Tuesday, October 23, 2012

Opportunities Lost - Why Jewish Settlement of the West Bank is Not The Issue.

Palestinian Authority leaders pay a great deal of lip service to their desire to  create a state of their own, even turning to the  United Nations to try to achieve some kind of unprecedented observer status for their as yet non existent state. At the same time the Palestinians, their friends and even elements of Israeli society, point to the Jewish settlements in Judea & Samaria (aka The West Bank) as the primary obstacle which stands in the way of a lasting peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, and the subsequent declaration of an independent Palestinian state in that area, which they claim is their ultimate aim, but this assertion does not hold up under even basic critical analysis or historical evidence:

Since 1947, the Arab world, including the Palestinians, have had multiple opportunities to negotiate with Israel & create a state. At that time the arab world rejected the United Nations partition plan, which would have created a tiny Israeli state and much larger Palestinian one, preferring instead to go for it all in a genocidal war with Israel that failed. 

PLO Terrorist, Munich Olympics 1972
Twenty years later, after the Six Day War, Israel's efforts to swap its newly acquired territory in the Golan, Sinai and West Bank, for peace was rebuffed with the infamous "3 Noes" from the arabs. Even so, for the next dozen years Israel did little to settle Jews in the West Bank, assuming that negotiations would happen, and the West Bank would change hands. Rather than grabbing at  this opportunity to try to turn their overwhelming loss in 1967 into something positive, the Palestinians chose a twelve year policy of international terrorism against Israeli & Jewish targets, they wrongly believed would lessen Israeli resolve. Incidents like the Munich Olympics and Entebbe hijacking are written in blood into Israeli and world history. It should be noted, by the way, that unlike what would have occurred had the arab's won the 1967 war, the West Bank residents remained in their homes, villages and cities. They were not massacred and they were not expelled, indeed their quality of life improved under Israel!

Despite the terror attacks, Israel however did not capitulate, as it saw no gain in unilateral moves that the arab world was stating would make not alter their attitude to "The Zionist Entity". Instead under Menachem Begin, Israel began to once again create settlements in the West Bank, more fully integrating it into Israel. I say once again, because prior to Jordan's land grab in 1948, this area had been home to a Jewish community since biblical times. Indeed, Hebron, ancient home and burial places of Abraham, Isaac & Jacob is considered the second holiest city to Jews and the area known as Gush Etzion, south of Jerusalem, had seen whole communities slaughtered in the war of independence. In any case, even as Jews started to build on the West Bank, Israel came to an agreement with Egypt that was based around a "land for peace deal", with the Sinai area being returned to Egypt. This clear demonstration of Israel's willingness to exchange land captured in the Six Day War for peace, could have been an opportunity for the Palestinians to begin a peace process and indeed Israel understood this, and offered them autonomy in the West Bank, which they of course rejected. 

Having made that offer, and now decades  after the Six Day war, Israel clearly saw that an intransigent arab response meant the West Bank would be in Israel hands for a very long time. Begin & subsequent prime ministers continued to invest in the area, building Jewish settlements, but also improving life for the Palestinians: Access to Israel's superb health system improved life expectancy dramatically, reduced infant mortality and eliminated childhood diseases. Palestinian education had been ignored by Jordan prior to 1967, leading to high illiteracy levels, but Israel's investment in education not only drastically improved literacy but also built universities and colleges. Unemployment went down, and employment was at record levels for the area. It was by no means a bed of roses for the Palestinians as an occupied people and therefore 2nd class "non citizens  within Israeli life, but it is a fact that their quality of life at that time was far better than much of the arab world.

Despite that, the Jordanian citizens on the West Bank, who now identified themselves as Palestinian, were indeed an occupied people. Tough anti terror measures by Israel, coupled with antisemitism and inherent hatred in the Palestinian world, led to a growing disobedience, and riots that erupted as the 1st Intifada.  Israel recognised that a change had to occur on the West Bank and Palestinian resolve to never recognise Israel had weakened, as their people put pressure not  only on Israel but on the PLO leadership as well: In the early 1990s the Oslo Process began. For the Palestinians they would get autonomy under Yasser Arafat, prior to final status agreement. Israel would get recognition and an end to armed struggle as well as a peace agreement with Jordan, who would give up their claim on the West Bank.

As part of the several attempts to come to a final status agreement, most importantly at Camp David in the summer of 2000, Israel offered to withdraw from all of the Gaza Strip and between 90-96%of the West Bank. Unfortunately, Palestinians rejected these offers and instead of building a state for their people, they chose a 5 year war of terror that killed many 100s of Israeli civilians and resulted in Israel building fences between Jewish and Palestinian areas, restricting movement of Palestinians and subsequent economic decline. It was not an outcome Israel had sought when it went into Oslo, but it ended the intifada and to this day the security fence and checkpoints have saved uncountable numbers of lives. The Palestinian failure to live up to its Oslo commitments to end terror opened the door for Israel to allow more settlement building and many thousands of Israelis chose to live in the ancient Jewish land of Judea and Samaria. 

In 2005, Israel boldly decided to unilaterally withdraw from Gaza, evacuating all its soldiers and painfully dismantling 21 settlements in the area it called Gush Katif, with approximately 9,000 citizens, many of whom had lived in their homes peacefully for decades, and whose businesses employed Gaza residents. Israel also removed four settlements in the West Bank. The hope was that “ending the occupation” and evacuating settlements would satisfy the Palestinians’ demands and provide an opportunity for them to begin to build the infrastructure of an independent state in Gaza. Instead, they saw it as a sign of Israel's lack of determination- a crack in their resolve and even weakness and they launched a rocket and mortar bombardment that continues to this day, against southern Israel that keeps the innocent civilians there in a state of constant anxiety. Once again, instead of land for peace Israel traded land for terror, death and war. The Gazan, who had had the opportunity they had dreamed of for decades in their hands, found themselves human shields to their Hamas "leaders".

As I have written elsewhere the Palestinians often declare their support for talks, but go to great lengths to avoid them. The vast majority of Palestinians today live under autonomous Palestinian control, but find the quality of their lives has deteriorated since Oslo ( and interestingly, are starting to show signs that they recognise the Palestinian Authority as the cause of their problems).

Meanwhile on the international stage, Israel has discovered that any steps it takes to defend itself are condemned, but it is clear that the Palestinian leadership still have the same goal in mind that they had in 1947- all or nothing, as judging by an open letter President Abbas sent to Gaza residents this week, where he clearly states that he believes all of Israel is occupied territory: "The recognition of [the State of  Palestine  at the UN] will not free the ground the next day, but it will prove our just cause that our land is occupied and not disputed territory, and this is true in regards to all of  the territories Israel occupied before June 1967.".

The arab world is in turmoil and mired in violence and religious extremism, and the Palestinian community deeply divided to the point of civil war, while the hatred and scapegoating of Israel for all the many failures of the Islamic world deepens. There is probably little or no possibility of the type of decisions that are needed to resolve the Palestinian question and the nightmare scenario for Israel is it makes further difficult concessions to end up with a second Gaza on the West Bank. Indeed Israel has made major unilateral concessions and has been badly punished for its efforts, and is unlikely to do that again. One thing is clear, this is not now, nor was it ever, a process that is being stopped by the presence of Jewish settlements! 




Sunday, October 14, 2012

Easy Guide To Recognizing Antisemitism & Racism disguised as Anti Israel Rhetoric

Anti Zionists work hard to prove that they are not antisemites, because after all - being any kind of racist is just not cool is it? Being anti Zionist isn't a negative, they argue, because after all its based on positive and good humanitarian concerns...one can almost see images of kittens by a fire and sweet children cuddling granny!!! I've blogged about this fraud previously, but I wanted to share a perfect example of why  this is a lie:
One typical Islamist front,Pakalert.com,  have an article that makes this point for me, with a headline to an article that screams the dire warning: 
SIX ZIONIST COMPANIES CONTROL 96% OF WORLD MEDIA
which is a chant the antizionist brigade  repeat constantly. Rule of thumb, by the way, is that if you can replace the word 'Zionist' with 'Jewish' in a sentence (or headline) and you end up with something that sounds very anti semitic, then it always was antisemitic. Try it with this example! 
In this case there's actually no need, because the html address includes the filename " /six-jewish-companies-own-96-of-the-worlds-media/ " making it very clear that the authors make no distinction between Jewish / Zionist & Israeli. Inside the article we don't find actual Israelis cited, but people like Michael Eisner and others, who apparently aren't "americans" but merely "Jews". This article is crude in its antisemitism, partly because it was written a couple of years ago, and exposure by people like myself has forced these bigots to become more subtle. Never the less the article is still up & pakalert are still active on Twitter. I have seen  links to the article on several mainstream anti Israel websites this week. 

Antizionists argue Israel's legititmate right to exist. The use of the word Zionist in this context is simply to avoid saying Israel, as if the name of the only democracy in the Middle East somehow legitimizes it. "Zionist Entity" says Iran, never "Israel" . People who are antizionist generally offer no positive ideas or solutions to the difficulties in the middle east and they tend to label anyone who does as being themselves zionists. They have one solution - genocide of the Zionists (ie Israel). For the antizionist / antisemites this issue has never been about one or two state solutions, never been about Palestinian rights or refugees, but rather from the earliest days it'sd been about hatred of Jews. The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Palestinian supreme leader in the 1930-40s was proud of his hatred of Jews as he wrote in his memoirs:
 "Our fundamental condition for cooperating with Nazi Germany (during WW2) was a free hand to eradicate every last Jew from Palestine and the Arab world. I asked Hitler for an explicit undertaking to allow us to solve the Jewish problem in a manner befitting our national and racial aspirations and according to the scientific methods innovated by Germany in the handling of its Jews. The answer I got was: 'The Jews are yours.'"
Reprinted from mainstream Arab press

To spot the hate for yourself , as I say above, always try to always replace the word Zionist with Jewish - see how things read - I saw this medieval blood libel retweeted several times today  but the writer swears it isn't Jews he hates: 
Zionism is when the coffee You drink is the blood of an innocent
  
Blood libels in 2012 - what a world!

Thursday, October 11, 2012

Arab World Faces a Few Home Truths

Abdulateef Al-Mulhim is an arab journalist and blogger whose recent article on the arab spring, the failings of the Arab world, and its total mishandling of Israel since 1948, has caused quite a stir. As the article gets widely reprinted (I just discovered it in the London  Times), I pray it sparks a genuine debate in the arab world over its demonization of Israel & Zionism. 

Al-Mulhim asks what the arabs have gained by their refusal to recognise Israel in 1948 and all the subsequent wars they have lost to Israel; He points to Israels incredible success militarily, economically, in research and development and most importantly in social issues and democracy, and asks why they Arab world is not partnered with this success story? He points out that Israeli arabs enjoy all the benefits the Arab Spring fights for elsewhere in the Middle East and he notes that Palestinians under Israeli control have the highest standards of living, freedoms, and life expectancy in the Arab world:
"...even the Palestinians living under Israeli occupation in the West Bank and Gaza Strip enjoy more political and social rights than some places in the Arab World. "

Al-Mulhim also repeats what is becoming blatantly clear to anyone who watches the Arab media, that as regimes struggle with the "Arab Spring: and fight for their existence, and governments fall or are replaced, the Palestinians (never the arab world's favorite child), are more than ever becoming a low priority, even an embarrassment

Perhaps Al-Mulhim's comments open the door to  a possible solution to the Israeli / Palestinian impasse- a pan-Middle East answer: This would involve the Arab world ending its scapegoating of Israel, and its blind refusal to negotiate with its most successful neighbour or often to even recognise its existence. Instead, the Arab states could make peace, and enter into meaningful discussions with Israel to create a future for the Palestinians. It would almost certainly mean so called Palestinian refugees becoming citizens of the states they have lived & been born in for 3 generations, and perhaps ceding land from Jordan to a future Palestine as well as establishing a multi-international trade agreement (including Israel) for this Palestinian state to allow it the chance to succeed. 

As Al-Mulhim so eloquently points out, the arab world has gained nothing from its pointless wars with Israel, but it has much to gain from peace with them! I pray his views represents a significant, if until now silent  constituency, of arabs and that others will express the common sense and clarity that he has shown.