Indyk Displays United States Misconceptions

 

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

 

The Differing Dreams of Two Peoples

 

The basis for the “Two State Solution” is to share a land equally between two peoples who both have an attachment and love for the land. If only this were so there might be some means by which it would work. The problem is that this premise is a lie. There can never be a two state solution which will satisfy one side because they have no love for the land, they are driven by a different drummer, and then there are two groups who wish to live productively, so let’s compare and contrast the driving force behind each of the three groups. We will start with the Jewish desires of the two Jewish residents and then the Palestinian side after a few clarifying notes. There are two completely separate Arab cultures and two somewhat separate Jewish groups. These disparate groups can all but one live in this land relatively peaceably but that final group can never be appeased and has the same desires as the extreme groups currently spreading their insatiable drive across Europe and into the United States and Canada, a group with whom there is no middle ground.

 

The easiest group for us to define is the Zionist Jews. They are here to realize a dream which has lived simmering just below the surface sometimes breaking through as happened to a fervent group led by the likes of Theodor Herzl, Ze’ev Jabotinsky and Rabbi Zalman Melamed, each at their own time and in their own way. The Zionist Jew has a desire to live once again in the ancestral home of the Jewish People, to live in Eretz Yisroel. The Zionist shares this dream with countless Jews throughout modern history and considers living outside of Israel as a form of punishment that though started by the Roman dispersal of the Jewish People to the farthest hinterlands of the Roman Empire in order to destroy the central pillars of Judaism which would necessarily lead to the death of the Jewish People within a couple of generations. This is what had happened to other peoples the Roman Empire had so treated but the Jewish People had a secret weapon, so to speak, called Torah. The attachment to the land of Israel was rooted in the Torah Scroll and thus Judaism is rooted in the Land and in Torah. Without the sacred and blessed land of our forefathers we were not completely lost and rudderless, we still had Torah; the Commandments, though some were to remain unfulfilled as they dealt with the land, the Priesthood, the Temple, the required Sacrifices; the rules for living a righteous life; the dietary laws; and other rules including the Oral Law which was for the first time written down. Torah became the link between one Jew and the next Jew and in Torah was the promise that in the future we would regain our land and rebuild the Holy Temple. The Zionist desire was to realize the dream of living in our Biblical and ancient lands. The Zionist dream was to live and rebuild our ancestral lands and reestablish the Promised Land to its place of prominence in our lives. This was always expected to be a realization which would take generations before it would be a dream fulfilled though the growing anti-Semitism may be the force which speeds up the return of the Jewish People to the land. The dream of the Zionist is one of rebuilding and restoration.

 

There are other Jews who were born in Israel who do not share or understand the significance of living in Israel. Many of them simply desire to live a normal life without complications and who want to find a solution to the conflict. There are also Jews born in Israel who are Zionist and thus share the dram described above and treasure their fortune of being native born and the reality that the dream has started to become a reality. There is little difference between the native born Zionist and their cousins who are returning to the lands; both have a deeply rooted tie to the land through Torah whether they can define it as such or not. Then there are the leftist Jews who do not share the Zionist dream and actually see the Jewish presence as denying the Arabs their lands and actively work to undermine any religious or secular drive to restore the Holy Lands as they see both secular and religious Zionism as being the problem and see both groups as actually being religious. Most of these Jews are referred to as post-modernist who have moved presumably beyond the primitive religions of the world and are now enlightened and thus true believers in this New Age leftist, and often environmental and so many other leftist progressive causes and thus more advanced than the simple minded Zionists who need to be awakened to the reality that they are invaders stealing the lands which has to be stopped. These Jews have so much in common with the anti-Israel activists found largely in Europe and throughout the Western World. They support the most extreme Arab claims seeing that desire to own the land as superior to any Jewish claims to the land. Many of these Post-Zionist Jews have over the past forty years or so been moving out of Israel seeing nothing special and placing no real attachment to the lands leaving it to live in Europe where their views on life are a better fit. Some of these Jews when faced with the vile and visceral anti-Semitism begin to understand some of the logic for a Jewish nation as a place of refuge from the hatreds and some even gain a further understanding of the Zionist love for a Jewish State, some solely the logic and fortunately the majority the religious. Still, there are the many who are so sold on their post-modernist lifestyle that they work ardently to destroy Israel as a national homeland of the Jewish People regarding such as a racist and supremacist set of values and one that has to be destroyed if the nirvana of the truly multi-ethnic society where all peoples are equal in value and there is no nationalist identity exists and everybody is a citizen of the world. These Progressive Jews are progressives first and foremost and secondarily Jewish if even remaining Jewish does not interfere with their progressive lifestyle and political socialist views and mores.

 

The indigenous Arab population, many of which arrived after the initial influx of Zionists had arrived and brought with them an economic outlook and productivity that increased the economic base of the area providing for more and better paying jobs. It was this economic environment of opportunity for a better life which attracted many of the first Arabs to move their families here to share in this opportunity for wealth and a comfortable life for their children when they grew up. These Arabs joined with the Jews though often the two groups lived in communities separate but in close proximity so as to share in the bounty of the land and the economic wealth. This influx started towards the end of the nineteenth century and early twentieth century. It was when the Arab nationalist movement first became a relevant segment of the Arab societies that the initial buds of the desire to take over the lands where presumably the plan was to establish one Jewish state amongst the fields of Arab states being established throughout the now defeated and defunct Ottoman Empire, and what would come to be seen as the last caliphate which must be rebuilt. This Arab nationalism was used by the Mufti of Jerusalem to whip up resentment for the Jews who had come and were stealing lands that were rightfully Arab lands. It was implied that the Jews were stealing the land and Arab wealth and it was the Arab economic opportunity which brought the Jews to the area being denoted under the British Mandate to form a Jewish state between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, an area of extreme economic opportunity which had even built cities with commercial and manufacturing centers resembling the cities in Europe and the United States and the rest of the Western World. Even the mode of dress was largely Western in its appearance. Still, a large portion of the Arab population remained dedicated to raising their families and was not drawn into the nascent Arab-Israeli conflict. There were riots started which were stoked by some of the British who were set against the formation of a Jewish state and assisted the Arab nationalism as their weapon against these Jews who desired to form a Jewish state. They viewed the idea of Jews having their own nation as an affront to all they believed and held as holy. In their limited view of history, which started somewhere around the twelfth century, the Jews were a despised, small and petty group of undesirables to be scorned and looked down upon. These British anti-Semites, for lack of a better description as actually theirs was the mainstream view throughout most of Europe, saw the Jews in the Mandate lands as an oddity as they were proud and strong, completely unlike the Jews in Europe, these Jews obviously did not know their place. Their fellow Arabs who were working to build a nation that would no longer need the British heel on their collective throats ignored the British and their values as much as was possible and continued their lives. After World War II and the revelations of the Holocaust, the idea of finally acting on that promise given back in the San Remo Conference which was finally ratified in April of 1920 and backed by the League of Nations by unanimous affirmation and later agreed to by the United States in an agreement with the British. This was the point the Mufti of Jerusalem simply was unable to allow and thus he began assembling groups to fight against this idea.

 

That leads right into the final group, the Arabs who refused to permit anything which permitted Jews to rule over Arabs, even as equals before the law. They knew only Sharia by which the Jew would be cast off to the realm of the Dhimmi, the scorned and abused second class people who were subservient to their Islamic masters by whose grace they were permitted to exist. Eventually this led to the KGB established Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) which was established in 1964 and had as its charter the destruction of the Jewish State of Israel which would then be united with the rest of Jordan and the Jews subjugated or murdered. The PLO was a nationalist and socialist organization designed around the call to destroy Israel and remove any lands from Jewish ownership just as had been done by Jordan when they managed to retain Judea and Samaria from the initial war of eradication which pitted seven nations and militias against Israel the initial morning of her existence and before anything resembling a national military could be established. Still, somehow the separate Jewish organizations merged and formed a rudimentary military which would succeed in defending much of the lands. The PLO was organized and trained mostly in Jordan with many of its leaders taken to Moscow where they received specialized training by the KGB in guerilla warfare tactics and revolutionary ideals and the best manner of methods to use against the Israelis. Their basic premise was that if they committed sufficient numbers of horrific terrorist strikes the Jews would turn tail and run. There was one main error in their reasoning, that the Jews would have anywhere to run to that had the same meaning of their national homeland in which they had resided for more than three-thousand years, far outstripping the under two-thousand years of exile. The Jews had returned to their lands of promise and eventual salvation and could not think of a place they would ever accept replacing Eretz Yisroel. But the PLO eventually got an Islamist entity which would compete with them for the crown of the greatest enemy of the Jews, and not just Israeli Jews as Hamas in their charter call for the eradication of Jews throughout the world (and beyond if it should ever be found that the Jews really are from another planet and have their own mothership sitting on the backside of the Moon). Then there came an alphabet soup of groups all fighting to destroy the Jewish state which included Islamic Jihad, Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), Fatah, Abdullah Azzam Brigades, Abu Nidal Organization, Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, Al-Quds Brigades, Arab Liberation Front (ALF), Army of Islam, Black September Organization, Popular Revolutionary Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PRFLP), Popular Resistance Committees (PRC), Palestine Liberation Army (PLA), Palestine Liberation Front (PLF), Force 17 (Security force for the leader of the PA), Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, and Palestinian Authority (PA). There have been other such as those claiming to be followers of al-Qaeda and ISIS as well a smaller groups which surround a charismatic leader but many such groups eventually fall to the side and merge with one of the major groups. The table is currently set with Hamas and Islamic Jihad ruling in Gaza while the remainder of the PA, which is mostly comprised of Fatah and the PLO which overlap in membership and leadership with each other and the PA. The driving force behind most of the current PA is to play up their victimhood and play on the guilt feelings of the Western world in order to gain the one manner the Western world knows to perform penance, they send funding and promise further contributions to the cause. To continue to receive these guilt payments there is a necessary but unspoken second necessity, this oppressing group which is to be thought of as evil and a horrific injustice. For the Arab cause it is this anathema that is the Jewish state, Israel. This serves as a twofer for many in Europe, they are supporting the downtrodden Arabs and at the same time ridding their world eventually, should their Palestinian allies ever succeed, of that most unholy of things, a Jewish state. The argument many of the progressives make is that Israel is a theocracy which by definition must be oppressing all the non-Jews and exalting the Jewish religion. They refuse to allow the freedom of religion laws which are part of the Basic Laws which form a legal backbone to the nation of Israel. The fact that the Palestinian Arabs demand that their areas be made Jew free is completely understandable by the Europeans and the Western world. In their post-modern world view which has reached such heights of reason and truth that their nations are self-destructing through a refusal to bother to have children as such is such a bother and requires difficulties which are just too messy to put up with. That is the gift of having no religious moral underpinning which makes the dedication to others, especially the youth who are to come to the world you leave them, and replace that with a simplistic Cyrenaic Hedonism or other offshoot of Hedonism in place of the morality of the previous religiously guided, and considered restrained, life where the raising of children was held in high regard as such preserved the future of the system and guaranteed the central pillars of the society. Often those pillars were also shared by the religious institutions and have been cast aside completely as the post-modernist seeks to be rid of those old-fashioned codes. This makes Israel a reminder of their former restrained lives and the fact that Israel is succeeding while Europe finds itself in a quagmire of a quandary of where did it go so very wrong. Thus they cast Israel as the representation of everything they hated from within their history and cast the Arabs as the innocent indigenous peoples who are enslaved and brutalized by the colonialist, capitalist, racist, oppressive and, worst of all, religiously observant continuation of the old and evil European values. Never mind that the Jews were either the brutalized of the Europeans or of the colonizing, conquering, religious, enslaving and master oppressors who had burst from the Arabic Peninsula towards the end of the first millennia and spread their will of force across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) and on into east Asia, southeastern Europe, Southwestern Europe, the Balkans, northwestern China and are currently attempting another expansion, their third, into south and central Africa and the Horn of Africa, southern Europe and beyond throughout Europe, and all of Western world taking a foothold in the campuses across the Western World and into government bureaucracies taking particularly into planning for school boards and other central controlling departments. The Europeans are willing to cut their own throats if it rids the world of that anathema and effrontery known as Israel, the Jewish State. In this hatred the Arab World stands in complete harmony with the Europeans and apparently the United States State Department except the Arab World’s reasons are very different as the Arab World’s reasoning is Islamic and based in a supremacist religious interpretation of the Quran. For a basic view into and describing the initial events and interpretations that guide much of Islam to this very day read our introduction to the duplicitous stories within the Quran explained Which Quran, Mecca or Medina?. The reality is that the European and the Islamists are in complete harmonious thought for diametrically opposite reasons, one fleeing anything religious and the other intent on the supremacy of their religion, holding the destruction of Israel as one of the prominent aims of their societal norms. Another difference is the Europeans are also destroying any hopes that their beliefs and societies will continue more than one or two generation forward and the Islamists are willing to assist this as long as their religious theocracy replaces the European post-modernist belief structure. So the Western world desires to take Israel down as its final achievement before disappearing while the Islamists simply want to steamroll Israel while also stretching their dominion over the remainder of the globe.

 

The saddest reality is the Islamists militancy will eventually destroy the peaceable Arabs who simply want to raise their families and bring them into a world which holds the greatest promise for their children’s children, a very similar desire shared by the Jewish People, especially the religious Jews. The Jews also have one other desire, to build their homelands to their former glory all held within the areas from the Mediterranean Sea to the Jordan River and no further. The Jews have no desires to rule the world or even to influence the world beyond the hopes that the Noahic Code, seven laws on which to base any civilization be used to guide the rest of the world and we will attempt to live by example of what righteousness can bring and to make discoveries and insights which we will gladly share with all who desire knowledge, be that knowledge in medicine, computers, agriculture, manufacturing, resource preservation or any knowledge of discovery which would go to further the development of the better human spirit and the ability for all peoples to live harmoniously. That is the gift we will exchange for this little strip of land at the eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea. Fair enough?

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

UN and EU Continue to Perpetuate Palestinian Propaganda

One of the chief negotiators, leaders and propagandists for the Palestinian Authority and its Fatah faction Saeb Erekat reportedly told UN Mideast peace envoy Robert Serry, a known anti-Israel instigator willing to spread any malodorous stories accusing Israel of even the most malicious and deceitful claims against Israel, as well as the secretary generals of the British and Finnish foreign ministries that Israel strove to “destroy the two-state solution.” He further purported that the Israeli initiated policy of “settlements” in Judea and Samaria, IDF activity in “Palestinian territories,” as well as the targeted killings and arrests of terrorists ignoring that the deaths of terrorist suspects is almost exclusively due to their resisting arrest dying in the resultant firefight which possess equal risks and danger to IDF troops was responsible for the failure of the peace negotiations. He accused the Israelis of intending to end the negotiations so as to enable the forming of a “one-state solution” which he claims would be an “Apartheid state.” His claims are very similar to the claims made by United States Secretary of State Kerry whose accusations that Israel would become an Apartheid state if the negotiations failed. Interestingly, when former and last President of apartheid-era South Africa F.W. de Klerk was asked his opinion of Secretary Kerry’s accusations he stated, “There are many definitions of apartheid. I do not know what Mr. Kerry meant, but one should be careful about making comparisons. From what I know of Israel, I do not think it’s a fair comparison. I ​​would not call Israel an apartheid state. You have closed borders, but even the United States has closed borders and Mexicans cannot enter freely. There are Palestinians here with full rights and representation in the Knesset, there are no discriminatory laws against them. It’s not fair to call Israel an apartheid state. If Kerry said it, I think he made a mistake.”

 

Obviously there is a huge difference in the range of opinions concerning Israel and the charges of Apartheid which have become a staple in the anti-Israel fanaticism which has spread out of the Arab and Muslim worlds, through much of Europe, and across campuses throughout the entire globe. But looking at the qualitative experience and knowledge of real Apartheid, the originating nation where Apartheid charges were the initial worldwide political crusade that brought about radical change and equality to South Africa which was implemented during the administration of former South African President F.W. de Klerk, who is more knowledgeable and less likely to hold prejudices in judging the truths about the conditions in Israel, former South African President F.W. de Klerk, the chief negotiator for the Palestinians and proven propagandist Saeb Erekat or United States Secretary of State Kerry whose claim to fame was his acrimonious testimony where he falsely accused his fellow United States Viet Nam soldiers, sailors and airmen stating amongst his now infamous testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on April 22, 1971, “They told the stories at times they had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks, and generally ravaged the countryside of South Vietnam in addition to the normal ravage of war, and the normal and very particular ravaging which is done by the applied bombing power of this country.” How anything John Kerry has stated throughout his storied career built on the slandered reputations of the men of the same military in which he “served” is beyond comprehension.

 

Some of the remainder of Mr. F.W. de Klerk’s commentary during his interview is worth reporting as it states very precisely and succinctly what the real test could be in Israel’s future if the negotiations prove incapable of reaching a resolution accepted by both sides, he stated, “The test will be everybody living then in such a unitary state, will everybody have full political rights? Will everybody enjoy their full human rights? If they will, it’s not an apartheid state. There will come in Israel a turning point where if the main obstacles at the moment which exist to a successful two-state solution are not removed, the two-state solution will become impossible.” Many may be quick to point to the recent South African government actions to boycott Israeli made items from the contested areas of Judea and Samaria and other statements and actions claimed to be the result of Israeli Apartheid laws and activities. The disparity of opinions can be credited to many possible explanations, one of which would include but not be limited to perspective on Apartheid policies between those imposing such a system versus those who were under the depravities of Apartheid. This difference of attitudes is very similar if not exactly the same as the difference between supporters and opposition to Israel and Israeli policies. I know that such quotes can be found supporting virtually any political argument and almost no one who has already reached a position is not about to have an epiphany from any number of quotes, still it is worth putting every view possible out for consideration, especially if the quotes support what one believes.

 

The problem which is so distressing for those of us who support Israel is the ease and willingness displayed by so many to accept without question any accusations which demonize Israel and Israelis, plus many show a measurable enthusiasm in spreading, and in some cases exaggerating, every derogatory accusation they come across. This was made affirmed when Martin Schulz, the President of the European Parliament, addressing the Knesset speaking in his native German where he stated, “Einer der Fragen dieser jungen Menschen, die mich am meisten bewegt hat, war: Wie kann es sein, dass Israelis 70 Liter Wasser am Tag benutzen dürfen und Palästinenser nur 17?” Literal translation determines that President of the European Parliament Schulz had accused Israel of water starving the Palestinians claiming, “One of the questions of these young people, which most moved me, was: How can it be that Israelis are allowed to use 70 liters of water per day, but Palestinians only 17?” Later his comments were altered and the official translation and original German include the phrase “although I could not check the exact figures” (“wobei ich die genauen Zahlen nicht nachschlagen konnte”) in order to amend his insult allowing for a measure of discretion not stated in his original speech. He was so completely sure that whatever he was told in an interview arranged for him by the Palestinian leadership with a youth had to be valid, especially since it reinforced his pre-established suspicions and demonization of Israel and Israeli leadership in their treatment towards the Palestinians that he did not at the time see any need to verify the charges. If Mr. Schultz was alone in this predisposition it would be something that could be dismissed as one incident. Catherine Ashton, the Foreign Policy Chief of the European Union, has denounced Israeli activities with particular vehemence on the so-called settlement construction and any activities within Jerusalem, whose annexation by Israel she refuses to recognize, while granting the Palestinian Authority and even Hamas latitude and excusing their attacks on Israelis and echoing almost every Palestinian territorial claim despite United Nations resolutions which allow for some lands to be annexed by Israel that are considered necessary for Israeli security in defending possible future attacks. There are numerous leaders within European governments which also have a history of condemning Israel often making charges adding their voices to Palestinian claims and accusations which have subsequently been proven false. Often there is no apology or retraction once proof of inaccuracy or outright falsehood instead the offending politician simply refuses further comment allowing the statement to stand despite the truth. One of the most guilty of such statements and who has even repeated false claims demanding that he speaks the truth and that any evidence against his truths are simply Israeli or Jewish lies and propaganda is the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian Richard A. Falk. Fortunately Mr. Falk will be retiring from his poisonous execution of his view of his duties but unbelievably the UN Human Rights Council has now appointed, as another of its special rapporteurs, none other than Richard Falk’s wife, Hilal Elver. And yes, she completely supports and promises to continue her husband’s singularly focused recriminations against everything Israel doing all her position allows to work for the delegitimization of the Jewish State.

 

The displays of open hostility and pure bile that has poured forth from the United Nations, European Union and all too many European leaders and politicians not only have refused to show any signs of decline but appear to be escalating. The United Nations Human Rights Council actually has as part of its bylaws that they issue a condemnation of Israel at the beginning of every session before considering any other business. How does such a predisposition serve truth and actually addressing the real problems that face the world? The only honest and viable reason for such hostility and unfiltered hatred is that as anti-Semitism became unfashionable after World War II and the revelations of the brutality and horrors of the Holocaust, not just to the Jews but also Roma, Homosexuals, Polish citizens, Russian captives, numerous religious leaders including Catholic and Protestant clergy and others considered to be threats or undesirables by the Nazi hierarchy, anti-Semitism did not simply disappear and eventually reappeared in the form of anti-Israel hatreds. Many of the condemnations of Israel take on similar dimensions to the traditional anti-Semitic invectives such as underhanded control of political processes, monopoly of the media, insidious plots to rule the world, monetary manipulation and hoarding and among others even many traditional blood libels such as kidnapping non-Jewish children to use their blood in the making of ceremonial foods such as matzos. The similarities are too close and easily recognized to be ignored or excused for other reasons other than blind hatred. Much of the Arab world, particularly the Palestinian Authority, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Fatah, PLO, Iran and numerous others, do not even bother to mask their anti-Semitism with much of their propaganda and political cartoons showing near exact copying of Nazi, Czarist and other traditional and historic anti-Semitism. These depictions are just as often aimed at Israel as they are at Jewish People in general. Such is evidenced by the Charter of Hamas where they call for not just the eradication of Israel supplanting it with the state of Palestine, but also to continue the war until every Jew on the Earth has been hunted down and eradicated. Then there are the speeches out of Iran, from Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood and leading Muslim radical clerics throughout the Middle East and North Africa which often take on similar sentiments as stated by Yusuf al-Qaradawi, a leading Muslim cleric with a wide audience, who claims, “To conclude my speech, I’d like to say that the only thing I hope for is that as my life approaches its end, Allah will give me an opportunity to go to the land of Jihad and resistance, even in a wheelchair, I will shoot Allah’s enemies, the Jews.” I honestly cannot think of a more pure statement displaying a delusional, psychotic, pugnacious and unadulterated display of unconstrained hatred than this and others I have witnessed coming from those who target Israel or the Jewish People. I am sure there may exist other such statements of hatreds that I would find equally disturbing and unconscionable but have fortunately not come across them in the recent past and hope to never have such displeasure in the future. Now if only humankind would accommodate by not adding to any of the hatreds which appear to have been one of the enduring moral weaknesses that has plagued human history with only pain, suffering and destruction as its resulting consequence.

 

Beyond the Cusp