This is a brilliant article and must be read. Greenfield argues we must fight to win and not to buy a few years of relative peace. Ted Belman
WESTERN FRONT: A Moment of Truth in Israel
What are Israel’s options – what are the realities that it faces in
this proxy war?
From Daniel Greenfield, INN
Seven years ago the Israeli government decided to forcibly evict the
8000 Jewish residents of Gaza and withdraw all bases and forces from
the area. The experts, some with the government and some with the
media, assured everyone that it would be for the best and that
withdrawal would actually improve the security situation in the
country.
It was put about that resources and lives were being wasted protecting
Israelis living in Gaza, while those Israelis insisted that their
presence in Gaza was protecting Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. The experts
laughed at them. Now the experts are keeping an ear open for air raid
sirens because as it turned out, those farmers and teachers, those men
and women growing lettuce in greenhouses and building homes on
hilltops, from which rockets are being launched, were the ones
protecting Tel Aviv.
“They are now being asked to relinquish these accomplishments for the
greater good,” the government press release said of their houses and
farms, of their synagogues and greenhouses. And the greater good was
served. The greenhouses were turned into Hamas training camps and the
synagogues were burnt to the ground. Rockets fly into the air from the
ruins of broken houses.
No longer will your sons have to die in Gaza, the experts said. A
month later rockets were falling on Sderot. A year later Gilad Shalit
had been kidnapped and Israeli soldiers were back again, dying in a
Gaza that was now run by Hamas.
Among the bundle of promises from the Sharon government, was that the
Gaza withdrawal was part of an oral agreement with the United States
limiting further withdrawals and concessions. That agreement lasted
for another few years until Obama took office and no one in his
administration could ever remember such an agreement or accept its
validity.
“The moment of truth has arrived,” Netanyahu said, on resigning from
the Sharon government. “At the moment of truth, a man – especially a
leader – must ask himself: ‘What are you doing, what do you stand for,
what are you fighting for?'”
These moments of truth come fast and furious in Israel, but hardly
anyone waits around for an answer. Not even Netanyahu, who knows
better.
Hamas’ objectives have always been straightforward. Its commanders and
suicide bombers, its militia members, bomb experts, smugglers,
launchers and embezzlers know what they are fighting for.
“Our struggle against the Jews is extremely wide-ranging and grave,”
the Hamas charter says. “Israel, by virtue of its being Jewish and of
having a Jewish population, defies Islam and the Muslims.” It has the
simplicity that you would expect from the Muslim Brotherhood, a
fascist organization that drew equal inspiration from the Koran and
Nazism.
What however is Israel fighting for? Since Oslo, the slogan of Israeli
moderate conservatives has been “Peace with Security” even though it
was quite clear that you could pursue peace and have neither peace nor
security, or you could pursue security and have peace. Their slogan
was muddled and their policies even more so.
Israel may have superior firepower, but like most Western countries,
its policymakers are too muddled to be able to apply that firepower in
a useful way. The limited scale warfare that has been adopted by
America, including drone assassinations and extensive security
measures, came out of Israel’s futile efforts to find a more
humanitarian style of warfare that would limit civilian and military
casualties. But all that these measures really did was make life with
terror more manageable.
Withdrawals and a variety of defensive measures such as Iron Dome made
it seem like Israel could maintain the status quo. Peace with Security
meant no peace and no security, but enough of the illusion of both
that it would seem as if the slogan had been fulfilled. Suicide
bombings dropped and the terrorists were forced to resort to rocket
attacks and drive-by shootings with much lower casualty rates. Rates
so low that those who didn’t live in Sderot or Samaria could ignore
them.
Instead of ending the threat, Israeli conservatives had found a way to
live with the pain of terrorism while turning their focus to economic
reforms. The left, with its emphasis on finding a permanent solution
through appeasement and withdrawals, was discredited and collapsed.
But the problem had not gone away.
While Israel slept, the makeup of the region changed. Hamas had
formerly been strongly backed by Syria and Iran, with some support
from more distant Islamist Gulf states such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar.
Egypt and Jordan were both wary of Hamas because their governments
were concerned about being overthrown by the Muslim Brotherhood.
The Arab Spring put Islamists into power in Egypt. Suddenly the Muslim
Brotherhood was running things on both sides of the Rafah Crossing.
Hamas switched its allegiance from the shaky Shiite axis of Iran,
Syria and Iraq over to the rising Sunni Islamist axis of Saudi Arabia,
Qatar, Turkey and Egypt. The Islamist terrorist group was no longer an
isolated arm of Iranian foreign policy, it could count on the backing
of Turkey, Qatar and Egypt.
Not long after Qatar’s leader paid a visit to Hamas, this latest war
began. Like so many conflicts with terrorist groups, it isn’t about
any specific domestic objective. The objectives are regional and now
international. Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood regime is looking shaky and
the Gaza lifeline has come at a perfect time, allowing Morsi to turn
the attention of Egyptians away from the shaky economy and some
dubious proposals, including early store closings, over to familiar
territory denouncing Israel.
Under Iran or Egypt, Hamas is not fighting for Palestinian
nationalism, which was already a fiction manufactured by Soviet
propagandists looking up to prop up a Greater Syria, but to support
the aims of Iranian and Egyptian domestic policy. And suddenly those
aims were uncomfortably close.
Terrorist militias serve an ideology, but function as a business. Al
Qaeda, Hamas, Fatah or any other of the many groups blanketing the
region, need money and weapons to be viable. They need state sponsors
and the states that sponsor them want something in return. Terrorist
groups find sponsors the way that Renaissance artists found patrons,
they show off their skills and wait for someone to come calling with
money and guns. And then they perform for their patrons.
Israel’s terrorist problem is unsolvable through any form of peace
negotiations because there will always be sponsors. A terrorist group
may sign a peace agreement, but then it quickly gets on the phone to
its sponsors to assure them that it will go on committing acts of
terror. Its militias are spun off into “separatist” or “splinter”
groups that go on doing what they did before. And the group then asks
its new friend American and Israeli friends for guns and money to
fight these extremists. That way the terrorist groups get twice the
money for terrorism and a farce of counter-terrorism.
Even if a terrorist leader is sincere, his movement is nothing but an
umbrella group for terrorist militias. If the umbrella group stops
funneling money from state sponsors to local militias, the militias go
into business for themselves. And there is such a demand by sponsors
for more and more “extreme” militias, that even the existing terrorist
groups find themselves having to compete with newer and more violently
Islamist militias.
Peace is useless and hopeless under these conditions. Fatah claimed
that it could not control Hamas. Hamas claims it cannot control the
men shooting rockets out of Gaza. The people shooting rockets out of
Gaza will claim that they cannot control their fingers on the trigger.
It’s plausible deniability all the way down when it’s convenient, but
the real control is in the hands of regional regimes who feed coins
into the slot and get out terrorism.
So what then is Israel fighting for? Peace with security. Which means
slapping down Hamas hard enough that it will have to wait another 3-4
years before trying the same thing again, this time with bigger and
better rockets. That was the policy six years ago and it’s the policy
today.
Israel will bomb Hamas targets, kill some of its senior leaders and
destroy some of its weapons stockpiles. Its soldiers will enter Gaza,
arrest some more senior leaders, walk into traps that will kill some
of its best and brightest, and then withdraw again while Hamas
celebrates its victory in the Battle of XX or YY where five or six
Israeli soldiers were killed, along with ten or fifteen Hamas
terrorists. And then the Battle of XX will become the Massacre of XX
and lead to a documentary that will be doing an extended tour of
American and Canadian campuses during the next Israeli Apartheid Week.
This is the status quo and it cannot be maintained indefinitely. The
air raid sirens going off in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem warn that the war
is heading into unsustainable territory. As Iran goes nuclear,
Hizbullah is trying to become another Iran and Hamas is trying to
become another Hizbullah. It is not a nuisance that can be ignored.
Israel has no answer to the growing threat except to try and contain
it through the same old methods that have now put Jerusalem and Tel
Aviv into the line of fire.
Since 1992, Israel has been retreating and those retreats have
replaced secure borders with borders of terror. Rather than reversing
those withdrawals, the right has been satisfied with trying to
stabilize them. But that has only created safe spaces for terror while
setting the stage for the next round of retreats by the left which
will create even broader territories of terror. These territories are
staging areas for the next invasion, which will come not from Hamas,
but a Muslim Brotherhood Egypt and an Islamist Turkey, once Israel has
been sufficiently softened up.
The only way to end the threat of Hamas in Gaza is by retaking Gaza,
but no such policy is on the table. Like America, Israel responds to
terrorism not with the aim of achieving decisive victories, but with a
policy of intimidating the terrorists into scaling down their attacks.
This is a political policy of political generals and leads to terror
becoming a permanent institution.
Israel has tried negotiating its way out of the terrorist trap. It has
not tried fighting its way out. Israel has tried to escape the
occupation, but in a region where you are either the occupier or the
occupied, it may have no choice.
Any moment of truth must begin and end with a realistic assessment of
the realities that you face. Israel faces a proxy war by its neighbors
and like most proxy wars, it is the opening round to a true war ending
in true occupation and genocide.
Its neighbors know what they are fighting for. They are fighting
Israel for the same reason that Shiites fight Sunnis and that Sunnis
persecute Christians. They are fighting Israel because “by virtue of
its being Jewish and of having a Jewish population” it is different
and must be crushed for the national and religious aims of any proper
Islamist country.
But what is Israel fighting for? Like so many modern countries it is
fighting so as not to fight. It is fighting for peace. It is fighting
to escape from fighting. And so like many modern countries it cannot
bring itself to fight hard enough to break the cycle. Instead it
fights just hard enough to defer the fight by another few years and
the cycle continues.
Israel can retake Gaza once. Or it can retake Gaza every few years. It
can have soldiers patrol Gaza or it can have rockets falling on Tel
Aviv and Jerusalem. The options are as unfortunate as they are clear.
The only hope for peace lies in driving out the terrorist militias who
have turned Gaza and the West Bank into their own Somalia and
Afghanistan and reclaiming the territory. Because after this fight is
through, the next generation of rockets will go on being built and
smuggled. And they will not fall in empty fields.
There can be farms and greenhouses on the hilltops of Gaza. Or there
can be rockets.
“There is no place for islamist on the Holy Land of Jews and Christians.”
If you want to talk “as per the Torah,” there is no place for Christians in Israel either. There never has been “as per the Torah.”
There is a desperate need to develop mechanisms to detect the GPS of a rocket and then “capture “it and re-program so that it returns to sender.If that be a school, hospital, kindergarten or community center or even fruit stall—so be it!
Its time for Israel to take back gaza and all the so called westbank of Judea Samaria and Bethleem and the Temple Mount as well There is no place for islamist on the Holy Land of Jews and Christians Send these islamists back to saudi arabia or jordan as palestine is jordan as per the Balfour Declaration and Israeli territory is from river euphrates to the border of egypt as per the Torah and the Bible
Andy Said:
I must apologize. Indeed the Toronto Star may deserve a fair share of abuse for anti-semitism but in this case it was “the Daily Star” from Lebanon”. Imagine my embarrassment.
I rectified my mistake – I signed on the site and apologized for criticizing them in a civil manner as I didn’t realize they were terrorist propagandists working for a Hezbollah propaganda news site and I said I hoped one of their closest internecine ‘friends’ in Lebanon there would put a missile up their rectums.
So I hope the business is cleared up with apologies all around.
Moshe Feiglin: No to Ground Deployment in Gaza
Israel at this point not need to reconquer all of Gaza. Israel should take over the Gaza side of Rafiach and the northern part that Sharon Should have never given up, creating a buffer to our northern fence and the town of Sderot.
The southern part gives Israel control of the southern entry entry point with Egypt and by extending the buffer between the Egyptian side of Rafiach to 1-2 Km buffer it would make it difficult to tunnel as there would not be friendly buildings to cover the exists. The distance could be expanded as the need arrives.
Gaza can be hooked up to the Egyptian power grid and Obama and the EU have enough clout with Bankrupt Egypt to force compliance. Egypt is due to receive 5-6 billion Euros from the EU, World Bank and Obama in a few weeks. That makes Morsi a compliant MB President of Egypt. Hungry Egyptians are his main concern now not MB radical ideology.
I think Iran orchestrated the Hamas attacks as a distraction if not diversion. It’s going to cost Iran billions to resupply and rebuild losses of weaponry and construction renewal. So it must have been a calculated operation. They also got to see Israels technological capabilities and I am sure they are already working to beat it.
Not invading Gaza guarantees another loss for Israel. The enemy understands our weakness and will always exploit it.
Until Israel has the resolve to state unequivocally that it will not observe one sided conventions or protect civilians that seek to kill Jews the foreigners will keep up their con artistry. Israel must show through merciless action that jew killing is truly unacceptable.
@ Canadian Otter:
Thanks Otter.
I appreciate your appreciation; means a lot to me coming from you.
I see no possible advantage to a cease fire for Israel until the weaponry is decimated. Why not keep bombing until they agree to hand over their weapons. If they dont agree then just keep bombing. However, this takes resolve to stick to the script. If foreigners complain remind them that hamas has a choice.
@ yamit82:
@ yamit82:
That’s the point!
Nothing so clearly displays the bigoted and double standards applied to Israel by the rest of the world. Let Egypt provide humanitarian aid. Israel is at WAR with Gaza. Just how does it owe the terrorist regime any material aid?
These measure do not preclude the targeting taking out of the terrorist leadership and both should be employed.
Ted Belman Said:
The solution is military but Israel has never had the resolve. Israels lack of resolve to capitalize on its military successes is not to be confused with a failure of military solutions. Accommodating the pals is a diplomatic solution whereas expelling the pals is a military solution: which one if done would actually succeed??? It is the refusal to consider the only logical remaining solution: even the fictional character of Sherlock Holmes knew the answer was what remained.
Ted Belman Said:
If they become continuous then the obvious answer is YES!!!(His solution is to wait for a change in the price of oil)
Ted Belman Said:
Of course, hasn’t IDF been to Beirut?
Ted Belman Said:
What’s your plan? You can sit down and die or pick up a stone and walk to the oven as an alternative.
Ted Belman Said:
It is not impossible, Israel has controled Sinai and Arabia is across the red sea. Taking control of Saudi Arabia oil would totally change the world and Israels position in it. Certainly Israel is paying the price of being militarized without getting any benefits. Saudi oil is run by foreginers and Israel can set up a puppet govt. Small nations have controlled huge land areas throughout time. Israel is making incredible advances, why think small.
Ted Belman Said:
What a ludicrous question as if anyone would fire a nuclear weapon in response to a katuyusha. However, Israel has nuclear weapons and if the only road to peace and security is to use them then it should be considered. Israeli civilians are a priority over jew killing enemy civilians.
Ted Belman Said:
Ted Belman Said:
The only thing that is bullshit is this email. This symbolizes the ongoing failed and futile strategies that characterize the ongoing resultant failures. This person is delusional. How much failure does one have to produce to recognize that they are using the wrong approach. This person only sees solutions in what others do and leaves for Israel waiting for things to happen. Hopefully, he will never rise to a leadership position. these are the people who have led the Jews down this trail of endless death. DUH?? When you fail that often its time for a change, start with a change in thinking. Whatever failed thoughts you had before think of the opposite and you will be closer to the solution; but first recognize you are an utter and abject failure. This email is a continuation of the same failed thinking that got everyone into an endless series of ovens.
“It’s means there’s not enough dead Jews to suit the Toronto Star’s taste.”
Hit the nail on the head there, Max. I once had an email exchange with the Star’s Haroon Sidique about something untruthful and denigrative he wrote about Israel and the Jews in the Toronto Star. As usual for his ilk, he would not admit his being deceitful and asked that I be more civil. I sent back an email instructing him to “Go f### yourself.” I thought that was the measure of civility he deserved. Now I’m blocked from his email contacts!!
“Even the Toronto Star in Canada is printing Pro Terrorist Rubbish.”
This is very far from remarkable. The Toronto Star ALWAYS prints pro terrorist rubbish. The Toronto Star is good only for ass-wipe.
@ yamit82:
I just wanted to say thank you for your perspective and excellent analyses and updates from inside Israel. We really appreciate them.
There does not seem to be any long term solution for Israel which does not involve retaking gaza and killing or expelling the arab population. Everything else is a stalling tactic. All the other “solutions” rely on an agreed performance by the arabs for which there is no supporting historical evidence: therefore highly improbable.
Furthermore, the residents of gaza overwhelmingly voted for and support the continuing hamas policy of killing Jewish children. they train their children to murder Jews. Therefore, trying to spare gaza civilian lives is equivalent to the aiding and abetting of the killing of Jewish children. Sparing Gaza civilians is genocide against the Jews. The entire Gaza should be liquidated to preserve Jewish children.
@ Yidvocate:
The political and militant leadership should be targeted for each and every attack. That is the only language they understand. Turning off utilities is correct but will bring the anger of the world against us. Knocking off each and every authoritative personality political and military has the best effect on their motivation. The first demand by Hamas after cession of firing is the end to targeted assassinations.
Israel must be consistent and not be sporadic in application of this principle. If they are hiding in a home or building destroy the structure even if their are families in them.
Iron Dome has given Israel a strategic option and when more batteries come on line and the systems toggled the kill rate will increase along with wider population protection.
I was opposed to this system till now because ofthe high cost, but I can appreciate it’s value. The danger is inaction based on too much trust in this system. The IDF must be as aggressive to complete our deterrence. Eventually they will find a way of beating the defense and I am sure that effort is already in progress.
One point few relate to. If Israel actually does attack Iran they do not want to have to fight three front war with Hamas and Hezbollah as well as Iran. The Fajar 5 could become a serious bother if they can hit not only Tel Aviv including Ben Gurion air port, but some of our Negev bases as well. This should have been an ideal opportunity to reduce at least one front from the equation.
If a cease fire becomes operative as things stand now Hamas will still be intact and still in possession of over 6000 rockets with additions they are sure to get in the coming months.
The residents of the South will punish our political leaders for not solving their medium to long term threats and a year or less of quiet won’t cut it for most.
The 40,000 reservists will be really pissed off and may not show up in future call ups. Many if not most of these reservist come from the South of Israel.
@ Max:
No doubt there are equally repugnant editorials in the TorStar, but this link is from Lebanon.
@ Ted Belman:
Retaking Gaza is not so simple. Nor is the territorial expansion Ted suggests would follow Daniel Greenfield’S prescription for rockets fired from farther afield.
War is hell but Israel has unique leverage that it lacks in all other situations. When the cease fire comes. And it will come. Israel needs to lay down as a key tenant of the cease fire that each time the cease fire is violated by Gaza, and it will be violated by Gaza (regardless of which terrorist faction is the purported cause), there will be a stoppage in water, electricity and supplies for a certain duration. That duration will increase with each additional rocket fired.
This will surely pit the citizenry of Hamastan against their rulers and will predetermine the price of their aggression, placing themselves in control of the consequences of their hostility.
Why the HELL Israel hasn’t done this effective and bloodless measure in 7 years, I will never understand.
Who in their right mind gives material support to their enemies, especially in time of war????
WHO????????????
Collective punishment, you say? Well what is war if not collective punishment. Besides, the Hamastinians elected Hamas in free and democratic elections and widely supports the terrorist regime.
Oh, but the world will cry foul, you say? Of course it will. It will no matter what Israel does. So what?
keelie Said:
It’s means there’s not enough dead Jews to suit the Toronto Star’s taste.
@ Ted Belman:
That email is what you call a ‘sapper’ or ‘Destroy from within’ IE someone who pretends to be on your side but then offers advice or takes a POV that is meant to destroy you. eg “I really love Israel and the best thing to do is give all your land to Hamas” That is why it is not what someone’s argument is, it is what is their intent and a demonstrable proof of that intent.
All the arguments in there are bogus. For example: missiles from Jordan or Qatar would mean war with other countries -totally nothing to do with the Gaza Strip situation. And it’s using the old ‘don’t make them angry’ intimidation.
The rest of it is not worth the effort to even look at. It’s bogus with a deceitful intent.
“hold them at bay to let us get on and build the country. ”
ROFTLMAO – that’s suicide and exactly the ‘advice’ HAMAS would offer.
Email from an Israeli friend.
@ Max:
Max – they got the countries’ names mixed up; it was meant to be “Syria”.
as for Israel’s…
…it’s so absurd that it’s difficult to figure out what it really means, or, more to the point, what mathematical theorem it is based upon.
Perhaps these newspapers should hire journalists with IQs that hit triple digits.
The problem is that that in the short or long term is not possible without making Israeli Law rule in Gaza. It was always a dreadful deed that Sharon carried out, driving out the Jews from Gaza, making it Judenfrei, and Sinai under Begin was the same badness.
But there is another timeline running here and that is the Iran Bomb. Obama bases his policies, but not his political life because the Media covers for him everywhere, on talking to Mohammedanism, but that has never ever been possible, because Islam is hard wired into lying. Obama will stretch this talking to Iran until about February, and then Israel has to attack the Nuclear Mountains on its own, and this may well include nuclear weapons, given escalation from the first attacks.
And there is another timeline as well, given that the American people are based not at all on Christianity AS IS OFTEN CLAIMED, but on the Great American Revolution. These two are often confused. America could be but historically is not the land for the killing of the Jews, Europe is that. Thus it is not a matter of separating from America but of drawing closer to the great revolutionary traditions of America. But those traditions are largely bubbling only under the surface and are expressed CONSCIOUSLY only on what is wrongly called the “right” or the “conservatives”, except in the sense that they “conserve” the revolution, thus are the true revolutionaries of today. Note the strong natural support of Breitbart for Israel today.
I return to the above proposition. There is no talking to Hamas or Fatah. Understand that Arabs kill Jews. THEIR MISSION! If the Nazis had invaded Palestine then the Arabs would have carried out the Eastern European programme of extermination. Now is a decisive time but it is very possible that the Israeli leaders cannot grasp it. There is a wonderful opportunity to eliminate Fatah and Hamas. It all makes perfect sense now. Those two organizations need to be broken and expelled. Sinai also is a danger and must be taken over as well. Do this rapidly. Then present Obama with the reality of Iran in February. Thus in February Israel will be in a far stronger position to defend itself against the Iranian Bomb. It is still really ALL about the Iranian Bomb, but it is doable.
I am specifically referring to this piece of absolute excrement printed by the Toronto Star.
Rampant butchery
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/Opinion/Editorial/2012/Nov-19/195446-rampant-butchery.ashx#axzz2CeGkblv2
LOL, the censors at the Toronto Star deleted all my comments.
So did the CBC.
Day after Day.
They won’t print anything that cuts to the chase and is pro-Israeli no matter how polite it is. It’s not just me, any similar opinions simply don’t exist in the Canadian MSM – strange because al those opinions are all over the internet.
…
Islamic terrorists were allowed to spew their drivel and hate in the most spiteful way in all the mainstream news, but my polite comments regarding the legitimacy of promoting Terrorist Propaganda in a time of ‘War on Terror’ were stamped out.
Reason and logic is rendered voiceless.
..
I know the problem – they were afraid of offending the Islamic terrorist supporting community in Canada.
Canadians have been sold out by our leaders, we are under the boot of Islamic repression.
Israel has lost the world wide propaganda news. It’s obvious beyond obvious. The Islamic terrorists have corrupted all the main news media.
Even the Toronto Star in Canada is printing Pro Terrorist Rubbish.
.
The only weapon of deterrence the Terrorists have is propaganda. Israel has already lost that one so why bother?
.
Just go in and do the job take the border and the corridor , Decimate Hamas and shoot everything that moves towards the troops. Kill 300,000 collateral damage , who cares? It won’t make a whit of difference in world opinion.
Get the job done.
Then Hezbollah will go doo-doo in it’s pants. And Israel WILL survive.
The article is 100 percent correct.
The status quo is death for Israel.
Chilling!!!
But – as ever – right to the painful truth.