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Don't run to Assad
Gabriel Siboni
Haaretz
15 November 09
The latest appeal by Syrian President Bashar Assad to renew negotiations with Israel, and statements on his people's readiness for peace, have once again brought peace talks with Damascus to the forefront.
The eager response by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Shimon Peres and Defense Minister Ehud Barak, who expressed their willingness to enter negotiations without preconditions as soon as possible, amply demonstrates how Assad is getting to eat the cake and have it too.
Syria has been brought back from the political cold only after indirect talks with Israel via Turkey were revealed. These talks gave the Syrian regime legitimacy, even though Syria continued on as a loyal member of the radical bloc. The talks boosted the ostracized regime, and the full extent of the strategic damage they have caused to Israel has yet to be fully understood. Syria was and is a disturber of regional balance, as American forces coping with its attempts to destabilize Iraq can testify.
Assad has several personal achievements of this kind to his credit: Syrian involvement in the assassination of Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri is well-known; Syria is developing chemical weapons of mass-destruction, and has tried to set up a nuclear reactor to achieve military nuclear capability.
Terrorist organizations over the years have found Syria to be a convenient and helpful host. Syria's deep involvement in Lebanon and its part in delivering advanced weapon systems to Hezbollah increase Lebanese instability, while providing backing for increased Iranian involvement. All these demonstrate how deeply Assad is implicated in the radical axis.
Some say that pulling Syria out of the Axis of Evil will improve Israel's overall strategic balance. But closer heed must be paid to the Syrian president's words. To him, peace with Israel means Israeli retreat from the Golan, while he maintains his strategic connection to Iran and other rogue states. Past experience shows that rapprochement attempts by Israel and parts of the international community don't make him moderate his positions, but rather convince him to believe he can have everything both ways.
Israeli decision-makers need to fundamentally review Israel's real interest in regard to Syria, while neutralizing the kind of strategic discourse that was relevant 30 years ago but is now hopelessly outdated.
The enemy, having realized it cannot conquer Israel, has chosen the path of resistance and attrition, with the aim of exhausting Israelis in the long run. This change proves the irrelevance of giving away assets in exchange for security arrangements and guarantees, demilitarization and the like.
A true peace agreement with Syria can only be discussed after Syria undergoes a profound and fundamental change. The desire to please the Damascus regime and go into talks will not help bring about such change.
Assad, whose supreme interest is preserving the Alawi reign, has a lot to lose. Israel must reach a strategic agreement with the American administration on the fundamental conditions for talks with Syria.
The first among them should be separation from the radical axis and from radical ideology. Syria, deep in the throes of an economic crisis and located in a problematic geo-strategic position, must choose a new path before peace talks can begin. Right now, Assad's haughty attitude is like he is living in a glass house and throwing stones in every direction.
The author chairs the military research program at the Institute for National Security Studies.
What Does "Pro-Palestinian" Really Mean?
Khaled Abu Toameh
Hudson New York
17 November 09
In recent years there has been a significant rise in the number of non-Palestinians who describe themselves as “pro-Palestinian” activists. These people can be found mostly on university campuses in North America and Europe.
What is striking is that many of these “pro-Palestinian” activists have never been to the Middle East, let alone the West Bank or the Gaza Strip. In most cases, they are not even Arabs or Muslims.
What makes them “pro-Palestinian”?
In their view, inciting against Israel on a university campus or publishing “anti-Zionist” material on the Internet is sufficient to earn them the title of “pro-Palestinian.” But what these folks have not realized is that their actions and words often do little to advance the interests of the Palestinians. In some instances, these actions and words are even counterproductive.
It is hard to see how organizing events such as “Israel Apartheid Week” on a university campus could help the cause of the Palestinians. Isn’t there already enough anti-Israel incitement that is being spewed out of Arab and Islamic media outlets?
If anyone is entitled to be called “pro-Palestinian,” it is those who are publicly campaigning against financial corruption and abuse of human rights by Fatah and Hamas. Those who are trying to change the system from within belong to the real “pro-Palestinian” camp.
These are the brave people who are standing up to both Fatah and Hamas and calling on them to stop killing each other and start doing something that would improve the living conditions of their constituents.
Instead of investing money and efforts in organizing Israel Apartheid Week, for example, the self-described “pro-Palestinians” could dispatch a delegation of teachers to Palestinian villages and refugee camps to teach young Palestinians English. Or they could send another delegation to the Gaza Strip to monitor human rights violations by the Hamas authorities and help Palestinian women confront Muslim fundamentalists who are trying to limit their role to cooking, raising children and looking after the needs of their husbands.
(Read full article)
Analysis: Obama's press on Gilo shows a continued misread of Israel
Herb Keinon
JPost
19 November 09
US President Barack Obama is an extremely intelligent man surrounded by equally intelligent advisers, many of whom have years of experience dealing with the Middle East. His continued misreading and misunderstanding of the Israeli public is, therefore, somewhat baffling.
This misread was evident again in the past few days by the US objection to the Jerusalem Municipal Planning Committee's approval of a plan to build some 900 new units in Gilo - not in a far-flung settlement overlooking Nablus, nor even in one of the settlement blocs like Gush Etzion, nor even a Jewish complex in one of the Arab neighborhoods of the capital, but in Gilo, one of the large new neighborhoods built in the city following the Six Day War. If Israel cannot build in Gilo without US approval, than it cannot build in Ramot Eshkol, French Hill, Ramot, Neveh Yaakov, Pisgat Ze'ev, East Talpiot or Har Homa.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs on Tuesday expressed "dismay" at the decision. The dismay, however, cuts both ways, with many Israelis clearly dismayed that the US - like Europe - now seems to be considering as settlements the post-1967 neighborhoods in Jerusalem. The EU, clearly following Gibbs's lead and then taking it one step further, released a statement on Wednesday saying, "The European Union is dismayed by the recent decision on the expansion of the settlement of Gilo."
Truth be told, this is not the first indication of US policy on this matter. Former US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice seemed to be giving the new neighborhoods settlement status in 2007 when she opposed a new project in Har Homa. She didn't clarify, however, whether other Jerusalem neighborhoods over the Green Line, such as Gilo and Ramot, were settlements in the eyes of the United States.
(Continue reading...)
Note to Media: Gilo Is in Jerusalem
CAMERA
18 November 09
Yesterday, Israel approved the building of 900 homes in Jerusalem, a move opposed by the United States, and incorrectly reported by some media outlets which misreported Gilo's location. For instance, theInternational Herald Tribune ran the following brief today on Page 4:
Whether you call it a settlement or a neighborhood of Jerusalem, Gilo is not in the West Bank. As Isabel Kershner correctly reports today in the New York Times(which publishes the Tribune):
Israel said Tuesday that it had advanced plans to expand a Jewish district of Jerusalem in territory that was captured in the 1967 war and that the Palestinians claim as part of their future state. . . .
The Israeli move to push forward the building plans in Jerusalemcomes as the Palestinians have begun seeking support for a plan to win the United Nations Security Council's recognition of a Palestinian state, without Israel's agreement, in the lands Israel won in 1967. . .
[The 900 housing units] are in Gilo, an area in southern Jerusalemconsidered by Israel to be a neighborhood of the city and by the Palestinians and much of the world to be a settlement that violates international law
In addition, it is clear from reading the transcript of yesterday's State Departmentpress briefing that the Obama administration also understands that Gilo is situated in Jerusalem and not the West Bank. For instance, spokesman Ian Kelly states:
Well, I think, Michel, you've heard us say many times that we believe that neither party should engage in any kind of actions that could unilaterally preempt or appear to preempt negotiations. And I think that we find the Jerusalem Planning Committee's decision to move forward on the approval of the - approval process for the expansion ofGilo in Jerusalem as dismaying.
Gilo lies within Jerusalem's municipal boundaries, though it is outside the Green Line delineating the pre-1967 boundaries, as shown in this U.N. map. Another part of the city that falls within this category -- within municipal boundaries but outside the Green Line -- is Jabel Mukater, the home of the Arab attacker who shot dead eight yeshiva students in April 2008. As Steven Erlanger and Kershner reported March 8, 2008 in the NYT:
Thursday, November 19, 2009
25 Long Years
Jonathan Pollard is the only person in the history of the United States to receive a life sentence for spying for an American ally. On November 21, 2009, Pollard will enter the 25th year of his life sentence, with no end in sight, and with not a peep out of our "leadership".
The maximum sentence today for such an offence is 10 years. The median sentence for this offence is 2 to 4 years. Click to see a list ofcomparative sentences.
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