Netanyahu’s Deft Touch
A big question is where Israelis will be allowed to build. With all the talk about a “two-state solution,” there is a growing divergence between what some believe is a political necessity and the need to provide housing for Israel’s burgeoning population. Shifting priorities to the Negev and Galilee may be important politically, but irrelevant without adequate infrastructure, job possibilities, resources, and of course security.
In the foreseeable future, settlements in Yehuda and Shomron must expand not only because they are strategic assets but because of economic necessity. People need homes they can afford near places where they work. That may not be politically acceptable for those who look forward to another Arab Palestinian state devoid of Jews, but no Israeli government will commit suicide to satisfy them.
Put simply, the process of settlement or “occupation” of Yehuda and Shomron (the “West Bank”), Jerusalem, and Golan is far too extensive to uproot. Three hundred thousand Jews who moved into these territories are no less entitled to live there than Arabs; their forcible removal would be a clear violation of civil and humanitarian law. Morally and economically, it’s unthinkable.
A terrorist-based Palestinian state of the kind demanded by Arab leaders, the EU, and now Obama is unrealistic not only because an overwhelming majority of Israelis won’t accept it, but because Palestinians themselves are, at best, ambivalent. They don’t like Israel, but they don’t trust the PA.
Forcing a solution, as President Clinton tried in 2000, will probably provoke the next round of violence against Israel (“intifada”) because it raises expectations that can’t be met: Israel’s return to the 1949 armistice lines (including eastern Jerusalem), return of Arab “refugees,” and more. Fatah’s recent convention confirmed this. Palestinians define their identity in terms of the absence of Israel as a Jewish state. Palestinian nationalism must replace Israel, not coexist.
Despite the Arab world’s rhetoric, they don’t care about the Palestinians and supported them primarily as proxy warriors against Israel. They view a Palestinian state as a threat to their regimes as well. The status quo, a Middle East without a second Arab Palestinian state, may not be as bad as some think.
Whether or not Obama learns the facts of life in the Middle East and the facts of history, Netanyahu’s mandate is to keep Israel strong and viable — not to establish a Palestinian state. Netanyahu may not have a vision, but he has a strategy; Obama has a vision, but no strategy.
If politics is the art of survival, then Bibi may prove to be Israel’s next Ben Gurion. His canonization, however, will take longer. Barack Obama’s has already begun.
Netanyahu. Is this his second or third attempt at government? Same names, same results. The only hope for any Israel and Palestine settlement is “divine intervention.” The best he can do this time around is the same as he did the last time around. Just try to keep the car from going back to the scrapyard.
I thought Mr. Netanyahu was doing a rather nice job of walking an ever lengthening tightrope. It is clear that one single policy or a set of similar policies will not bring about success in dealing with the threats of Israels enemies list. Each new situation poses a serious dilemma to Israel but they seem able to keep dodging and ducking to stay in the game,
I think it is clear to Israelis, and to many Americans, that Israel has no true friends. Ironically, the Evangelicals in this country always support Israel, but to have the American president turn on them is a blow. Israel is the only friend that American has in the Middle East, the only ones that we know won’t try to cut our heads off when our backs are turned. I think we should stand up for Israel. If we allow our government to withdraw any kind of help, we will, I think, rue the day. And I think Israel can do without the “helpful advice” given them by this administration.
Bibi is the right man at the right time for the job. He knows that Israel has done very well despite no peace and will continue to do well. He knows that Israel doesn’t need another hostile Arab country on it’s border. He also knows that continuing the narrative of the so called peace process with no real results just process is what all the western diplomats really care about. As long as he continues the narrative and keeps expanding Jewish building no one will really care (sort of like the Iranian or the N Korean tactic on negotiation with the West about nuclear arms). At some point the Arabs will give in. Perhaps when the oil runs dry or when Israel blasts the Mullahs or when the ordinary Palestinian Arab man on the street remembers what life was like when he had a good paying job in Israel before the Arafat era. May be wishful thinking on my part, but Israel has time on it’s side, not the other way round.
Don’t discount the help he received from Obama and Emmanuel. Their attempts to destabilize the Israeli government have secured it. Bibi should sent a thank you letter to Rahm.
Can those Keystone cops do anything right?
I believe tha Moshe Dann is excessively optimistic about the coalition that Netanyahu has put together, and the chances of forming a post America alliance with rogue leaders like Putin or the other Russian allied regions. Obama and his advisors have certainly put the wrong foot forward in their shallow foreign policy regarding Israel and the Palestinians and have made progress in peace negotiations a moot point. But that is where the Palestinian Israeli negotiations have been for decades, and it’s not because of American foreign policy, European Quartet diplomacy, or any other outside force, the Palestinian Israeli peace talks have gone nowhere because the Palestinians still hold to their mad and bloody goal of destroying Israel, and they will only sign off on a peace agreement which includes a clause to that effect. I would think that this would be obvious to even someone as uninformed and inexperienced in foreign affairs as Barack Obama since all of his predecessors knew it!
Netanyahu is no longer reaching out to Kadimah in any real way. Kadimah is a raft of unprincipled, back-biting rats that Likud voters are happy to be rid of. Kadimah’s only differentiator from Likud was a more “pragmatic” approach to peacemaking – which makes them irrelevant to post-Cast-Lead Israelis, who clearly see Oslo-style concessions as a dead end.
Watch restrictions on settlement dissolve after Israel attacks Iran.
Until the Iran situation is resolved, Netanyahu must keep the White House off his back – and present a plausible position to Congressional Democrats, who are far less likely than the White House to attack Israel.
After that – it’s likely that Obama will be a lame duck, and the Congress will have been, uh, repopulated.
All of Netanyahu’s “progressive” statements are conditioned on concessions by the Arabs – recognizing Israel, ending terror, excluding Hamas from Palestinian politics. To any realist, those conditions are highly unlikely. Fortunately, many lefties are fools who only hear what they want to hear.
Netanyahu is being very cautious until Iran is taken out.
But he is unmistakably laying the groundwork for shifting Israeli and world opinion away from the failed Oslo pattern of peacemaking.
“Hard right” patriots like General Ya’alon and Lieberman have not surrendered their cabinet posts – which indicates that Bibi finds them useful as counterweights to Mr. Mitchell’s messages from a left-leaning White House.
Don’t hold your breath waiting for a 2-state solution.
I like Netanyahu a lot. He’s my kind of guy and a politician I can support. It’s too bad he’s recieved the Bush, Cheney, [inser any right wing politician] treatment – which is to say being completely demonized constantly. I respect his military service, his intellect and I agree with his world views. He flew through MIT, joined an elite anti-terrorist commando unit in Israel and has seen the evil in the eyes of our islamic jihadist enemy and won’t forget it. He has 110% support from this American.
One twist is that Netanyahu’s success will aid the Republicans in the US. Obama’s lack of support to Israel must certainly cause some Jewish voters in the US to regret their past Democrat votes.
I too am a fan of Netanyahu and a judeophile. It is not just the Christian Right that supports Israel.
I thought his recent trip to see Putin was brilliant statesmanship, even if no immediate gain is apparent.
Actually, Netanyahu has a vision, best illustrated in this article by George Gilder, who recently authored “The Israel Test”.
He wrote an excerpt of it in the City Journal magazine, which was published this quarter.
I highly recommend you read it. It is mind blowing stuff.
Here’s the link:
http://city-journal.com/2009/19_3_jewish-capitalism.html
printable link:
http://city-journal.com/printable.php?id=5105
Dann astutely notes that “by drawing Russia into the picture, Israel has sent a message to the U.S. that it is not the only player.”
The Israeli prime minister’s “secret” visit to Moscow on September 7, whose purpose, according to Israeli sources, was to persuade Russia not to supply the S-300 missile system to Iran, http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1113570.html indicates that that in Israel’s view, the United States is no longer, as has been suggested, “the world’s only superpower.”
In an interview I saw, Netanyahu said that the only way to stop terrorist attacks is to hit them so hard that they know they can’t win. The terrorists don’t have to admit it, but they will know in their hearts that Israel will trump their efforts with massive force. May it begin with Iran and then continue into Gaza and the other viper pits.
I do not disagree with this writing…