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NETANYAHU MULLING WEST BANK PULLOUT
TO STAVE OFF ‘DIPLOMATIC TSUNAMI’
Barak Ravid
Haaretz, April 12, 2011
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is weighing a withdrawal of Israel Defense Forces troops from the West Bank…to block the “diplomatic tsunami” that may follow international recognition of a Palestinian state within the “1967 borders” at the United Nations General Assembly in September.…
Conversations with two Israeli sources with ties to Netanyahu’s bureau led to the conclusion that [a] withdrawal in the West Bank…would see the IDF forces redeploy and security responsibility handed over to the Palestinian Authority. This would mean that in Area B—[as defined in the Oslo Accords]—where Israel has security responsibility and the Palestinians civilian policing functions, full control would be ceded to the PA. In addition, some parts of Area C, where Israel has complete control, will become Area B.…
Netanyahu is still uncertain to what extent the withdrawal would be.…
THIS WEEK IN HISTORY: THE FIRST DISENGAGEMENT
Michael Omer-Man
Jerusalem Post, April 22, 2011
On April 23, 1982, just over three years after then-Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian president Anwar Sadat signed a peace treaty between their two countries, Israel painfully evacuated the last of its settlements in the Sinai Peninsula—Yamit.
As stipulated in the 1979 peace treaty, Israel was required—within three years—to withdraw all of its 2,500 civilians and thousands of military personnel from the Sinai, which it had captured in the 1967 Six Day War. With three years notice as well as economic and relocation compensation packages provided by the government, most of the Israeli residents of Sinai had long departed before the April 1982 deadline approached.…
Ideologically opposed to the withdrawal, however, dozens of religious and some secular Israelis descended on the remaining settlements in the Sinai, intent on using their bodies to oppose the evacuation. Bypassing army checkpoints erected to prevent objectors from reaching the soon-to-be-demolished Sinai settlements, dozens of religious Zionist youths sailed south past the Gaza Strip and entered the coastal settlement of Yamit.
Some of the youths…barricaded themselves in the basement of a building in Yamit with explosives, threatening to blow themselves up in an act of collective suicide rather than allow the army to forcefully evacuate them.… [B]oth chief rabbis of Israel at the time, including Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, traveled to Yamit and attempted to talk down the suicidal yeshiva students through a ventilation pipe. [Eventually], they agreed to disassemble their explosives, though they remained holed up in their underground bunker refusing to be evacuated.
Another…group of objectors who made their way down to Yamit in order to physically protest its evacuation—secular students intent on showing that the struggle was not only a religious one—was led by Tzahi Hanegbi, son of legendary Lehi fighter and MK Geula Cohen.… Revisiting those times in an interview with The Jerusalem Post over 20 years later, Hanegbi described how he and members of his group of students chained themselves to the top of a 28-meter monument but decided not to physically struggle against the soldiers sent to evacuate them. “We just stood there, sang Hatikva, chained ourselves and were taken down [via a ladder],” he recalled.
The traumatic scenes most widely remembered by the Israeli public, however, were not those described by Hanegbi. Disturbing images of club wielding holdouts on rooftops, attempting to keep the inevitable siege of IDF soldiers at bay, were etched into the national collective memory. Similarly, pictures of soldiers dragging children from their homes momentarily shattered the purity of the inseparable relationship between the IDF and Israel’s citizens. Twenty-three years later, nearly identical images would have a similar effect when the army was charged with evacuating Israeli settlements in the Gaza Strip.
In a twist of fate, the general charged with carrying out the final evacuation of Yamit was none other the man who decades later would order the largest-ever evacuation of Jewish settlers, then-defense minister Ariel Sharon.
On the morning of the evacuation, hundreds of IDF troops were sent to [Yamit]. While groups such as those led by Hanegbi put up symbolic resistance to the evacuation orders, others put a more determined and physical fight. No serious injuries took place either among the holdouts or the soldiers sent to remove them, but the scene nonetheless turned ugly.
Just one day later, acting on orders from Sharon and Begin, the IDF blasted Yamit into a massive pile of rubble. The logic behind the dramatic demolition was to prevent a large Egyptian population center from sprouting on the newly delineated border. Although the peace treaty was expected to hold…there was a fear of encroachment.
The evacuation of Yamit represented two major events in the Israeli collective memory. In a historical context, it was the last action taken before Israel’s first peace treaty with an Arab state formally came into effect.… On an emotional level…the day was remembered as the first time an Israeli government uprooted its own citizens from towns it had asked and encouraged them to populate, an experience that would be traumatically repeated 23 years later.
THE LEGACY OF A TEETERING PEACE
Caroline B. Glick
Jerusalem Post, February 14, 2011
One of the first casualties of the Egyptian revolution may very well be Egypt’s peace treaty with Israel. The Egyptian public’s overwhelming animus towards Jews renders it politically impossible for any Egyptian leader to come out in support of the treaty. Over the weekend, the junta now ruling Egypt refused to explicitly commit itself to maintaining the treaty.…
Ayman Nour, the head of the oppositionist Ghad Party and the man heralded as the liberal democratic alternative to Mubarak by Washington neo-conservatives has called for the peace treaty to be abrogated. In an interview with an Egyptian radio station he said, “The Camp David Accords are finished. Egypt has to at least conduct negotiations over conditions of the agreement.”
The Muslim Brotherhood has been outspoken in its call to end the treaty since it was signed 32 years ago.
Whatever ends up happening, it is clear that Israel is entering a new era in its relations with Egypt. And before we can begin contending with its challenges, we must first consider the legacy of the peace treaty that then prime minister Menachem Begin signed with then Egyptian president Anwar Sadat on March 26, 1979.…
The peace treaty contains an entire annex devoted to specific commitments to cultivate every sort of cultural, social and economic tie imaginable. But both Sadat and his successor Mubarak breached every one of them. As the intervening 32 years since the treaty was signed have shown, in essence, the deal was nothing more than a ceasefire. Israel surrendered the entire Sinai Peninsula to Egypt and in exchange, Egypt has not staged a military attack against Israel from its territory.
The peace treaty’s critics maintain that the price Israel paid was too high and so the treaty was unjustified. They also argue that Israel set a horrible precedent for future negotiations with its neighbors by ceding the entire Sinai in exchange for the treaty. Moreover, the Palestinian autonomy agreement in the treaty was a terrible deal. And it set the framework for the disastrous Oslo peace process with the Palestinian Authority 15 years later.…
Since Israel withdrew from the Sinai in 1981, it has been the state’s consistent policy to ignore Egypt’s bad faith. This 30- year refusal of Israel’s leadership to contend with the true nature of the deal this country achieved with Egypt has had a debilitating impact both on Israel’s internal strategic discourse as well as on its international behavior.
As the US-backed demonstrators in Tahrir Square gained momentum, and the prospect that Mubarak’s regime would indeed be overthrown became increasingly likely, IDF sources began noting that the IDF and the Mossad will need to build intelligence gathering capabilities towards Egypt after 30 years of neglect. These statements make clear the debilitating impact of Israel’s self-induced strategic blindness to our neighbor in the south.…
On the international stage, our leadership’s refusal to acknowledge that Egypt had not abandoned its belligerent attitude against Israel was translated into an abject refusal to admit or deal with the fact that Egypt leads the international political war against Israel. Rather than fight back when Egyptian diplomats at the UN initiate anti-Israel resolution after anti-Israel resolution, Israeli diplomats have pretended that there is no reason for concern.…
Israel failed to consider the implications of signing a deal with a military dictator on the prospects for the deal’s longevity. In an interview with Der Spiegel last week, the Muslim Brotherhood’s puppet Mohamed ElBaradei explained those implications. As he put it, Israel has “a peace treaty with Mubarak, but not one with the Egyptian people.…”
ISRAEL AND HEZBOLLAH PREPARE FOR WAR
Asaf Romirowsky & Avi Jorisch
National Interest, April 21, 2011
Hezbollah and Israel are once again facing the void, and both parties appear to be preparing for another confrontation. According to press reports, since its 2006 hostilities with Israel, Hezbollah has amassed more than forty thousand weapons, spread out over one thousand facilities across southern Lebanon. Once again, these strongholds are reportedly situated in civilian areas.… Policymakers and analysts alike in Washington, Paris, London, Beirut, and Jerusalem are beginning to brace themselves for the spark that will light up the eastern Mediterranean.
Israel pulled out of Lebanon in May 2000…not as a result of a peace agreement, cease-fire, or informal understanding on the status of forces on the border, but as a unilateral move. Hezbollah and its supporters interpreted the withdrawal as a milestone in the organization’s development as a military and political force in Lebanon, and as a resounding victory in its struggle against the “Zionist entity.” The withdrawal was depicted as a great defeat for Israel, a sentiment shared by many Israelis. As Hezbollah often claims…this was the “first Arab victory in the history of the Arab-Israeli conflict.”
The summer of 2006 paid off for Hezbollah—and other sub-state actors across the region. Palestinians have adopted Hezbollah’s military tactics [believing they can get Israel to withdraw from the West Bank, as it did from Gaza], including the use of short-range missiles and hit-and-run operations designed to draw the IDF into combat in populated areas. This has gradually forced the IDF…to change their way of dealing with terrorist organizations.…
Hezbollah still maintains (though in muted tones) that it wishes to implement a mullatocracy modeled on the Islamic Republic of Iran.… For its part, Hamas has established the Islamist Republic of Gaza and runs it based on its founding charter, which calls for “the reinstitution of the Muslim state.… Allah is its goal, the Prophet its model, the Qur’an its Constitution, Jihad its path and death for the ca[u]se of Allah its most sublime belief.” [Hezbollah leader Hassan] Nasrallah has repeatedly used his group’s willingness to die as a strategic bulwark: “The Jews love life, so that is what we shall take away from them. We are going to win, because they love life and we love death.…”
Israel’s borders with Lebanon and Gaza have effectively become the front lines of…the Arab-Israeli conflict.… We should be prepared for the battle to continue as both Hezbollah and Israel gear up for more hostilities.
THE NEXT GAZA WAR WILL BE A COORDINATED ATTACK
Neil Snyder
American Thinker, April 15, 2011
On Thursday, April 7, an anti-tank missile fired from the Gaza Strip by a Hamas terrorist slammed into an Israeli school bus loaded with children and exploded. [One teenager] was killed, [and] the message was clear: Israeli citizens, even little children, aren’t safe anywhere. Immediately following the attack, a barrage of mortar fire from Gaza hit near Israeli towns in the Negev. Israel responded with helicopter gunships, and in short order Hamas announced that a ceasefire would go into effect.… Two days later, Hamas resumed firing rockets and mortar shells at Israel. That’s a ceasefire Hamas-style.
If you follow events in Israel closely, you recognize the routine. First Hamas engages in indiscriminate attacks on innocent Israeli civilians. Next Israel responds. Then Hamas announces a unilateral ceasefire. Soon thereafter, the attacks resume, and Israel responds. Eventually, a full-scale war breaks out. It’s as predictable as clockwork. That’s how the Gaza War of 2008-2009 began, and that’s how the next Gaza war will start—only the next Gaza war will be markedly different.
Since the end of the last Gaza War, we’ve witnessed a flurry of activity to rearm Hamas and Hezbollah. For example, in November 2009, Israel seized a ship carrying Iranian arms bound for Hezbollah on Israel’s northern border. According to Israel’s deputy naval commander, Rani Ben Yehuda, the cargo included “dozens of containers with hundreds of tons of arms.” Later reports revealed that the shipment contained more than 500 tons of weapons.
Just last week, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad admitted that he has allowed Iranian weapons to flow through Syria to Hezbollah, and Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah has made it clear repeatedly that Hezbollah will cooperate with Hamas if another Gaza war breaks out. Those weapons are needed for an attack on Israel.…
In February 2011, the resignation of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak allowed the Muslim Brotherhood to emerge from the shadows and engage openly in political activity for the first time in 57 years. Following Mubarak’s resignation, Muhammad Ghannem, a leader of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood, told the Iranian news network Al-Alam that the Egyptian people need to prepare for war with Israel. Supplying weapons to Hamas is a step in that direction. Mubarak worked with Israel to prevent weapons from flowing into Gaza though the Sinai Peninsula, but the Brotherhood’s lust for Israeli blood raises serious doubts about that arrangement as we look to the future. Egypt and Jordan are the only two Arab countries to have made peace with Israel.… As the Muslim Brotherhood gains political strength in Egypt, you can bet that it will change.
In March 2011, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad reached an agreement with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to build an Iranian naval base in Latakia, Syria’s largest port, from which Iran can operate freely in the Mediterranean Sea. Within days of the announcement, Israel intercepted a Gaza-bound ship leaving Latakia carrying Iranian weapons to Gaza. Syria is on Israel’s northeast border, and the two countries have been sparring over the Golan Heights since the end of the 1967 Six Day War. Under the dictatorial regimes of Hafez al-Assad and his son Bashar, Syria has served as field headquarters for Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, and a host of other Islamist terrorist organizations brazenly committed to Israel’s annihilation. Will they take part in the next Gaza war? With Assad’s power diminishing and Islamist groups in Syria increasing their strength, the answer is probably “yes”—if not directly as combatants, then as guerrilla fighters.…
Iran’s attempts to change the balance of power in the Middle East and North Africa by picking off one country after another is evident in Iraq, Bahrain, Yemen, Libya, and Saudi Arabia as well. President Obama’s missteps in response to Iran’s gains caused Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah to reexamine the United States’ role in the region. Rather than deferring to the U.S., Abdullah sent Saudi troops into Bahrain to help quell violence there, and, according to Martin Indyk, former special assistant to President Bill Clinton and former U.S. ambassador to Israel, the King “views President Obama as a threat to his internal security.” Moderate Arab leaders feel the same way. They have every reason to believe that President Obama will not come to their aid if they need help, but Iran stands ready to assist Islamist elements throughout the region.
We’re witnessing the fruition of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s plan to destroy Israel. His first step was to announce his intention to the world. Some mocked him, but he meant business. Next, he worked to undermine political regimes in every country in the region and to strengthen Islamist elements beholden to him. All the while, he has worked feverishly to develop Iran’s nuclear capability. Today, Israel is surrounded: Hamas in Gaza on the west, the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt on the south and southwest, Hezbollah in Lebanon on the north, a host of emerging Islamist terrorist organizations in Syria on the northeast, and on the east, a weakened monarch in Jordan attempting to restrain radical Islamists. With Ahmadinejad’s unswerving support, the only step remaining is a coordinated attack on Israel.
Given its proximity to the Tel Aviv metropolitan area, Israel’s most populous region, Gaza is the logical place for the war to begin. From southern Lebanon, Hezbollah has promised to join the fight, probably with an attack on Haifa, Israel’s third-largest metropolitan area. Syria, Egypt, and Jordan may join the fight as well, and Israel could end up fighting a war for survival on all sides, much like the Six Day War. But things have changed markedly since 1967. The U.S. is weaker in the Middle East than it has been in decades, and Islamist groups are stronger than they have ever been. There should be no doubt that the next Gaza war won’t resemble the 2008-2009 war, and it could start at any time.
(Neil Snyder taught leadership and strategy at the University of Virginia for 25 years.)
ISRAEL’S INDIVISIBLE LEGITIMACY
Caroline B. Glick
Jerusalem Post, March 18, 2011
Over the past several years, a growing number of patriotic Israelis have begun to despair. We can’t stand up to the whole world, they say. At the end of the day, we will have to give in and surrender most of the land or all of the land we took control over in the 1967 Six Day War. The world won’t accept anything less.… [However], the notion that Israel has no choice but to surrender Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem to the Palestinians is wrong and dangerous.…
The first problem with this view is that it confuses the focus of Palestinian and international attacks on Israel with the rationale behind those attacks. This is a mistake Israelis have made repeatedly since the establishment of the Fatah-led PA in 1994.
Immediately after the PA was set up and IDF forces transferred security control over Palestinian cities and towns in Judea and Samaria to Yasser Arafat’s armies, Palestinian terrorists began attacking Israeli motorists driving through PA-controlled areas with rocks, pipe bombs and bullets.
Then-prime minister and defense minister Yitzhak Rabin blamed the attacks on “friction.” If the Palestinians didn’t have contact with Israeli motorists, then they wouldn’t attack them. So Israel built the bypass roads around the Palestinian towns and cities to prevent friction.
For its efforts, the Palestinians and the international community accused Israel of building “Jews-only, apartheid roads.” Moreover, Palestinian terrorists left their towns and cities and stoned, bombed and shot at Israeli motorists on the bypass roads.
Then there was Gaza. When in 2001 Palestinians first began shelling the Israeli communities in Gaza and the Western Negev with mortars and rockets, we were told they were attacking because of Israel’s presence in Gaza. When the IDF took action to defend the country from mortar and rocket attacks, Israel was accused of committing war crimes.
[Many] said then that if Israel left Gaza, the Palestinian attacks would stop. They said that if they didn’t stop and the IDF was forced to take action, the world would support Israel.… After Israel expelled every last so-called settler and removed every last soldier from Gaza in August 2005, Palestinian rocket attacks increased tenfold. The first Katyusha was fired at Ashkelon seven months after Israel withdrew. Hamas won the elections and Gaza became an Iranian proxy. Now it has missiles capable of reaching Tel Aviv.
As for the international community, not only did it continue blaming Israel for Palestinian terrorism, it refused to accept that Israel had ended its so-called occupation of Gaza. It has condemned every step Israel has taken to defend itself from Palestinian aggression since the withdrawal.…
The lesson of these experiences is that Israeli towns and villages in Judea and Samaria are not castigated as “illegitimate” because there is anything inherently illegitimate about them. Like the bypass roads and the Israeli presence in Gaza, they are singled out because those interested in attacking Israel militarily or politically [consider them] an easy target.
The Arabs, the UN, the Obama administration, the EU, anti-Israel American and Israeli Jews, university professors and the legions of self-proclaimed human rights organizations in Israel and throughout the world allege these Israeli communities are illegitimate because by doing so they weaken Israel as a whole. [And even if] Israel…bow[ed] to these people’s demands, they will not be appeased. They will simply move on to the next easy target. Israeli Jewish communities in the Galilee and the Negev, Jaffa and Lod will be deemed illegitimate.…
So what can Israel do?
The first thing we must do is recognize that legitimacy is indivisible. In the eyes of Israel’s enemies there is no difference between Itamar and Ma’aleh Adumim on the one hand and Ramle and Tel Aviv on the other hand. And so we must make no distinction between them. Just as law abiding citizens are permitted to build homes in Ramle and Tel Aviv, so they must be permitted to build in Itamar and Ma’aleh Adumim. If Israel’s assertion of its sovereignty is legitimate in Tel Aviv, then it is legitimate in Judea and Samaria. We cannot accept that one has a different status from the other.…
Once we understand that Israel’s legitimacy is indivisible, we need to take actions that will put the Palestinians and their international supporters on the defensive.… It is hard to stand up to the massive pressure being brought to bear against Israel every day. But it is possible. And whether defying our foes is hard or easy, it is our only chance at survival. Either all of Israel is legitimate, or none of it is.
