Martin Indyk not only displayed total misconceptions, a total lack of knowledge of history, erroneous assumptions of what is necessary for peace, complete ignorance of with whom the onus lies for refusing to make peace, his obsession with forcing solely Israeli concessions forgetting, or likely because that the Arabs have never made a single compromise while claiming that Israel had been inflexible and that this is the cause for his fixation with the anti-Semitic belief that only Israel is to blame for the perpetual standoff. This was made all the more obvious when Martin Indyk spoke at a conference in Tel Aviv recently. This ignorance and presupposition of a false and selective knowledge base when he claimed that Mahmoud Abbas would “become a partner tomorrow for the deal you’d like to make if there was a settlement freeze.” This can be proven false in so many ways that it borders on insane and tortuous for our readers, editors and the letters on my keyboard for the words “settlement freeze” have worn off making it difficult to type at times as my typing is a sight driven rather than a touch driven system. There was the ten month building freeze in response to a very insistent President Obama who in his first year was hoped to be at least on a steep learning curve about the Middle East and the Arab-Israeli conflict. Well, here we are well over half way through President Obama’s second four year term and almost ready to enter his final and eighth year of his two terms and yet one of his personally assigned State Department experts who was the main contact person for Secretary of State Kerry and his entire peace push from the last year or so and Indyk has less of a clue anyone dependent of the BBC, CNN, PBS and the NYT for all their news and opinion articles. Wait, that explains it, we likely just described where the State Department and the Obama administration do rely in for their news, I almost forgot.
But Mr. Indyk was far from over, he had far more ignorance to spout but one more should suffice. He had the audacity to claim “I can tell you, from personal experience, they (the settlements) are the problem.” Israel, believe it or not because even the supposedly most pro-Israel news coverage would likely leave the average viewer with the opinion that Israel has never sacrificed for peace because had Israel been ruled by reasonable Prime Ministers and governments then Abbas the ‘mild’ would have leapt at any reasonable offer. Unfortunately for Mr. Indyk, Israel has not constructed a new settlement since the establishment of the Oslo Accords as under a request for Israel to show their undeniable desire for peace was lodged by then President Clinton thus Prime Minister Rabin made such Israeli policy and every Prime Minister since then, including Prime Minister Netanyahu, ever since then. Yes, there have been some tenders taken and even accepted to build new areas beyond the Green Line but the freeze has stalled them from moving forward. Yes, there has been building within the perimeters of existing settlements but the building has been greatly offset by demolitions ordered by the Supreme Court and already conducted leaving a number of families homeless. Additionally, Prime Minister Netanyahu has enforced a complete building freeze ever since President Obama entered his second term. As with every previous concessions the pattern has remained the same as it always has demanding every concession possible from Israel while coddling Abbas and having his coffers constantly filled and still Abbas claims that the whole world had deserted him and his government is broke and cannot meet wages. This is usually followed by the European Union sending cold, hard cash while insisting that the rest of the world, defined Western world, send emergency relief funds in order to keep the Palestinian government well paid and happy otherwise Abbas might become upset and throw a hissy fit. What it comes down to is easy to see if you just watch the news every so often and you will eventually realize that the entire Arab-Israeli, or Palestinian-Israeli conflict is actually Israel vs. the World. The European Union which just ordered the labeling of Israeli products made in what the world had determined to be occupied but which are technically and legally Israeli liberated lands which were formerly occupied by Jordan. But the world has this very unique rule which only applies to Israel and it goes like this, if Israel wins a conflict which was brought against them by whatever combination of neighboring countries, then Israel will be made to return all those lands despite their presumed ability to retain such lands until that time which they feel comfortable about returning but may retain all lands as necessary for the defense of that nation. If any nation takes Israeli land in a war of their starting with the intent of annihilating every Jew in Israel then they may retain such lands as was the case in the 1948-9 war of annihilation against Israel where Jordan retained Judea and Samaria lands which they even went so far as to rename them as the West Bank. Just because Jordan renamed these areas does not make them any less Jewish ancient homelands nor does it remove any Israeli right to retain them as they were part of Israel when the seven Arab armies invaded her immediately after her statehood was established.
The claims that Israel is on Arab lands and that for the Arabs who have taken the name Palestinian and built a false history which they claim goes back for thousands of years and that they predate any and all peoples in the areas enclosed by Israel from the Jordan river to the Mediterranean Sea is beyond ridiculous and beyond absurd and only the fact that the world can claim that the Arabs are being truthful and are believed by the European Union is an even worse travesty of justice, especially justice as determined by International Law. It is this fact which prevents Abbas from taking his entire claim and rushing into any international tribunal, like the World Court he keeps claiming to place the entire situation for adjudication. Arab leaders including ranking members of Abbas’s own Fatah Party (The Oslo Accords in order to make any peace, whether real or imaginary, had to first legitimize the PLO which was accomplished by inventing a political party, the Fatah Party, into which all PLO leadership were given new titles in which they were placed without their previous terrorist baggage thus any PLO executive would technically receive Fatah political cleansing in 1993 as part of the agreement, the Oslo Accords) have let slip the truth every so often and one of the biggest was when in an interview where Zahir Muhsein a PLO executive committee member, in a March 31, 1977 interview with the Dutch newspaper Trouw
“The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct ‘Palestinian people’ to oppose Zionism.”
“For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa. While as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan.”
As stated by Zahir Muhsein, a PLO executive committee member, in a March 31, 1977 interview with the Dutch newspaper Trouw.
Of course all this matters not one iota to the modern day anti-Semites whose anti-Zionist and anti-Israel bona fides are evident to see by quoting their stated purposes as being the destruction of Israel and the genocidal slaughter of the Jews residing in Israel with many going one step further and demanding the entire world be ‘cleansed’ of the Jews. Their rallying cry has not changed as even before there was a state of Israel the pogroms were called for by their leadership with calls for the Arabs to come to the aid of the al-Aqsa Mosque as the Jews were defiling it and planning to tear down the Mosque and the Dome of the Rock in order to rebuild their Holy Temple. These were the calls used to foment the Hevron riotous assault on the city’s Jews which was the excuse used by the British for removing the Jews from Hevron for their own safety. This is part of the reason that there are so few Jews residing in Hevron as once the British removed the Jews the Arabs simply ‘inherited’ their homes and businesses. Seeing how well the Hevron rioting worked out, there were riots held in Jerusalem but this time the British did not attempt to remove all the Jews from Jerusalem but the damage had been done in Hevron.
So, the call for violence has not changed since the initial rioting recorded by the British to today with Mahmoud Abbas repeating the very same blood libel with an extra twist of their defiling the al-Aqsa Mosque with their “filthy feet” and that the Jews plan on removing the al-Aqsa Mosque, the Dome of the Rock and Abbas adds the Church of the Holy Sepulchre which he claims belongs to the Arabs which he is in a way correct as it had been made a historical site by UNESCO placing the responsibility and ownership as the Palestinian Authority acting in good faith for the State of Palestine. The act of incitement by the Arab leadership has not changed. Above is the result and below is the modern message in Abbas’s own words and take special note of his claim to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre whose ownership he equates as the same as the al-Aqsa Mosque, that should infuriate every Christian world-side but their indignation if often aimed and targeting Jews while giving the Arabs a complete pass as they know the Jews are civil and the Arabs would murder every Christian living amongst them should they denounce the lies from Mahmoud Abbas.
The rioting has changed but is just as deadly with the initial assaults being stabbing attacks stirred up by incitement aiding what has been a total package of anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism with claims that the Jews have no history, there never was a Temple on the Temple Mount, let alone two. On the one hand they deny the Jewish history and heritage in Jerusalem and then they turn around and adopt the Jews’ history almost straight from the Torah and Old Testament stealing all of the best known stories attaching them together as the Arab Palestinian history. This was classic KGB methodology which Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud Abbas received as part of their lessons in Moscow as to how best to defeat the Jews and usurp their land as usurp the history, usurp the modern claims and then the land is easily usurped as its history is now your own. The problems that the Arab leadership is having is there still exist in the Western World people familiar with Jewish history and are standing with Israel to fight this most modern anti-Semitism. (see video below)
The game is the same but the result must not be permitted as this game has been played by Europe and the Arab world long enough. The time has come to allow Israel to have her peace and piece of land. It is not a huge amount of land they seek. It is not like the Arab and Muslim worlds are scrunched up and out of space. Surely this one-tenth-of-one-percent of their land is not an impossible request (see map below where Israel is in red, look hard, it is there). But the problem is if Islam loses any piece of their lands then they have lost favor with Allah and may as well die. This was their way of defining the world, not the Jews way as the Jews would gladly share their lands in peace and security with the wealth being granted as to ability and willingness to work hard and diligently. But the Muslim Arabs claim if the piece of land pictured in context below falls into Jewish rule their world ends up in turmoil, and looking at much of their world one might ask what would be the difference and how would we know.

Display of the Muslim Nations of the World in the Middle East, Asia and Northern Africa in Green with Israel depicted in Red
Perhaps somebody should send a copy or two of this map to the State Department with additional copies addressed to Martin Indyk and Secretary of State John Kerry so they can get a frame on the reality of the situation and ask how is Israel going to conquer all of the lands from their little starting-point? That might be a good question with overlay for the projector next time the State Department makes a briefing with a projector. Just saying.
Beyond the Cusp