This cartoon and the following article appeared in Canada’s National Post.
Obama doesn’t get the arithmetic of the Israel-Palestine situation
By George Jonas
About 10 years ago, when the spiritual leader of Hamas, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, was still with us, he gave an interview to freelance photo-journalist Flore de Préneuf. Unlike the Palestinian Liberation Organization’s cagey Yasser Arafat, whose shtick was his forked tongue, Yassin preferred speaking in plain language. “Hamas was established to resist and kick out the occupier,” he told de Préneuf. “All of Israel, Tel Aviv included, is occupied Palestine.”
Ten years later, Yessin is dead, and so is Arafat. Many of my colleagues see a fundamental change in the Middle East. Maybe it’s my glasses, but I see nothing.
I’m squinting, trying to refocus, but far from seeing anything fundamental, I don’t even see very much cosmetic. The Middle East continues to be the Middle East, and the West continues to be the West.
The Middle East has no difficulty understanding that if (a) your war aim is not to have a Jewish state in your region, which has been the Arab/Muslim aim all along, then (b) making peace with a Jewish state next door, on whatever terms, means (c) defeat. Nor does the Middle East have any difficulty understanding that if (a) your war aim is to establish and defend a Jewish State, which has been the Israeli war aim from the beginning, then (b) achieving peace with neighbours who oppose it, on almost any terms, spells (c) victory.
The formula, then, is A+B=C in both cases. The only exception is “peace” terms that would undermine the existence of the Jewish State.
To repeat the same thing in different words: Peace amounts to an Israeli victory, except on terms that render the country geographically or demographically indefensible. This means that the Palestinians will insist on such terms, and Israel will not agree to them.
Let the U.S. president who brokers the deal be Old Bush, Zipper Clinton, Young Bush, or Irish O’Bama (as America’s Commander-in-Chief prefers to be called this week). A+B=C whether Israel is led by Netanyahu the Hawk, Barak the Dove, Livni the Pixie, or the poltergeist of Golda Meir. Two-state solution? By all means. 1967 borders? No can do.
How come Obama doesn’t see this? Maybe he does. We know what he says, not what he thinks. After all, the whole process has been a charade even before him.
Just how much of a charade is illustrated by one-time Soviet dissident Natan Sharansky’s anecdote about an earlier round of Palestinian-Israeli negotiations at Wye River in which he participated as an Israeli delegate. Apparently a moment came when Sharansky and his colleagues managed to extract a promise from Arafat to delete from the Palestinian Charter the sections calling for the destruction of Israel.
“Upon leaving the conference room,” Sharansky recalled in a nostalgia-piece he wrote for Ha’Aretz newspaper some years ago, “we saw one of the closest advisors of president Bill Clinton and proudly told him about our achievement. ‘Are you out of your minds?’ he shouted. ‘[Arafat] is going to be killed because of that. He is too weak for dramatic steps like that. First, he has to be strengthened!’”
This sums up the sham peace initiatives of the last 20 years. Arafat probably had no intention of excising any section calling for Israel’s destruction from the Palestinian Charter. He had made half-hearted promises to do so long before Wye River and nothing came of them. He knew that understanding souls in the U.S. State Department would exempt him from having to go out on any such limb until he was suitably “strengthened.” But — and here’s the point — in the unlikely event that Arafat had actually made an attempt to remove the clause, he might well have been killed, just like Egypt’s Anwar Sadat.
A con artist of some accomplishment, Arafat was prepared to accept down payments from Sharansky and colleagues on the Brooklyn Bridge: A package called “peace” that he had no intention of delivering, and that wasn’t his to deliver anyway. Arafat had no title to peace — and Israel’s current negotiating partner, Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud “Abu Mazen” Abbas, has even less.
A lot of water had flown down Wye River since the last round of negotiations, and things have changed “not necessarily to Israel’s advantage” (to paraphrase the immortal words of the Japanese Emperor after Hiroshima and Nagasaki). At Wye River, Hamas was an outlaw; now it’s Abbas’ in-law. Then, the U.S. President was Israel’s ally; now it’s Barack Obama.
The President’s suggestion that the two-state solution be based on Israel’s 1967 borders made Israel’s Prime Minister lose his cool. Having turned “Bibi” Netanyahu into “Booboo” Netanyahu, Obama addressed AIPAC (American Israeli Public Affairs Committee) to suggest that he never suggested what he suggested. This caused AIPAC director Howard Kohr to suggest this week that “If Israel’s foes come to believe that there is diplomatic daylight between the United States and Israel, they will have every incentive to try to exploit those differences and shun peace with the Jewish state.” Right. And closing the barn door after the horse has bolted beats never closing it, I guess.
“Deutsch Costabel says:
May 26, 2011 at 5:32 pm
I have very little faith in the American Jewry, what a ignorant people, with their phd, masters and all their education, they voted for an anti-semite.
and will do it again. Remember “Judenrath” in EUROPE, they betrayed their on people and than were murdered anyhow.
Learn from History!
A Holocaust survivor”
I am not a holocaust survivor, but have spoken to many who recently escaped the holocaust. They all agreed that it could happen again, in America, and happen quickly. The German Jews refused to believe the horror that was to happen. This was in spite of world famous scientists and writers. Same in America. It is not enough to be an intellectual or a professor. I was a professor in Ben Gurion U, Israel, but fired because I opposed socialism. Nazism started out as socialism. Too many very smart people are irrational. See the new book, Rational Thinking, Government Policies, Science, and Living. Rational thinking starts with clearly stated principles, continues with logical deductions, and then examines empirical evidence to possibly modify the principles. Read this book to help understand the terrible problems we face today.
Not all of us Eva…..Far too many, but not all. I’ll be that there’ll some
changes this time around.
I have very little faith in the American Jewry, what a ignorant people, with their phd, masters and all their education, they voted for an anti-semite.
and will do it again. Remember “Judenrath” in EUROPE, they betrayed their on people and than were murdered anyhow.
Learn from History!
A Holocaust survivor
Dave Grossman: I don’t think so. Europe is like a big moth trapped in a small spider web. She is being wrapped in silk, and
shortly will have her juices sucked out and be left a dry and empty bag. Don’t expect anything good out of people who have
layed down their pride, their arms, and the ownership and love of their own nations. The muslims will own them soon. If there is any mass migration from Europe to the mideast, it will be the Home Folks begging Israel for entry.
Here’s a prediction for the future say by 2025. Europe will be in civil turmoil due to islam. They will embrase neo imperialism and deport millions of muslims back to their native lands of origin. Europe will be damm glad to have fortress Israel guarding the eastern mediteranian sea as they perform this massive operation to save europe from islam.
😉 🙂
ME
Give Him heck, yamit.
robinfox2012 says:
anti-Christ? Heh, that’s me. 😛
That’s because, faulty as he is, Netanyahu’s recognition system doesn’t take into account christian mythology.
I would have said we’ll go back to 67 borders when we get back alive all our brave young men and women who died in 48, 56, 67 and 73 etc.
I JUST LOVE THIS CARTOON! SO TRUE!
I APPLAUD THE CARTOONIST!
ABOMINATION OF “DESOLATION!” Ever wonder why global weather patterns have gotten worse since Obamaination became president?
Netanyahu might not have recognized the anti-Christ sitting right in front of him. This entity that is Obama is clearly an anti-Christ/anti-Israel sock puppet – an anti-Christ crash test dummy.
I applaud the Prime Minister for holding fast. He needs to be a lot toughter though because the planned destruction of the State of Israel by the devil and the devil’s accomplices, like Obama is moving closer towards their goals of not just Israel’s destruction, but the world’s destruction.
With the HAARP WEAPON now in the hands of Russians and Chinese, the world is being destroyed.
What Netanyahu should say is that Israel will not give up any more land until Obama gives up his seat.