Posted on 01/07/2006 3:05:29 PM PST by avile
Whither Israel I received this email from Ziv, a Princeton grad, who now lives in Israel, --------------------------------------------------- On Friday morning, the shoppers at the corner grocery in Jerusalem were vigorously debating politics. This is par for the course in Israel, between selecting cucumbers and bananas. The severe stroke suffered by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was, not surprisingly, the only topic of discussion. One shopper predicted that Sharon’s deputy and now acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert would take the reigns of the newly created Kadima party and lead it to victory in the elections just as surely as Sharon would have. Another man vociferously disagreed, arguing that the politicians in Kadima would now scatter, each returning to his or her old political base. “Everything will go back to what it was. In the elections, Likud will again confront the Alignment,” he proclaimed, subconsciously slipping back into calling the Israeli Labor Party by the name it had twenty-five years ago.
There is much confusion and uncertainty in Israeli politics and amongst the general public. After several years of ossified slumber, the political system suffered a series of jolts in the autumn and early winter – Amir Peretz shocked the nation by taking the leadership of Labor, then Sharon shook everything up by creating an instant party that drew leading politicians away from the Likud and Labor and grabbed a huge lead in the polls. And then the likelihood that Sharon will be leaving the political stage forever threw everything back into turmoil.
This is an incredible moment of political fluidity.
A friend of mine here has for a long time filled a job application sheet for a particular position, only to find himself unable to affix a postage stamp to the envelope, because the job would require him to maintain close contact with an organization whose opinions were far to the right. He recently finally managed to bring himself to ship off the application. “Nobody knows what right or left mean any more,” he told me in explanation.
Over 150 years ago, it used to be said about Prussia that although most countries have armies, in Prussia the army has a country. Over the past thirty or more years in Israel, it seemed as if, in contrast to most countries, which have policy issues with which they must deal, in Israel a policy issue had a country. From the first few days after the shock of Israel’s surprisingly swift victory in the Six Day War settled in, there was only one question that counted in Israeli politics: ‘what to with the territories’. Everything was measured in relation to that question.
If you believed the entire land was promised to the Jewish people and should be filled with Jewish settlements endlessly until the demographic balance was completely altered forever, you were on the right end of the political spectrum. If you believed that Israel should negotiate an accord that would immediately dismantle every last settlement and return the borders to what they had been on June 5, 1967, you were on the otherend of the spectrum. Every other permutation placed you somewhere along a rough line from one pole to the other. Whatever opinions you might have had about, the economy, or social policy, or any other matter, was largely irrelevant.
Doubtless there are individuals in the settlement movement, in Yossi Beilin’s Meretz party, who still insist that the old categories of left and right are as important as ever. But most Israelis, apparently, feel that these distinctions are slipping away. They know we won’t go back to the situation of the seventies, when Israelis flocked every weekend to the Arab markets of Bethlehem and Ramallah, Palestinian labourers worked from morning to night in every Israeli city and hamlet, and even Shimon Peres was a champion of the settlers. Nor will the euphoria of the immediate post-Oslo agreement, when many believed a new Middle East might dawn, return any time soon. The suicide bombers made sure of that.
At the same time, the public approval Sharon maintained after the trauma of last summer’s disengagement from the Gaza Strip indicated that the old dreams of the right are very far from being popular in middle Israel.
The disengagement and the security fence snaking its way through Judea and Samaria have taken on symbolic importance beyond their immediate practical import. About 15 years ago, Yossi Alpher, a strategic analyst, noted that nearly 90% of Israeli settlers lived on about 10% of Judea and Samaria, and rather near to the old Green Line. Whether by design or a step-by-step improvisation, the policy that Sharon has constructed over the past three years has remarkably resembled a practical, 90-10 solution a la the Alpher map. And a large number of Israelis said they would vote for Sharon’s party because they liked it. It is a policy that says, absent a Palestinian partner with whom we can negotiate, we will draw a line – or in this case a security fence – in the sand. The fence will sometimes hug the old border, and sometimes extend out to include 90% of the settlers. We will disengage – meaning remove settlements – from some areas.
There won’t be a comprehensive peace agreement, only conflict containment for a generation. We don’t want to determine the lives of millions of Palestinian Arabs. They won’t work or even visit on our side of the fence. We won’t go there. They can do what they want over there, create a Middle East Switzerland or, as is actually happening now in the Gaza Strip, sink into lawless anarchy. We don’t care. The answer to that old question ‘what will we do with the territories’ is – we’ll ignore them.
The only problem with this is that lots of people on the other side of the fence don’t want to be ignored. Rockets are still being fired from Gaza to Sderot and very near Ashkelon, in Israel. Hamas is mounting a serious campaign for taking over the Palestinian Authority. Huge weapons caches are being smuggled daily along the Egyptian-Palestinian border.
The realignment of political parties and daily political dramas may soon be a luxury that cannot continue forever. Maybe Olmert will be able to hold Kadima together and continue Sharon's plans. But a lot of Israelis are likely to miss the old Ariel Sharon.
Posted by Ted Belman at January 7, 2006 12:11 PM
All the Israelis need to do for peace is to become a Normal people and throw out the vestiges of Judaism and the world will love them and anti semitism will disappear.
They should take away the ultra orthodox children from their parents, cut off their payot give them non kosher food blow cigarette smoke into their faces on Shabbat, tell them that their parents are medieval and deny their parents jobs if they send their kids to religious schools. Then use the power of the media to complain of religious coercion.
Hey it worked for the Yemenites. They are now a NORMAL people.
Next get rid of any vestiges of Judaism from pop culture. We need to copy and Hebricize American high culture like Britney Spears. Except she is too modest for us .Too be a Normal people we need our pop singers to be even more revealing and her music is too complex. So what if in the galut we produced Mendelson, Mahler and Shonberg- we need NORMAL music- we need DANA INTERNATIONAL!
Next we need to be righteous . we need to show the Palestinians we can be friends. Lets get out of the territories and give them enough money to match our standard of living. If we do the same for our Palis in pre-67 Israel they will love us and not only become the most loyal of citizens they will be "more Israeli than the Israelis" .In fact the next generation of officer corps will be Palis!
After all that is done at least 2 million American Reform Jews will make aliyah.
Because their Jewish commitment is so strong , they have been itching to move here but have been holding back because we were not righteous enough. Once we show them that we are they WILL COME!
Next all the hiloni yordim (1 million) will return!
NOT!
The morons who think they can hide behind a fence will soon have their eyes opened for them. While the majority of Israeli's don't want to control the lives of these Arabs, they're living in a fools paradise if they think they can wall themselves off. The world will continue to make demands, the Arabs will be allowed in, and the terrorism will continue. The solution is either to allow Israel to be destroyed and the Jews exterminated, or for the Jews to finally stand up and do what it right.
And that is ?...
What the Torah tells them to do. Terrorists, and those who support them, must be exterminated. Being an American, as I am, I would hope that you remember 9/11 and that you agree.
For starters, advertise the following in major papers throughout America:
PLO admits Palestinian People is a myth.
*"The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct 'Palestinian people' to oppose Zionism."
PLO executive committee member Zahir Muhsein, March 31, 1977
16 posted on 12/23/2005 2:12:00 PM EST by Publius6961 (The IQ of California voters is about 420........... .............cumulatively)
Then make sure that any further attacks result in a Six Days War conflict. Arabs have a centuries long record proving they understand best power and vengence.
America and Israel have the power. 'Tis time to use it.
They can build a wall, but the citizen arabs will help elect self hating dreck that will weaken Israel further and since it will have withdrawn to aushwitz borders the syrians and egyptians can finish the job.
Oh and the Jewish media libs wont care- Kushner will write a new screenplay about how Israel should never have been reborn and Jon stewart libowitz will have more gentile babies.
---------------------------
There won’t be a comprehensive peace agreement, only conflict containment for a generation. We don’t want to determine the lives of millions of Palestinian Arabs. They won’t work or even visit on our side of the fence. We won’t go there. They can do what they want over there, create a Middle East Switzerland or, as is actually happening now in the Gaza Strip, sink into lawless anarchy. We don’t care.Sums it up, IMHO.
You were expecting something else ?
I would think the overriding issue for Israelis is to stop the killing of Jews. Period. Whatever that takes.
Not to mention the fence does not have a hand that reaches up to knock down incoming missiles.
The small minority of Jews you describe are more of a threat than millions of Muslims who seem to hate us? Hmmm... let me think.
No, I don't see it. Sorry.
Except for a relatively small number of zealots, religious nationalists with a messiah complex and their American supporters, most Israelis, and indeed most Jews everywhere, see it the way you do. I don't feel that holding onto lands with a million and a half hostile Arabs and a few thousand Jews stuck in there in Gaza made any sense at all.
There is nothing more important in Judaism than saving lives. There are no holy sites in Gaza and precious little Jewish history at all. There is lots of the "promised land" we don't control. I suppose some would want us to invade Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon to claim it. I prefer to believe that promise will be fulfilled when moshiach comes, not before.
So... I continue to support unilateral separation and I plan to vote for Kadima. I continue to be criticized and called a leftist on Free Republic even though I am center-right in Israel. If you don't agree with Benny Elon (or perhaps consider him too liberal) on Free Republic then you will be attacked and called insane. Get used to it.
What is "do what is right"? What is your brilliant plan?
Do you know how many times Palestinians from Gaza, which is walled off, have infiltrated Israel and committed an act of terror (i.e.: a suicide bombing)? The correct number is one, the Ashdod bombing. The number of suicide bombers coming in from Judea and Samaria has been greatly reduced by a combination of the (still incomplete) security fence and IDF action.
It is certainly true that the fence won't stop Qassam rockets. It is also true that it won't stop the IDF from taking action against those who threaten or attack us. The fence works. It is not a perfect solution, no. When you come up with a perfect solution, one that will actually work and not threaten Israel's very existance, please do let us know.
One thing we will not do: allow ourselved to be destroyed. This isn't an either/or thing the way you descibe it.
--Sums it up, IMHO.
Indeed it does. All I care is that the Palestinians ability to kill Jews is reduced as close to nil as is humanly possible. If they want peace, good lives, and to live next to us in peace I'd be all for it. If they rot in their own self-created misery that's fine with me too, so long as they don't do harm to anyone else.
Exterminate all terrorists and their supporters. Last year, Israel had an opportunity to take out a bunch of terrorists but they used a smaller bomb than they should have because they were worried that "innocent" Arabs might be killed. The terrorists weren't killed. In another incident, the Israelis use ground troops, exposing them to greater danger (and some of them were killed), to avoid killing "innocent" Arabs. The Arab culture is one of hatred and death. They glorify it and teach it to their children. While there are some Arabs who are truly innocent, the overwhelming majority allow the culture to go on. If the Israelis continue to care more about innocent Arabs than innocent Jews, they will be destroyed.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.