The hard truth about Tom Friedman
By Reuven Koret April 8, 2002
Israel will be to blame for undermining U.S. anti-terror policy unless it does what Tom Friedman says. In "The Hard Truth," the New York Times columnist writes: "Ariel Sharon's operation will succeed only if it is designed to make the Israeli-occupied territories safe for Israel to leave as soon as possible. Israel's goal must be a withdrawal from these areas captured in the 1967 war; otherwise it will never know a day's peace, and it will undermine every legitimate U.S. effort to fight terrorism around the globe.
Perhaps Friedman is stung that his previous attempt at armchair statecraft, "suggesting" the "Saudi Plan" to the Crown Prince, Emir Abdullah, didn't turn out the way he hoped. The Saudis, he assured us, weren't going to insist on the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes in Israel. They would oppose terrorism. They would propose normal relations.
Those were neither the words nor the music coming from Beirut. The message of those few Arab leaders who showed up was threatening: if the Israelis do not give in to our demands, in advance and without negotiation, we will boycott Israel, make war on it, and oppose the American anti-terror effort. The Arab leaders made it clear that suicide attacks against Jews at religious ceremonies or restaurants or in the streets did not fit their definition of terrorism.
Since those Arab leaders present included all of the Arab and Islamic dictatorships in the Bush "Axis of Terror," this should not be surprising. And yet the Saudi Ultimatum now, surprisingly, forms the basis of the new Bush peace initiative. So perhaps Tom's suggestion was not unsuccessful after all. Or that he was merely the messenger boy to make palatable to the American public an Administration-initiated gambit to impose on Israel an Arab- backed ultimatum to drive it back to the 1948 armistice lines.
Friedman is certainly correct when he says "the Palestinians cannot, at this moment, be trusted to run those territories on their own, without making them a base of future operations against Israel. That means some outside power has to come in to secure the borders." He cites a Jewish critic of Israel as saying: "The only solution is a new U.N. mandate for U.S. and NATO troops to supervise the gradual emergence of a Palestinian state - after a phased Israeli withdrawal - and then to control its borders." No prominent Israelis, save a few former ministers of the defeated former government, endorse this. Why? Because it would enable Palestine, protected behind secure borders, to become a base of operations against Israel!
Israel, battered by seemingly unstoppable terrorism, would be compelled to accept foreign forces, compelled to surrender control over its borders and its sovereignty. When the inevitable cross-border terror attacks come, Israeli forces will encounter those of the U.S. or NATO. And that's not all. The foreign troops and observers will need places in which to stay, bases in which to train. Guess where? Where else but Israeli settlements, and the West Bank bases of the IDF? The move will be gradual, and sugarcoated, portrayed as in Israel's long-term strategic interest to have a strong American base in the Eastern Med.
But, as Friedman suggests, protecting Israel is not be the function of these forces. To avoid being seen as Zionist agents, U.S. of NATO troops must serve as "the midwife of a Palestinian state and supervise a return of Muslim sovereignty over the holy mosques in Jerusalem." They would deter Israeli retaliation for attacks and defend Palestine from Israel.
Tom Friedman is what has been traditionally called a "Court Jew," a prominent Jewish figure serving the interests of the governing power. That is, of course, his right as a loyal American. And the privileged position he enjoys as mouthpiece and messenger for the State Department is the reason we need to take Friedman's "ultimatum" seriously. He is privy to the plans of the New World Order. He can "pass" where other Jews cannot: within the borders of Saudi, to be used by their potentates, too. He dutifully leaks what they want us to hear, which is this: Unless it obeys the Order, Israel will be blamed for no less than the Clash of Civilizations. Israel will be blamed for future acts of Islamic terrorism against U.S. and Western interests. Israel will even be blamed for acts of terrorism against Israel itself. It is already happening.
Friedman's proposal for an international "midwife" for the State of Palestine presages the new American Mideast policy. The continuing ambiguities and zigzags in Administration policy only make sense in light of American interest in buying alliances with "moderate" Arab states. Delivering the head of Israel on a platter is the price of tacitly allowing an Iraq attack. If the U.S. is left as Israel's last remaining ally in the world, it has the leverage to force the Jewish state out of the West Bank, Gaza and, make no mistake about it, East Jerusalem.
The Palestinians rejected the Barak and Clinton proposal. The Saudi ultimatum is more far-reaching. The goal is an outcome resembling the 1947 UN Partition plan, which the Arabs rejected, with Jerusalem, both eastern and western parts of the city, defined as international zones protected by the U.S., NATO, the UN and/or the Vatican. The plan envisions the Old City of Jerusalem becoming an international "city of peace."
If we take Friedman's immodest proposal as a precursor of U.S. policy, the about-face of the Administration becomes understandable. Neither the Bush Administration nor the Europeans want the Israeli anti-terror campaign to succeed. Success would prove that Israel is correct in arguing that military solutions, not political concessions, are the way to fight terror. When terrorists are on the run, their ability to launch attacks is reduced. That is a lesson the Americans learned in fighting al-Qaida.
What America allows itself in its war against terrorism, it does not permit to Israel, even if their enemies are the same. Al-Qaida itself is operating in the West Bank and in Lebanon. Five of the factions in the PLO are on the State Department list of terrorist groups. Arafat is directing, supporting and funding terrorism. Indeed, he is the godfather of terrorism. Syria, Iran, Iraq, and Libya are terror states that support the Saudi "peace plan." But these are hard facts that Friedman, and those who think like him, must deflect.
Instead, Friedman blames fellow citizens who dare to disagree with him: "The other people who have not wanted to face facts are the feckless American Jewish leaders, fundamentalist Christians and neo-conservatives who together have helped make it impossible for anyone in the U.S. administration to talk seriously about halting Israeli settlement-building without being accused of being anti- Israel. Their collaboration has helped prolong a colonial Israeli occupation that now threatens the entire Zionist enterprise."
Friedman is disingenuous when he argues that "settlement-building" or "occupation" on the West Bank and Gaza is really the problem. He knows that the issue obsessing the Arabs is Jewish settlement in Haifa and Tel Aviv and West Jerusalem, all of which the vast majority of Arabs consider part of "occupied Palestine." The absurd threat of "peace or else" and the Orwellian twisting of the definition of terrorism that came out of the Arab summit in Beirut confirmed that phased destruction of Israel remains the pan-Arab plan: no Zionist enterprise, no Israel of any size, will ever be permanently acceptable. No piece of paper will cause an "end of conflict" or "normalize" the hatred of Israel or America in the Arab world. U.S. wavering in the face of intense pressure by terror-supporting and terror-appeasing states will only encourage the jihad against the Jewish state, subverting America's anti-terror policy.
What Friedman proposes, in the guise of protecting Israel (from itself), is the United States emasculating into a protectorate the only terror-fighting state in the region, making it hopelessly dependent on the armed forces of America and the good will of the Arabs. If the U.S. prevents Israel's army from defending its citizens by rooting out terrorists and terror bases, or if it forces Israel to accept indefensible borders or surrender the core of its eternal capital, it would mean, tragically, that America is embracing the Pan-Arab plan to end Jewish sovereignty in stages, starting with a forced march to the 1947-8 borders.
The hard truth is that embracing the Pan-Arab Plan, and midwifing the birth of a hostile state of Palestine, means that the U.S. has decided to offer up the Jewish State as a sacrifice to appease the terrorists, their supporters, and their appeasers. That, to quote and to characterize Tom Friedman, would be "feckless … collaboration."
The alternative is the one Israel is pursuing: fighting the terrorists, protecting its citizens, and -- at a time when Jew- hatred is once against rampant worldwide -- defending its isolated and embattled homeland. A true friend would understand and support that. A false friend would distance himself and impose an ultimatum. The truth isn't hard to see. If you want to see it.
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