Kerry and Abbas Meet Today in Turkey

Here we go one more time. It is not like whatever is decided will be the main theme for restarting the so-called peace process as whatever it is it will end with the same disappointment for the world when Israelis refuse to surrender their entire country to Arab rule. The presumed theme this time is how to energize the Palestinian economy thus making agreements more viable. The problem is that the talks aimed at improving the Palestinian economy will be crafted to carefully avoid one subject, the kleptocracy which has ruled over the Palestinians since the return of Yasser Arafat after the Oslo Accords. Nobody ever mentions the million if not billions of dollars nestled away in European banks in the accounts of Mrs. Arafat. Nobody mentions the others who have benefited monetarily at the expense of the Palestinians. Of course there will be mention of the Israeli withholding tax incomes collected by them presumably for the Palestinians despite their having been released over a month ago when the Palestinian Authority made their desperate plea for more treasure from the entire world to repair their shortfall and inability to meet the payroll. This brings into the argument the fact that the Palestinian government has on its payroll an inordinate percentage of the population and includes many Hamas employees in the Gaza government. But there will be the economy destroying Israeli checkpoints which prevent free traffic of goods. Abbas will turn every discussion into a point of how it is the Israelis who are preventing the Palestinian economy from blossoming. No mention will be made that with Israeli assistance the Palestinians have one of the highest standards of living in the non-oil producing Arab world and that despite any difficulties their GDP has grown faster than the rest as well. Surprisingly to many, the Gazan economy has been even far healthier under Hamas than the West Bank under the Palestinian Authority. This is actually due to the odd fact that Hamas has far less corruption and graft as Hamas is funded largely through fees and taxes upon goods brought through the smuggling tunnels. It almost seems completely lacking in logic to claim that Hamas provides greater economic opportunity through honest government than does the Palestinian Authority seems to be able of providing.

Eventually Secretary of State Kerry will likely decide to agree that the economic difficulties are mostly due to Israeli malevolence and attempt to move on to restarting the peace negotiations. This is where the groundwork of blaming Israel will be utilized by Abbas to claim injury and that he will require a number of steps to be taken by the Israelis in order to prove their honest intentions to act fairly and that they truly seek a real and just peace. Then will Abbas start to list the preconditions which he fully knows will prevent the possibility of any talks ever being recommenced. All the parties to this dance already are familiar with these preconditions and are aware that they are a fairly complete list of every of the final status disagreements demanding full Israeli surrender. A partial list include the 1949 Armistice Lines be used as the basis for the border (also misnamed the 67 border), Palestinian Capital to include all of East Jerusalem including all of the Old City and Temple Mount, the removal of all Jews from Palestinian territories, the release of most if not all Palestinian terrorists and prisoners from Israeli prisons, the submitting a map showing the final borders proposed by Prime Minister Netanyahu, and the two biggest one which are a complete building freeze in claimed Palestinian lands, and the “Right of Return” for five million plus Palestinian refugees into Israel itself given full rights as citizens. There has also been one more precondition which, like the building freeze came from the mouth of President Obama in his abortive attempts believing Israel needed to be forced to negotiate rather than Abbas and the Palestinians being the ones blocking negotiations, comes from Secretary of State Kerry’s statements to Abbas during their previous meetings that Israel transfer all of Areas B and a large portion if not all of Area C from any Israeli controls over to complete and total Palestinian control. It is very likely that Secretary John Kerry will be a sympathetic captive to Abbas and his claims of Israeli intransigence as Kerry is another believer that it is Israel who has prevented peace talks and that Palestinians are simply more victims of Western, in this case Israeli, aggressive policies and domination. Every accusation Abbas will give as evidence of Israeli acts of aggressions and colonialism will be naively received by Secretary Kerry as confirmations of his preconceived notions fitting the progressive model of Western oppressions and colonialism. Perhaps Secretary Kerry should read some history of the British Mandate period and learn about the formation of Transjordan out of 78% of the Mandate Lands which were to have formed the Jewish State and how Israel has also been one of the main victims of Western colonialism and that the current insanity of attempting to form another Arab state out of the remaining 22% of the British Mandate lands is yet one more colonialist theft of land set aside by the League of Nations and confirmed by the United Nations Charter in Article 80. But often the truth falls secondary to personal preconceived notions.

Beyond the Cusp

United States Department of State Proves Their Blindness Again

The State Department of the United States once again made the same tired old New Year’s resolution, or should I say wish list, by once more urging that the leaders of Israel and the Palestinians return to negotiations and find a resolution. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland stated, “As we turn the calendar to 2013… now is the time for leaders on both sides to display real leadership, to focus on the work that’s necessary to return to direct negotiations.” Her helpful suggestions were for, “both sides to clearly demonstrate that they are serious about achieving two states living side by side in peace and security,” adding that both sides, refrain from “counter-productive unilateral actions.” Ms. Nuland turned thoughtful and made this observation which had obviously escaped everybody else’s observations, “We have an environment that was quite fraught and quite difficult at the end of 2012, so the question is whether we can make a fresh start in 2013, and that’s going to require restraint on all sides. We want 2013 to be a better year, we really do.” How can anybody expect anything short of miracles to suddenly bloom and both sides to come together and hold a hoedown.

Well, let’s take a look at what needs to occur from both sides in order for negotiations to actually produce results. We will start with the Palestinian side. Numerous times, almost as many times as we’ve discussed this, Mahmoud Abbas has given a partial list which varies from time to time, depending on the atmospheric conditions, orientation of the stars, and his horoscope, of preconditions he requires the Israelis fulfill before he would be able to even consider joining into negotiations. His precondition lists usually start with almost understandable demands as if you can get anything from the other side before negotiations begin, you have gained the advantage and that is one less area of contention. Examples of such are the Israelis accepting the pre Six Day War which are also the 1949 Armistice lines as the starting point for negotiations for boundaries for the Palestinian State, a complete freeze of any and all Israeli building of any variety beyond the same boundaries, the surrender of the Old City areas of Jerusalem, the surrender of the entirety of the Temple Mount, and the surrender of the Western Wall and the Plaza where Jews regularly gather to pray as it is the closest Jews can come to praying at the holiest site of Judaism which is the Temple Mount.

There is a secondary level of preconditions which the Palestinian leadership regularly trot out just in case anybody might think that if only the Israelis make some offer of compromise which was the whole idea behind United States President Barack Obama’s forcing of a ten month building freeze on Prime Minister Netanyahu in order to entice Mahmoud Abbas to the negotiating table near the beginning of the President’s first term. It was during that time when Mahmoud Abbas first previewed some of his additional preconditions. Some of these include the release of the majority of Palestinians imprisoned in Israel serving life sentences, release of all Palestinian from Israeli prisons as part or at the end of negotiations, open route under Palestinian control and security between Gaza and Judea and Samaria cutting Israel in halves, no restrictions on military buildup of Palestinian security forces, ability to hold military training exercises with other nations within Palestine, removal of all roadblocks and checkpoints anywhere in the West Bank, recognition of all Islamic holy sites in the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) which a subset of these sites bears a remarkable similarity to the Jewish and Christian holy sites, and the requirement that upon completion of negotiations every single Jew must be removed from within the lands denoted as the Palestinian state and be forbidden from reentering these lands in perpetuity thus placing the majority of Jewish holy sites out of the reach of the Jewish people both Israeli and non-Israeli.

Then there are the deal busters which Mahmoud Abbas has trotted out any time it appears that the Israelis might actually agree to meet any of his preconditions. These are the real beyond the pale demands which no Jewish or Israeli leader would ever agree to grant.  These include the Right of Return within Israel with full rights as citizens of over four and a half million Palestinian refugees as listed by UNRWA, the Palestinians are not to be held to consider any agreement as final and must be permitted their understandable right to continue protests until all of the Palestinian lands have been liberated which means they get to continue their terror war, and they then claim that these are not preconditions at all; they are simply items and obligations which Israel is required to fulfill in order to prove to the Palestinians and the world that they are seriously interested in peace.

There are some items that Israel has declared that must be included in the final agreement which are that Israel be recognized as the Jewish State, the agreement be an end to incitement, terror, rockets, and other forms of attacks, and recognition that all of Jerusalem belongs to Israel and Israel understands the existence of Christian and Islamic holy sites in addition to Jewish sites and that Israel will fulfill their obligation to allow free access for all religions to their holy religious places while Israel intends to be allowed access to Jewish holy sites within Palestine. Mahmoud Abbas has never stated that he would refuse allowing Jews to visit the Jewish holy sites in Judea and Samaria and has left that to others to state; Abbas has simply claimed that no Jewish holy sites exist anywhere in the entire area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea and figures that settles the need for Jewish access as there are no places to visit.

There is one thing I would love to hear from Ms. Nuland or any of the other United States State Department spokespeople, exactly what do they expect from the Israelis who are willing to come to the table and attempt to hammer out some agreement between the two sides which they both give and receive some amounts of what each side claims while Mahmoud Abbas simply wants to hold a signing ceremony after the Israelis have met his demand over every single negotiable point which exists and then some. My bet is that had the Jewish people accepted the alternate offer the British had proposed, taking Madagascar in which to build their Jewish state, Mahmoud Abbas along with Yasser Arafat would have sailed their and claimed it as Islamic lands of the ancient Madagascar Muslims and they were here to take back their ancient homeland. Would you bet against such a preposterous idea and feel safe?

Beyond the Cusp

Is Attack on Iran Necessarily Dangerous?

Read virtually any news source for a week on the global scene and there will be at least one person quoted claiming that for Israel, the United States, or anybody else to attack Iran over their nuclear program would be foolhardy, dangerous, risky, disastrous, catastrophic or a calamity. In virtually every case the claim is that since no attack upon the Iranian nuclear facilities will permanently end Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons, any attack therefore falls short of the goal making it a failure. The argument is always in absolutes as if an attack must result in a total end and not simply a delay pushing the date for attaining weapons status further down the road. You would have to believe that anyone who attacked Iran thus pushing the date of their nuclear breakout anywhere from two to ten years into the future would be completely unable of attacking again when it appeared that Iran had once again come close to completion of weapons capability. Granted, such a resolution is far from perfect and would eventually fail to prevent Iran from building a nuclear arsenal, but doing nothing guarantees such an arsenal much sooner. The point these people seem to make beyond the inconclusive result is that attacking Iran would upset the cold calm and resultant low level of violence in the Middle East and might very well cause a major conflict to break out. When one considers the assets available to Iran to strike back without even using their own military forces by supplying and unleashing their terror proxies around the world, the prospect is indeed unnerving. Most who study the Middle East and Iran in particular are aware that Hezballah is capable of striking anywhere on the globe. Hezballah very likely has more numbers and wider distribution of assets than does al-Qaeda and most are familiar with the reach of al-Qaeda. There is nowhere in the Middle East, Africa, Europe or the Americas that is beyond the reach of Hezballah. It has long been known, as noted in articles from CNN in 2002, NBC News in 2007 and The Heritage Foundation in 2010, that Hezballah has a training facility in South American area known as the tri-border region which borders on Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay.

There is something troubling about these frightening statements which claim severe and varied disasters, they never address the issue of what the situation will be should nothing be done and Iran develop and produce deliverable nuclear weapons in even relative small numbers, say two dozen or so. Where I am more than willing to admit that any strike upon the Iranian nuclear facilities, no matter how precise and restrained from causing collateral damages or casualties, will necessarily lead to some form of retaliation ranging from significant terrorist strikes on targets world-wide targeting mainly assets of Israel, Britain, and the United States to a full-fledged war with multiple countries allying with Iran targeting mostly Israel and the naval and military assets belonging to the United States and those assets from allies which are also in the area. Neither of these scenarios is desirable and no sane person would risk such a retaliatory offensive if other venues could be availed in order to gain the same end result of preventing nuclear arms being produced by Iran. This is why there has not been any military solution implemented thus far and the avenues utilized thus far have been political, economic, social and other soft-power methods. These methods have been being pursued for well over a decade if one counts all economic sanctions against the Iranian government as the United States has had sanctions in place since the 1979 revolution which overthrew the Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. Despite ever growing restrictions on trade, the sanctions, both United Nations approved and independent sanctions by the United States and many European countries have proven insufficient to force the Iranian leadership to defer to demands and halt their enrichment of Uranium. Where Israel desires a definitive “Red Line” be drawn which, if crossed, would trigger the use of military force to halt Iranian progress with their nuclear programs, President Obama has refused and publically rebuked Israel over this demand. Meanwhile the nations of the European Union have applied even stricter sanctions than those of the United States which is, as is President Obama’s foreign policy is on most situations, leading from behind and has yet to ratchet up sanction to match the Europeans. Meanwhile President Obama and the State Department have issued waivers from having to apply sanctions on Iran to China, India, Belgium, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain and the United Kingdom as they are dependent upon Iranian oil for their petroleum needs and other items which were also considered. Sometimes one might wonder if the sanctions are designed to fail or to simply be an annoyance but not the necessarily strangling of the Iranian economy which is necessitated if they are to be successful. One further point is North Korea and the sanctions which were placed upon them to prevent their attaining nuclear weapons capabilities and the fact that those sanctions which relegated some North Korean citizens to be near starvation, the sanctions proved insufficient in stopping their nuclear progress. Does anybody really and honestly expect Iran would be any less dedicated to their goal? So, if we note that the sanctions on Iran have as many holes in them as a colander, that sanctions have never in history prevented a determined nation from attaining nuclear weapons capability, and that it is apparent that neither President Obama, any of the European nations, Russia, China nor anybody else other than the remote possibility of Israel attacking the Iranian nuclear sites, then we had best begin to draw the picture of a world in which Iran has nuclear weapons and soon thereafter Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Syria, and possibly other regional nations would join those nations with nuclear weapons.

In such a world and considering the volatility of the Middle East, how long could we expect that nuclear weapons might be deployed in a first strike capability and not simply kept as a deterrent such as existed during the Cold War? My optimistic prediction would be a decade at the very longest before somebody or group of nations would resort to deploying their nuclear weapons in an effort to destroy Israel or possible one of their neighboring rival states. What is more likely would be the use of a single nuclear weapon by a terrorist entity who would deliver it aboard a ship or plane very likely in a large western city or capital. The possible targets for a nuclear weapon aboard a personal craft, be it an ocean going vessel or a private jet, would be any major city with a port facility or an international or similarly large airport. Offhand that does not leave out any cities in the Western and industrial world. The only defense against such an attack would have to depend on having sufficient intelligence beforehand and preventing the craft from ever leaving its home port or, if it is a ship, intercepting it in international waters before it could approach the shore, and a plane would need to be shot down as once it was airborne there is no way to board the plane, only shooting it down would prevent the plane being used as a suicide bombing. Whatever the threat that we are now considering with just Iran having the possibility of becoming a nuclear power would be multiple times worse as the number of other nations decided that if Iran could have nuclear weapons and not suffer the wrath of the Western powers, then they too are going to also develop nuclear weapons. Then we would very likely be facing a whole new world equation as numerous developing nations, say the majority of the countries making up the one-hundred-twenty non-Aligned Countries in NAM, all having nuclear arsenals and scores to settle. Imagine if every instance in the world where there are currently terror strikes or an active war being fought and now place nuclear weapons at the disposal of those perpetrating the violence or those who respond to attacks also having a nuclear option with which they could forever be rid of an ancient enemy. Picture a military coup where some military leader decides to use their country’s nuclear weapons in order to remove the current government and they simply plan to move the capital city to a less radioactive city after the coup. A world where it might be possible that within fifty years there are over a hundred, maybe even approaching two-hundred nuclear armed nations and the future will not be one of security, it will be a ticking time-bomb. Imagine all the world leaders at the United Nations and they are all playing a game of bridge with their neighboring nation and one of them has a small nuclear device and we get to watch and see which table disappears in a mushroom cloud, and then which one will be next. All it would take is one country or madman to use the first nuclear weapon and after that, who knows. I really would not wish to find out, but it is likely I will not get my wish.

Beyond the Cusp