Posted on 12/06/2017 9:41:21 PM PST by Oshkalaboomboom
President Trump's son-in-law and designated Middle East peace envoy, Jared Kushner, told the Brookings Institution's Saban Forum last weekend that a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians is key to solving larger goals, such as stopping Iranian aggression and Islamic extremism.
If he believes that, he has fallen into the trap numerous and more seasoned diplomats have experienced.
The most obvious impediment to peace in the region is a religious one. A visceral hatred of Jews is promoted in Palestinian media and many mosques and schools throughout the region. The destruction of Israel and elimination of Jews from land that has been historically and legitimately theirs for thousands of years is their goal. Radical Islamists believe Allah has ordered it. Why would they risk perdition by violating his command?
Duplicity and deception are the coin of the realm in the Middle East. It is why many Palestinian leaders say one thing to the West and another to their own people.
Here is one of many examples, which contradicts what Palestinian leaders say to Western ears. In a 2013 interview on Syrian TV, Abbas Zaki, a close associate of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, said the Palestinian Authority would not enter into any peace agreement with Israel unless it includes Israel's withdrawal to indefensible 1967 borders. Zaki stated: "Even the most extreme among us, Hamas, or the fighting forces, want a state within the '67 borders. Afterward, we [will] have something to say, because the inspiring idea cannot be achieved all at once. [Rather] in stages."
In other words, incremental steps toward a shared goal: the elimination of the Jewish state, which Iranian mullahs have described as a "cancer" in the Middle East.
Does this sound like the language of people who wish to live in a peaceful state adjacent to Israel? A person not deceived by the mirage of a Middle East peace agreement should consider the numerous and unreciprocated concessions Israel has already made to advance the "peace process," which seems more like a war process from the Arab and Palestinian perspective.
This is all about increasing pressure on Israel to "do more," as if Israel were the one advocating genocide. Many Palestinian and Arab leaders hate Israel (and Jews) not for what they do or don't do, but because they exist. If Mr. Kushner believes he can be a peace broker without understanding and accepting this basic fact, he is bound to end up like all the others who have inserted themselves into the region.
What is the answer, if there is one?
Writing in the Israeli publication, Al-Monitor, following President Trump's visit to Saudi Arabia in May, columnist Akia Eldar says: "...(an) American president may be able to bring the sides to the table, if he is lucky, but they will only eat what is on it if they are dying of hunger. He would have realized that the hunger for peace only comes after the thirst for blood is quenched."
Isn't that what happened when Egyptian President Anwar Sadat decided enough blood had been spilled and made peace with Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin?
As unlikely as it might seem, perhaps the road to settlement and stability might go through Riyadh. While Saudi Arabia has been a principal exporter of an extremist view of Islam through its media, funding mosques in Western countries and textbooks for school children that promote anti-Semitism, Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has said he wants a return to a more "moderate Islam" that allows for peaceful co-existence with other religions and the world.
One eagerly awaits such a transforming message within Islam, but will other Islamic countries who also hate Jews and Israel accept this move toward peaceful co-existence when, and if, it comes?
Does Jared Kushner fully understand what he has gotten himself into?
The Thursday or Friday before the General election in 2018, Mueller will indict Jared, and Trump will be completely surprised.
After all, Ty Cobb said it might end before Thanksgiving...
It will have to happen before that.
Even some of the Leftist rags are now calling for Mueller to either step down or end this.
I don’t think there’s a prayer he’ll continue this beyond the end of January.
Hey, I’ve been wrong before, but from what I’ve been hearing, I don’t think he’s got an open end on this
Congress is now beginning to look at him. Yikes.
He better wake up and smell the smoke signals others are sending up.
put down the bong...
“Jared Kushner, told the Brookings Institution’s Saban Forum last weekend that a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians is key to solving larger goals, such as stopping Iranian aggression and Islamic extremism”
This presupposes that the moslem world is doing what they are doing BECAUSE of Israel. Israel isn’t the -reason- it’s the excuse. And the islamists must always have an excuse, because they are brutal dictators and need an external enemy or people would expect freedom and prosperity.
And Jared... in touch with the leftist Brookings Institute. That alone says a lot.
I would completely disagree with Cal Thomas here. The Israelis have made all, every one of the concessions to date and have gained nothing. There is no difference between whatever peril they face from 20 years ago, to today. Except their wall. If anything, the coalescence of worldwide anti-Semitism has grown and metastasized since our former president made it seem OK. Meanwhile, the Palis have been appeased at every stage, and now the world apparently needs to appease them further to prevent the kind of violence they are capable of. At a moments notice. Over anything. Such wonderful people to grant statehood, no? Ready to riot over any perceived slight? Pay stipends to those who kill Jews?
The Palis need to come to the understanding that they have something to lose, because they have lost nothing. They have no particular claim to Jerusalem, it’s not mentioned in the Koran. The ancient Jewish sites that have come under their control have consistently been destroyed or desecrated. But that’s OK, see, because the world understands them to be freedom fighters. Never mind that there is astonishingly little freedom in any Arab society.
“put down the bong...”
If you think this will end before the Election....you need a Blunt.
Cal basically says that the Arab world, or more accurately the Muslim countries do not want peace with Israel. That peace could only be a possibility if the Muslims suffered more bloodshed than they can tolerate. Much like what had finally brought Sadat to seek peace with Israel. Sans that, anything offered will result in a short lived peace with Israel until Islam is the only religion standing in the region.
At the same time though they are invading other non Muslim nations where they are receiving little to no resistance in eliminating other religions in those lands since most have abandoned religion for secularism. Mainly because they smugly believe that nothing can overtake their sacred secularism.
Lots of a parallels going on.
Funny u wrote this. Many people don’t understand that all that land, all of it was Coptic Christian prior to Muslims taking over, including 500 YEARS in Spain until Isabella expelled them. Much of my family and your families don’t know that that land was all Christian prior to the Muslim take over. Sadly, looking at Europe today, It almost or really is, looking like they just want to give all their land, culture religion over to Muslims.
In Spain it was actually 700 years. As I look out my window or sit out on the terrace I can see 3 rocks jutting out into the Mediterranean. A millennia ago they marked the entrance to the town harbor. At the base of the first rock is a bronze statue of Umayyad Abd ar-Rahman I of Damascus, the founder of the Emirate of Cordoba, who arrived from North Africa to establish his Moorish kingdom in 755. At the top of the same rock is a large cross that was put there to commemorate the surrender and expulsion of the Moors from that same harbor in 1489. The palace they left behind, the Alhambra, was taken over by Ferdinand and Isabella and it was from there that they authorized funds for an expedition by Christopher Columbus.
The reason I would disagree with you here is that there is no level of Bloodshed that the Palestinians cannot tolerate. Relative to the loss of any piece of land. If 20 or 50 or a couple hundred rioters are killed as a result of these riots, they have shown that this is nothing that they are not willing to expend. It does not register on the same scale with them as the loss of land. And like it or not, to them this is a loss of land. And Justified or not, this appears as a loss of a piece of Holy Land. Now the importance of this move is important in a longer-term historical context because they may or they may not come to realize that their behavior engenders the loss of land, and that is the only equation that they will ultimately weigh in the manner that you are I would weigh some sort of sacrifice. The loss of a few dozen youths to them isn’t anything.
Cal lives deep down in the rut.
With Jerusalem now the acknowledged capital of Israel, President Trump has destroyed the status quo and created a totally new game.
Those agin the new game have tons of careers totally dependent on the status quo ante. All those with all that knowledge are now obsolete.
There is no Palestinian conflict now. The Palestinians have lost
Although the various Arab allies have protested, they will not act to force a reversal. They are pleased the Palestinian thorn is removed.
Pee wee Kushner needs to take his libtard wife and go back to NYC. I’m sick of watching her try to upstage Melania and he hasn’t got a clue.
I think when millions end up dead they may rethink their position.
Kushner strongly supported the announcement so who knows how much influence he had on the timing?
What do they have to lose?
Land. They regard land as inviolate once they claim it. Now any rational being would understand that not one stone in Jerusalem will be changed as a result of simply designating it as Israel’s capital. Nothing will change wrt borders, etc;
I once had lunch with a Palestinian fellow, about my age. We were at a realtor meeting and ate at a hamburger joint. (What was funny was that the cash register receipt had the clerk’s name which was Jesus (Hay-Soos in espanol) and I joked that Jesus was selling us hamburgers.)
While I did not want to get into argumentation with him over all the standard irritations and gripes because we were getting along fine and it was a quasi-professional type of meeting we (and many others) were at, he *did* happen to mention that Jerusalem was a top-level deal for the Palis. Top-top. I didn’t understand it then and I don’t particularly pretend to understand it now, but I’m just saying that he mentioned it and I could not get any explanation other then “it just is”. Ultimately, I think it is their “mini-Mecca”. It is not so much that for other Arabs, but for the Palis, it is among the biggest of big deals.
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