Abbas Blockading All Peace Efforts

 

The reality is there for all to witness if they take even the most causal of observations, the Palestinian Authority (PA) refuses to accept any peace in which the State of Israel is permitted to remain Jewish. World Jewish Congress (WJC) President Ron Lauder published an opinion piece in the New York Times on March 18, 2018, titled, “Israel’s Self-Inflicted Wounds” and is a commentary equating Israeli sins of a presumed occupation and Arab government supported terrorism for preventing any hope of peace. The entire self-hating piece has been proven to be a wrong-headed concept with no validation in the real world. His errors are legion starting with the idea the Arabs are forced to live under Israeli rule when well under five percent of Palestinian Arabs live in areas under Israeli rule. All one need do is read and understand the definitions of the three areas in Judea and Samaria and how each is to be ruled to see the reality. Area A is under PA rule and security where sixty percent of Palestinian Arabs reside. Area B is under PA rule and joint PA-Israeli security and where forty percent of Palestinian Arabs reside. Area A was intended to be the core of the Palestinian Arab State while Part B was where the division between Israeli and Arab and intended to be negotiated. Area C has a minuscule Palestinian Arab population and contains 100% of the Jewish towns, cities, industrial parks and is under Israeli control for both security and rule. Area C was presumed to remain with Israel under the Oslo Accords. PA lies and obscurations  have combined with an eager world attempting to erase as much Israeli presence as possible to expand the PA claims to include all the areas divided between the parties by the Oslo Accords.

 

Ever since the final offers by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert made in 2008 were rejected by Mahmoud Abbas, there have been no negotiations as Abbas has refused all invitations to negotiate. During the eight years of the administration of President Obama, Mahmoud Abbas got accustomed to America pressing Israel to make obviously dangerous concessions which Israel refused to accommodate leading to an appearance of Israel being the party resisting any peace proposals. During this time it was beneficial for Mahmoud Abbas to refuse any Israeli offer for face-to-face negotiations and instead allow President Obama and Secretaries of State Hillary Clinton and John Kerry to press Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu to literally fall on his sword and surrender all of the disputed areas of Judea and Samaria. Prime Minister Netanyahu gallantly fought against these efforts from Washington D.C. while also giving loud protestations and prescient warnings of the dire future being carved out of the Middle East by the Iranian Nuclear Deal, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPA). Mahmoud Abbas watched as the United States had moved slowly but inexorably away from supporting Israel to adopting every last attribute of the PA demands of Israel reaching its apex at the end of the Obama Presidency.

 

Netanyahu Falling on His Own Sword

 

The inauguration of President Trump brought all the good times crashing down around Mahmoud Abbas’s ears and he still had not figured out the new lay of the land. This might be attributed to President Trump’s Secretary of State Rex Tillerson whose Arabist credentials are impeccable. Well, good old Rex is not around any longer as he and his boss, President Trump, were not seeing things eye-to-eye. Rex supported the JCPA, Trump wants to kill it; Rex supported Qatar, Trump placed embargoes on Qatar; Rex supports a Two State Solution, Trump favors Israel; Rex is an Arabist through and through, Trump is an America Firster; Rex was the anti-Donald, the President is Donald Trump so Rex is unemployed and President Trump made a statement on a large number of issues where policy had been ambiguous due to the Secretary of State having his own and contrary agenda. The biggest change in the Middle East came to a head over the Jerusalem announcement which Rex Tillerson opposed quite vehemently which probably was the last straw breaking the camel’s back. President Trump made his announcement that the United States would recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and would move the American Embassy to Jerusalem. President Trump would really like to officially open the temporary Jerusalem Embassy on May 14 of this year coinciding with Israeli seventieth birthday. Strangely enough, Israeli bureaucracy may prevent such from happening as they are dragging their feet on approvals for the needed changes so the current consulate building can also serve as an embassy until the actual building can be constructed. Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon tweeted President Trump (see below) promising to do all within his power to facilitate all items required for moving the embassy in mid-May. His Tweet was sent in both Hebrew and English so all on both sides would understand where the Israeli Finance Minister stands, and it is with President Trump and simply getting things done, the bureaucracy, not so much. One might come to believe that the Israeli Deep State is working with the United States State Department Deep State.

 

Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon Tweet to President Trump

 

Abbas decided to throw a temper tantrum upon the announcement of the United States recognition of Jerusalem and the Israeli capital city and their intent to move the United States Embassy to Jerusalem. He denounced the recognition of Jerusalem to be a Zionist plot pointing out the obvious, that the Jews were running the United States and had control over President Trump. He denounced the United States claiming it had lost its ability to be an arbiter in the peace process and these were things just for starters. Abbas has refused to attend a twenty nation, including seven Arab Nations and Israel, White House Conference on Gaza which Abbas refused to join and included this into his rants referring to this as a ruse by Zionist entities. As we have noted before, Mahmoud Abbas obviously intends to burn all his bridges after crossing them and is burning the fields in a scorched earth practice intending to get President Trump to wither before his onslaught of political suicide and dive in to save him. Apparently President Trump is perfectly willing to allow Mahmoud Abbas to destroy any chance that the Palestinian Arabs have for peace. Abbas with his personal attacks on the American President are only serving to further push the United States into fully supporting Israel. Just like Kim Jong-un has noticed, these antics which instilled trepidation into the veins and arteries of former Presidents, this President, Donald Trump, is made of sterner stuff and these childlike antics simply bounce off him and fall forming embargos against the nation throwing the tantrum. These antics by Abbas has already ended United States support of UNRWA and further embargos have been set against the Arabs in Gaza for their part in aiding Hamas build tunnels within Israeli areas where the IDF patrols, thus finding these tunnels and destroying them. President Trump also appears to be the anti-Europe faction on all items concerning Israel. President Trump has announced that negotiations can begin and be held wherever the parties decide with no preconditions or inducements, just meetings to do the difficult work of hammering out a complete peace deal forming recognized borders ending many centuries of struggles and hardships suffered by both peoples. Abbas appears content with living in his new house built with European donations and allowing time to pass and hopefully Trump will soon pass with time. What Abbas has yet to realize is that the settings have changed and that neither he nor the Europeans are able to turn them back as long as Trump is standing at the switch. These self-destructive antics are simply another diversionary tactic by Abbas waiting for the world to be so disgusted by the lack of peace that they will try to force the European Union’s peace concept on Israel. Such a peace would not be supported by the United States though the United Nations General Assembly would back any plan which would likely harm Israel. But Israel need not worry as there is still time and contrary to predictions and doomsday reports about demographics giving the Arabs within Israel a plurality, such has been proven incorrect with the new numbers which depict the Jewish majority to continue and increase. The future is a bright and wonderful Israel. This too put Rex and the Donald on opposing sides as Rex believed the Arabs would eventually defeat Israel. Let us pray they are correct and Israel does eventually become the beacon and light onto the nations. Then the words of Isaiah 2:4 shall become a reality and “they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift the sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore.” Oh to live to see that day come, that would be a dream come true.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Leaked “Deal of the Century” Isn’t

 

The trial balloons have been slowly leaked to the people who matter on exactly what will be in the “Deal of the Century” President Donald Trump has been claiming he will finally bring peace between the Arabs and Israel, the Jews. These balloons are only partially inflated as the Trump Administration is playing their cards close to the vest. They are mostly floating the most contentious pieces to watch and see how everyone reacts. Fortunately for Israel, Prime Minister Netanyahu and all the other important party leaders in the coalition and in the opposition will not need to say a word; they just have to allow Abbas and company to talk. The problem is that everybody in the opposition will jump onboard with the plan claiming that it is just about everything they have said was required for there finally to be peace with the Arab Palestinians and some may even ask why so many deviations from the pre-Six Day War Green Line* are part of the deal. Some might claim that Israel does not need the settlements. They will sound as if they are negotiators for the Palestinian Authority (PA) and not on the Israeli side at all.

 

There will be one outlier, Yair Lapid. His response will depend upon which side of the bed he got out of that morning, the right or the left. If he got out of bed on the right, then he will claim that the deal is overly balanced for the Arabs and that Israel would be required to make very painful, some might say dangerous, concessions but if the United States and the United Nations can guarantee what is promised, then Israel should accept the proposed borders with a few minor corrections. If he got out of bed on the left, then he will stand in near total agreement with Zehava Gal-On, the leader of the Meretz. Mr. Lapid’s claims that he stands to the right of Netanyahu only lasts as long as an election cycle, and once he is either in or out of the coalition he begins tailoring his speeches to fit the audiences. He is as if he has no honest opinions that are his own, but that is not entirely true. Yair Lapid was a supporter of Labor Party most of his life and his associates and friends are largely leftists. He has always and will always support the Two State Solution and a divided Jerusalem. The one thing which people need remember about Yair Lapid is that his former profession makes him a professional teleprompter reader and thus he can deliver completely opposite speeches at the same time with his address to the left side of the audience contradicting his address to the right side of the audience and as long as the one side cannot hear what he says to the other, then he will receive rounds of applause from both sides.

 

Now to the leaks and what we have been able to patch together from the little squeaks we have heard in the night. First and foremost, this plan obviously has not been run past the President or he saw it and decided to allow Abbas and company to reject it for him. The “Deal of the Century” leaked thusfar has State Department and Arabist writ large all over it. We can hear much of Exxon-Mobile, Saudi Arabian friend and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson echoing through and through these leaks. It is difficult to read the idea that the same President Trump who recognized Jerusalem as the rightful Israeli capital and is having the dedication for moving the American Embassy to Jerusalem this mid-May is calling for redividing it and giving the entirety of the Old City including the Temple Mount, City of David and the Mount of Olives Cemetery to the PA, as the leaks claim. Further, the rumors speak of only retaining some of the Jewish communities beyond the Green Line meaning that very probably many Israelis will need to be reintegrated into the areas of pre-Six Day War Israel. This will cause great hardships as the unfortunates who were displaced as a result of the Gaza withdrawal have yet to be fully returned as productive citizens with employment and an actual home. Those were people fully employed with homes and neighbors, with friends and fellow congregants, with real and happy lives as complete and full as any and now still seeking a place, any place which they can make into a home and find a restoration of a life with meaning and full of hope. Israel does not need another group of such refugees, even if they only count as a few thousand, though it is far more likely the plan is talking not even of tens of thousands but hundreds of thousands. That does not even include the Jewish population who has returned to their homes in the Old City which has surpassed one-third of a million. This also does not give any consideration of the Arabs in the Old City who have a limited citizenship within Israel with all the legal and social rights other than voting in national elections and the majority of whom have expressed their desire to never again be under the oppression of the PA.

 

Abbas Gives Peace This Much of a Chance

 

Much of this plan resembles the plans which were presented by Ehud Barak and Ehud Olmert which divided Jerusalem along the 1967 pre-Six Day War division which became the tactical position for Arab snipers to fire at every Israeli; Arab, Jew, Druse, Christian, Israeli, tourist or even space invaders, anything which was moving even to include dogs and cats as they were shooting for amusement as well as to murder as many hapless Israelis, preferably Jews, who came within their sights. The rest was partitioned once again along the 1949 Armistice Lines (Green Line) with minor adjustment and Israel was permitted to retain some of the more established communities (settlements) beyond the Green Line while the outposts and lesser communities (smaller or geographically isolated settlements) would be destroyed and their populations rendered homeless and would need to be relocated elsewhere within the Green Line presumably. This proposed solution is so obviously something proposed by the State Department who would give the Arabs the entirety of Israel if the power to decide such were ever granted them. This has been the cookie cutter response proposed by President after President and has met the same acceptance by Israel with reservations and outright dismissal by Mahmoud Abbas and Yasser Arafat before him. The leadership of the PA in particular and the Arabs in general is simple; they cannot accept any solution which does not completely erase all of Israel. They have promised their people and raised three generations of absolutists who were weaned on the destruction of Israel, educated to seek the destruction of Israel, sent to summer camps which were closer to basic training and commando training camps than recreational and there taught that Allah demanded of them the complete destruction of Israel. The result is there are a good number of young adults and teens who are completely inundated with hatred of the Jews and a murderous obsession with the destruction of Israel. These radicalized members of the population are completely unaccepting of any peace with Israel; they will only accept the utter destruction of the state of Israel and are so beyond control they would murder any leader who made such a peace. This places Mahmoud Abbas exactly where he belongs, having to appease an unappeasable and murderous mob who would gladly kill him if he were to take any offer of peace. They do not want peace, as they have been raised for total warfare and believe that the Jews can be sent running with their tails between their legs just like the Crusaders, the British and every other group to come to the Holy Lands. Those others were all actual invaders with no actual attachment to the land beyond a love of Jerusalem and a few historical cities. The Jews will prove different, as we have come home to the place where we began and where we lived with Hashem and are foretold that we will do so again. This is our home and despite what they believe, we have no other home and cannot return to the Diaspora as only death awaits us there. We are home to stay and Jerusalem was and has always been our only capital since David Melech (King David).

 

Abbas Statement Excerpts and Their Intended Result

 

The one constant thusfar, and likely forever, is that the PA leaders will refuse to accept any peace proposal outright and will never make any counter-proposal stating those items that would make an agreement acceptable to them. There are two main and easily understood reasons that force this situation upon the PA leadership, and Mahmoud Abbas especially. The first reason is the only time that a Palestinian leader made a counter proposal was when Yasser Arafat gave President Willian Jefferson Clinton the demands which he believed that any Israeli leader would refuse to even consider out of hand. When President Clinton explained what Yasser Arafat demanded to then Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, Barak accepted them and agreed to make the deal. Yasser Arafat simply bolted from the conference in Paris and refused every further attempt in the final days of President Clinton’s second term to get him to sign a peace accord. Since then, no PA leader has ever delineated what he would be willing to accept. The other reason is that the Arab Palestinian position has become so radicalized within the power structure and amongst the younger Arabs raised on the poisonous hatred of everything Israel and everything Jewish. This has made it such that the PA has been transformed, or is it untransformed, back into the PLO** terrorist group founded in September 1964, almost three full years before the Six Day War and any so-called “Occupied Territories” ever existed. The original claim of the PLO was to destroy Israel and remove the usurper Jews and reclaim all of the land from the (Jordan) River to the (Mediterranean) Sea. There was no idea to form any state of Palestine; the idea was to give the lands, after the destruction of Israel, to Egypt and Jordan. The idea of an Arab state of Palestine was born of the loss in the 1967 Six Day War when the PLO refused to alter their claims to liberate the lands occupied by Israel. Mahmoud Abbas stated it clearly in a United Nations speech when he stated that he demands that the lands occupied by the Jews stating, “No one has held Israel accountable when it occupied our territories in 1948.” This speech he also repeated his infamous claim that, “We are the descendants of the Canaanites that lived in Palestine 5,000 years ago.” Here we include a few videos of Abbas and some of his more outlandish claims to the world.

 

 

 

 

And here we have included Mahmoud Abbas’s United Nations speech made in early 2018.

 

 

The reality is Mahmoud Abbas has promised himself into a corner where he can only accept the total destruction of Israel. He has burned all the bridges to get back to the concept of destroying Israel in stages. He faced threats to his own power and position, which in this case means his life and fortune. These threats came from those who read the lay of the field amongst the Palestinian Arabs, especially the youth, and saw they wanted more radical leadership and craved action in the form of more attacks and more terrorism and some even desired an all-out war with Israel. The end result which became accepted as the sole solution was the erasure of all of Israel and the Jews slaughtered where they stood, slept, walked, ran, dined and everywhere they could be found. Hamas has gained in popularity because their charter actually calls for the murder of every Jew in the world. This is the new parameter has become the bottom line and anything short of Israel dead and the Jews dead with anything short of that completely unacceptable and must be rejected out of hand and any leader accepting a peace with Israel would not last out the week, just like the assassination of Anwar Sadat by his own military men at a military parade and event. Should Mahmoud Abbas accept anything President Trump or even his allies, and they are the allies of the Palestinians, from the State Department write up and propose he would be dead killed by his own security detail before he left the building. This has been the Israeli ace in the hole which most do not even realize, the Arab Palestinians will refuse every offer.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

*The original 1949 Armistice Lines which the Arab League demanded could never be construed in any fashion, as a definition of a border as doing such would include recognition of Israel and the Zionist Entity.

**PLO is the Palestinian Liberation Organization which is the terrorist group formed under Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud Abbas with the blessings of the Arab League and assistance from the KGB as a terrorist group in September of 1964.

State Department Declaring Open Season on Middle East and Israel

 

We once predicted Rex Tillerson would be a problem for Israel in particular and much of the Middle East as a whole. Secretary of State Tillerson belongs with the State Department with only one shortcoming; he is an Arabist and not a supporter of the new Persians in Iran. Making his position to be at odds with his own department will come when the struggle finally turns to Iran against Saudi Arabia. Rex Tillerson, before becoming Secretary of State for President Trump, was the CEO for ExxonMobil and as such had many enjoyable and enriching relations with the Saudi Royal Family. In that position, Rex Tillerson was granted honors and received with feasts and joyous celebrations. He saw the most shining and generous side of Saudi Arabian culture as he was an honored guest who brought great prosperity with his visits which enriched the Royal Family. He would have stayed in five star hotels in the finest suites available and eaten at royal feasts so it is no wonder that he has great affection, respect and possibly love for the Saudi Arabian rulers, and thus favors their nation which he has only seen their best side. One cannot blame the man for the views he gained in a lifetime of working in the oil industry.

 

Secretary of State and Former CEO for ExxonMobil Rex Tillerson

 

Another problem with Rex Tillerson and the State Department is their view that the Kurds should postpone their September 25th vote and any consideration of declaring their independence until it will be more suitable to the understandings and outlook of the United States State Department. Imagine a people, a proud people with a history and who had their own nation until empires came and erased their nations and enslaved them and who, despite the best efforts of Saddam Hussein and his chemical weapons, survived and have been the ones who initially stopped ISIS leading to the current offensive and the best hope for their defeat, having to wait until the United States State Department decides they are ready for their own country. Had President Truman listened to the State Department, the United States would not have recognized Israel but President Harry Truman listened to his mother growing up and read his Bible and was a good man who decided he would listen to his mother and his learnings as a youth over some government department. Now we need to hope that President Trump, another president whose last name begins with a “T” like Harry S. Truman, also can find his way to disregard the State Department and give the Kurds recognition simply because they deserve the recognition and any assistance they require as they have carried the fight against Islamic State for the world. But Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and his State Department have not changed since 1948 where they simply do not believe that people can have their own nation without their permission. With any good fortune, the Kurds will hold their vote, take the world by the horns and declare their independence and the world has the great goodness to recognize their aspirations and recognize that without the Kurds, ISIS might still be rampaging across the Middle East instead of being pushed out of Mosul with the Kurds playing a major role.

 

The Middle East is going through a period of great turmoil shaking off the old lines imposed upon them by the Europeans at the close of World War I. After World War I, the victors (Britain, France, Russia, Italy and Japan) decided where the new boundaries and borders with much of the decisions made by two men, British diplomat Mark Sykes and a French diplomat François Georges-Picot, called the Sykes–Picot Agreement. The lines were drawn with no regard to tribal allegiances, without regard to Sunni and Shiite observance and simply decided on how the major powers decided they would carve up the remains of the former Ottoman Empire. These lines were set up in such a way as served the major powers in Europe and the Russians agreed as they were given some parts of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire and protected them from any resurgence from Turkey. Russia also was in the weakest position as they had left the war early after the revolution unseated the Tsar and the Communists had finally established governance which was to last until almost the end of the Twentieth Century. The Middle East was colonized mostly by the British, French and Italians who gave up their colonies mostly by the end of World War II through until around 1970 (see map below). Still, the nations that were formed were ungovernable resulting in mostly dictatorships, which suppressed most of the population. This led to such leaders as Saddam Hussein, Muammar Gaddafi, Hafez al-Assad, Gamal Abdel Nasser, Abdullah I bin al-Hussein and the Saudi Royals and their successors. Now the Middle East is making its first steps to figuring out where the lines need be drawn and what belongs to whom and everything else. Like any continental shifts in a world, the Middle East will take some time to shake out and there will be those who believe they are entitled to an empire on the backs of others while still other leaders will refuse to surrender rights to their people. This will be where the State Department will take their position that nobody deserves anything without their consent.

 

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

 

Now the State Department is demanding that President Trump demand that Israel return seventy-five-million dollars voted for Israel to build additional equipment for their defense against rockets and missiles which Israel requires to upkeep their defenses. The State Department demands these finances be returned as they exceeded the limitation that President Obama placed upon Israeli aid. The State Department claims that Israel lobbied Congress for the additional funds. Many in Congress claim that they voted for the funding without any requests or coaxing from the Israelis. Senator Lindsay Graham, Republican of South Carolina, stated, “Congress is not a party to this agreement nor is this agreement binding on future congresses. Congress has an independent duty to make a decision about the proper level of support for Israel or our other allies. To suggest this will bind future presidents and Congresses for the next decade is constitutionally flawed and impractical.” Many have commented that this is an internal war within the United States government where the Department of State is doing everything they are capable to drive a wedge between the Trump Administration and the Israelis. There are those in Congress who have their hackles up over this claiming that they had no part of the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that they feel President Obama forced and threatened on the Israelis. They also declare that it is the duty and responsibility of the Congress and that no President, especially any past President, can limit or restrict their decisions on spending beyond their veto power. Once a President has left office, he can no longer veto Congressional legislation once passed, only the sitting President has such power and the Congress has promised to flex their power and pass legislation to resend these funds should the State department win this round. This is a war that will decide exactly how much influence Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and his Department of State are going to have over the Administration of President Trump. In all honesty, we hope that their influence will be as minimal as possible as it has been our opinion that the Department of State has been on the wrong side of history and the fight from the very start from before World War II onward. We will be watching this test for President Trump as if he gets this one wrong, then we will know that there is troubles coming.

 

Beyond the Cusp