Secure Roads From Rock Terror Before Worry Over Price Tag

Justice Minister Tzipi Livni is once again putting the cart before the horse. She is making a grand display of where her heart lies and it is not with the victims of real terrorism but with a phantom crime which has yet to produce all that many solid arrests, let alone actually taken lives. The vast majority of so-called “Price Tag” crimes have never been solved while those that have produced a perpetrator were found to have been committed in a set-up by Arabs trying to place blame on neighboring Jews for a self-inflicted crime. Yet this same justice and law enforcement system which expends inordinate amounts of manpower and investigative hours chasing phantoms and detaining innocent Jewish youth from the communities in Judea and Samaria only to have to release them due to lack of evidence while not arresting those hurling deadly, life-threatening projectiles including large rocks and fire-bottle-bombs at private vehicles and government vehicles with literal abandon free of any consequences. But you are doing that which government is best at doing, turning the real priorities upside down. You choose, Minister Livni, to chase after the least criminal act in both severity and numbers while turning a blind eye in order to ignore the threat to countless lives of the innocent and challenge to the authority of the State of Israel. Let us simply compare your priorities of placing “Price Tag” crimes above rock and firebomb terror attacks for concerted legal efforts.

 

“Price Tag” crimes are an illegal act against property. Much of the “Price Tag” crimes are a committing of vandalism which in and of itself often would only even be qualified as a misdemeanor and not rise to the level of felony except that the vandalism which qualifies as a “Price Tag” crime automatically becomes classified as a crime against the State. Such an inflation of the perceived importance of “Price Tag” crimes is purely political and minimally a legal classification. Yet a “Price Tag” crime which amounts to under a thousand shekels in damages has become a critical focus for the Justice Ministry. Meanwhile, the potentially fatal barrages on our streets and in our communities targeting our children and our adults, our police and our troops, the youth and the elderly, a universal and lethal threat which is not being taken even as a criminal act yet you want to invest more enforcement assets and resources chasing after phantom criminals and false-flag crimes.

 

Meanwhile, the standing orders which for the police, the IDF, the Border Police, and any other enforcement personnel is to run away should they come under assault by rocks, bricks, or fire-bombs if retreat is at all possible. Israeli citizens have been assaulted, some, like Asher Palmer and his infant son literally days before his first birthday, have died as a result of these so-called nuisance attacks and an innocent little three years-old girl named Adelle Biton continues to lie comatose while fighting for her little life as the result of the large rock that crushed her tender skull weeks ago and still nobody has been arrested for this crime. The Palestinians behind these attacks are having a propaganda field day posting videos on You-Tube of Israel’s cowardly IDF troops running from their brave stone-throwing Palestinians. Free the arms of law enforcement to complete their assign tasks of enforcing the laws using passive, non-lethal measures and arrest the leadership and as many as continue breaking the peace after the first week’s enforcement. A show of fortitude and resolution is all that is required, that and taking the first step and it is all up to you. It could not be any simpler.

 

This is an even worse example of misplaced priorities than your interference with Minister Bennett’s efforts to find accommodations which would satisfy both the religious and the Women of the Wall ending a terrible strife in the religious fabric of the State. What could be your reason to interfere in the procedures being taken by the Minister of Religious Services attempts to reconcile a rift between two factions of Judaism except for your endless efforts to place your name in the headlines. Often your actions seem to have no other explanation beyond that you missed yesterday’s headlines and you refuse to miss them two days in a row. Make a positive headline stating that the rock and fire-bomb terrorism will no longer be tolerated and relative quiet will return to the streets and towns within two weeks; refuse to change the stand-down order against terrorism and you would start the countdown to the Third Intifada.

 

The people have petitioned the Justice Ministry for protection, troops and police on the front lines obey restrictive do-not-shoot orders against such attacks, and the government including the Prime Minister and his Cabinet kowtow to world opinion by allowing these crimes to continue unopposed. You, Justice Minister Livni, if you wish could take steps to enforce the law and provide safety for all Israelis from such attacks. Both Arab and Jew have been targeted at one time or another by these viscous attacks. Knowing that there is little you would love more than to once again be considered for the position of Prime Minister and before you is the golden ticket to that office. What is even more amusing is all you need do is enforce the law and allow whatever measures are necessary and end the attacks on motorists and other civilians. Step up and show that the rock and fore-bombing attacks will no longer be tolerated and they will soon stop because they continue solely because there is no enforcement. End the capitulation to world pressure and protect all Israeli citizens as your position requires and reap the rewards of standing up for justice. A golden opportunity stands before you Ms. Livni and all that is required is for you to grasp a situation and do the right thing by all the people of Israel.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

How Jews Living in West Bank Affect the Palestinians

We hear so much noise about the areas known historically as Judea, Samaria and Benyamin which were recently retagged as the West Bank in order to make them sound less Jewish. We hear about the need for the Palestinian Authority to be granted full autonomy of an independent nation with complete control over this West Bank as well as Gaza. Part of the problem with this presentation is that the Palestinians have two completely separate, mutually exclusive, actively competitive, viciously antagonistic governing agents with Hamas controlling and ruling over Gaza while the Palestinian Authority Fatah organization controlling and ruling over Area A the West Bank. Hamas is led by Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh while the Palestinian Authority leader is President Mahmoud Abbas. Since the two factions split after the Hamas violent coup which placed them in control of Gaza in June 2007, all efforts to reunite the two groups have utterly failed. Part of the problem is that Hamas is based in Islamic religious governance while the Palestinian Authority is aligned with Fatah which is secular socialist governance and such philosophies are very much similar to oil and water, they do not mix well. The power struggle between these two groups drips with the avarice and hatreds such that the resultant atmosphere is not conducive to healthy economic policies therefore depressing economic growth potentials due to crippling corruption. The situation has resulted in totally failed governance in almost every category which has become completely reliant on foreign generosity lurching from one financial catastrophe to the next. Such poor governance constantly leads to the need to plead to the world for emergency funding. This has resulted in high unemployment for the Palestinian Arab people living under the direct controlling rule of either Hamas or the Palestinian Authority in either Gaza or Area A in the West Bank. Yet there is one group who has 100% employment as the Palestinian Authority places every Palestinian terrorist or criminal who has been sentenced to prison in Israel, whether they are members in the PLO, Fatah, Hamas, or any other terror related group, where they receive some of the highest salaries which are directly proportional to the number of Israelis they were able to maim and murder. This would almost be the guaranteed condition over the entire areas of Gaza and the West Bank should the entirety of these areas be placed under solely Palestinian governance.

 

Should anybody desire to find a more optimistic and promising atmosphere where the overwhelming majority of the people are employed and making significantly higher salaries resulting in a higher standard of living, one need not leave the West Bank, one simply needs to visit the areas where modern governance encourages economic ventures and the size and scope of government is limited. These areas are not under either Hamas or the Palestinian Authority. The Palestinians living in these areas are largely employed with comparatively no unemployment when compared to the Palestinians living in Area A. The major difference in the condition for these Palestinians is they live among Israeli settlers. Much of the world decries the supposed conditions under which Palestinians are forced to live in areas where they share the lands with the Israeli settler who are mostly Jewish. There are so numerous different origins of the Israelis living in Samaria and Judea that any attempt to stereotype them as just religious Jews is not only pointless but in complete denial of reality. The Jews who have chosen to live in what the world refers to as the West Bank consist of religious and secular Jews, Israeli Arabs both Christian and Muslim, Secular Jews, Zionist Jews, Jews seeking a more relaxed atmosphere in which to live, farmers, people working locally as well as many whose work is in Tel Aviv who commute, IDF soldiers, physicians, nurses, computer programmers, entrepreneurs, and people from every walk of life one can find. There is a major Israeli University in Ariel called, oddly enough, Ariel University.

 

But what is most interesting is the completely impossible situation under which the Jews and Palestinian Arabs face living close to each other with all the serious relationship problems which are the constant fare in the mainstream media coverage of the Jewish settlers living beyond the Green Line. For the best example of how all of this has an effect, all one need do is visit Ariel University, Barkan Industrial Park, Shahak Industrial Park, and the other industrial parks, farms, vineyards, wineries, business parks, and other businesses and witness a bit of the truth about the Israeli controlled areas of Judea and Samaria. What becomes evident very quickly is that there is no distinction between Jews, Muslims, Christians and those of other religions, Jews and Arabs, Asian ancestry and European ancestry, or religious and secular. Approximately half of the employees along with their supervisors and management in both large and small industrial enterprises are West Bank Arabs employed there right next to West Bank Jews. The same goes for students and professors to a great extent at Ariel University. Throughout the main settlement areas of the West Bank the Jews and Palestinian Arabs live and work together in harmony without any trouble, violence, oppressions or any of the myriad of misconceptions that spring from a media more interested in forcing the issue of the oppressor Jews dispossessing the unfortunate Arab victims of Jewish hegemony. The fact that the Palestinian Arabs who live and work among the Jewish settlers in Judea and Samaria have a much higher standard of living is a little secret of which the mainstream media refuses to inform the world. The fact that the rule is cooperation and an improved life for those Palestinians fortunate to reside in the developed mixed Jewish and Arab areas and that the terrorism and violence are the exception must be suppressed as there exists an entire industry based upon the Jewish oppressions of the Arabs. The problem is people living and working in harmony just does not sell newspapers or newscasts anywhere near as well as explosions and violence. The real truth is that the standard of living for the Palestinian Arabs throughout Gaza and the West Bank was among the fastest growing GDP of anywhere in the world from 1973 through 1992. Then, starting in 1993 when Yasser Arafat returned and the very same Palestinians were placed in a semi-autonomous self-ruled areas under the Palestinian Authority the GDP and standard of living reversed and has continued to drop ever since. The wonderful and hopeful truth which the media insists does not exist is that where Palestinian Arabs live together in relative harmony and mutual tolerance with Jews in Area C of the West Bank, sharing the advantages of the rule of law and entrepreneurial opportunity live better lives than their Palestinian brothers living in Area A and Gaza where the leadership is under the Palestinian Authority or Hamas which consist of dictatorial regimes. If people throughout the world truly wish the best of possibilities for the Palestinian people, perhaps they would be better able to decide where to place their efforts after taking an actual investigation of the separate Areas in the West Bank and Gaza and ask the Palestinians who reside within and amongst the Jews in Area C and those living in Palestinian autonomous areas of Area A and Gaza and then decide which group lives a more productive and preferred life. Finding the truth would definitely be an eye-opening experience which would likely deliver a viewpoint not covered by the mainstream media and actually actively hidden by the mainstream media.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

How Can One Compromise with Those Holding Such Positions?

One of the leading representatives with Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian Authority, Jibril Rajoub, was giving an interview on Lebanon’s Al-Mayadeen TV when he allowed the truth to leak out. Mr. Rajoub when queried as to whether the Palestinian would ever plan to return to negotiations with the Israelis replied that negotiations would be considered only if the Palestinian Authority’s preconditions are met. It was in further explaining what he viewed as the Palestinian Authority’s desire in place of negotiations that he stated, “Listen. We as yet don’t have a nuke, but I swear that if we had a nuke, we’d have used it this very morning.” Rajoub is the Deputy Secretary of the Fatah Central Committee and chairman of the Palestinian Authority Olympic Committee. This should make for some serious doubts as to the sincerity of any position including compromise with the Israelis the Palestinian leadership express in interviews given to western media outlets. As many other as well as we have pointed out, if only the world would take the time, investing some effort even if only to satisfy curiosity and translate what the Palestinian spokespeople express when speaking in Arabic translating and placing them in their reports with equal prominence they give their articles denouncing Israeli efforts at self-defense, the public would be well served in making an informed and balanced evaluation of the realities of the Palestinian-Israeli peace process. Unfortunately, it appears that truth and honest reporting are the first two casualties in the mainstream media coverage of virtually all things concerning the Middle East and its relevance and importance to the current world struggles.

 

In another recent television appearance, another senior PA official, Sultan Abu al-Einein on Palestinian Authority TV stated about the recent stabbing murder of Evyatar Borovsky by a Palestinian terrorist recently released from Israeli custody, Salam al-Zaghal, “We salute the heroic fighter, the self-sacrificing Salam al-Zaghal. He insisted on defending his honor, so he went against the settler and killed him. Blessings to the breast that nursed Salam Al-Zaghal.” Such comments being broadcast on Palestinian, Lebanese, Egyptian and other Arabic broadcast media are far from being the exception, they are by far the rule. It is solely due to the willful negligence of our Western mainstream media that prevents such claims from being widely known and the hidden truth behind who are the true impediments to peace being more broadly recognized. When covering the Middle East much of the media either omits information or represents misinformation unchallenged as if it were fact. There is a near constant drumbeat claiming that the presence of Israeli communities on established Palestinian claimed land which prevents any possibility for peace and stands in the way of negotiations. What is not explained are the facts that the Palestinians not only claim the areas known as the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem but also the rest of Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Haifa, the Galilee and all of the land that makes up Israel, every single square inch. The Palestinian leadership reserves the right to continue the resistance until all of Palestine is freed which is an actual declaration that the terrorist attacks must continue even after any peace accord which may be signed in the future. Whenever this fact is admitted in the Western media it is portrayed as belonging only to Hamas and Fatah and the Palestinian Authority are represented as being moderates who are willing to make peace. The unfortunate truth is that the Fatah, the PLO, the Palestinian Authority and the entire Arab League all hold fast to their claim to replace all of Israel with an Arab state and the eradication of any trace of Judaism as their only acceptable goal. Since the Khartoum conference of 1967 the entire Arab World has held to the Declaration of the Three No’s; No peace, No negotiations, and No recognition. Such a position does indeed make holding peace talks rather difficult.

 

The truths which are lost because of the ruse known as the Palestinian’s claim to reconstruct their ancient homeland called Palestine are that there never was in all of history such a place as Palestine, the British used the term Palestinian to describe the Jews who resided within the British Mandate, The Balfour Declaration addressed the rights of the Arab populations residing within the British Mandate, Transjordan (currently called Jordan) was created as the Arab State for those Arabs living within the British Mandate and required the Jews to relinquish their legal claim to 78% of the British Mandate, Israel was not required by UNSC Resolution 242 to relinquish any of the West Bank but to relinquish only those lands acquired as a result of the 1967 War that were not determined by Israel to be vital for secure borders. Of the lands under UNSC Resolution 242 Israel has already relinquished well over 75% of the area by returning the Sinai Peninsula to the Egyptians, and lastly the original conflict was never between the Israelis and the Palestinians but between the Arab World and Israel.

 

Even should one look at the Oslo Accords one would almost immediately draw some interesting conclusions. The Oslo Accords drew three distinct areas within what is often referred to as the West Bank, and was historically referred to as Judea, Samaria and Benyamin (which kind of explains why those wishing to prevent Israel from claiming these areas had to rename them), into three separate areas, A, B, and C. Area A was given over to complete control of the Arabs under the auspices of the PLO and Yasser Arafat. Area C was given over to total Israeli control. Area B was jointly controlled by both the Arabs and the Israelis. This makes an obvious demarcation suggesting the intended solution originally was that Israel required all of Area C as their minimum needs to have basic security and the Arab population already, as it existed, was concentrated within Area A. This left Area B which held some concentrations of Arab villages and farms, some open lands, and some lands claimed by Jews who had their lands confiscated by the Jordanians after the 1948 war which the Arabs referred to as the war to eradicate the Jews and Israel calls their War of Independence, which gives some insight to the perspectives of the two sides. Since Area B was placed under dual control one might be led to think that these were the lands disputed between the two sides as originally observed when the Oslo Accords were enacted. It also would be prudent to believe that the negotiations should have been over where the border should be placed in order to fairly divide the lands within Area B. Instead we have muddied the original intents to the point that there have been discussions of granting the Palestinian Arabs a corridor across the Negev Desert so that their areas near the Jordan River have easy access without entering Israel to Gaza and the Mediterranean Sea, never mind that by doing such Israel is cut in two and is no longer contiguous, as long as the Palestinian areas are contiguous everything should be wonderful. There was a period when Mahmoud Abbas felt he had such a strong position he began claiming the entirety of Jerusalem as the capital city for the Palestinians. Fortunately, somebody managed to disavow him of such a felonious concept. All of this is a prime example of how far removed today’s perceived realities are from the original ideas of the Oslo Accords, let alone from the decisions, treaties, conferences, and even the White Papers which were all ratified soon after World War I and blessed by the League of Nations, the United States, Russia, and even the leadership of the Arab World, King Faisal. Sometimes time worsen wounds, not heals them.

 

Beyond the Cusp