Mahmoud Abbas Makes Peace Impossible

 

The world loves to claim that Mahmoud Abbas is Israel’s best prospect for peace. The shocker is that we agree with that statement and claim that this makes peace impossible. What people do not realize is that Mahmoud Abbas is Israel’s savior from its own mistakes. More than once Prime Minister Netanyahu has agreed to make sacrifices for peace which would have very possibly mortally wounded Israel. Had these offers been accepted the Arabs would have been able to fire rockets directly into Tel Aviv using line of sight aiming which would have crippled all economic life and life in general for the majority of Israelis. But Israel has a strange savior because Hashem works in strange and mysterious ways and often with a sense of irony thrown in just for amusement sake. That savior is the man who cannot afford to accept any peace because doing so would cost him everything. That man is Mahmoud Abbas and he knows the minute that he makes peace with Israel and the IDF and Israeli security personnel withdraw from Judea and Samaria that his life would not be insurable with Lloyd’s of London at any price, and they have an odds price on virtually anything. Once Abbas makes a peace with Israel he would be wise to leave before Hamas makes their move as the result will be identical to the fight over Gaza except this time those Hamas does not like will have nowhere to run. Abbas knows his name tops that list and that only the IDF and Israeli security forces stand between Hamas and his neck, thus he will never make peace. Still, he is Israel’s best chance for peace as there is no other and that is the sole reason, and the world knows this as well.

 

Then why does the world, especially the European Union and the United Nations insist that Israel make sacrifices to bring Mahmoud Abbas to the negotiating table? They do this for two reasons; first because they want to compromise Israel, and second because they know Abbas will never make peace thus they can make Israel destroy itself safely and without getting their hands dirty. Their plan is to shrink Israel piece by piece which is funny as that is also the Arab plan for the destruction of Israel, by stages peace by peace. Prime Minister Netanyahu also knows the truth about Abbas and his delicate predicament and that Abbas is happy with things just the way they are. You need to understand that Mahmoud Abbas has another interest in keeping everything just as they are because the European Union and the United Nations plus certain European nations along with the United States continue sending millions of dollars atop millions of dollars annually from which Abbas and select groups amongst the Palestinian Authority (PA) leadership and PLO hierarchy, of which Mahmoud Abbas is the top person in each, are taking their generous share off the top making themselves unbelievably wealthy. Abbas is not about to kill the geese which continue laying golden eggs for him and with whose gold he uses to retain loyalty and stays alive. These are the realities and everybody involved is quite content with the status quo, well, except for Netanyahu and the majority of Israelis, and that brings us to other realities we all know are real and true.

 

This is where International Law enters the picture and the realities of treaties, conventions, mandates, charters and hard facts come in. What all of these do is paint a picture of another reality which Abbas knows as does everybody else who is playing the music that they are all dancing to. The truth is that all the lands between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea belongs to Israel and will remain Israeli unless Israel signs treaties giving the land away. That is how they stole Gaza and Israel learned a hard lesson there. Israel also knows that should they ever again be forced to fight and gain territory, not to return it but to exercise the law of nations that allows that lands gained in a defensive war may be retained by the aggrieved nation. This lesson was the lesson of southern Lebanon where once Israel returned the lands taken in the war with Hezballah they returned in force and now that area has approximately one-hundred-fifty-thousand rockets and missiles aimed at every target imaginable throughout all of Israel all the way down to Eilat at the southernmost tip of the country. Israel has learned that every inch of land which she allows to be given to her enemies, be it Israeli lands or those gained in defensive struggles, are immediately taken by the terrorist enemies and become a launching pad for future wars and terrorist raids and continuous threat for more death and destruction. Yet this is exactly what the world demands that Israel concedes to, giving lands to those who will immediately utilize it as a staging ground for the eventual destruction of the Jewish State. But fortunately Mahmoud Abbas must refuse any offer no matter how generous as he proved when offered over ninety percent of Judea and Samaria, half of Jerusalem including the Old City and Temple Mount, and lands from within the Green Line equal to the lands retained from Judea and Samaria. This offer was refused twice, one when offered by Ehud Barak in 2000 and again in 2008 offered by Ehud Olmert. Perhaps Israel should be wary of any leader named Ehud in the future, especially Barak and Olmert.

 

Israel has a world seemingly hungry for her to sacrifice pieces of her ancient homelands and half her Capital City of Jerusalem and much of the historic lands of the Bible. Places that Christian and Jews hold sacred, Biblical Places, such as Bethlehem, Jericho, Hevron, Bethel and numerous others. They would demand that the Temple Mount be made Islamic only grounds where they would picnic and play soccer while Jews and Christians would be denied to come to their precious lands. These are the demands the world makes and then relies on Mahmoud Abbas to refuse any offerings so they can claim they are the ones standing for peace if only Israel would satisfy the Arab demands. We are back to the fact that everybody on all sides are familiar with the Arab demands and that they will only accept the Jews living under Arab rule begging for each day and praying that it not be their last. The Arabs cannot allow Israel to exist because their pride is challenged as the area once was theirs. They have the same problem with the lands of Andalusia, what we recognize today as Spain and Portugal. They also believe that the lands all the way to the gates of Vienna should be returned to them as the Ottomans twice extended their reach to the gates of that city. The Europeans also know that Israel is like the plug in the bottle and without Israel they stand even more vulnerable than they presently find themselves, and that brings us to the final story.

 

Biblical Israel a Historic and Accurate View

 

Europe and the remainder of the free world and developed world are facing the same threat as Israel, Islamic terrorism. The United States has taken a partial step in preventing further infiltration, though it is currently being debated in the courts, briefly, as the restraints on immigration will stand the test. Europe has been open to infiltration and has reaped their just rewards and the people have begun to stir in a number of nations. The terrorism threat has reared its ugliness throughout much of Europe but media and the current leaders are doing all they can to downplay these incidents. Many Europeans feel betrayed by their leadership which has these leaders worried as facing their public come next elections. Some are proposing an administration which would control the media acting as a Ministry of Truth. Their quoted intention was to prevent “fake news” and to act as fact checkers, but the facts they check could be to further their power or at least try to protect them until after the next elections. The left realizes that they have backed themselves into a corner and the troubles the people have realized is being placed at their doorstep. BREXIT and the election in the United States of Donald Trump as President and a Republican Congress have sent shivers through the entire left-wing political hierarchy which has completely controlled Europe for over a decade. Now they feel threatened and still have not realized why the people are displeased. The next set of elections in Europe might bring about a seismic shift in the political alignment of the continent. The real question is to how long the populations will remain engaged and retain a more measured and conservative leadership in power. The balance is precariously balanced and unless the people remain vigilant then one more round where the left gains control of the Western nations there may be no road back. Should that become the reality then the Tytler Cycle of Power will advance and history teaches us that the cycle will not return to freedom for generations. The next decade or two will be determinative in the future we hand our children and their children for too many generations to be contemplated.

 

Beyond the Cusp 

 

My Guilty Verdict of Identity Political Sins

 

I awakened this morning realizing the horrid truth that I am an affront to identity political fears. Of all my sins, probably my most egregious is that I am a male. Not just male but also heterosexual. Well, I may as well admit to my further crimes, I am white as well. At least I do not fit the final box on the White, Male, Heterosexual privilege chart, I am not a true WASP as I am not Protestant. But as it turns out, I may be in an even worse category; I am a Jew, and not just a Jew but a Zionist and conservative Jew. I may as well admit it as it has cost me dearly in the past making me a pariah in more than one Synagogue across the fruited plains and both coasts as well. But I am even worse than the run of the mill White, Male, Heterosexual, Conservative, Religious and pro-Israel individual, I am proud of my guilt because I know that there is no real guilt to be had. The only true sin I have committed is not having any difficulty owning up to my presumed guilt and will gladly profess my preferences before my accusers. Of course this simply infuriates them further as they only gain advantage when people like me act ashamed and defensive to their accusations. Me, I simply revel in them and laughingly watch as those who would greedily stand pointing out my guilt over my groveling and writhing body on my face and begging forgiveness as they haughtily instruct me that I must confess my sins. They cannot utilize someone who refuses to beg and instead stands proudly before them stating that sure I am exactly what you accuse me of being, so what! That is the wrong stance and they are used to people that apologize for their sins, not reveling in them and using the identities as a badge of honor that it should be and not a sash of shame. I will not eat humble pie nor will I claim to be sorry for my accomplishments as I earned each and every one and none were simply given to me because of my so-called privilege.

 

You see I refuse to play by the rulebook of Identity Politics. This book states that in order to win every argument one only need accuse the other side of committing some unforgivable sin. The person is white or male or heterosexual or conservative or belongs to any group which can be cast as a majority, well, except being male as men are actually a minority. Their rules are to hit any sensitive spot where they can accuse you of being one of the deadly privileged kinds of personhood and if no prime example exists, then they just throw accusations until they hit a nerve. The accusations start with the obvious but let us say their adversary is someone such as Star Parker who is an American syndicated columnist, Republican politician, conservative political activist, author and very attractive (see below). Her disqualifying identity is that she is famous and even more unapologetic than I. They would strike her for being a known conservative and a Republican and those would be the last words they manage before she would tear them apart piece by piece. That is a side effect of proud and informed conservatives; we usually are not at a loss for words. But even those of us who are capable of giving as good as we get, if not better, is that we are defenseless against the current dilemma, the massive attacks such as are showing at Republican politicians’ town hall meetings.

 

Star Parker

 

Protesters exploded in anger after a chaplain prayed in the name of Jesus at a town hall meeting in Louisiana hosted by U.S. Sen. Bill Cassidy. They did just as decent, or should we say indecent, a job heckling at a decorated Viet Nam veteran when he attempted to recite the Pledge of Allegiance. The hecklers shouted things such as, “Pray on your own time. This is our time,” and “Amen. Let’s get on with it,” while others insisted, “Separation of church and state” and so on and so forth. Chaplain Sprague told the media, “I’ve never been shouted down throughout a time of prayer like that,” adding “I’ve never been in a situation like that. It’s sad there wasn’t honor and respect for God.” Cassidy said in remarks reported by the Times-Picayune, “Wow, they booed the name of Jesus.” Some mentioned that they were suspicious as to the origin of these disrupters as they claimed people from their area would never have acted in such a manner. Our sense was it had been noted that there were numerous vehicles which arrived early with out of state license plates which we found to be suspicious explaining why the event had been hijacked with some of the locals betting that the disrupters were likely paid for their disruptive and disgusting performances. Their providers likely should be happy as it appears they got their money’s worth.

 

 

This has been the recent explosion across the width and breadth of the United States at numerous conservative town hall meetings held by Republicans. These have been in concert with the events we spoke of in our article from yesterday titled, “The Left and Their Dream with the Shadow Government” where there have been concerted rioting taking place in major liberal cities and college campuses with many locations security personnel and police instructed to stand back and allow the “demonstrators” space to express themselves. In an event not too long ago where Milo Yiannopoulos was invited to give a performance or something at the University of California Berkley Campus where because he was perceived as a conservative speaker, he is more libertarian than conservative, there was a riot staged with the campus police instructed not to interfere resulting in over one-hundred-thousand-dollars damages to the campus before everything calmed. He was denied speaking so their actions were rewarded and this will serve Berkley, the birthplace back in the 1960’s of free speech, poorly and probably just serve to encourage a much larger disruption the next time anybody considered controversial is invited by anybody to appear.

 

All of these actions have been far from amusing and have served to reinforce that my making Aliyah was the correct action even though my doing so had nothing to do with American political scene, it was the result of a promise made to myself when I was quite young, nine to be exact. My wife probably would have preferred my informing her of this little item before we were married and the look on her face when I announced we were moving to Israel one evening in passing as if it was simply another casual remark. Her reaction was less than casual and in the end we made the trip and it has made us both quite happy to be here. She still holds dearly to her Americanism and the politics are a sort of interest though she does not dwell politics quite as I do. She spends more time socializing and having events with other ladies and groups, often dragging me along (well, not always dragging as I do enjoy many events and am going to pay for admitting this). Perhaps we can take less of a panicked look at events in the United States, at least far more relaxed than our friends still back there, especially those residing near and about the nation’s capital. That space allows for a more unattached review where things do not strike us as if it were right outside. For that we have our own set of political and other possibilities which take center stage over the events in America, as they should. Still, we at BTC still need to stay up to date on events back in the United States in order to write on them, so we still know and react to events, just do not need to worry if the demonstrations will be coming down our street or block our way to the store or wherever. As stated, for that we have our own difficulties from time to time.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Reasons for NOT Moving the Embassy to Jerusalem

 

This has been the most and greatest coverage we have seen since the Inauguration of President Trump when covering his promises and the possibility that he might falter. Every article has mentioned different choices predicting which promises the President Trump would renege upon. Many claimed he would never build the wall along the Mexican border. Some kind of cheated by claiming that he would merely use a fence or even cameras with computer monitoring for motion detection and alerting the Border Police instead of building a wall along the entire border. Some would claim that the terrain would prevent it being a wall along the entire border but these arguments were disingenuous as the wording of a “wall along the Mexico border” simply meant closing the border through the use of combined deterrents, walls, fences or monitoring through advances of technology in the most difficult terrain or least used crossing locations and simply closing the border using all means necessary and required. Others claimed he would be unable to deport all the illegal immigrants as promised. First off, that was not the promise. He promised to deport illegal immigrants with felony convictions and to work at finding an equitable solution in which deportation may be an integral part of the equation.

 

The one item which made virtually every article’s list was the promise to move the American Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Almost, well, honestly every article we read claimed that President Trump would not be capable of moving the embassy as the threats, dangers, political pressures or even that Trump would use moving the embassy to force the Israelis to make the next concession of dividing Jerusalem and returning to the 1949 Armistice Lines with very minor land swaps making a final peace deal. What the problem with the claim is that the Congress passage and the signing into law of the Jerusalem Act “recognized Jerusalem as the undivided capital of Israel, under Israeli sovereignty.” That makes an undivided Jerusalem under Israeli sovereignty United States law and thus holds any President to standing either actively for the undivided capital of Israel as being all of Jerusalem or remaining silent, no matter how President Obama attempted to divide Jerusalem as he disregarded numerous laws including the United States Constitution. Even some Israeli media has come up with lists for why President Trump will not, or should not (Haaretz), move the embassy to Jerusalem claiming things so extreme as stated by Haaretz, “Relocating its embassy to Jerusalem would mean the U.S. taking a partisan stance on a central and sensitive issue, a source of controversy between Israel and the Palestinians, and between Israel and the international community.” That is a falsehood unless moving the embassy to western Jerusalem would be taking a position that western Jerusalem would remain part of Israel. Is Haaretz indicating that Israel should leave western Jerusalem and if that is the meaning, then what else should Israel surrender or does Haaretz stand with the most extreme position such as that expressed by Helen Thomas who stated on May 27, 2010, when asked whether she had any comments on Israel? “Tell them to get the hell out of Palestine,” she replied. “Remember, these people are occupied and it’s their land. It’s not Germany, it’s not Poland.” When further asked where they should go, she answered, “They should go home.” When asked where’s home, Thomas replied: “Poland, Germany and America and everywhere else.”

 

 

The American Embassy could easily be moved to even the most western edge of Jerusalem and be as far as possible from any lands under dispute and still there would be whole hosts of people screaming that the United States is persecuting the Palestinian Arabs and determining to cheat them out of their homeland. This might at first glance appear as a ridiculous position to take as it could be so easily repudiated except that the Palestinian Arab claims include all of Jerusalem. The reality is the United States has already made a statement that is determined to cheat the Palestinian Arabs out of their homeland by leaving their embassy in Tel Aviv as the Arab claim is to all of Israel just as the students chant in campuses across the United States, Europe and beyond, “From the river to the sea, Palestine must be free.” The Palestinian Arabs are actually the entire Arab world’s crowbar and will be their implement by which they continue to wage their war to destroy all of Israel. The truth is the existence of a United States Embassy is an affront to the Palestinian Arab claims to their “rightful” country which would be built on the ruins of the Jewish State as anything less would be an aberrance to their stated demands and eventual goals. This is part of why Mahmoud Abbas, and Yasser Arafat before him, refused even offers which granted them with over 90% of Judea and Samaria along with all of Gaza and east Jerusalem as their capital when offered in 1999, 2000 and in 2008.

 

So, why should President Trump move the United States Embassy to Jerusalem according to us here at Beyond the Cusp? Well, we could use our favorite reason when trying to win an argument as kids with our parents when life got between us and a promise to go somewhere fun, “But you promised,” but we know that does not wash when things are on this level. First, it would send a message that there really has been a change in Washington D.C. and that the change will very likely be permanent for all intents and purposes. The world’s train is racing towards oblivion and nobody is manning the breaks. The old steam engine is racing with its speed balls spinning full out threatening to blow off their spinners. Everything about the old globe is screaming, whistles blowing and rivets near popping and the boiler exploding and the Deadman’s switch rig disabled and there is nobody in the cabin. Well, there was nobody in the cabin. This was the picture of the world not long ago and hopefully things will be saved before we hit a sharp curve and it all goes off the tracks. Brexit was step one and President Trump is step two but nobody knows how many steps it will require for sanity to rescue the world. Will the needful steps be taken or will the next cataclysm strike before the world regains sanity. What are the necessary steps that will bring the world back within the bounds, who can tell? The world has been slowly gaining reckless speed slowly slipping out of control and towards untold violence. There are those forces which would welcome the untold violence. They loudly proclaim their love for violence and the death it brings. They claim to worship death and that this allows them power over all who worship life. Their claim is that death conquers life. Those who love life claim that death is the rest one receives after a full, long and hopefully well spent life. These are opposing views which cannot be reconciliated, one must prevail. The good news is that President Trump is aware of the challenge though he has spoken only about it through allegory and indirect references. Moving the United States Embassy would be a strong message when it is announced as a definitive and executable policy decision. Perhaps that is the future for the moving of the United States Embassy, a declaration that the United States and life will declare over death and those who believe it is primacy. Yes, perhaps the moving of the Embassy will be a greater declaration than what the debaters believe it will be. Perhaps there is a grander plan than we are aware, perhaps the plan is greater than men and from beyond our understanding. This may be a greater issue than a mere embassy and the city in which it sits. Jerusalem had been more than a city and perhaps this is more than a simple embassy. Lastly, if the reason not to move the embassy to Jerusalem is because it reportedly will inflame Muslim passions moving them to further animosity and in turn greater acts of violence, then there is no reason not to move the embassy as from all observations of the Middle East, especially Syria, Iraq, Turkey, Libya and both Sudan and South Sudan as well as the levels of terrorism in Europe, more so Western Europe and also in the United States, though there it has been reported as anything but terror, especially Islamic driven terror, the levels could not conceivably be any higher. Violence, thy name is Islam, has become a truism of our times and thus simply move the embassy as there is no possible additional levels other than war, and that will happen whether the embassy is moved or not. If we had our way and the United States had not already purchased the land, then we would call for the embassy not only to be moved to Jerusalem but to the Jewish sector of the Old City as well. After all, did not Trump promise that his Presidency would be a brave and bold rebeginning for America and her relations with her friends? Well then, let’s get it off on the right foot.

 

Beyond the Cusp