Looming Disaster in American-Israeli Relations

What would be a faster way to turn the American public against Israel than to have United States troops returning in caskets from Judea and Samaria, also known as the West Bank, where they were serving as peacekeepers presumably protecting the Palestinians from the Israelis and vice versa. If such a thing exists we have been unable to think what it might take. The problem is that the path that President Obama and Secretary of State Kerry may be taking in order to force a peace between the Palestinians and the Israelis includes American troops placed within the new Arab State of Palestine as a guarantee to Israel to prevent terrorism and a guarantee to the Palestinians against any Israeli interferences and guarding against IDF responses even if somehow a terrorist event should be committed. This idea is fraught with potential calamities and disasters beyond all imagination. Judging from the current situation in Iraq one can easily envision exactly how useless American troops would be in preventing all terrorist attacks while also being committed to performing their tasks while obeying all restrictions and limitations placed upon them by the Palestinian leadership. Add that the main function of American troops as peacekeepers would soon be realized that they are actually just potential hostages held whenever such were needed to make demands for concessions from either Israel or the United States. The best bet is that American peacekeepers stationed in Palestine to act as a deterrent against terrorism and to be guarantors of peace while enforcing the agreed upon border would be pulled either at the insistence of the American public or the demands of the Palestinians within the first year.

 

The path leading to this catastrophe waiting to happen will occur quickly and be in place before anybody either in Israel, the United States or the Arab World has time to react and prevent such idiocy. The most likely scenario will go something like this. Secretary of State Kerry will convince Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to forgo his litany of preconditions in return for a guarantee that the 1949 Armistice Lines, also called the 1967 Lines, will be the basis for the borders and that the Palestinians will have their Capital in East Jerusalem with complete control over the Temple Mount. Secretary of State Kerry will coerce Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu to come to the talks by guaranteeing that the United States will enforce Israeli access to all Jewish Holy Sites especially in Jerusalem and that the United States will be the guarantor preventing any future terrorist attacks including rocket attacks. There will be a great meeting very likely in Washington on the East Lawn or the Oval Office with a signing ceremony where a tentative peace agreement will be signed. The agreement will spell out a proposed solution to such final issues as borders, Palestine being a non-military State defended by the United States, a solution to the Palestinian refugee resettlement with some ten to twenty thousand who have provable claims to lands lost within Israel being accepted by Israel with the remainder being absorbed by Palestine and possibly some remaining in the countries where they have resided with some having lived there over sixty years. And the cherry on top of this peace of cake will be American peacekeepers placed in the State of Palestine as the guarantors of all the implementations, peace, safety, and security for both sides. Presto, instant Americans placed in harms’ way under what will be the worst possible of conditions.

 

In order to appease the Palestinians, the American troops will answer to the Palestinian leadership operating under similar restriction as the UNIFIL (United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon), who operate in a nearly complete ineffectiveness in containing Hezballah in Lebanon from rebuilding south of the Litany River, having to request permission in order to operate outside of their bases and perform any of their supposed duties. The American troops will find that their service will be utilized in such a manner that they will only have the effect of preventing any Israeli response to terrorism. The ability of the American forces to control or prevent terrorism will be virtually nullified by restrictions placed on them by the Palestinian government. They will become a protective force for the terrorist functions by blunting any operational abilities of Israel in anti-terror operations within Palestine, the only thing restricting terrorism on a massive scale currently. Eventually there will be American soldiers kidnapped by such groups as Hamas, Islamic Jihad, al-Qaeda, Salafists or even al-Aksa Brigades, who are part of Abbas’s Fatah Organization, should the Americans actually manage to hold any terrorists from any of these groups or simply to make demands for any purpose from freeing terrorists held by Israel or any country worldwide or any other purpose where a hostage would give sufficient leverage. The American troops would also be living day and night wearing a virtual target on their backs and be targeted by any terror groups or individuals who are not supporters of Mahmoud Abbas; this is a very large and possibly majority of the Palestinian Arab population. Once Americans are taken hostage or murdered while presumably making Israel safe from the Palestinians, and this is how it will be played in the press and across the media, the relations between the American public and Israel will begin to grow strained. At some point Israel will likely ask that the Americans cut their losses and return to the United States as the price of American troops being harmed would be too high a price that Israel would rather the United States not pay. Israel has, in their entire history, never requested for American troops to come to their aid. Israel has always preferred to be responsible for the security of her people and country and have been consistently reluctant to allow others to be placed in harm’s way preferring to take such risks for their security themselves. This idea of injecting American troops into the Israeli-Palestinian peace process is an awful idea whose time must be avoided and seen as poisonous to Israeli-American relations. Nothing positive can come from such a mistaken idea, such an abhorrent and noxious idea.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Formation of Palestinian State no Solution to Middle East Violence

For the entire twenty years since the fiasco named Oslo was perpetrated on Israel and the entire world we have heard the constant drumbeat droning out the mantra that the founding of a Palestinian State living side-by-side in peace and security with Israel will result in peace and calm over all of the Middle East ending all strife and violence. Even after experiencing over two years of unrest and turmoil of the Arab Spring, more aptly called the Arab Winter, we saw uprisings, violence, protests and revolution replacing longstanding dictators in the hope of founding something better all without even the mention of Israel or the Palestinians. How could it be that we had a popular uprising that replaced the government of Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, and Yemen with further unrest ongoing or soon to come in Syria, Jordan, Mali, and possibly Lebanon and others. Again, none of these will be about Israel or the Palestinians with the possible exception of Jordan whose population largely consists of Palestinians. Yet still we hear the drumbeat droning out the mantra that the Palestinian Statehood being established and carved out of Israel will end all Middle East problems and the world will enter a period of blissful peace.

 

How can anybody expect a thinking person to believe such foolery after witnessing the Middle East of the recent past? The Palestinian leadership itself has demanded that one of the conditions which must be granted when forming a Palestinian State in any form other than having it completely replace the State of Israel that they retain the right to resist and fight against the Zionist existence in the rest of their homeland until all of Palestine from the River to the Sea is liberated from the Zionist influences. So, by granting the Palestinians statehood a country established in all of the lands beyond the Green Line that includes every inch of land lost by Jordan in the West Bank, all of Gaza that Egypt lost, and half of Jerusalem including all of the Old City and the Temple Mount, there still will not be peace because as long as the Jews retain any land which was once under Muslim control there can be no peace. This is not my opinion but is the opinion of the PLO, Fatah, Hamas, Palestinian Authority, Arab League, Hezballah, al-Qaeda, and countless rulers, Imams, and Islamic leaders worldwide. So, it is obvious by their own words of intent that the two state solution as a final agreement is unacceptable to the vast majority of the followers of Islam and that they will only accept the entire eradication of Israel and replacing it with a Palestinian Islamic governance where the Jews will initially be allowed to remain as long as they accept the status of Dhimmi. But, even if this result were to be implemented, would that then lead to complete calm and peace throughout the Middle Easy? I think not and here is why.

 

Does anybody actually hold that should Palestine be formed and meet even the wildest of demands of the most radical of Palestinian leaders that this would result in the end of the violence and uprising in Syria? Of course not. That alone should be sufficient to disprove the claim that all of the violence in the Middle East has as its root cause the Palestinian/Israelii conflict. Would founding Palestine end the violence against Christians and other non-Muslims in Mali or Nigeria? No chance that would end simply because Israel and the Palestinians reached an agreement. Would all the terror induced violence in the West immediately terminate once the State of Palestine was founded and borders were established between the Israelis and the Palestinians? Nope. What about the eternal standoff which flares up with consistent levels of animosity and violence between Pakistan and India over the lands which were formerly Kashmir, would that come to a conclusion after the peace was signed between Israel and the Palestinians? That would rank as highly unlikely. Would stable governance and an end to the conflicts suddenly fall over all of Somalia, especially in its capital city of Mogadishu? Not a chance. Would Iran cease their drive to attain nuclear weapons and establish a Shiite crescent and hegemony over the entirety of Muslim lands and then spread this new caliphate to encompass the entire world? Never happen as their goals would remain unfulfilled. The simple fact is that most of the violence and terrorism which exists or is rooted in the Middle East has nothing to do with Israel or the Palestinians and whatever should come to pass between Israel and the Palestinians would have absolutely no effect on the rest of the Islamic world and those places where they have extended their influence or interests.

 

Solving the impasse between the Palestinians and the Israelis with the intent of solving all the violence and situations currently existing in the Middle East is a fool’s errand which only the most misguided would believe or expect such a result. That begs the question as to why in the world is it taken as fact that solving the Palestinian/Israeli conflict would be the cure-all of all the problems in the Middle East? The reason is the most obvious of reasons. An often used excuse for not addressing a difficult problem or not tackling a pervasive threat is to blame it on some unsolvable problem that is only loosely tied to the situation. The Middle East violence is a pervasive problem which would be extremely difficult to address, let alone solving. Much of the violence in the Middle East is of ancient origins with no resolution as long as the two sides of each conflict exist. The conflict between the Sunni and Shiite Muslims will not reach any conclusion in the foreseeable future. So, blame it on Palestinian/Israeli conflict and its lack of resolution. It does not matter if transferring the responsibility for tackling near impossible conflicts is a total ruse which anybody who takes even a moment to inspect would find the complete insanity of the claim as nobody wishes to see the truth. Seeing the realities as they truly are would require actions that nobody is prepared to undertake. Blaming the Palestinian/Israeli conflict for the entire bundle of turmoil, violence, and conflicts throughout the Middle East and related problems traceable to the Middle East is simply a way of kicking the can down the road, just somewhat more insidious.

 

This begs another question, what would happen if the Palestinian/Israelii conflict were to be resolved? Obviously, those blaming every ill or at least the majority of them, on the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinians are counting on that problem never ending which is why there is never any pressure placed on actually forcing a solution. The pressures for solving the Palestinian/Israeli conflict are almost universally placed upon Israel while the Palestinian side rarely has any pressures applied to make concessions towards solving the conflict. The reasons for this is that Israel is actively seeking to meet and solve the problem while the Palestinians do not wish a solution as they are only being paid great amounts of money for as long as their “difficulties” continue. The Palestinian society is setup as being dependent on large infusions of money and on not taking the responsibility for governing themselves and simply blaming Israel. This fits perfectly with the desired situation of an insolvable situation which will continue without end allowing for a plethora of other problems to also be avoided and left unsolved. Making the finding of a solution acceptable to both sides of the Palestinian/Israeli conflict as the prerequisite for tackling the other myriad of problems which is the Middle East is exactly the same as promising to weed your garden after the last rainfall had passed. There will never be a last rainfall within reason thus the garden never needs to be weeded. The Palestine/Israel conflict also will never be resolved as long as the actual only result the Palestinians will accept is the instillation of a Palestinian State over all of Israel replacing the Jewish State and subjugating the Jewish population of Israel at best and an unspeakable alternative at worst. Since the Israelis are never going to submit to Palestinian rule over their entire homeland, the problem will never be resolved. Even if a Palestinian State is formed with recognized borders, the conflict will continue if this recognition includes a Jewish State of Israel existing beside the Palestinian State. That insures that the rest of the world can simply kick the can down the road rather than making the difficult decisions to address the rest of the problems in the Middle East. Simply stated, it is much easier to blame Israel for not completely surrendering to the Palestinians while never expecting them to do so. That is the path of least resistance when one considers that all the other paths are just as insolvable and much more dangerous to become involved. That is why the claim exists that the Palestinian/Israeli conflict is the root of all evil in the Middle East and why there will be no truthful attempts to address any of the plethora of problems involving Islam.  

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Prisoners, Politics, Policies, Perceptions, Principles and Pardons

Once again the news is filled with denunciations, demands, pleas and outright indignations all demanding Israel release or commit to actions which will alleviate the reasons, conditions and complaints in order to mollify and end the hunger strike by Palestinian prisoners. It is not a new set of circumstance as this exact scenario has been played out before much to the delight and satisfaction of those who constantly call for Israeli surrender no matter the reason, situation or possible deleterious results which will be caused. The last time there were hunger-striking terrorist prisoners, we add the modifier terrorist in order to clarify exactly the kind of people and the reason for their detention as such is important, the world, or at least the Europeans and their cohorts from the left, made a set of demands with attached admonitions which revealed their duplicity. Now that the precedent and full consequences for particular actions have been established, this time around only the bald demand need be voiced as the rest of the limitations are understood. But what are the demands and the options the Israelis may utilize in addressing this situation?

The initial picture is a select number of Palestinians held due to their ties to terrorist activities. Some are under what is known as Administrative Detention, a charge left from the British Mandate legal system where those responsible for planning, arming, or other direct means of assisting terrorist activities were placed in custody for the increased safety of the peoples as a whole. Such incarcerations usually have an upper limit to the length of time such a prisoner may be held though there is no limit as to how many times they may be held or the frequency. Neither of these latter conditions applies to those currently involved in the hunger strikes and many of the strikers are imprisoned for actual terror acts. The one part of this entire affair which will never likely be explained are the limitations placed on the country or other administrative body under whose jurisdiction the hunger-striking prisoners are held. They are required to have a neutral physician determine the rationality and sanity of the prisoner and if they are found to be of sound mind, then they must be advised that their actions are harmful to their general health and could, if carried to its logical end, result in death. This is the limit in which the government may intercede concerning the hunger-striking prisoner. If the prisoner should expire as a result of their refusal of nourishment the state is not seen as being responsible. Should the state intervene and force-feed the hunger-striking prisoner, the act is viewed as a denial of the prisoners’ rights and such actions may lead to sanctioning the state. In a nut shell, Israel is left powerless to act in any manner to provide sustenance as long as the prisoner is deemed rational. So, if Israel were to force-feed any of the hunger-strikers, they would very likely find themselves charged with crimes against humanity as they would have denied the prisoner their human rights. If Israel followed international law and allowed the hunger-striker to starve and die, the firestorm that would follow would be beyond any such outrage ever before seen. That leaves Israel with only one option, to capitulate to the demands of the hunger-striking terrorist prisoners and release them to resume their organizing, assisting and implementing terror attacks against Israeli civilians. This is the unspoken desired result those protesting Israeli lack of actions in preventing the adverse effects of starvation from inflicting the hunger-strikers.

The real problem Israel is currently facing is a direct result of their former actions. Many, ourselves included, advised not to give in to an early release or any other demand made by the initial hunger-striking terror prisoners. This is not to say that Israel should have allowed the prisoners to starve themselves to death. There is a technicality which can be applied to make a kind of end-run around the noninterference clause within the applicable international law. The law states that if a prisoner should be determined to be in an impaired state of mind and possibly not fully cognizant of the imminent danger their actions are causing, then the prisoner may be hospitalized and fed. The only qualifying requirement is the documentation of their limited capacity by two neutral physicians. It is highly doubtful that two such physicians could be procured to make such a determination and thus allow Israel to address the threats of prisoners starving themselves to death while not surrendering to the demands for release or any other demands. No doubt Israel would probably be called to account for their actions for feeding terrorist prisoners against their declared intentions and will to starve themselves to death in order to bring condemnations upon Israel. It is not too late for Israel to implement this method for addressing such protestations in a way which will blunt the indignations from the world’s busybodies while also rendering hunger-strikes as an ineffective ploy robbed of its impact and denying the intended result. Sometimes it becomes dizzying witnessing the lengths and depths many in the world will travel simply to condemn Israel.

On another front of this situation, Israel should refuse to allow any advantages to come of not only the hunger-strikers but also those rioting and attacking security forces in supposed support of the hunger-strikers. We say supposed support as it is a relative call as to how much of the current increased violence is directly due to the prison hunger-strikers and how much is simply instituted in order to attempt to interrupt the joys and revelry associated with the joyous Purim celebrations throughout Israel this week. If Israel were to react with panic and surrender to increases in violence perpetrated by the Palestinians, the result would be a never ending spiral of increased violence. This has been the exact reaction to apparent Israeli restraint in the face of violence perpetrated against her citizens in the past. When Israel attempted to simply wait out increased violence of previous intifadas instead of mobilizing and restoring order; their lack of action was perceived as weakness and resulted in more violence, increased destruction, higher death toll, additional casualties and a greater intervention in order to restore order and calm. Each time Israel has appeased such pressure tactics such as these hunger-strikes which are coordinated with allied NGOs, leftists, and other anti-Israel and anti-Zionist groups and governments, Israel has simply guaranteed more similar actions with ever increasing demands attached. In every instance where some act was initially met with Israeli compliance and surrendering before coordinated world demands, the action would be repeated and escalated with demands eventually surpassing even the ability of the most permissive and tolerant of Israeli society to agree it was necessary to meet the demands in the hopes of restoring peace and order. This use of escalating threats tied to ever increasing demands has become the normal operating procedure of the Palestinian Authority with its preconditions, Hamas and their rocket barrages and has even spread to the anti-Zionist allied groups in Europe, the Middle East and world-wide. Since Israel gives in to some minor action and continues to capitulate through numerous and ever-increasing escalations; whenever Israel finally refuses and takes whatever actions are necessary to restore order, the result is the same calamitous cacophony of shrill denunciation thrust upon Israel for having the audacity to defend her people, country and even existence. The intent of the most minor act of defiance should be treated the same as the eventual escalation of such similar act if Israel can ever expect to live with the same peace and tranquility afforded other nations. It is not as if the boisterous cacophony if indignations would be any more or less than when after numerous escalations Israel finally resists the blackmail that is at the heart of the terrorist onslaught faced by Israel daily. The friendship of the world which is offered before every demand for Israeli concessions, usually land for the promise which matters not as it will never be met, will likewise not be forthcoming but withheld with yet another concession brought forth as the new parameter necessary for their friendship. The friendship of much of the world will remain denied to Israel until she learns that the world only loves those who demand their respect. Capitulation begets further demands, standing one’s ground is the only path which eventually leads to respect, the first requirement for friendship. Simple stated, capitulators will capitulate themselves to death, both literal and figurative, while the steadfast will dictate the terms and gain respect and be the ones whose friendship is sought. Israel needs to soon choose which side of this fence they will be found, lying helplessly defeated and trounced on the side of the capitulators or standing strong with pride among the recognized nations of the world. Let us hope and pray they choose to stand among the nations.

Beyond the Cusp