Posted on 07/13/2014 2:17:28 PM PDT by robowombat
Netanyahu finally speaks his mind
At his Friday press conference, the prime minister ruled out full Palestinian sovereignty, derided the US approach to Israeli security, and set out his Middle East overview with unprecedented candor. His remarks were not widely reported; they should be
BY DAVID HOROVITZ TOI July 13, 2014,
These are fundamental questions — questions you’d think Israelis and the watching world would long since have been able to answer, especially given that Netanyahu is Israel’s second-longest serving prime minister ever. In fact, though, while many pundits claim to have definitive answers, most Israelis would acknowledge that they’ve never been entirely sure how Netanyahu sees a potential resolution of the Palestinian conflict, which concessions he’s truly ready to make, what his long-term vision looks like.
But now we know.
The uncertainties were swept aside on Friday afternoon, when the prime minister, for the first time in ages, gave a press conference on Day Four of Operation Protective Edge.
He spoke only in Hebrew, and we are in the middle of a mini-war, so his non-directly war-related remarks didn’t get widely reported. But those remarks should not be overlooked even in the midst of a bitter conflict with Gaza’s Islamist rulers; especially in the midst of a bitter conflict with Gaza’s Islamist rulers. The prime minister spoke his mind as rarely, if ever, before. He set out his worldview with the confidence of a leader who sees vindication in the chaos all around. He answered those fundamental questions.
Netanyahu began his appearance, typically, by reading some prepared remarks. But then, most atypically, he took a series of questions. And while he initially stuck to responses tied to the war against Hamas, its goals, and the terms under which it might be halted, he then moved — unasked — into territory he does not usually chart in public, and certainly not with such candor.
For some, his overall outlook will seem bleak and depressing; for others, savvy and pragmatic. One thing’s for sure: Nobody will ever be able to claim in the future that he didn’t tell us what he really thinks.
He made explicitly clear that he could never, ever, countenance a fully sovereign Palestinian state in the West Bank. He indicated that he sees Israel standing almost alone on the frontlines against vicious Islamic radicalism, while the rest of the as-yet free world does its best not to notice the march of extremism. And he more than intimated that he considers the current American, John Kerry-led diplomatic team to be, let’s be polite, naive.
Perhaps most reporters switched off after he’d delivered his headlines, making plain that “no international pressure will prevent us from acting with all force against a terrorist organization (Hamas) that seeks to destroy us,” and that Operation Protective Edge would go on until guaranteed calm was restored to Israel. If they did, they shouldn’t have.
Netanyahu has stressed often in the past that he doesn’t want Israel to become a binational state — implying that he favors some kind of accommodation with and separation from the Palestinians. But on Friday he made explicit that this could not extend to full Palestinian sovereignty. Why? Because, given the march of Islamic extremism across the Middle East, he said, Israel simply cannot afford to give up control over the territory immediately to its east, including the eastern border — that is, the border between Israel and Jordan, and the West Bank and Jordan.
The priority right now, Netanyahu stressed, was to “take care of Hamas.” But the wider lesson of the current escalation was that Israel had to ensure that “we don’t get another Gaza in Judea and Samaria.” Amid the current conflict, he elaborated, “I think the Israeli people understand now what I always say: that there cannot be a situation, under any agreement, in which we relinquish security control of the territory west of the River Jordan.”
Earlier this spring, Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon sparked a storm in Israel-US ties when he told a private gathering that the US-Kerry-Allen security proposals weren’t worth the paper they were written on. Netanyahu on Friday said the same, and more, in public
Not relinquishing security control west of the Jordan, it should be emphasized, means not giving a Palestinian entity full sovereignty there. It means not acceding to Mahmoud Abbas’s demands, to Barack Obama’s demands, to the international community’s demands. This is not merely demanding a demilitarized Palestine; it is insisting upon ongoing Israeli security oversight inside and at the borders of the West Bank. That sentence, quite simply, spells the end to the notion of Netanyahu consenting to the establishment of a Palestinian state. A less-than-sovereign entity? Maybe, though this will never satisfy the Palestinians or the international community. A fully sovereign Palestine? Out of the question.
He wasn’t saying that he doesn’t support a two-state solution. He was saying that it’s impossible. This was not a new, dramatic change of stance by the prime minister. It was a new, dramatic exposition of his long-held stance.
Naming both US Secretary of State John Kerry and his security adviser Gen. John Allen — who was charged by the secretary to draw up security proposals that the US argued could enable Israel to withdraw from most of the West Bank, including the Jordan Valley — Netanyahu hammered home the point: Never mind what the naive outsiders recommend, “I told John Kerry and General Allen, the Americans’ expert, ‘We live here, I live here, I know what we need to ensure the security of Israel’s people.’”
Earlier this spring, Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon sparked a storm in Israel-US ties when he told a private gathering that the US-Kerry-Allen security proposals weren’t worth the paper they were written on. Netanyahu on Friday said the same, and more, in public.
Netanyahu didn’t say he was ruling out all territorial compromise, but he did go to some lengths to highlight the danger of relinquishing what he called “adjacent territory.” He scoffed at those many experts who have argued that holding onto territory for security purposes is less critical in the modern technological era, and argued by contrast that the closer your enemies are, physically, to your borders, the more they’ll try to tunnel under those borders and fire rockets over them.
It had been a mistake for Israel to withdraw from Gaza, he added — reminding us that he’d opposed the 2005 disengagement — because Hamas had since established a terrorist bunker in the Strip. And what Hamas had been doing in Gaza — tunneling into and rocketing at the enemy — would be replicated in the West Bank were Israel so foolish as to give the Islamists the opportunity.
“If we were to pull out of Judea and Samaria, like they tell us to,” he said bitterly — leaving it to us to fill in who the many and various foolish “theys” are — “there’d be a possibility of thousands of tunnels” being dug by terrorists to attack Israel, he said. There were 1,200 tunnels dug in the 14-kilometer border strip between Egypt and Gaza alone, he almost wailed, which Egypt had sealed. “At present we have a problem with the territory called Gaza,” the prime minister said. But the West Bank is 20 times the size of Gaza. Israel, he said flatly, was not prepared “to create another 20 Gazas” in the West Bank.
Beyond Israel’s direct current confrontation with Hamas, and the eternal Palestinian conflict, Netanyahu also addressed the rise of Islamic extremism across the Middle East — covering the incapacity of affected states to resist it, and Israel’s unique determination and capacity to stand firm. He said Israel finds itself in a region “that is being seized by Islamic extremism. It is bringing down countries, many countries. It is knocking on our door, in the north and south.”
But while other states were collapsing, said Netanyahu, Israel was not — because of the strength of its leadership, its army and its people. “We will defend ourselves on every front, defensively and offensively,” he vowed.
And in a passage that was primarily directed at Israel’s Islamist enemies, but might equally be internalized by those he plainly regards as Israel’s muddle-headed self-styled friends, he added: “Nobody should mess with us.”
BB is a joke. A Liar and a weak coward. He always talks the talk but never walks the walk.
Notice not one word about Jewish rights to Y&S and Gaza!!!
Not one word that even if Abbas were a Zionist TZADDIK (Saint) he is over 80 years old with a bad ticker. Any successor would have even less influence than he does and he has next to Zero among the Palis Arabs.
From BB not a word. BB said he was against the Gaza pullout. He is a liar he was for it till it became clear that it was a done deal and cynically quit the government to prepare for the coming elections.
It was BB he caved to Obama in 2012 and quit the last Gaza confrontation with Israel with Hamas getting the better deal against Israel through Morsi and Obama interference.
It is BB who has allowed Hamas to arm itself with 10,000 plus rockets To build miles of interconnecting underground tunnels from Gaza into Israel for infiltrating terrorists and for kidnapping Israelis and soldiers.
Israel under BB allowed them. Israel under BB supplied them with the metal tubing and pipes used to build the rockets, the fuel and the raw material for explosives. Israel supplied the Arabs with cement and Re-bar for the tunnels and electricity and water to operate their underground factories in secure bunkers.
It was BB who when the IDF attacked Israel responded by shooting at empty lots and buildings at hours they knew no one would be injured.
In short this situation can be laid almost completely to BB the liar and coward. The sooner he is removed from public office and replaced by almost any one else, the safer we will all be.
Unlike anyone new BB has a record of near zero accomplishments.
I stand by everything I have said which is only the tip of the iceberg of my criticism and disdain for the creep.
I’m glad they’re not taking that Clown Kerry seriously. And he talks about Obama as though he’s no better than the Hamas leadership, which is probably true.
Amen!
He has a responsibility.
What he might want to do as a general, is not the same as what he must do as the PM.
But the time is coming where restraint is no longer feasible and the results for all are going to be horrendous.
It appears there are a lot of people around Israel who want to die for their cause.
They’ll get the chance.
what’s the Hebrew word for asshole ?
B. Netanyahu is walking a tightrope. He has to. I don’t doubt, for example, that he’d love to destroy Hamas, but Israel is pretty much alone in the world against the Palestinians now that the pro-terrorist, er...pro-Muslim, Obama administration is running America. Security guarantees from the US and EU are worthless. Yet, B Netanyahu cannot afford to intentionally antagonize the US and EU to the point where we overtly take the Palestinian side (more than we already do).
Netanyahu has made it clear to anyone who wanted to know
fascinating. Thanks so much for posting...
While Bibi is far from perfect, he’s on the right side and we (Obama) are not. I prefer him to our leader and we mostly let the good or decent be an enemy of our perfect. We will never get perfect in a human.
I think you should have pointed your criticism at the Administration and John Kerry, for trying to get Israel to negotiate with the Palestinians WHILE THEY, THE PALESTINIANS under any name, REFUSE TO ACKNOWLEDGE ISRAEL AS A STATE.
We had no business initiating or participating in negotiations with that Palestinian premise on the table.
I think this article made it clear where BB stands on Israel’s sovereignty.
This is not my criticism. It is a comment from an Israeli.I think that is clear, or I hope it is, from the introduction lines that are mine. It is not a denunciation to state that many rightist Israelis do view BB as many here view the current Governor of Texas, Mr. Perry.
It is impossible. There will never be an independent arab west bank. Separate from Jordan, separate from Israel, it has no industry, no economy that isn't based on terrorism and foreign support, no source of employment besides Israel itself, no market for its products besides Israel itself... if it had any products to sell besides murder and the threat of murder.
Energy wasted on an independent west bank is energy diverted from something that would work, it merely stretches out the misery and ensures the death of more innocent Israelis and more deluded arabs.
The arabs in leadership did not come to the west bank or Gaza to be backwater mayors and city councilmen, and they didn't come there to worry about storm drains and street paving. They are there to make war. It is only war, the threat of war, the promise to refrain from war, followed by more war and threats and promises, that keeps the money flowing and keeps them relevant.
They can never stop the war because the day they do is the day they lose the source of their power.
The only peace in the middle east is the peace within Israel's well-guarded borders. The rest is chaos and thinly disguised barbarity.
Until recently Hamas was part of the unity government. Who knows how far they have their fingers into the PNA.
This should be interesting.........Just who in the Israeli government would you prefer as a replacement for Netanyahu?
Netanyahu finally speaks his mind
The Times of Israel | 7/13/2014 | DAVID HOROVITZ
Posted on 7/13/2014 12:30:57 PM by Former Fetus
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3179650/posts
Kindly read the the beginning of the comment. I specifically state that the text is from an Israeli remarking on BB’s remarks, not me. I only note that many rightist Israelis (and I think this is the third time I have reiterated the context) have as hostile feelings about Netanyahu as many here have towards Gov. Perry for what they see as the same reasons’ i.e. all hat and no cattle. I am not endorsing the comment . it is provided to give readers some more background. The anger patriotically inclined people in many western democracies feel towards their leaders mirrors what we in the United States feel. Of these leaders, IMHO, Netanyahu seems to be several heads taller, certainly he towers over the Mahdi and that porcine little twerp Hollonde.
Posting the comment seems like an endorsement to me.
Sorry. Couldn’t get past their paywall.
...”The only peace in the middle east is the peace within Israel’s well-guarded borders. The rest is chaos and thinly disguised barbarity”....
Yes.
... And that will not be long lasting if the Arabs have anything to say about it..and you can be certain in time they will. Doesn’t matter if it’s terroist groups as Hamas or any other....they are all of the same cloth and how they see Israel is the same.
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