What Israel Should Have Learned in the Twenty First Century?

 

What has made the Twenty-First Century interesting is that there have been eight years under the Republicans and eight years under a Democrat; so there can be a fair and even comparison between the two parties when they hold the White House. What is frightening is that despite the talking lines appear quite different; the actual policy execution is not all that different. Both party’s Presidents, Georgy W. Bush and Barack Hussein Obama, had a target of Israel returning to the 1949 Armistice Lines and splitting Jerusalem leaving the Temple Mount in Arab hands or under international agents who will flee surrendering the entirety of the Temple Mount to Arab hands and closed to Jews just as it was for the horrifically disappointing nineteen to twenty years under Jordanian control when Israelis and Jews in general were very disappointed to not be able to visit the historic areas starting with the Temple Mount plus literally thousands of historic sites from Jericho, Hevron, Bethlehem, Shechem, and innumerous other locations where our history laid out in numerous manuscripts both Jewish as well as numerous other historic manuscripts of almost every major empire which tread the lands of the crux meeting place for three continents, Asia, Africa and Europe. The Jews had histories with the Egyptians, the Hittites, the Babylonians, the Canaanites, the Assyrians, the Persians, The Greeks, The Romans, the Byzantines, the Crusaders, the Spanish, the Caliphate, the Golden Age of Islam, the Umayyad Caliphate, the Abbasid Caliphate, the Ayyubid Dynasty, and eventually the British for a total of twenty-nine years. When the British left the land of Israel, which declared its independents on the evening of May 14, 1948, though the world claims Israel became a nation immediately after midnight of May 15, 1948, with her border as depicted below, the state was born.

 

 

Eretz Yisroel the Israel Solution to Problems is One State Solution with Citizenship for Anybody Who Desires Living in Peace with Equal Rights Responsibilities and Worshiping as One Pleases

 

 

The Arab Armies of Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, the Free Palestinian Arab Army, countless other Arab formations which existed inside Arab villages which attacked Israeli forces from behind which resulted in the entire population of that village being expelled in order to protect the Israeli Defense Forces from rear attacks from the citizens from the village which launched the initial assault. Such reactions were the reason that Israel was accused of forcing some Arab villages to be sent beyond the soldiers in order to leave a safe front without rear forces attacking during any battles. These were the Arabs who Israel evicted from within their lines solely for tactical reasons. The Arabs who either fought with the Israeli Jews or remained as noncombatants were left and could choose whether they remained in Israel and become Israeli citizens and remained as Israeli citizens and today enjoy full citizenship. Unfortunately, Israel did not win the war as is taught in history. Israel survived the war of Jewish genocide but lost lands to Jordan, parts of Judea and Samaria; to Syria, the Golan Heights; and Egypt the Gaza Strip. This was named the Israeli War of Independence which was done by the Israelis because the odds were such that they had little if any chance of winning according to every tactician. Israel had almost no armor or aircraft, no navy and unbelievably few trained soldiers and only a few experienced officers who fought in the British Palestinian Brigades which were almost one-hundred-percent Jewish as the Jews were called Palestinian by the British and most other Europeans and the Arabs were simply called Syrians. This became evident when the Mandate system was enacted with the British given control of what the Arabs referred to as southern Syria while the French were assigned the area including Syria and Lebanon. When the two areas of Syria were divided into two different zones, the Arabs of southern Syria referred to this as the Naqba. The current meaning of Naqba being the founding of Israel is a misnomer as the real Naqba the Arabs related to was the dividing of Syria into two separate Mandates and as the Arabs in the British Mandate thought they would not be permitted to cross into Syria, especially Damascus, which was entirely false but we all know how rumors get a life of their own once they are born. The resultant loss of territory loss left Israel tactically weakened as they no longer had the Jordan River and the Jordan River Valley as their eastern border and only held half of Jerusalem and lost the high ground of the Golan Heights. The new map which was tendered as an armistice line and not a final border, something which has never been settled completely for the entire existence of Israel, left Israel defensively vulnerable as is obvious from the map below.

 

 

Occupied Israel where Syria Occupied the Golan Heights While Egypt Occupied the Gaza Strip and Jordan Occupied Judea and Samaria They Renamed West Bank

 

 

What is absolutely ridiculous is the drive by both George W Bush and Barak Hussein Obama were equal in their demands that Israel surrender the remainder of the West Bank as the surrendering of the Gaza Strip worked out so wonderfully. The retreat from the Litany River in Lebanon back to the so-called Blue Line allowed Hezballah to occupy the territories vacated and able to build a sizeable threat with well over a quarter of a million missiles poised and targeting Israel. So now both the mainstream Democrats and mainstream Republicans both agree that this make-believe people who are, accurately put, Arabs from southern Syria and not in any manner or way Palestinians as there has never in all of history been a people called Palestinians. They stole the concept of a Naqba redefining it to fit their particular situation. There have been other things that are the result of Mahmoud Abbas’s paranoia about losing any election despite having his own inner circle counting the ballots that should he appear to be reelected the Arabs would likely rise up and demand clean elections. Currently nobody has attempted to challenge Abbas about his remaining in office for over a decade since elections were supposedly to have been held around 2008 at the least. But Abbas continues to remain in office and rule unchallenged as he has decided he is going to be President for life. He has always made sure his picture is taken at attending every event no matter how inappropriate. One such event was the solidarity for the victims in the shootings of Charlie Hebdo and the Hyper Cacher kosher market where he shoved his way to assure that he was in the front when pictures were taken. His smile when the picture was taken shows how he had no compunction or true sympathy as all Mahmoud Abbas desired was to get his smirking face in a picture of heads of real nations all showing great deference for those who laid with their lives, both the Charlie Hebdo and the Hyper Cacher kosher market. See below,

 

 

Mahmoud Abbas smirking while at remembrance rally for Charlie Hebdo in Paris after terror slaughter of a dozen writers and cartoonists for the satirical magazine.

 

 

Mahmoud Abbas simply plays a conglomerate consisting of equal parts jackal, jester, prankster Loki, hyena, Typhoid Mary, Freddy Krueger, and Bride of Frankenstein while always remaining the nemesis to all that is holy. He is the bad dream from which one awakes in a panic that cannot be exorcised. The one trait Mahmoud Abbas retains no matter what is passing by with time; he refuses to accept and deal which falls short of the elimination of Israel replaced by Palestine and the Jews of Israel all murdered. That has worked in Israel’s favor and been the real bane to all who seek to end the conflict by having two states living side by side in peace and security. Abbas cannot count to two, he deals solely in absolutes where he sees the eventuality of the world forcing all the Jews to reside elsewhere, preferably somewhere other than Earth, and then he would claim that the Palestinians were the indigenous civilization on that planet and demand that all its continents and oceans be given immediately to his Palestinian Arabs as they are too cramped on the state they have on Earth. Simply stated, he wants everything the Jews have built and even that will not do. There are some lessons from the surrender of Gaza which need be remembered before considering what would please Abbas.

 

Lesson one: both Republican and Democrat Presidents take the standings advised by the Arabist and anti-Semitic State Department which blames Israel for all the troubles everywhere but particularly in the Arab/Israeli Conflict.

Lesson two: Abbas does not desire peace because the world has continued to lavish him with monies making him excessively wealthy.

Lesson three: Mahmoud Abbas is filled with hatred beyond what anyone from the Western World can even begin to understand.

Lesson four: Abbas has been playing the world just as Arafat had before him basking in the attention taking the podium to mostly expound broad lies which he knows the Western Leaders, especially those in Europe will swallow whole as truisms which define the conflict.

Lesson five: The world does not really care about the Jews or especially Israel and the fact that they have not forced the Jews to relocate to Madagascar or Antarctica.

Lesson six: The left and left center but not necessarily the far left or Arab Parties are in agreement with the Right Center and Religious Zionists that no more land should be surrendered to Abbas and the Arabs.

Lesson seven: When Israel surrendered Gaza whole leaving for the Arabs a multi-billion dollar a year industry worth of greenhouses which were within two days completely scavenged for parts to make rockets and other destruction done simply because the greenhouses did not represent an industry or opportunity, they represented the Jews and as such needed to be demolished.

Lesson eight: The Arab youth over the last twenty-two years have been raised on a steady diet in schools, at camps, soccer leagues, media and almost every place they turn with Jew hatred such that on key phrases they will riot, attack with knives or whatever they can lay their hands upon as is happening right now with the knifings and this indoctrination has spread into the Israeli Arab youth.

 

 

These are the truths which need be introduced to the equations being used to calculate what step might prove successful in ending the conflict. The reality is that the only workable solution is for one side to win out and the other to be vanquished. Either the land will be all Israel or all Arab and the Jews granted other location to turn into a green and wondrous place while the land which was Israel returning to a forsaken land as it will not produce for the Arabs, never has in the past and never will in the future. Look over the entirety of empires including the Greeks and Romans, the Caliphates and Ottoman Empires and none could make the land grow and produce without the Jews. Hashem made a land where only his children, as in the Jews, would be permitted to reap the bountiful promises of the land. So, which will it be, a productive Jewish state or another agricultural and technical wilderness bereft of even the simplest worthwhile ventures be they farms, technology, medicine, physics etc…

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Who were the colonizers of MENA Pre-World War I?

 

We hear much talk by the mainstream media and especially the leftist editorialists about how the deprived victims the Arab populations of MENA (Middle East and North Africa) who were subjugated beneath the imperial European (and presumably American) colonizers. Exactly who were these colonizers and for how long had they exploited the citizens of MENA’s lands? Well, according to the liberal and mainstream media story line as they infer, though never quite say outright, were England, France, Italy and Spain. Further, there will be implications of over a century to potentially many centuries these colonial powers ruled over most of the MENA nations with many remaining under colonial control after World War I and even after World War II with the old dynasties lasting through 1970 or even 1979, and the most brash might even claim that there is a colonial power still ruling in the Middle East to this very day, though this last claim is as big a lie as they come. Perhaps a closer look is in order to get an honest picture.

 

Let’s begin with when the nations in MENA first came under imperial control and were placed under the presumed onus of foreign rule. Colonial rule came to the MENA nations in an early period which many of us first heard referenced when we studied the Bible. Perhaps some of the earliest colonial powers are not exactly what many of us would ever consider to be colonial powers yet as these were rulers who conquered other nations and subjugated them, these were the original colonialists. Terms can be applied to situations which most of us never would have considered applicable but when you are weaving a lie it is easy to go overboard in your definitions and apply modern terms to ancient events. The Egyptians would have been the first of the colonial powers many of us knew about despite there were others close to the same age such as the Hittites, Minoans, Mesopotamian, Persian and even Israel under Kings David and Solomon. All of these predated the better known Greek and Roman Empires and dates back to the ancient beginnings of China and Mayan cultures. A handy little timeline can be seen below. For the purpose of choosing a start date, why not begin around the year five-hundred which is after the fall of Rome and the Western Roman Empire while the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantine Empire was limping into the future feebly.

 

 

Timeline of World Civilizations 3700 BCE through 1700 CE

 

 

All the most ancient empires have fallen and for the most part there was peace with each city moving forward loosely attached to Constantinople across the entirety of MENA though the farther west one went across northern Africa, which had less the ties to the Byzantine rule. This left this area ripe for the pickings and a harvester was about to enter the scene. Shortly before the year seven-hundred a new force emerged under the banner of Islam and began its spread heading initially into the heart of the former lands of Babylon, Persia and into Egypt. There was little resistance as the Byzantine Empire was crumbling and unable to field a credible defense. Jerusalem fell in April 637 to the forces of the Rashidun Caliphate. The conditions for the surrender were understood to be the conquering Islamic rulers would give guarantees of civil and religious freedoms for the Christians under the rule from Jerusalem in exchange for Jizya, a tax on non-Muslims given in exchange for their protections which also included the Christians acceptance of Dhimmitude, a form of subservient lower class citizenship which was to be protected and tolerated and condoned. The spread of Islam took place largely in three stages, the first during the life of Mohammad, Next under the first four Caliphs, and finally under Umayyad Rule which was the basis for the Caliphate (see map below).

 

 

Expansion of Islam Across MENA and threaten Europe before Ottoman Rule

 

 

After the spread of the Caliphate which continued what was technically an empire which implied colonization over territories beyond the initial founding under Mohammad which was centered around Medina, the beginnings of Mohammad’s power, and included the Mecca region which Mohammad took partially as it was the closes power base, the Meccan rulers denied Mohammad’s claim to rightful ruler and had chased the early Mohammad from their territories as they rejected his preaching and teachings and determined he was a corrupting influence. The Caliphate had followed particular lines of succession which had split early after Mohammad’s death which formed the duality which still splits Islam into competing camps of Sunnis and Shiites. For the largest part the Sunni Muslims outnumbered and were the stronger camp though never quite capable, or more likely never made an effort to unify belief as beliefs can be near impossible to be completely defeated thus any effort would eventually prove fruitless and not worth the efforts expended. Instead the Sunni simply kept expanding their empire and largely tolerated the Shiites unless attacked and given no choice. When the two sects did engage each other the Sunni proved superior defeating and often killing the Shiites and their rulers in battle. The Caliphate continued to rule their lands after and expanding conquering Spain and headed into Frankish territory, early France, where the Caliphate reached is furthest advance. After taking Granada they advanced to the next major city, Tours, where a decisive battle turned the tides in the year 732 CE finally having a definitive defeat of the Caliphate forces. The battle victory is credited to Charles Martellus (the Hammer) Martel, who lost a mere thousand to fifteen-hundred of his forces, would later in history be granted the title of savior of Christianity. The vanquished was Abd Ar-Rahman Al Ghafiqi who was slain during the battle along with an estimated twelve-thousand of his warriors.

 

Beginning at the beginning of the fourteenth century the Ottoman Empire began to make its presence felt which would eventually lead to their conquering the entirety of the Caliphate at their most powerful. Until this point the Caliphate ruled over the near entirety of MENA and had spread into Spain and southeastern Europe. The map below shows the advances and periods of the Ottoman Empire conquering the Caliphate, bringing an end to the successions of Caliphs and temporarily ending the violence between Shiite and Sunni camps. The Ottoman succession follows the lineage of Ottoman Beylik who initiated the spread and domain of his family tribe in the year 1300 as his aim was likely like everybody before them, to conquer the known world. The expansions continued from his death in 1359 through 1451 when the next ruler of the Ottomans who expanded the borders notably during his rule through 1481 was Medmed II. He was followed by Selim I (1512-1520) and Suleiman the Magnificent (1520-1566). There was expansion beyond this period where the Ottoman Empire reached its apex before its fortunes began to wane.

 

 

Ottoman Empire Ascending from 1300 through 1683 includes Golden Age of Islam

 

 

The Ottoman Empire caught the Caliphate as it was in retreat after having lost Spain (Andalusia) during the Christian Reconquista which was part of the campaign to rid Spain of its Moorish Muslims as well as the Jews and any other group which was not Catholic and sworn fealty to the crown. This period of the Christian Reconquista was a logical following from the victory at Tours by Charles (the Hammer) Martel and spanned an area of time stretching from its earliest uprisings in the north and northwest in the Battle of Covadonga in the summer of 722, a full decade before the battle of Tours, but this revolt was the very beginning of the end of Islamic rule in Spain (Andalusia). The battles continued until finally the signing of the Treaty of Granada on November 25, 1491. This was the end of the fighting with the turning over of the city of the final southern coastal towns of Granada. It was during the final push that King Ferdinand II of Aragon and Queen Isabella I of Castile that the infamous Spanish Inquisition was initiated. The Spanish Inquisition lasted from November 1, 1478 through to July 15, 1834. The Inquisition was the attempt, a rather thorough and successful attempt, to convert, drive out or otherwise deal with any residual Moorish or Islamic followers remaining in Spain along with ridding Spain of its Jews who either fled with the Muslims or were chased eventually across all of Europe ending up in Russia and Poland for a while until the Czar’s pogroms drove them into Poland and Germany which set the stage for the Shoah, the Holocaust.

 

There were other adventures which came from Europe somewhat as a response to Islamic Caliphate advances leading up to the fall of Constantinople in 1453. These were known as the Crusades which were an attempt to retake the Holy Land after the initial fall of Jerusalem in April 637. There were four separate crusades which took separate routes reaching the Holy Lands and gathered the troops from various countries, kingdoms and City-States they passed through and could find willing, or sometimes less than willing, forces to join in their ‘holy’ missions. The Crusader routes and periods of duration (shown below on map) began in 1095 with the First Crusade which continued until 1099. The Second Crusade began in 1147 and lasted until 1149. The Third Crusade was initiated in 1189 going into 1192. The Fourth Crusade began in 1202 and terminated in 1204. They had limited success and resulted in making some groups and individuals very wealthy, so much so that they remained in the Middle East despite having to live under Islamic rule. As far as having a definitive effect on the course of history, it is doubtful and at best might be credited with a residual effect of engaging forces which otherwise could have assisted with the attacks on Constantinople but not on events thereafter.

 

 

Crusader Routes I through IV spanning 1095 through 1289

 

 

The Ottoman Empire final began to weaken while the European powers were feeling the results of the Renaissance, the Enlightenment and soon the industrial revolution. While these events were transforming Europe the Ottoman Empire mostly rested on their laurels and stagnated which would cost them as they began to be surpassed by Western technology and discoveries and inventions which led to superior weapons of war. There were three stages of decline for the Ottoman Empire as indicated on the map below. Parts of the Ottoman Empire were held by them for just over a half century, and were under Islamic Caliphate before that for another seven-hundred to almost a thousand years. The final areas of the Ottoman Empire finally fell during World War I and became the Mandate lands from which Iraq, Lebanon, Transjordan (currently Jordan), Syria and Israel were formed. The European colonialists held lands which were formerly under either Ottoman or Caliphate colonial rule for well over a century while the Europeans held these lands for periods of merely a decade or less to the longest being at most a century and those are the exceptions.

 

 

Ottoman Empire in Decline 1800 through 1914 and Start of World War I

 

 

The next map depicts the lands as they were held by European nations after World War I had established their claims in the Treaty of Versailles in 1919. The area outlined in red depicts the mandate lands decided by the San Remo Conference in 1922. These demarcations were proposed initially by the Allied Powers of Great Britain, France, Italy, Japan and Russia. The United States observed the negotiations but was not a direct signatory as the United States desires no holdings, colonial states, mandate responsibilities and was hopeful that they could have assisted in ending this horrific war and had already made their feelings known concerning the restructuring of Europe and the redrawing of boundaries, founding independent states out of the Austria-Hungarian Empire. Eventually the United States was coerced into adding their approval of the Mandate System which many viewed as the most tenuous of the treaties despite the signature of King Faisal signing as the representative for the Arab League.

 

 

Colonial Structure Post World War I defined by Treaties from initial surrender in 1919 through the San Remo Conference setting up the Mandate System in 1922 plus Sykes-Picot redrawing of much of the Middle East

 

 

The final map below depicts the independent states and their dates when their current governments or their freedom from European colonial rule came about. These dates are meaningful as it puts to a lie the claims you will likely hear about how these nations were under colonial rule and only recently gained their independence. There will be other lies which will be half-truths or misinformation by giving one impressions knowing the reality is totally different.

 

 

Dates that the MENA nations received their independence after colonial rule many since the times of the Persians or even earlier

 

 

The actual history which needs to be remembered is that many of these nations have been ruled by outside forces since the very early ages of civilizations while others were once inhabited by a nation which either was destroyed in history or faced a natural disaster which placed their population, that which survived, within another culture where they assimilated and disappeared from history though they often brought skills with them which benefited their host nation which likely made them more welcome. One example of the last occurrence was the Minoan civilization which resided on the Isle of Santorini in the Mediterranean Sea. Everything was going along really great as they had their religion and held their sacrifices, one of which is of interest if you know your Hebrew Bible. The Minoans had a spring ritual which was intended to bring fertility to their crops, their herds, their people and to benefit all parts of their society. In this sacrifice they had to prepare a feast using newly born calf boiled and then roasted and brushed with a preparation made from the calf’s mother’s milk. Anyway, the Minoans were happily fishing and enjoying the wonderful Mediterranean weather until the ground rumbled and the caldera erupted all but destroying the entire Island which has slowly resurfaced in the ensuing years. Santorini is located between the Greek mainland and Cyprus in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea (see picture with map insert below). Santorini is still a dangerous place and potentially threatened with another eruption. Like most volcanoes, it is not a matter of if but of when the next devastating eruption pours forth and erases all traces of human development or existence as the Island may be blown completely apart only to rise from the Mediterranean depths with a whole new look and geography just as it has done throughout all of history. The homes and island is beautiful and a jewel glittering in the Mediterranean Sea and we can only hope it continues to glitter from the lights on the porches of the homes and not from lava belching forth from out of the sea.

 

 

Volcano Thera Caldera Santorini Island Ancient Home of the Minoan Civilization until Eruption just ruined their day

 

 

When we look at the history of MENA nations one need remember that much of the area was also the cradle of civilization and as such had a distressing habit of spawning great civilizations which came, expanded as far as they could reach, overreached or had a number of bad years or the next great civilization either defeated and overran their empire or the two had a merger of sorts as exampled by the Greeks being subsumed by the Roman Empire which did not exactly destroy the four Greek sub-Empires as much as they incorporated as the Greeks saw an advantage of being the center of education and philosophy while the Romans knew of the Greek intellect and their ability to fashion weapons. That is not to say there were not conflicts, but somehow both civilizations influenced each other for the better. But even before Rome, before the Greeks, before the Persians there were the Babylonians, the Israelite Kingdom, the Hittite, the Egyptian and the Mesopotamian Empires. Each ruled and the areas of MENA can be said to have survived as best the individual tribes, city-states, empires, nations and peoples could be expected. There were the Ancient Empires which lasted from prehistory through the Greeks of Alexander. Alexander the Great was the last of the ancient empire builders and his would be the first of the new age empires, the actual colonialists of history. From here many empires claimed to be setting out to conquer the world but they also knew that dream could not be realized in one’s lifetime. Even here the states of MENA faced the Greeks followed by the Romans then the Byzantines as Rome broke into two Empires, the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantine; and the western Roman or what became the Holy Roman Empire. Even European nations became colonized as there were the intra-European empires such as the Austrian-Hungarian Empire, Charlemagne, Napoleon and eventually the Nazis. After the Byzantine Empire collapsed there was the Caliphate followed by the Ottoman Empire, the two main Islamic Empires. During their time in power there were still the Mongols who came to conquer the world and instead converted to Islam by in large. China and India had their effect on the nations of the Middle East and also set up that area for who could take control of the trade routes. It was because of lack of access to these very trade routes which launched the European age of colonization which is the final or modern stage. Where the age of European conquest began in the late fifteenth century with Columbus and the other explorers heading to lay claim to the new lands in the Americas, then started an age of conquest as the natives were not as advanced when it came to warfare. The one advantage of living in the most contested lands in the world is you build up some formidable weaponry and tactics which the native tribes of the Americas were of no match.

 

The lands which form MENA were already colonized by the Ottomans who had a number of other cultures which also fought with their colonizers as all had a common bond which was Islam. This made these lands too much of a threat plus the Europeans had learned to have a healthy respect for the Ottomans and the followers of Islam through the Crusades and the wars which were barely able to constrain the Ottomans from sweeping across Europe. Much of that was due to the King of Poland and Lithuania John III Sobieski who came and relieved the city of Vienna from the Ottoman siege and brought that offensive to a conclusive end. Still, there was little attempt until into the nineteenth century before any assaults were waged on a by then weakened and almost backward sclerotic empire. Taking fair stock on the years of actual colonialization we see that the MENA nations, of which Syria is no exception except like Israel there was an Assyrian Empire which did not extend to anywhere near as vast an area as the more well-known colonizing empires, otherwise Syria has been a colony of somebody for a very long time. The ancient Empires spanned a good three-thousand years or more depending on sources. The middle empires which include the Roman, Byzantine, the Caliphate and the Ottoman Empires lasted almost two-thousand years. The final age was the European age of colonization of the MENA area which lasted less than two hundred years and when we speak of the Middle East itself it is even shorter barely making a century with Syria being far less and Iran almost untouched by the European colonizers. So, when the news reports tell of how these poor nations have been colonies for near an inestimable time and have not tasted freedom until only the most recent of times and even then most were brutal dictatorships, there is some truth. The problem is for the vast majority we were talking of Biblical era and pre Biblical times all the way through the Greeks and to the Roman Empire after the fall of the Eastern Roman Empire these lands were ruled by Muslims for the majority of the modern ages.

 

 

Mandate of San Remo for French and British including actual treaty demarcations for each nation

 

 

The Europeans only poured in at the end of the Ottoman Empire as it fell with the final areas which included Syria not falling until World War I thus not becoming a colony of the Europeans until around 1920 and with the areas of Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan and Israel they were not colonies as much as protectorates being held secure from invasions by the British and the French starting in 1922 with the enactment of the San Remo Conference. The above map shows the League of Nations proposed British and French Mandates with the demarcations for Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Transjordan and Israel. This mandate was carved from the remains of the Ottoman Empire where the nation of Turkey was what would remain as the originator of the entire Ottoman Empire while these areas above plus Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Yemen and Oman were brought into being and Saudi Arabia gained complete and uncontested control over Mecca and Medina. These maps and dates should arm those wishing to have the truth behind their arguments readily available to speak to what exactly Europe owes the refugees and victims of colonial rule when in reality it is the Arabian Peninsula, the originator of the Caliphate, and Turkey as the original source for the Ottoman Turks who founded the Ottoman Empire. The Europeans as far as Syria is concerned were a brief caretaker that lasted barely twenty-six years, exactly the same as it did for Israel and Israel has only had to take in over one million Jewish refugees from across the lands that make up MENA as many of them drove their Jews from their lands during the late 1940s and through the 1950s with some from Ethiopia and Russia coming even later and still taking in the Bnei Menashe from India and Israel will continue to take in Jewish refugees from the world over and has also taken in other refugees including but not limited to the Vietnamese boat people and Christians seeking refuge from persecutions. It makes one wonder how many refugees have been taken in by Saudi Arabia, Kuwait (who after the Gulf War which freed them from Saddam Hussein thanked the Palestinian workers for the support which Yasser Arafat lauded on Saddam Hussein and flew every last one back to the Palestinian Occupied areas of Judea and Samaria), Qatar (whose Al-Jazeera news service so gallantly praised and supported the uprisings in the hopes of placing the Muslim Brotherhood in charge of as many nations as possible and almost won Egypt and really urged on the war in Syria until it turned so very ugly) or Bahrain. One might expect these wealthy nations to assist their Arab brothers and sisters but nary a word from them except to demand that Europe do their part because the Europeans had colonies in the area for an average of fifty years compared to the one thousand year rule of Islam as the Caliphate and the Ottoman Empires. Europe should offer to take in refugees one for every twenty that the nations of the Arabian Peninsula give refuge to, that would be fair and proportional but don’t hold your breath.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Coddling Barbarians While Condemning the Civilized

 

Let it be understood that our nerves are still raw and our restraint in wording may suffer a tendency towards the extreme but we will attempt to keep it civil as the United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, Nickolay Mladenov has insisted in his statement that, “On this second day of Ramadan and at the start of the Shabbat, I call on all sides to exercise the utmost restraint, to maintain calm and promptly bring the perpetrators to justice.” We will attempt to exercise the ‘utmost restraint’ but that will be difficult. Still, odds are you will never hear about Danny Gonen who at the tender age of twenty-five was gunned down along with a friend who remains hospitalized in moderate but stable condition simply for the crime of being Jews passing a barbarian with blood in his eyes seeking his sacrifice to his gods or martyrdom in their service. The one thing I can be assured of is he must not have worshiped as a member of the religion of peace as if he was, how such a barbarous act could have happened? This is a familiar story and Danny Gonen will be labeled a settler because Jews should know their place and not stray beyond the Green Line. There are those in the world demanding that Israel accept as many as five-million Arab refugees within the Green Line in order to make Israel the twenty-fourth Arab State behind the twenty-third Arab state of Palestine but Jews must know their place in the world. We must obey our masters at the United Nations, the European Union, countless western Capital Cities and whomever else demands our restraint, a restrain which is never truly demanded should in response to rioting and attacks on Israeli police or other security personnel result in an Arab Palestinian accidentally or in response to imminent threat to the life of said Israeli law enforcement personnel but always almost simultaneously with the viscous and unprovoked attack upon Jews, usually Israeli Jews but the victim can be a Jew visiting from outside Israel or even a Christian visiting or residing in Israel.

 

While this barbarity was being understood and calm was the response as it would have been even had nobody said a word, as Jews tend not to take vengeance as much as we try to understand, but to put some emphasis on this need for Jews to sacrifice more than our young but also risk sacrificing our entire nation, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius is jetting his way for meetings with the Arab League and then on to meet with Mahmoud Abbas and then complete his mission meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu where the demand of the combined Arab world will be delivered and the message will be to give them everything they demand before they murder more Jews, more Israeli youth. What all the caring souls such as French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius, United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process Nickolay Mladenov, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon who just finished his dressing-down of Israel for the use during the defensive response to terrorist assaults sending thousands of rockets into Israel last summer named Protective Edge consider is that it is all Israel’s responsibility all the time. Maybe you have heard about it in the recent report by Willy Stern of Vanderbilt Law School which complained of the IDF actions in the preliminary cautionary steps leading up to strikes on positions stating, “It was abundantly clear that IDF commanders had gone beyond any mandates that international law requires to avoid civilian casualties,” also made the point, “The IDF’s warnings certainly go beyond what the law requires, but they also sometimes go beyond what would be operational good sense elsewhere,” concluding in a cautionary tome with an actual complaint, something we and the IDF are used to, but this one was different claiming that, “People are going to start thinking that the United States and other Western democracies should follow the same examples in different types of conflict. That’s a real risk.” Yet Moon demanded Israel respond to the use by Hamas of children as shields for their rocket stores, rocket manufacturing facilities, and rocket launching locations while firing rockets statin, “I urge Israel to take concrete and immediate steps, including by reviewing existing policies and practices, to protect and prevent the killing and maiming of children, and to respect the special protections afforded to schools and hospitals.”

 

Ban Ki-Moon’s admonitions came right on the heels of the UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East) Commissioner-General Pierre Krahenbuhl who managed to make an admission buried between a litany of complaints, accusations, admonitions and spurious excuses, reasons and explanations that there indeed were rockets and other stores, but left out any comments on the UNRWA clinic built with explosives within the walls so as to be used at a later date as a trap to kill IDF soldiers, were indeed found in UNRWA schools and other structures. He also had to include such tales of his noble and brave actions stating, and we fear this will be another long quote as he was long winded in his self-congratulatory-orations stating, “We were the ones who found the weapons caches in our facilities during inspections,” not entirely true as the IDF found and reported the first two of the finds, not Commissioner-General Pierre Krahenbuhl and friends. Continuing, “The reason that the whole world knew about it is that we told them,” after initially denying the reports then feigning surprise, shock and complete protestations of innocence and having no prior knowledge of such transgressions. But wait, there’s more, “We knew the revelation would lead to harsh responses against us in Israel, but try to imagine what would happen if we weren’t the ones who published it. The act of publishing proves we aren’t ready to allow it and show restraint,” such restraint such as calling Hamas rocket removal services to remove the rockets from the first location and having a collapse of memory on who they called to remove the rockets from the subsequent locations but we have our suspicions, we know, so cynical of us. Additionally we have the self-aggrandizement phase of his response, “I was the only senior international official who condemned the rocket fire from the Gaza Strip at Israel. And I didn’t do that from a place where it was easy and convenient to talk like Jerusalem or Geneva, but rather from within the Gaza Strip itself. I can say of myself that I take international law very seriously, and if I know that rockets are fired intentionally at regions where there is a population that can be harmed by it – I condemn.” Now comes more self-involvement and self-congratulatory rhetoric while condemning Israel and the IDF along the same venue as Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, “The day after the strike I visited the wounded children at the hospital, and I saw with my own eyes their parents who stood by them; what does that mean when you don’t have the ability to protect your children. When I see whole neighborhoods in Gaza that were destroyed by the IDF, or that there are UNRWA schools that were harmed after we gave the IDF their locations a dozen times and clarified that there are citizens there, then certainly we will put out condemnations. The price of the last operation was very high: 540 killed children and 3,000 wounded children. That doesn’t match with the Israeli statement that all steps were taken to reduce to a minimum the number of wounded.” Noticeably missing from his diatribe was any mention about his dear friends and combatant-in-arms Hamas and their usage of locations such as schools, hospitals, refugee centers and clinics to store, fire and place positions all in efforts to maximize civilian casualties with a special effort to include as many children as possible by such means as asking young children in an excited and playful tone if they would like to come and ‘help’ the brave Jihadist warriors as they fire rockets at those demonic Israelis, what youth could resist? Perhaps a recount of the report from Professor Stern of Vanderbilt Law School’s content.

“It was abundantly clear that IDF commanders had gone beyond any mandates that international law requires to avoid civilian casualties. The IDF’s warnings certainly go beyond what the law requires, but they also sometimes go beyond what would be operational good sense elsewhere. People are going to start thinking that the United States and other Western democracies should follow the same examples in different types of conflict. That’s a real risk.” A further conclusion from the report added that the IDF, “is setting an unreasonable precedent for other democratic countries of the world who may also be fighting in asymmetric wars against brutal non-state actors who abuse these laws.” Pnina Sharvit Baruch, a senior researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) concurred with the report adding her assessment stating legal advisers from other militaries around the world confront her with “recurring claims” that the IDF “is going too far in its self-imposed restrictions intended to protect civilians, and that this may cause trouble down the line for other democratic nations fighting organized armed groups.”

 

Still, the violence which added the name of a blessed young adult, Danny Gonen, barely beyond his childhood, and actually would be considered a child in any report which lists the children killed in any IDF action as child seems to go as far in life as a few years past thirty if the cause is righteous and favored by those purveyors of Human Rights. Meanwhile Israeli and Jews who are murdered are often cast-off as deserving of such as they are “settlers” or were taking unadvisable and dangerous, life-threatening risks hiking in the wrong location, that location is anywhere in Israel according to the growing numbers of extremist reporters and commentators. Recent reports have introduced one more the concept that all of Jerusalem should be made the capital of and Arab nation formed out of the hide of the Jewish State as Israel already has a city worthy of the title as their capital, Tel Aviv, after all, is that not where the European and American embassies are located. I wonder if the Israelis moved their capitals from Paris to Marseilles, Berlin to Frankfurt, Moscow to St. Petersburg, London to Manchester, Rome to Milano, Warsaw to Krakow; would the world accept the Israeli media using these replacement capital cities in their news reports or would there be a holy stink and caseloads of indignation showered onto such acts of perceived disrespect for national pride and the self-determining right of nations to choose their own capital city, at least in the rest of the world. The same also applies to the Israeli citizens living or visiting the contested areas which were legally repatriated through a defensive war which liberated them from Jordanian internationally declared illegal occupation even by the Arab League and the Arab nations individually. Since Jordan was occupying Judea and Samaria which she illegally renamed the West Bank, a name that has become so popular it has all but erased the lands real names, and Egypt was occupying Gaza, and the Golan Heights by Syria, from whom were they occupying these lands? The answer can be found in numerous places and historic treaties, conferences and documents; they were occupied Israeli lands and were liberated, not conquered during that fateful week in June of 1967. Israel has returned the lands she has occupied over her short history where she has responded to attacks and gained legal right to those lands, but she has exited them and returned them. Israel has returned the Sinai Peninsula and returned after the 1973 defensive war, one where Israel was almost overrun and would have been if not still possessing the Sinai, the lands west of the Suez Canal and the control over the Suez Canal as Israel was well on her way to Cairo in the south and withdrew back to the Golan Heights from her advance almost to Damascus in the north, responding to simultaneous assaults by Syria and Egypt. The remaining lands, with possible discussions as to where exactly in the Golan Heights region the border needs to be drawn, are all rightfully belonging to Israel by treaties reaching back to the 1920s. That is the simple truth nobody cares to mention in polite conversation.

 

Also left from polite conversations is the fact that from May 15, 1948 through June 8, 1967 the lands of Gaza, Judea and Samaria were held by Egypt and Jordan respectively and during that nineteen year and three weeks interval the Arab citizens within these areas, they had yet decided that they were Palestinians as they still identified as Syrian, Egyptian, Iraqi, Turkish, Saudi, Yemenis, and Balkans; anything but Palestinian as that was still the reference for the Jews who had resided in these lands returning in numbers and joining the Jewish communities which could be found largely in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, on Kibbutzim, working farms, in Shechem (Nablus), in Hevron, Beersheba, Eilat, Jaffa, Haifa, Jericho and numerous other cities, towns, villages and such where many of the families had resided for as long as close to three-thousand-years and many could trace their heritage in these lands which are Israel back to before the Greek invasions having resided in these lands since returning from the Babylonian exile and some since the Exodus itself. These so-called ‘Palestinian’ Arabs never once during those nineteen years of Egyptian and Jordanian occupation muttered a peep about their ancient and holy land of Palestine as they were as content as an unkosher animal in a mud-puddle. There were no riots even after the Israelis liberated the lands and were well on the path to patronizing these Arab populations to potentially Israeli citizenship while offering them opportunities they had never even dreamed of before Israel arrived on their scene, as Israel opened new schools, a university, hospitals, paved many roads, new sewage treatment facilities, new water mains and pipes to virtually every town and farm and electricity from the Israeli grid and phone service which reached out to the world. It was not until KGB agent and provocateur Yasser Arafat and his second in command Mahmoud Abbas arrived and stirred up racial strife and began the first Intifada, invented a new meaning for Naqba Day which originally referred to the partitioning of the area into French and British Mandated lands thus separating those Arabs living mostly east for the Jordan River but in British Mandate lands from their holy city of Damascus where they were required to make regular pilgrimages since the Mecca was denied them during much of the Ottoman Empire which preferred the Damascus location of the Hajj as it meant more money for their empire. These Arabs who cast their allegiances as being citizens of the southern region of greater Syrian Province with Damascus as its capital city and thus considered a place of importance that any perception of difficulties preventing travel to Damascus as being life-altering and thus given the name Naqba meaning catastrophe. This all started after World War I and the setting of the Mandate Lands and the division of their governance during the 1920s.

 

The recent report which came from the United Nations decrying the unnecessary and needless deaths of children would not have included any reference to Danny Gonen just as it did not mention anything about Yaakov Naftali Fraenkel age 16, Gilad Michael Shaer age 16 and Eyal Yifrah age 19, who were kidnapped, possibly tortured and then brutally murdered and hastily buried in a shallow grave on June 12, 2014, which prompted a weeks’ long search before the bodies were recovered. Let us pass on some more names not covered by the United Nations report of violence against children where Israel received far more coverage for her ‘crimes’ than were ISIS, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Iran, North Korea or elsewhere, surprised? We weren’t. There is Adele Biton who was three-years-old when injured and received serious head wounds and brain damage in early 2013 and has subsequently died under two years later succumbing to her horrific wounds. Yonatan Palmer died on September 23, 2011 on a roadside in the family van striking a tree at speed as his father, Asher Palmer, slumped over the steering wheel dead with his face smashed partially through his skull with a rock which bore a striking resemblance to the horrific wound; Yonatan Palmer was barely one-year-old. There was the Friday, March 11, 2011 attack on the Fogel family where both parents were murdered with the father having his throat cut while he slept and his wife murdered after a brief struggle with her attacker who slit her throat as well just to make sure she was dead. The children murdered were Hadas age three months, Yoav age eleven years and Elad age four years all except little Hadas from having their throats slit while sleeping on a Friday night Shabbat evening. Tiny little Hadas had initially escaped notice as had two of her older brothers sleeping in the living room rather than their beds and the families’ oldest, their daughter who was still attending a Shabbat late prayer session and young adults’ Torah session who returned to find the family slaughtered. Little three month old Hadas was not in a crib but was mostly concealed by the covers as she slept next to her father who had his arm holding her even in his death. Something woke the little, nay, infant girl as the two Arab teen cousins from the Arab town bordering the Jewish community of Itamar, a place unfortunately all too familiar with such terror attacks, were making their escape and when she started crying they heard her. One of the cousins returned to silence the infant, a mere three-month-old barely out of the womb tiny girl, helpless, innocent, no real cares in the world as we adults know it, everything was a new and fascinating experience until that Shabbat night. She lie there next to her father probably aware that something was amiss, little children have a built in alarm system which warns them when there is a tear in their world and she likely sensed there was quite a bit wrong with her world. The Arab teen returned and murdered little Hadas quite measurably more brutally as she had her little neck slit like the other members of the family murdered that night but before slitting her throat this barbarian had plunged his knife violently and viscously into her chest piercing her heart multiple times during that four or so stabs into her little torso in such a brutal and hateful way.

 

What makes a person so dead inside as to be capable of such an act? How does one desensitize someone to be capable of such brutality to a three month old baby girl, and mere infant whose life has barely begun and who is the most helpless and innocent amongst us. It is beyond reason and understanding and even human nature to take such action or is it. This was an act carried out in these lands four or five thousand years ago. Nobody knows when it was finally ended, or was it when we see what was perpetrated against little Hadas. The practice in prehistory and even into the age of written history was to sacrifice young children to the pagan gods, but not to all or any random of these false gods often represented by a stone idol. One of the chief gods to which children were sacrificed was Baal. Priests would hold a great ceremony of which was the culmination where a child or even many children were sacrificed depending on the whims of the priests. The Priests used the threat of granting you the honor of presenting your young child for the sacrifice as a way of governing and assuring that nobody opposed their will, or at least not for long. The method of sacrifice varied as some were thrown into pits of fire while another popularly used was to slit the child’s throat and then plunge the dagger into their heart several times, almost the same manner in which little Hadas was murdered. If this can be looked upon as a ritual sacrifice then we truly are dealing with barbarians and they are inside our gates. This is not to claim that all people who share racial, religious, societal or any other convictions as these two teens and the other perpetrators given to list of their victims above are all barbarians as there are monsters amongst all societies, just some more than others, but that alone does not make their actions the nourishment upon which it suckles. But should a society find that more and more of their youth have taken to such violent acts, then it is up to the adults and influential people to make an effort to end such barbarisms, and if they miss the opportunity to make such changes as required to end barbarous behavior, then their society may gain the label of barbarians and that should result in their being shunned and ostracized for the good of the society as well as for its own survival. When people exhibit such violent tendencies and show no remorse, or as the perpetrators of the acts above, show pride and the feelings that such acts are an accomplishment, then there is a serious problem which must be addresses with the utmost urgency and not necessarily taking steps to assure the exercise of the utmost restraint.

 

With our sincerest apologies to United States President Obama, European Union’s Foreign Policy Chief Federica Mogherini, United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, Nickolay Mladenov. Another note for Mr. Mladenov, the (so-called) Honorable Ban Ki-Moon, UNRWA’s Commissioner-General Krahenbuhl and all the other holier-than-thou human rights experts and other busybodies; the truth be told the Israeli public is getting good and fed-up with having to take the high road and always turn our rage aside and simply quietly and politely bury our dead and try and believe it is all over till the next time, which comes a lot more frequently the further we go down this road. When we look back down the road to see from where we have come there are too many bouquets lining the road on both sides and too close together to even try and pretend there is nothing wrong. There is something wrong and it is wrong here, in Europe, in the United States, it’s permeating the Western World and to a lesser extent, the entire planet. You ask us to “exercise the utmost restraint” or to “practice restraint” or as Ban Ki-Moon demanded when commenting on the commission report on the suffering of children from violence where he appeared to instruct Israel to, “take concrete and immediate steps, including by reviewing existing policies and practices, to protect and prevent the killing and maiming of children,” with no mention of Hamas practices or the report that Israel has set the bar too high for the rest of the Western nations to be capable of meeting those standards implemented and utilized by the IDF with the intent of decreasing, if not eliminating, not only children’s casualties but all noncombatant casualties. The day may come and come sooner rather than later when Israelis go out of their minds and show the world what the ethnic cleansing and genocide would look like if the political leadership decided to actually let loose the maximum capabilities of Israel to sew the whirlwind. Do not get all frantic as Israel would never actually commit such acts, but we could perform an operation by displaying in an exercised war scenario in conjunction with another nation providing the necessary opposing forces using the laser tagging vest system to depict what could happen if we were to actually commit the crimes which so many are so fond of accusing us of committing or intending to commit. If we intended to commit such acts, the world would know about it really quickly, but let us hope things never come to such a state as, oh, say Iran acquiring nuclear weapons and having used them on another nation, not necessarily Israel as though they have promised to destroy Israel, they never reserved the first slot for Israel, that is likely either for the United States or Saudi Arabia, and we might desire to strike back in their names. That would provide a definitive display of Israel letting loose the dogs of war and doing so with every dog we can muster.

 

Beyond the Cusp