Israeli government seems to be working consistently against our national interest
Martin Sherman, YNET
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Yesteryear’s spy masterminds, military geniuses, and political heavyweights have seemingly gone into high tech, leaving the state in the hands of corrupt, short-sighted mental midgets Daniel Pipes – July 21, 2008
There is well-known quip about politicians defying the Law of Perspective that goes something like this: The closer you get to them – the smaller they look. Sadly nowhere has the wry truth in this barbed witticism been more apparent than in Israel over the last two decades. For the leadership of Israel has clearly been afflicted with what can only be termed “terminal stupidity,” which is bringing this nation to its knees – if not to its demise.
This is the only explanation – other than purposeful perfidy – that can account for the preposterous and perilous policies that it has adopted in the past, for those it is adopting in the present, and for those that it overtly considers adopting in the future.
It is difficult to deny the entire concept that Israel chose to embrace since the early 1990s is in ruins. One after the other, the tenets on which it was based have cracked, crumbled and collapsed. What makes this failure all the more alarming is the fact that – in virtually all its aspects and all its stages – it was not only entirely predictable but indeed…predicted. For every-one of the security mishaps that have befallen the country since the start of the Oslowian misadventure, were foreseen and foretold -and the leadership forewarned that their advent was imminent if not inevitable. But such sober voices were drowned out by a cacophony of politically-correct drivel and thrust scornfully aside by sycophantic pseudo-sophisticates who dismissed sound common sense as simplistic and primitive and the time-tested principles of political prudence as anachronistic and out-dated.
Irrefutably, the concessionary doctrine adopted at the beginning of the previous decade proved to be a disastrous error. While this is something even the most ardent advocates may ruefully and reluctantly concede, there appears little willingness on their part to internalize the lessons of this regrettable endeavor, to acknowledge the fallacies on which it was based and to accept the unavoidable conclusions that arise from a dispassionate analysis of the past. Quite the opposite – seemingly oblivious of the calamitous chain of recent events, the current leadership seems unswervingly resolute to press on with policies that are based on the same manifestly flawed precepts.
Having experienced the bombardment of both the north and the south of the country from areas evacuated by the IDF, the government is still pressing ahead with plans to transfer the highlands overlooking the coastal metropolis in the east to Palestinian control – thereby willfully and knowingly exposing the nation’s only international airport, its road and rail system and its principle urban and industrial centers to the same fate suffered by Sderot and the surrounding villages in the south.
Baffling counterproductive elements
Astoundingly, this policy is being advanced even though the alleged rationale that was presented initially as its justification no longer exists. For if previously, the conceptual basis of conceding territory to the Arafat-regime was rooted in the claim that it was the only Palestinian partner with the necessary authority to implement an accord with Israel, today even this flimsy – and discredited – contention has been abandoned. Almost unbelievably, the current government is considering conceding to the Abbas-regime territory of vital strategic importance, despite the fact that no-one believes that it has the authority to impose its will on the Palestinian population – and certainly not to ensure the long-term implementation of a peace agreement with Israel. Indeed if the IDF were to transfer control of Judea and Samaria to the feeble Abbas – an indispensable part of an peace deal – there is more than a tangible possibility that it would hastily toppled and replaced by radical Islamists, as it was in Gaza.
So any concessions made to the allegedly “moderate” Abbas will readily, and predictably, fall into the hands of the extremists, whose enmity to Israel is the very reason that government refrains from negotiating with them. Can the Israeli leadership really be so blind so as not to see the self-contradictory – and self-defeating – nature of its policy?
The same question can be directed at the recent imbecilic decision regarding the wholesale surrender to ransom demands for the return of Israeli hostages – dead or alive. Perversely, instead of embarking on a harsh punitive policy to create disincentives for further kidnappings in the future, the conduct of the Israeli government in this traumatic and tragic affair has actually created enormous incentive for the Arabs to abduct more Israelis – and very little to keep them alive. The decision taken – and the one apparently about to be taken – are even more difficult to understand and to accept in light of past precedents, which show that, as matter of statistical certainty, released terrorists revert to their violent ways and will indubitably kill more Israelis.
Likewise the same baffling counterproductive elements characterize the policy regarding Gaza. It is difficult, if not impossible, to fathom the rationale behind the decision to halt military operations against the Hamas and other Palestinian terror organizations. For the present and regularly violated lull serves the strategic interests of the Islamists far more than it does those of Israel. Indeed, while it may bring brief and temporary respite to the harried the residents in the environs of the Gaza Strip, there is no doubt, and little argument, that it is being utilized by the radicals to regroup, rearm and retrain their forces. Thus any short-term benefits will soon be wiped out, with both Israeli civilians and soldiers facing even greater perils than today, making what is becoming increasing inevitable – a large-scale land operation – far more costly, bloody and difficult.
What could possibly motivate a responsible government to raise, rather than reduce, the level of risk; to reinforce, rather than remove, the source of dangers facing both its civilian population and its military combatants?
Of course the latest episode in this relentless march of folly relates to recent indirect contacts -via the good services of the Islamic-leaning government of Turkey – regarding Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights. It is little short of staggering that immediately after finding it necessary to destroy a “strategic installation” which the Assad regime had surreptitiously been constructing, the government begins negotiations with the self-same regime, renown for its brutality and treachery, on the evacuation of the IDF from strategically vital territory – when it is precisely the IDF deployment in this territory that has made the Syrian border the most tranquil Israel has had for over one third of a century.
The government of Israel includes two former IDF chiefs of staff, two former heads of the security services, one of whom was the also commander in chief of the Navy, two well-known professors and an array of former high ranking army and intelligence officers. Yet by any criterion of common sense this very government seems to be working consistently and constantly against the national interest of the country, recklessly gambling with vital security issues and with the physical safety of its citizens, in the manifestly forlorn and unfounded hope that the most unlikely “best-case” scenarios will materialize. There appear to be only two possible explanations for this behavior. Since the first of these – purposeful perfidy – cannot be entertained (could it?), the second – terminal stupidity – must be the answer.
Bland, is this an example of good old Christian shunning? Brogas Brogas le Olam!!! (smiling)
Yamit
Good. Just so long as we know we’re not talking to one another.
L’chaim.
Bland, so was I, just made necessary corrections for his edification and knowledge, as from you I found inconsistencies and incorrect data and contexts, not to mention outright falsehoods.
Yamit, I was talking to Vince.
Shimon Peres set the tone for Israels enemic counter to anti Israel sentiment way back when he was PM or foreign minister when he said that Israel didn’t need to pursue a Hasbera effort as our policies are our best defense and that if we have the wrong policies(code for Peace process and capitulation) no amount of Hasbera would overcome policies that the world rejects. ( My paraphrasing).
Israeli Elites have always used world negative opinion in order to both pursue and justify pursuing and instituting policies inimical to Israels welfare and to justify those same policies that for the most part the majority of Israelis reject or would reject if given a sane alternative.
Martin Sherman replies to Narvey
Oat, Shas is not exactly what you claim. while leadership is Ultra Orthodox ( North African variety) the rank and file are mostly semi observant Jews what we call here traditional and are most found in our development towns most far from centers of cosmopolitan western culture.Shas gets her support from the most uneducated and still assimilated Jews from Primarily North Africans and Middle Eastern Countries. It is more an ethnic rebellion to Ashkenazi dominance than ultra religious acceptance.
Jews have always except for short interval all through history made up the majority in Jerusalem, Safad,(TSFAT) Tiberius, as well as others. JABOTINSKY CAME MUCH LATER THAN THE First Zionist Congress (1897) He arrived to the Twelfth (1921). BY THEN PALESTINE FOR THE Jews was already up and running project.
I don’t see the connection between winning wars and the Jewish internal debate about religiosity or non religiosity in Israel.
Rav Kook believed that God was using non observant Jews for a Holy purpose and embraced all Jews. He was responsible more than any other for giving the pre state and subsequent State the stamp of Kosher.
Oat here is where your antisemtic Christian false precepts begin to creep in to your historical and sociological overview.
While I agree that Orthodox Jews do not study for the most part the Tanach as they should. from 5 years to bar mitzva Tanach then Mishne and much later Gemora, both the Mishne and Gemora are based on Tanach. I agree that it shouldn’t be that way but it is a far cry from your positioned statement. They never based their Jewish existence here solely on the Bible , the secular were more into Marx, Engels and Tolstoy.
Shalom shalom.
Hi, Vince
The modern State of Israel is largely the product of the Zionist Movement of the late 1800s, around the time of the Russian pogroms. The architects of the movement thought that by becoming a state like every other state, inhabited by a people sharing a common language and history, the Jewish people would no longer be singled out for persecution. It was thought that their very statelessness was the cause of their grief. Religion did not enter into this picture; but it was acknowledged that religious Jews would have to be accomodated in order for the venture to work.
“Biblical Zionism” was implied in the very choice of Palestine as the Jewish homeland, instead of alternative sites such as Uganda. The ones who insisted on settling in Palestine were largely the followers of Ze’ev Jabotinsky, a secular Jew. In the early 1900s, Rav Kook hammered out a compromise with non-religious Jewish settlers, to bring about peace between the two communities. As long as secular Jews were the clear majority in Israel, there wasn’t enough friction between seculars and religious to become a major problem. The was an era of great accomplishment by Israel, including successful wars in 1948-51, 1956, 1967, 1973 and 1982.
With the advent of Shas, the religious in Israel became a political power to be reckoned with. Their demands for military exemption and govenment funding of their yeshivas, which had not produced much social or economic strain in earlier days, became a serious threat to the unity and continuity of the state. The response of the “Left”, as you call it (i.e. the non-religious) was to actively seek ways to protect the rights of non-religious Jews. This has led to the division of Israel into opposing camps. On the one hand, the non-religious cemented their grip on institutions such as the High Court, the Press and the University system, which can effectively control the country long after the non-religious founding class becomes a minority in its own country. On the other hand, the issue of the “territories”, which in the early days of the State of Israel was mainly a territorial and security issue, became a religious issue:
The “territories” included the Temple Mount, the Tombs of Abraham, Rachel and Joseph, and Biblical sites such as Beit El, Jericho, Sh’chem, etc. By giving these lands to the Arabs, the non-religious-controlled government is refuting a connection with its Biblical roots. As I have said, when the religious element in Israel was small, none of this was an important issue; but with the large influx of religious Jews since independence, and their demographic and political threat to the very people who created that state, this is a serious issue. The Arabs, it turns out, are only minor actors in this contest.
“Biblical Zionism”, therefore, was originally part of the secular program; but it is conflict with the religious, more than anything else, that has caused it to come under fire. It was the secular leader, David Ben Gurion, who proclaimed to the world that the Bible was Israel’s “title deed”. That ought to be convincing proof that one needn’t be “religious” to embrace “Biblical Zionism”. The Bible, after all, is not the basis of religious Judaism (Talmud and the Rabbinical Commentaries are); but it is the fundamental non-religious HISTORICAL document of Jewish right to the land — not just of the Temple Mount and Beit El, but of Tel Aviv and Haifa as well. Because the religious treat the seculars as non-Jews, though, and thereby perpetuate and exacerbate the conflict, and because the religious parties have clearly demonstrated that they have an agenda that is entirely self-seeking and inimical to the non-religious, the seculars are undermining their own existence as a nation in order to preserve their identity. This is a serious matter, which must be resolved before Israel can hope to move forward.
Shalom shalom.
Oatmeal wrote:
[Disclaimer: I’m an American in America… I only know of Israel of what I have tried to piece together from what I learned in school… the many many books I’ve read, and a visit I made in 98]
Why is it weak? Is it weak because the religious sectors are forcing the State and IDF to make stupid compromises with the enemies of Israel?
No of course not.
It’s the same anti/non-religious factions, that founded that State, that is leading the charge to the State’s weakness in the face of Israel’s enemies.
It was Rabin and Peres who violated the norms and legitimized the PLO. It was Sharon who gave Iran/HAMAS the Gaza Strip. It was Barack who gave Iran/Hezbellah Lebanon.
And it’s Olmert who is stupidly talking about giving Iran/Syria the Golan.
I dont pretend to know the cultural influence of the Jewish religious communities but surely it can’t be any worse than what the idiot secularists are doing.
When has Israel ever looked to the religious community for basic self-identification and moral support. If my memory is correct , most Jews wouldn’t mind if the religious ever made themselves known.
I think you’re leaving out the importance of the Jewicidal Left… the sector of society that wants to give everything to the Arabs no matter how obvious it is that it will only result in more war.
I have no information to dispute you.. so perhaps this is correct.
When was modern Israel ever connected to Biblical Zionism?
Sherman ignores a number of factors at work that account for the attitudes, views and positions of Israeli governments, present and past.
Some, but certainly not all such factors are:
1. Historical Israeli dreams to live in peace with her neighbors;
2. The Israel Westernized belief that the issue is one of land for peace and the overly optimistic view that the Arabs/Palestinians will eventually come around if enough inducements are given;
3. The fact that Western economies are tied to and dependent on oil, much of which dependence is on the good will of the OPEC nations led by the Saudis. Add to that, the OPEC nations have amassed tremendous wealth which only adds to the economic and political power they are able to wield to press the West to meet their wants and needs, one of which is to weaken, if not destroy Israel.
4. Since weakening Israel is one of the obvious wants and needs of the Arabs, the West due to their own vulnerabilities to the Arabs, while not going along with the Arab dream of Israel’s destruction, have been forced to make weakening Israel part of their grand Middle Eastern strategy to further their own interests, which strategy is appeasement based.
Not only does the West seek to appease Arabs by pressuring Israel to make concessions to Palestinians and Arabs, the West’s efforts to appease the Arab/Muslim world are quite independent of their efforts at appeasing the Arab/Muslim world by pressuring Israel.
5. Israel’s susceptibility and vulnerablity to Western pressure to make concessions.
It is as unimaginable to Sherman as it is to me that Israeli leaders since Ben Gurian have not had Israel’s best interests at heart just as it is as certain for Sherman as it is for me, that Israeli leaders have not managed to advance Israeli best interests as well as they should have and in a number of cases have taken steps that have been contrary to Israel’s best interests.
I disagree with Sherman that the only choice to account for Israel’s situation today is perfidy or stupidity.
For those who suggest Israeli politicians are corrupt, even corruption for personal gain takes intelligence.
Taking into account other factors at play suggests that Israel is where it is today because:
a. Western minded arrogance that Arabs/Palestinians would eventually see the light and wisdom of Western logic and rationality;
b. dreams of peace early on blinded Israelis to the vast and in a number of cases antithetical cultural differences between them and their Muslim Arab neighbors. One of those misjudged cultural factors was that Arab/Palestinian Jew hatred could be reasoned away. It can’t. It is intractable.
c. Concessions were made early on that Israel cannot easily retreat from if at all.
d. Israel’s vulnerability to American and international pressures.
When Israel was nearly all anti-religious, it was strong. Now that the religious are a substantial minority, it is weak. So much for “Jewish roots”. I don’t see the religious doing anything to help the situation. Whenever they get into a position of powerer, they use it purely to get more freebies from the government. Israel doesn’t seem to need “Jewish roots”. What it seems to need, is a good kick in the butt — maybe even a second Holocaust. Ditto for Europe, America and every other land that gets lulled into complacency by comfortable living and forgets its reason for being.
Israel was created as a refuge for the Jewish people, regardless of their religious inclinations. Now it’s divided between two peoples, religious and non-religious, with each thinking it would be better off without the other. Israel is like the United States in the years leading up to the Civil War — with an enormous domestic issue hanging over its head, that nobody has the courage to address. The anti-religious want to give away the Temple and the holy places like Hevron and Beit El — not because they love the Arabs, but because they fear a takeover of their country and their way of life by an increasingly militant and growing religious minority. They want to disconnect Israel from Biblical Zionism, because the religious look upon them as strangers and enemies, and they know it. This is not “stupidity” on their part, but enlightened self-interest.
Vince:
Countries keep their nuclear programs secret. That makes Iran’s trumpeting every new stage of warhead development suspicious.
If Iran wanted to fend off the impeding strike on its nuclear facilities, it would say the bomb is ready. Nobody could definitely disprove that, and the strike would be recalled for fear of retaliation.
Is Ahmadinejad inviting a strike, pleading for one? A nuclear program is fairly expensive, and the Iranian budget is tight. Iranians might or might not have the nuclear know-how. It is not impossible that Ahmadinejad wants an attack to cover a failed nuclear program.
That said, the Iranian facilities still must be bombed; we shouldn’t take chances with nuclear weapons.
The thing with Pakistan though is that they can not do much to the rest of the Middle East, without moving troops from the border with India, and that is not about to happen, as those two are like modern versions of the Cold War. As long as Pakistan has an enemy that is nuclear capable next door, they will not move.
vince Persians invented chess and I am sure by now they are already several moves ahead of us but isnt it curious that America’s Muslim allies would love to see Iran bombed. Saudi Arabians fear nuclear Iran not because it would attack Saudis – Iran has never attacked anyone in the modern history – but because its growing stature would stir up Saudi Shia population which dwells in the oil field region. Saudi Sunni Wahhabites stole oil from its Shia citizens, and might be forced to give back the horde if Iran goes nuclear. Is it good or bad news for international oil interests? Probably good, because Saudi oil production is state-owned and foreign corporations there receive moderate service contracts but not the windfall concessions. If, under Iranian influence, Saudi Shia pockets become semi-independent, they would grant concessions to international oil corporations to make foreign governments accede to their autonomy. This is similar to Kurdistan. Instability in the Middle East generally and particularly in Saudi Arabia would send oil prices through the roof, contributing handsomely to corporate profits. Therefore Western oil corporations prefer the nuclear Iran. Israeli-American operation against Iran will close it to Western oil corporations and, accordingly, secure oil concessions for Russians. Their rhetoric aside, the Putin-Medvedev duo would love to see Iran bombed. Besides the inbuilt Russian trait of enjoying others’ troubles, destruction of Iranian nuclear objects would check Persian influence in Azerbaijan and generally in Central Asia, Russia’s soft underbelly. An American attack on Iran would secure that country as a Russian client for decades. Nuclear Iran would reshuffle the power balance in the American-controlled Middle East, and Russia enjoys Iran going nuclear, but devastation of Iran’s nuclear program benefits Russia still more.
Egypt, an American client and recipient of huge aid which allowed it to build modern army, is not overly wary of the nuclear Iran. Egypt feels no military threat from Iran. Nuclear Iran would rival Egypt in regional politics, and the Egyptians mildly prefer to have Iran bombed.
Iranian nuclear threat pales compared to that of Pakistan, an extremely unstable entity with rabidly Islamist voters and demagogue Islamist parties. For Israel and America, Iran is not so much a military as a political problem: Pakistan developed its nukes clandestinely while Iran defies everyone’s authority. Unable to deal with Pakistan, North Korea, or even the Palestinians, Israelis demand doing something against Iran. On the issue of Iran, it is oil interests versus populist politics.
North Korea is trying for rapproachment, if they got caught selling WMDs it would not work out so well for them, so after that incident in Syria, they are trying to stay under the radar. I could see Russia selling a nuke or two to Iran, but I think Czar Putin wants to keep them all to balance out the US. While the US is Iran’s eventual target, currently Iran is using its proxies of Syria, the Lebanese Hizbollah, Hamas etc., to surround Israel in a noose.
A phrase that instantly makes me want to vomit is something like “The Israel people will need to pay a heavy price to achieve a lasting peace” or however the cliche goes.
Why the hell should Israel pay anything more? Why was it ever expected to pay anything?…. Usually the guilty party has to suffer in these types of settlements…. just what do the Arabs have to pay? Of course we know the answer.. nothing.. nor do they really want peace.
On a related note.. the more I think about Iran , the more I think that Israel is not the target. While true… Iran does have something in store for Israel… I do not believe it is WMD.
Why in the world would Iran go through all this trouble to develop WMD to use against Israel? It could just buy the two or three it would need from North Korea or probably even Pakistan.
The US is what Iran has in mind.
I have to believe that it can’t be stupidity across the political spectrum here so that only leaves according to Sherman perfidy! The more our leaders are removed from our Jewish roots the easier it is to view everything in either a personal context (what’s in for me) and to view every policy and every decision based upon a given perception of short term gains( maybe) as opposed to medium and long term risks when they will in all probability not be in positions of political power and will not have to pay a price for previous policy failures. They depend on spin , short memories of the public and feel they can overcome future criticism. Then there is the view of rootless Jewish leaders here of viewing J &S and the Golan as just tracts of real-estate that only has value in the event of sale or trade or even trade- offs for nothing, its all how you package and sell the product. When one adds that most public servants in Israel are corrupted if not outright corrupt the term perfidy becomes a mild and incomplete description of them it is perfidy and so much more!
Well, the American government acts in much the same way, terminally stupid with people who would rather fight political battles then come together and do what is in the best interests of the people, because sadly, there are so many lobbyists running around the capitol. Politicians are the same all over the world.