Category Archives: Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

Cain Un-Able

Economy, Federal Reserve Bank, Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Middle East, Political Economy, Republicans

What a great title from NPR: “Herman Cain Wasn’t Able On Palestinian Right Of Return Question.” (That is if you know the Hebrew Bible.) It captures this Republican presidential contender’s Palinesque lack of command of basic facts, in general, and in the dispute between Israel and the Palestinians, in particular. The man is not only clueless, but perfectly comfortable in holding court on an issue about which he knows nothing. The last quality is way worse than the first. Check Cain’s insertion of the “compassionate” adjective at the end, vis-a-vis Israel. You can win elections in America armed with a fatuous vocabulary that includes words like “hope, change, compassion, dreams.”

Fox News Sunday’s host Chris Wallace: Where do you stand on the right of return?

CAIN: The right of return? (Pause) The right of return? (Pause)

WALLACE: The Palestinian right of return.

CAIN: That is something that should be negotiated. That is something that should be negotiated.

WALLACE: Do you think the Palestinian refugees, the people who were kicked out of the land in 1948, should be able or should have any right to return to Israeli land?

CAIN: Yes. But under — but not under Palestinian conditions. Yes. They should have a right to come back if that is a decision that Israel wants to make.

Back to — it’s up to Israel to determine the things they will accept. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made it real clear in his statement following the statement that President Obama made. They are wiling to make some concessions. They are willing to give on a lot of things. They are willing to be compassionate.

[SNIP]

I “Liked” Vox Day’s evisceration of the Republicans’ token racial candidate’s economics:

“He is not even close to being a genuine conservative on the single most important issue presently facing the nation. Indeed, both his economic philosophy and his employment record are quite literally Communist. In the fifth of the “10 Planks” of the Communist Manifesto, Karl Marx demanded “Centralization of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly.” In the United States, credit has been centralized in an exclusive government monopoly granted to the Federal Reserve; Mr. Cain was the deputy chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City from 1992-1994 and the chairman from 1995-1996.

MORE.

UPDATE II: What Would The Sainted ‘W’ Do About Israel?

Barack Obama, Bush, Democracy, Israel, Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

EXACTLY WHAT OBAMA IS DOING. To listen to “conservatives,” one would think George Bush and his murderous band of neoconservatives held a vastly different position to Obama’s on the Israeli-Palestinian peace process farce. Nothing of the sort. First, the Arab Spring is as much Bush’s wet dream as it is Obama’s. To wit, necons have not stopped gushing about the “virtual reality of the ‘Arab Spring,'” “in spite of the [Arabs’] 1,400 year old systemic track record of tyranny, terror, political violence, uncertainty, volatility and treachery.”

Who other than the “Skeeza who is a Condoleeza” and her boss Bush pushed for “democratic” elections in the PA? Having superimposed their phantasmagoric narrative about Iraq on the world, Bush and Rice set about validating the Palestinian parallel universe. They forced Israel to let Hamas, whose plank includes the destruction of Israel, to campaign openly in East Jerusalem. The Bush-supported free elections in the territories saw the “Palestinian People” vote overwhelmingly for the “Islamic Resistance Movement” (Hamas). When that transpired, George Bush deceived the American people. He told them that Palestinians want peace and that their “yes” to Hamas was merely a yen for healthcare and other welfare.

The following are excerpts from a statement George W. Bush’s gave in January 10, 2008, during a visit to the “Holy Land”:

“The point of departure for permanent status negotiations to realize this vision seems clear: There should be an end to the occupation that began in 1967. The agreement must establish Palestine as a homeland for the Palestinian people, just as Israel is a homeland for the Jewish people. … I believe that any peace agreement between them will require mutually agreed adjustments to the armistice lines of 1949 to reflect current realities and to ensure that the Palestinian state is viable and contiguous. I believe we need to look to the establishment of a Palestinian state and new international mechanisms, including compensation, to resolve the refugee issue.”

W’s Solomonic wisdom extended to an assertion about the sanctity of Jerusalem to Palestinians. Another lie. Jerusalem was sacred to Jews for nearly two thousand years before Muhammad and is not once mentioned in the Koran.

BHO may be doing one better than Bush, but Bush led the way; he’s the original flea bag.

UPDATE I: I was forced to post the hereunder post on facebook, since the overall reaction to this post was to exculpate Bush as the better bastard. In truth Bush is a worse traitor than Barry, who tends not to conceal his perverse proclivities. On the border, Barry is even better than that bastard Bush. You need to dig into my archive. Search under Bush, here: http://www.ilanamercer.com/phprunner/public_article_list_search.php?Search+by+Category=Search+by+Category.

Here are two cases that ought to engender a bit of balance among defenders of the odious Bush. José Medellín any one? Read and puke: http://www.ilanamercer.com/phprunner/public_article_list_view.php?editid1=346. Ramos and Compean anyone? Read this and atone for defending the creep Bush: http://www.ilanamercer.com/phprunner/public_article_list_view.php?editid1=477

No offense to drag queens, but “Republicans are the drag queens of politics. Peel away the pules for family, faith and fetuses and one discovers either ‘neoconservative welfare-warfare statists or global social democrats,’ or national socialists of sorts, who fuse economic protectionism, populism and a support for the very welfare infrastructure that is at the root of the social rot they decry” (November 06, 2002).

UPDATE II: Is Netanyahu asleep at the switch? Here is the substance of a statement released by Bibi and the Hildebeest on Novermber 11, 2010:

“The US believes that through good-faith negotiations, the parties can mutually agree on an outcome which ends the conflict … based on the 1967 lines with agreed swaps….”

UPDATE III: Obama Out Of The Closet On Israel (Cavuto & The Prince)

Barack Obama, Foreign Policy, Israel, Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Law, Nationhood

On November 20, 2008, I wrote a column titled “Obama’s And Abdullah’s Plans for Israel.” The column pretty much outlined what has come to pass today. Here’s the lead and a little more:

Barack Obama has decided to revive a plot the Saudi Crown Prince hatched in 2002. Abdullah bin Abdulaziz had suggested Israel beat a retreat to the pre-1967 borders, in return for the recognition, whatever that means, of the Arab world.
Back then, Time magazine made the mustachioed monarch its “Man of the Week,” for what it termed his “peace plan.” [Their enthusiasm today is a little more muted.] The Sunday Times now reports that:
“Obama intends to throw his support behind a 2002 Saudi peace initiative endorsed by the Arab League and backed by Tzipi Livni, the Israeli foreign minister and leader of the ruling Kadima party.”
A loose paraphrasing of U.N. resolution 242, this “peace initiative” requires Israel to give the Golan Heights to Syria, which is tantamount to returning land to the aggressors, and “allow the Palestinians to establish a state capital in east Jerusalem.” For its concessions, the Arab League will doff a collective kafia to Israel. As will Israel be given “an effective veto” on the national suicide pact known as the right of return—the imperative to absorb millions of self-styled Palestinian “refugees” into Israel proper.

Understandably, it’s a little tough locating in US media the precise wording of the president’s plan for Israel. But Ha’aretz has it:

U.S. President Barack Obama said Thursday that the U.S. endorses the Palestinians’ demand for their future state to be based on the borders that existed before the 1967 Middle East war.
“The borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states,” Obama stressed during a major Mideast policy speech at the State Department.

If it continues to return land to the aggressors, Israel will be in violation of Nullum crimen sine poena, the imperative in international law to punish the aggressor (one that seems to comport quite well with the natural law). Israel has already breached this principle—and its own national self-preservation—by signing and honoring agreements (Oslo I and II) with a terrorist organization (the PLO). Israel has also flouted the “rights of necessity,” as explained by Professor of International Law, Louis Rene Beres:

“[T]his norm was explained with particular lucidity by none other than Thomas Jefferson. In his ‘Opinion on the French Treaties,’ written on April 28, 1793, Jefferson wrote: ‘The nation itself, bound necessarily to whatever its preservation and safety require, cannot enter into engagements contrary to its indispensable obligations.’”

What will Bibi Netanyahu’s do? That’s the question.

UPDATE I: Bibi has booed Obama’s latest decree. The Israeli Prime Minister, however, still used dhimi-like tones, which can only be ditched once Israel cuts the Gordian Knot that ties it to the US (foreign aid).

“Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said on Thursday Israel would object to any withdrawal to “indefensible” borders, adding he expected Washington to allow it to keep major settlement blocs in any peace deal.”

MORE.

UPDATE II: GANGSTA DIPLOMACY. George Will: “Obama’s dilation on the 1967 borders makes matters worse: Borders are what negotiations are supposed to be about, not what is to be stipulated before negotiations.”

Remember Netanyahu’s last visited to the White House? The boorish Obama practically confined the Israeli Prime Minister and his party to the basement. Once again Obama has exhibited contempt for Netanyahu by making this Middle-East statement on the eve of the PM’s visit to the White House. Bibi can hardly bail on the bastard, and so is destined to be diplomatically humiliated again.

UPDATE III (May 20): I’ve just heard Fox News’ Neil Cavuto complaining about Bibi Netanyahu, while reverentially referening to The Saudi Prince, to whom he had just been making overtures. It was quite bizarre. Cavuto had suddenly turned into a defender of the Leader of the Free World (who presides over the largest welfare-warfare state in this “free” world), against the onslaught of the Israeli PM, who dared to lecture the venerable leader (BHO), as follows:

“For there to be peace, the Palestinians will have to accept some basic realities,” Netanyahu said, sitting beside Obama at an appearance with reporters. “The first is that, while Israel is prepared to make generous compromises for peace, it cannot go back to 1967 lines.”
In his speech about Middle East issues Thursday, Obama had reiterated U.S. support for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian problem, suggesting that Israel revert to the territory it held prior to its gains in the Arab-Israeli War of 1967, while allowing for swaps of land between the two future states.
“These were not the boundaries of peace,” Netanyahu said at the White House. “They were the boundaries of repeated wars.”

Netanyahu ought to have given Obama a taste of his own boorishness and canceled his visit to the White House. Instead, he firmly but politely told the president what was what.

“Rhymes With Fagin”

Anti-Semitism, Israel, Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Journalism, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, Media, Middle East

That’s the title of the Wall Street Journal’s Bret Stephens article describing last week’s TIME magazine cover story, “Why Israel Doesn’t Care About Peace”:

“If you’re a reader of a certain age, you might understand the headline.

In May 1977, when Menachem Begin was elected Israel’s prime minister, Time magazine set out to describe the man, beginning with the correct pronunciation of his last name: ‘Rhymes with Fagin,’ the editors explained, invoking the character from Oliver Twist. Modern Israeli leader; archetypal Jewish lowlife: Get it?

The magazine’s other characterization of Begin was that he was ‘dangerous.’ A year later, he shared the Nobel Peace Prize with Egypt’s Anwar Sadat.

Maybe there’s something in the magazine’s DNA. This week, readers were treated to a cover story by Karl Vick titled, suggestively, ‘Why Israel Doesn’t Care About Peace.’ That’s one way for Time to address the current state of negotiations between the Jewish state and its neighbors, which otherwise barely rate a mention in the article.

Mr. Vick’s essay draws on the testimony of a pair of real estate agents, a columnist for a left-leaning newspaper, and a few others to explain that Israelis are too blissed-out by the fruits of their economic prosperity to pay much attention to the subject of peace, much less whatever sad things may transpire among their neighbors in Ramallah and Gaza. ‘We’re not really that into the peace process,’ says Gadi Baltiansky, a peace activist quoted in the story. ‘We are really, really into the water sports.'”

It’s hard to say what to make of this, since the article concludes by contradicting its central thesis: ‘For all the surf breaks, the palms and the coffee, the conflict is never truly done, never far away,’ Mr. Vick writes.

Indeed it isn’t: Nearly every Israeli has a child, sibling, boyfriend or parent in the army. Nearly every Israeli has been to the funeral of a fallen soldier, or a friend killed in a terrorist attack. Most Israeli homes and businesses come equipped with safe rooms or bomb shelters; every Israeli owns a gas mask. The whole country exists under the encroaching shadows of Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza, and the prospect of a nuclear Iran. How many Americans, to say nothing of Europeans, can say the same about their own lives?” READ ON.

[SNIP]

What TIME cretin Karl Vick is describing, and depicting with the aid photos of good looking Israelis on the beach, is a plucky people engaged in LIFE; working, playing, making money (horrors!), and having fun, in the face of daily existential threats. This is to be admired not condemned.

My daughter, who was decidedly not pro-Israel when she visited there, came back enthralled with the country and its people (she wrote about it HERE). Never before had she met such tough, positive, feisty sorts (and certainly not in the Jewish school she once attended in South Africa. Israelis and diaspora Jews: never the twain shall meet).

As admirable as is the Israeli absorption with the good life, I’m afraid that regular Israelis need to learn to be more guarded with creeps likes Vick of TIME. And maybe to revive some of that founding patriotism, once again.