and “was irrational, if you will, about it because he understood that Israel without Jerusalem is Israel without a soul.”
Indyk then moved on to the proposed annexation of Area C, arguing that no Israeli government has proposed such a thing and the reason being “that the world will not accept that. There’s no country in the world, including and maybe especially the United States, that will accept it.” He didn’t stop there and said “how are you going to deal with the consequence of EU sanctions which are likely to come about? I mean, annexation will cause an incredible furor in the international world. There will be Security Council resolutions. There will be boycotts. How are you going to deal with the consequences of this idea of yours?”
Bennett started by saying that when Israel annexed Jerusalem, the world didn’t accept it and when she annexed the Golan, the same, implying of course that the world will learn to accept the annexation of Area C. He might also have mentioned that the world condemned Israel for bombing Iraq’s nuclear facilities only to later acknowledge that it was a good thing that Israel did it.
Indyk accused Bennett of avoiding the question and Bennett shot back, accusing Indyk of avoiding listening to reality. Indyk asked again “How do you deal with the consequences of sanctions, international isolation — de-legitimization, and a basic fundamental crisis in your relationship with the United States.”
Bennett gave a lengthy reply that’s worth reading in full.
“So, first of all, you know — this is a process. I’m not suggesting that, you know, one day in midday we just do that. There’s a process of changing the global view of what’s going on here and it has to start with that, and that’s why I’m sitting here right now because I want to present a different approach to Israel’s future, a different one from the one that keeps on saying this is an occupied land, it belongs to the Palestinians, these are oppressors, you’re occupying. And it takes time. It’s an uphill battle.
“There’s a lot of groundwork because we have to undo the decades of nonsense that the peace industry has been fomenting and bringing up to a position where the world thinks that we’re occupiers in our own land.
“But if something is false and it’s repeated enough times, it becomes sort of common wisdom. We have to undo that. And it starts by being true. All right? You can’t be an occupier in your own land. So I would come to our friends, okay, to, you know, the President and say, listen, here’s the deal. We don’t agree. You think that we need to give up our land to the ’67 lines, plus/minus, swap it, whatever. I don’t. My people don’t. We think that would be tantamount to national suicide. Okay, so now we don’t agree. We have a different vision.”
Part of the problem, Bennett acknowledged, is that “we’re inconsistent. You can’t say that you favor a Palestinian state and then build communities there.” What he is saying is that Israel must abandon the TSS and keep building.
Indyk shifted to the alleged demographic threat. Bennett in effect said, what demographic threat, and argued there was no such thing.
Bennett expressed concerns about 6 million refugees coming back in the advent of a deal. Indyk sought to allay his fears.
Indyk said that Palestinian refugees in Jordan are not interested in going back to the West Bank. Bennett did not challenge this but should have. If a TSS was achieved, they would flood back into Palestine for a better economic future and because they are discriminated against in Jordan.
Indyk didn’t leave it at that. He was remarkably candid. “The Palestinians in the West Bank are in no hurry to bring Palestinian refugees back.” But Bennett shot back, “Yeah, but the Palestinian refugees are in a hurry to get back”.
And then things got really testy.
Indyk said, “I really don’t think you know what’s going on.”
Bennett came back strongly,
“I exactly do and I’ll go into everything. I’m not afraid of talking about anything, so don’t tell me you don’t want to go. I want to go everywhere and talk about reality. And the reality is that when we have 6 million Palestinian refugees from Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria flowing into Israel, you know what’s going to happen? They’re going to get to Ramallah and the Arabs are going to say, whoa, whoa, whoa, don’t put your tent here. You never lived in Ramallah. You lived in Lidia, you lived in Haifa. Don’t even stop.”
INDYK: It’s just fear mongering. It’s not based on reality.
MINISTER BENNETT: The only fear mongering is telling us that the world’s going to be angry and that the demography is against us.
INDYK: I, as a Jew, who cares about Israel’s survival and cares about solving that.
MINISTER BENNETT: And, of course, you know better than the Israeli public.
INDYK: No, I don’t and don’t imagine to know better than the Israeli public.
Score another point for Naftali Bennett. But Indyk didn’t give up.
INDYK: You know, I just think you live in another reality. It’s what Steve Jobs called distorted reality thinking.
MINISTER BENNETT: You know, I love that sentence. I live in another reality. I’ve been in the First Intifada, the Second Intifada.
INDYK: So you would know —
MINISTER BENNETT: — more than all those conferences that you live in a different reality.
MINISTER BENNETT:
“How many missiles need to fall on Ashkelon until you’ll wake up? How many? How many people need to die in our country until you wake up from this illusion? You know, the Oslo process took more than a thousand lives in Tel Aviv, Haifa, and Jerusalem, and I didn’t hear anyone say, you know what, I made a mistake. When are you going to wake up?
“We pulled out of the Gaza Strip. We were clobbered by thousands of missiles. When we go defend ourselves, the world calls us murderers. You know, you talked about our international position. Let’s talk about that. What were the three worst events for Israel’s international standing over the past decade? It was Cast Lead, it was Marmalah, and it was the last summer. Where did it happen? Did it happen in Shoham, Nablus, in Ramallah? It happened in Gaza.
“So what do I learn? Does the world praise us? Did the world say you go get them because they’re shooting without any reason at my family? No, the world said you’re murderers.
“I was there on Sky News, CNN, BBC. I saw it. So anyone who thinks that Israel will somehow become loved, beloved by the world if we just give up another piece of land, I don’t need to guess, we’ve seen it roll out. So if anyone’s living in illusion…”
Indyk then made a 180 degree turnaround and agreed, “It’s about Israel’s future, not about an applause meter in the Arab — in the world.” Exactly.
There is much more to their heated encounter. I recommend you watch the video of it to fully appreciate the battle of ideas that took place.
yamit82 Said:
antyhing is possible just as Reagan was considered almost a joke by many prior to winning or being nominated after the Carter debacel. the shift of the undecided is the major factor and those in the middle will more likely shift to a “moderate” republican after Obama than a conservative. I said bush as first and rand paul as veep is a possiblity. Its emotional for most, they flirted with carter and obama and now theyre ready to go back.. but not too far. After bush 1 who figured on dubya? remember the bush clan by now must have enormous influence within gov and financial circles, I think they keep pollard in Jail
bernard ross Said:
Jeb Bush ill never get the nomination and if he does the conservative right and libertarians will desert the party and like previous elections sit on their hands this time as well but even more so. That should ensure a democrat victory Hitlery or another. He is too librul, his positions on abortion , gun control and immigration should bury him then he is a Bush not a very respected or popular name even today in most stalwart republican circles.
I think he is counting on polling match up with Hitlery.
Conventional wisdom says in order to beat a democrat Librul you need to run a Liberal cum (moderate Republican).
@ mar55:
thank you and Happy Hanukah to you and family and all the other Israpundits
@ Felix Quigley:
the “civilized” British stew them, what about the Irish?
@ honeybee:
remember I told you this?
return of the dynasty?
@ mar55:
@ honeybee:
HAPPY HANUKKAH To all who celebrate and those who don’t.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jzh-TKzXN2k
@ mar55:
May The ALMIGHTY watch over on your trip.
@ honeybee:
HAPPY HANUKKAH TO ALL!
Honeybee, yamit82, Bernard Ross, Samuel, Phoenix, M.Devolin, Laura, Dove, Eric and Ted Bellman.
Leaving tomorrow to see my grandchildren. Celebrate!
Enjoy your families and friend.
See you soon.
Felix Quigley Said:
That does it , Felix your not invited !!!!!!!!!! But Bless yore Lil’ol Heart !!!!!!
@ Felix Quigley:
Sure there will be just different you are a believer in evolution. Lucy etc… just you probably won’t be around 🙂
BBQ rabbits. How apt for a Texas savage!u
Such big men eh!
But you would not defend Assad and the Christians in Syria!!!
And that is Israel being guide to the nations … With your SO there will be NO humans!
Such big men eh!
And that is Israel being guide to the nations … With your SO there will be NO humans!
SHmuel HaLevi 2 Said:
I know the location of the ” Lost Dutchman Mine”, and we’ll hide out together and BBQ Jackrabbits.
@ bernard ross:
Then Samson prayed to the LORD, “Sovereign LORD, remember me. Please, God, strengthen me just once more, and let me with one blow get revenge on the Philistines (palestinians) for my two eyes.” Judges 16:28
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuNYhyXAWlo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvpruBhMGpg
Felix Quigley Said:
read the story of samson
yamit82 Said:
The MSM and internaiional wire services rely upon the “reporting” done by these local stringers which is one of the reasons why there is so much disinformation from the international wire services and MSM about Israel. However the other reasons are anti semitism and economic “incentives”(e.g. share ownership, BBC need to maintain viewership for BBC arabic)
@ Felix Quigley:
State a specific opinion and what you base it upon like reasoned out and providing if possible supoort for your position and I will answer directly to that. If you insist on imposing your religious views ie, Trotsky and communism , I will mock you and not take you seriously any more than fundamentalist christians who seek to inject and even in some cases impose their unwanted views and beliefs here.
@ Felix Quigley:
It means we have an ace in the hole making a royal flush.
it means we hold the world in check and can mate you anytime we choose.
It means that for the first time in history the Jews have the means to destroy any enemy anywhere on the planet especially with 5-6 modern submarines armed with nuclear cruise missiles.
It means that we have placed limits as to how far we will allow the world to push us without paying an ultimate price.
All that with a push of a button or two.
The world knows we have them and capability to deliver but they don’t believe we would ever use them. That makes them next to useless as a deterrent to both enemies and friends alike. I want to bring them up from our basement and flaunt them in your face. You want to Isolate us and worse this is what you can expect like Israel taking out every oilfield in the ME and beyond even Russia.
Say good morning to a nuclear winter!!!! Just a thought.
We are not Serbia or any other of your pets. We are small but not weak. We only act weak and that sends the wrong message at home and abroad. We are not weak neither economically or militarily and we will become stronger by the year as you become weaker. In 10 years Israel will be the wealthiest nation per-capita in the world. Jews will flock to such an Israel and our population will burgeon.
Do you believe the timing of Israeli success and prowess is ascending while the West is beginning to crumble and we have done this with terrible leadership and little help from government and the outside.
Did it ever ocur to you why the eyes of the world are always upon us? They aren’t on Spain or Ireland but they are always on us.
Think about it and if Trotsky could see us today he would have abandoned his sick corruption of an ideology and joined us under the Law of Return. Well maybe not he was a born loser. 🙂
@ Felix Quigley:
Simply. If the “the world” tries it again against us then EVERYBODY goes puff. EVERYBODY Not just us.
No further discussion.
I write using phone keyboard and find it hard to do things like c and paste but I am SO disturbed by the promotion of Bennett by especially Ted Belman. I wish Yamit had backed me earlier. I began the criticism of Bennett but he did not support me then.
Much talk here about the SAMSON OPTION. What does that mean in the world of today?i
@ yamit82:
Hi mar, Hi Yamit.
The old sage said. “Lo arabim lo biguim”.
Sooner or later and I sense sooner, we will have to take that simple statement seriously.
Further to that.
Never again goes as one with…
The Jewish people removing today’s Judenratters and capos. Everyone knows who that filth is.
Doing that will fast send the concept to the Muslim telephone totters. If not, well…
Provide the means for them telephoning from Tunis or other of their choice destinations.
Of course we have another alternative… And that is doing what the capos, Judenratters, their partners, the “un” and the present administration and EU want since before 1948.
It is our choice.
@ NormanF:
If the price of oil drops much lower it will make shale oil unprofitable to extract and refine. I have a strong feeling this is the aim of prime producers even Obama.
On the other hand it hurts badly Russia, Iran, Mexico and Venezuela. This also may be the target of the Arabs producers and the Obama admin.
Drop in price of oil too steep too fast to be based on purely supply and demand considerations especially after it was reported that Opec initially tried to cut production and that didn’t work.
It costs $2 dollars a barrel at the well head for Saudi oil to extrract and $40-60 dollars for a barrel of shale oil.
If Prices remain low or lower than they are today Putin and the Iranian Mullahs are in deep cow dung.
In 6 mos or less they will be screaming murder unless they have have a way out, like starting a war or even threatening one.
Another straight talker. Looking for his American and Israeli clone???
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRw39Ju4xFw
@ mar55</a
You physically can't ban media becuae they all use local stringers embedded with the enemy. Every Arab with a smart phone and internet link is a potential media source. New age new technology and they are all media savvy.
yamit82 Said:
They’re going to ban Israelis? So all they will really lose is they can’t travel anymore to Paris, Brussels and London. Not a great loss from my standpoint.
yamit82 Said:
Don’t forget shale oil. Israel has reserves that exceed those of Saudi Arabia in size. Just wait til the fracking revolution hits Israel.
yamit82 Said:
I would have replied Israel is energy self-sufficient or is soon going to be. If the Europeans want to freeze, let them go ahead and impose sanctions on Israel. Israel is well poised to survive without them.
@ SHmuel HaLevi 2:
I agree with Eric about banning the media. During the Iraq war. General Schwarzkopf when driving the American forces through their first assault banned the media. They were complaining to high heavens because the liberal media did not have a chance to complain about how poorly our troops were doing. That was a response to the Vietnam War which was lost on the sanctimonious media reporting the lies fed to them from the Vietcong. Years later when one of the journalist from Time magazine found out that his source of information had not been an allied, but a Vietcong supporter. Him and the slimy NYT never apologized for the misinformation fed to Americans and the world.
I say ban the media is basic. You save lots of lives by banning the misinformation they report.
Banning all the professors and members of the J Street crowd will make any war or annexation go smother. People will complain at first and, when they see it is a fact and the the Country is victorious they forget and shut up. What it cannot continue under any circumstances is to allow people who are not Israelis dictate to Israel what it should be done or not. Any outsiders who want to make policy in Israel against what is best for Israel should be considered enemy of the State of Israel and banned for life. It will send a message for those who are thinking of joining them in their criticism of Israel. Much talk when they don’t have to do the fighting or receive the enemy rockets.
Shut them up. If they come trough any subterfuge JAIL them.
@ SHmuel HaLevi 2:
I agree but you are skipping all the in between stuff….
@ bernard ross:
Israel must institute a policy of jeopardy against foreign enemies. Those “professors” and J alley tramps must be denied hereafter entry to Israel, for as long as they live and after death.
Regarding setting priorities against other enemies.
Israel does not need to mix it up with the Goyim.
We must make removing from any state role ALL of those that support Oslo and partition, They are the first on the enemy list to handle.
Jeopardy MUST be forever in place against anyone in any way causing Jewish people’s death, maiming, loss of properties, loss of Heritage.
The foreign enemies will find that enough to act gingerly.
A unilateral palestinian action can breach oslo and nullify the TSS if BB had the guts to assert that position. A breach of Oslo gives a justification for deporting the hundreds of thousands of PLO families allowed into Israel on the basis of Oslo. In fact, there is a question as to whether Oslo is already materially breached due to the PA UN recognition last year. RE Oslo, the US officials are wrong, the UN action may be deemed multi lateral but the PA request would be unilateral in terms of the Oslo agreement.
I expect Obama to provoke a conflict during election season between himself and BB and the right in order to frighten Israelis into voting for the Livni, lapid, herzog, foreign stooges so as to “not endanger” the US Israel relationship. He will prove them right by showing BB driving a wedge between the US and Israel.. the right and BB should be prepared with a comeback.
what is Indyks track record of success and good judgement other than being a paid academic stooge to facilitate an agenda?
yamit82 Said:
discussing the Samson option will lose votes to the coalition of fear mongers
yamit82 Said:
they are as anti BDS, zionist and supportive of Israel as Jstreet…. Livni calls herself a zionist
yamit82 Said:
As this issue will likely be a major issue of the newly forming coalition of losers, peaceniks and leftists… Bennet will likely need to clarify to his voters how he will deal with the sanctions which are assumed will arise from his policies. However, I am not a full believer that those sanctions will arise, with teeth, if Bennett implements his policies. Therefore he might strngthen the unlikeliness of serious sanctions occuring based on reality today or use the timeless Israeli phrase “we know how to deal with that occurrence.” I expect him to avoid a direct unveiling of what he might do in the same way that BB avoids a direct unveiling of what he wants to do regarding YS. By presenting a scenario of sanctions he might frighten some on the fence sitters who might just seek a stronger diplomatic Israel. I expect that getting votes is the prime determinant of behavior right now…. Glick was in a debate without seeking votes. In politics, first the power and then the action. Bennett is less vague than BB on YS, etc.
Anti-BDS academics urge ‘personal’ sanctions against ‘annexationist’ Israelis
Zionist professors, including renowned political theorist Michael Walzer, say U.S. and EU should restrict visas and freeze assets of Bennett and three others who entrench the occupation.
Ted Belman Said:
Politicians at election time first seek to accede to power and that is their prime initial goal. More votes from a wider arena!
@ SHmuel HaLevi 2:
SHmuel HaLevi 2 Said:
All the more reason IMO to respond forcefully.
Non ans. shows weakness in their eyes.
Israel finds more gas – but will it be extracted?
If the numbers work out, the Royee field will be a distant third in size to the Leviathan and Tamar fields. Israel may have a glut of natural gas
http://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-finds-more-gas-but-will-it-be-extracted/
Just in….
We have discovered another huge natural gas field. 3.2 TRILLION cubic feet. Europe has now only two viable suppliers or freeze. Russia or us.
About that boycott… Mother Russia’s bear is ready folks.
Israel is every time provided the means to deal with enemies. I believe.
I stand by what I said. Bennett did stand strong in many ways. Sure he could have said we have been subject to boycotts throughout our entire existence even by the US, but he said more than enough.
@ yamit82:
Each of us have different ways to respond to threats.
Indyk’s threat was not his, it was his controllers threat. I prefer to leave them pondering rather than knowing. They all know that what Dayan said remains in place and much more.
My problem is that I do not trust the Oslo military command to carry out the Samson Plan.
@ Ted Belman:
@ SHmuel HaLevi 2:
The only real point in that whole interview was the actual and implied threat not to Bennett but to the State of Israel whether it’s Bennett or any other leader is the Threat of Total Isolation and all that it implies.
Such a threat posed verbally and directly on such a public forum deserves and in my opinion and is imperative that a direct response be made verbally by an Israeli leader and public official to that threat or any threat to the State of Israel.
You all had superlatives over Glick’s response to the Danish AH. Why Glick And not Bennett? Why do you both give Bennett a pass over a more serious issue for us?
Nothing else in that interview really means much except for the issue he ducked.
I hate to quote Moshe Dayan but I believe it to be a valid reply!!!!
“In 2002, the Los Angeles Times published an opinion piece by Louisiana State University professor David Perlmutter in which he wrote:
“Israel has been building nuclear weapons for 30 years. The Jews understand what passive and powerless acceptance of doom has meant for them in the past, and they have ensured against it. Masada was not an example to follow — it hurt the Romans not a whit, but Samson in Gaza? What would serve the Jew-hating world better in repayment for thousands of years of massacres but a Nuclear Winter. Or invite all those tut-tutting European statesmen and peace activists to join us in the ovens? For the first time in history, a people facing extermination while the world either cackles or looks away–unlike the Armenians, Tibetans, World War II European Jews or Rwandans–have the power to destroy the world. The ultimate justice?”
In 2003, Martin van Creveld, a professor of military history at Israel’s Hebrew University, thought that the Al-Aqsa Intifada then in progress threatened Israel’s existence. Van Creveld was quoted in David Hirst’s “The Gun and the Olive Branch” (2003) as saying:”
Bennett needn’t have been so blunt in conveying a similar message response!!! 😉
@ yamit82:
Lets me start with this. In my opinion Indyk deserves nothing as a response. I know we agree on just about everything. I hope we agree on the following.
He is our enemy and works for our major enemies and as such he and his masters must dealt with. Bennett was masterful on his non response.
As to sanctions.
Not a day has gone by since 1948 to now without one or another anti-Semite threatening us. The executive arm of the threats has been Islam.
And before 1948 was just as bad or far worse.
Either we iron up and reciprocate, regardless of disproportionate size and power in our disfavor or we are history. I much rather be known as one that hurt them than one that cowed to them.
yamit82 Said:
I disagree. Instead of saying, “Damn the torpedoes. Full speed ahead.” He said I am not going to be stupid about it. He does not want to be branded as a crazy. He wants to be seen as responsible.
The only real argument Indyk posed was whether Bennett was prepared to suffer the consequences of almost all of the world condeming Israel and implied sanctions or worse if Israel annexed all or part of Y&S. Total Isolation of Israel is the threat. Deserves a serious answer and response.
Bennett dodged the direct question with a non answer.
I hope that in March, when Bennett becomes Prime Minister, his first act is to throw out European “news” media, as well as the NY Slimes and National Palestinian Radio (er, American “NPR” for those who might not get the joke).
I hope his second act will be to sever diplomatic relations with some of the more virulent anti-Semitic states in Europe, which would include Norway, Sweden, Belgium and Ireland. I know he has already closed trade offices in three of them (the Israelis never had one in Ireland).
The unJews with the Oslo stain and their coattail following are being decimated. Mr. Bennett decidedly hammered out of the ball park one of the chiefs of the betrayals process.
Still. Millions are being pumped from the Soros funds at Obama’s calling and only some 100’s professional “protesters” show up.
Their combinas such as Hertzog and Livni fall apart before they get even started.
I cannot fathom what happened to Lieberman but his corral is getting empty.
Lapid doing what his Lapid father also did.
If that is all that Mr, Obama can pull… Well…. he must be in far worse shape than what we suspect.