Tel Aviv: "Jerusalem Is Ours!"

Netanyahu confirms settlement rise was no mistake; Washington reportedly withholds weapons.

Netanyahu has confirmed, now that Biden is out of the way, that the U.S. can go to hell. As quoted in Haaretz on March 15, 2010, he told a Likud party meeting:

The building in Jerusalem and in all other places will continue in the same way that has been customary over the last 42 years.

In other words, there will be no compromise, there will be no viable Palestinian state, Israel will grab whatever it wants.

Now, has Washington gotten the message? What happened when Biden visited was nothing. This is the real insult. The superpower, in thanks for 60 years of sacrifice, has been dismissed.

There is nothing to talk about because Netanyahu has decided everything by himself. Israel only understands the language of force.

If yesterday was the time for talks between the US and Hamas, today is the time for formal negotiations with Hamas, Fatah, and any other identifiable Palestinian civil society organizations.

Then, there’s the whole “attack Iran” issue. According to the always exciting, pro-militarist Israeli website DEBKA on March 13, 2010, Israeli Defense Minister Barak has requested an emergency list for even more U.S. arms, including missiles, a request on which the U.S. has reportedly been sitting. Presumably, the arms would be designed, although DEBKA certainly did not put it in these terms, to facilitate Israeli aggression against Iran. DEBKA, to its credit, did let what looks like the cat out of the bag, however, concluding that:

Defense sources in Washington reported Saturday the view that the Obama administration, which has never cultivated warm relations with the Netanyahu government, has seized on the Jerusalem housing spat as a device for restraining Israel from attacking Iran's nuclear sites, a step which the White House strenuously opposes.

This remark should be read in the light of the recent news about Petraeus’ January briefing warning the White House about the negative impact of the U.S.-Israeli alliance on U.S. national security.

This seems to be the first hint of any actual move, as opposed to talk, by Washington to reign in the combative Israeli right wing.

Israeli Media: Netanyahu Endangering Israeli Security

Haaretz editorial, March 14, 2010:

A year after [Netanyahu] took office, it is apparent that his government's policies, which made it top priority to populate East Jerusalem with Jews, is leading to Israel's increasing international isolation and threatening its key security interests in the name of an extreme right-wing ideology.

Cracking the Washington Groupthink on Israel

A very convincing argument holds that the Washington elite and the right wing ruling Israeli elite are so inextricably linked by their short-term perceived mutual interests that any rhetorical disputes are at the most temporary if not a complete charade.  Even while admitting that this argument holds much water, I still beg to differ.

In a highly networked democracy that claims to base its political system on the “open marketplace of ideas,” when the elite dramatically shifts the direction of its rhetoric, the butterfly effect applies. The butterfly effect holds that a tiny step can lead to an enormous change, e.g., the flapping of a butterfly’s wings in Beijing altering a air current which interacts with something else and perhaps contributes to a hurricane much later in the U.S. Accordingly, each time members of the Washington group-think club violate the taboo on criticizing Israel without the sky falling, it further frees the political constraints on open-minded thinking—both among the elite and among the population.

Where the tipping point from subservience to the interests of the Israeli right lies cannot be said, but each criticism brings us closer. For members of a politically-correct community to resist group think is, not to put too fine a point on it, impossible. Therefore, when they appear to be violating the taboo, they are instead redefining what is politically correct. Maybe Biden’s criticism of Israel three days ago was an anomaly; maybe Clinton’s publicized criticism of Netanyahu over the phone two days ago was just for show. Now Axelrod has reinforced the message, saying that the Israeli move "seemed calculated to undermine [the proximity talks], and that was - that was distressing to everyone who is promoting the idea of peace and security in the region." Axelrod did not specify whether or not he thought Netanyahu is one of those “promoting the idea of peace and security in the region.” Axelrod added a new phrase to the growing space of elite American critique, saying “this was not the right way to behave.” Alexrod also articulated a point I have previously stressed, noting that resolution of the issue “is important for our own security.”

Underscoring the shift in Washington elite perceptions is the just revealed (by Mark Perry on the Mideast Channel on March 13) and very important January briefing by Petraeus, in which he argued for responsibility over Israel and Palestine on the basis that the dispute was too great a threat to U.S. national security for the military to stay out!

Yes, Netanyahu would argue (in private) that a Palestinian Bantustan would offer precisely that resolution. Yes, Lieberman would argue (even in public) that moving the Palestinians to South America would also offer precisely that resolution. The Washington elite still has a long way to go. It is not yet explicitly rejecting such solutions in sufficiently clear terms. Nevertheless, evidence is building drip by drip that this time the Israeli extremists have stepped in mud. Netanyahu’s ridiculous remark that “there was a regrettable incident here, that occurred innocently” already appears grossly out of touch with Washington perceptions.

Some in Washington will surely play the game of speaking to the crowd while winking at the Israeli right wing, but the longer this continues, the more likely a new American open-mindedness becomes.

How to Resolve the Palestinian-Israeli Dispute

A current school of thought on how the U.S. should deal with the recalcitrant Netanyahu is that it should tighten the screws. The argument, persuasive at a certain level, goes like this: Netanyahu has spent the past year making it crystal clear that he will never agree to a viable Palestinian state, so continuing polite discussions is mere charade. This is certainly true, but it does not necessarily follow that "turning the screws" will work: there is a severe political constraint on what Washington's timid politicians will ever have the courage to do. Therefore, while pressuring Israel may be deserved and emotionally satisfying, an alternative and quite obvious approach holds more promise of achieving a breakthrough in the Israeli-Palestinian dispute.

The more promising approach is straightforward and logical: talk to people willing to cooperate rather than wasting time with those intent upon cheating. This can proceed on three levels. First, Israelis disenchanted with their government's intransigence and concerned about Israel's long-term security are speaking out loudly; listen to them. Second, Turkey, Brazil, and Japan have all made it clear that they are willing to assist in any genuine effort to achieve a Mideast compromise. Third is the Palestinian level. After all, the issue does concern the Palestinians, so why not talk to them? Extend an invitation to all concerned Palestinian parties to meet with U.S. and allied representatives, making clear that Washington will favor not individuals or groups but all those willing to join together in a Palestinian united front dedicated to establishing an independent, democratic state.

If the Netanyahu regime chooses to exclude itself from this dialogue, then simply leave it be. Let history pass it by.

Israel's Threat to U.S. Security

Is Washington finally waking up to the real significance of its mindless capitulation to the militarist Israeli right wing?

Biden to Netanyahu, as recounted on Politico on March 11:

“This is starting to get dangerous for us,” Biden castigated his interlocutors. “What you’re doing here undermines the security of our troops who are fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. That endangers us and it endangers regional peace.”

On one level, Biden does now seem to get it: when the US is fighting, by his count, three separate wars simultaneously against Muslim enemies, its association with what is perhaps the world’s most blatant state policy of repression of an ethnic group (that happens also to be Muslim) is tactically dangerous for US troops because it provokes hatred of the US and volunteer violence against those US troops (which Americans are pleased to dismiss as “terrorism.”) Attacking US troops who are interfering in your internal affairs is not terrorism, but there is a second part to the danger that Biden evidently did not mention: the probability that the US kowtowing to the Israeli right in fact will provoke terrorism (i.e., random attacks on US civilians). More significant to my mind is the third level: the general threat to US security of alienating global Muslims.

Meanwhile, UNIFIL reported on March 11, according to Now Lebanon and many other non-US sources, that the daily Israeli aerial violations of Lebanon’s border are increasing in frequency. The U.N. "peacekeeping" forces, denied the armaments necessary either to defend themselves or the integrity of the Lebanese border, can only watch helplessly. Reminding the population of the horrors of Israel’s summer 2006 effort to destroy civilian infrastructure in Southern Lebanon, such terror tactics can only heighten tensions and redouble Hezbollah’s efforts to obtain the ability to defend Lebanon’s security. As with the creeping ethnic cleansing of Palestine, the military threats against Lebanon illustrate Israeli steps to change the situation on the ground under the cover of chatter about peace talks. How such behavior can quickly transform into a threat to the US is suggested by the 1983 killing in Lebanon of over 200 U.S. soldiers who, under the cover of a “UN peacekeeping mission,” facilitated the on-going Israeli invasion begun in 1982.

Note carefully that none of this speaks to the issue of supporting Israel’s existence. Obama could probably become the most popular leader in the Arab world by cementing Israel’s position in the Mideast as a moderate, non-violent state living within its 1967 borders. Such an Israel, still holding a regional nuclear monopoly, would most likely be seriously challenged by no one. The issue of recognizing Israel’s right to exist is long past. The Israelis won that fight hands down (though they could, if they remain on their current violent track, put the issue back on the table).

The argument today is whether Israel must compromise, as described above, or whether it can become a mini-empire on the basis of American kowtowing and the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. Israel’s own defense minister just warned in clear terms that the price for the second choice will be the death of Israeli democracy. That would be unfortunate. Whatever one may think of the current right wing Israeli regime, the original pioneering spirit of the European Jews going to the Mideast contained much that was admirable, including, before 1948, frequent examples of Jewish-Arab good neighborliness. The historical precedent for integrated village life exists, if only in distant memories.

Obama Still Searching for Mideast Balance

Effectiveness in global affairs requires more than big guns; it requires the ability to balance rhetoric and action. Few leaders do this well; as his Mideast policy shows, Obama is not yet among them.

Judging from the AP summary in Haaretz on March 12, Clinton found some backbone during her phone call to Netanyahu. That is encouraging, coming from someone whose “Israel first, America second” bias has been deeply disturbing not just to Palestinians desiring justice but to Americans hoping finally to be able to be proud of their country again.

Nevertheless, Clinton's newly tough rhetoric still falls far short of matching Israel’s steady shifting of the realities on the ground. For the past year, as Obama talked about peace, Netanyahu has been taking slow, constant steps to implement the Zionist program of Israeli expansion and the clearance of Palestinians. The announcement of new housing for Israeli colonists during Biden’s trip was noteworthy only for its timing – both in that it served to humiliate the U.S. and in that it carefully pulled the rug out from under the imminent new round of Israeli-Palestinian talks.

Why the Israeli right wants to derail the talks is a mystery, since talks have always served to delay rather than prepare for Palestinian independence. Perhaps the right has over the past decade and in particular over the past six months since the high point of Obama’s rhetorical support for a new U.S. attitude toward the Muslim world become so confident that it views the fig leaf of talks with impatience.

In any case, for Washington to regain the initiative it must not just alter its rhetoric but match Israeli changes to the ground truth (settler terrorism against Palestinians, new houses, new settlements). A “deeply negative signal” that “undermines trust,” as Clinton put it, seems more than sufficient to justify Washington simply turning its back on Tel Aviv and focusing on negotiating with Fatah and Hamas to create a Palestinian united front. But the fact that Clinton spoke for 43 minutes with Netanyahu suggests quite the opposite – that she pleaded and argued and let Netanyahu talk her ears off while his ministers prepare the next slap in the face. It does not take 43 minutes to tell someone that you no longer have confidence in them.

Meanwhile, on the ground, the Israeli police were arresting and shooting not just Palestinian protesters but Israelis as well. Yes, there are still some Israelis—called “leftists”--willing to risk violence at the hands of the police in order to support human rights.

The Netanyahu regime knows exactly where it wants to go and is moving straight toward its target. The Obama regime unfortunately continues to stumble, having yet to find the balance between words and action.

Evidently realizing that the United States of (north) America needs help, the inimitable leader of the United States of Brazil gave an interview for reporters from Haaretz and an Islamic organization in which he made some of the points Obama seems unable to articulate. According to the Palestine News Agency on March 12, Lula noted that “the world is lacking global governance” due to the unrepresentative nature of the UN and other multilateral institutions, that the Israeli-Palestinian issue and the Iranian nuclear issue are two parts of the overall Mideast problem which must be resolved through negotiations:

the time has come to bring into the arena players who will be able to put forward new ideas. Those players must have access to all levels of the conflict: in Israel, in Palestine, in Iran, in Syria, in Jordan and in many other countries that are associated with this conflict. This is the only way we will be able to advance Israeli-Palestinian peace, and at the same time be able to say clearly to Iran that we are against the manufacture of nuclear weapons....

I do not want Israel to attack Iran, just as I do not want Iran to attack Israel. In an orderly world, people have to learn to talk to one another....

[the November 2007 Annapolis conference] gives me serious doubts: Who really wants peace in the Middle East? Who has an interest in achieving a solution and who would like the conflict to continue? The impression is that someone is constantly working here as though he has hidden enemies, people who simply do not want an agreement to be reached....

Anyone who compares Ahmadinejad and modern-day Iran to Hitler and the Nazis is having the same kind of radicalism of which Iran is being accused. Anyone who takes that line is not contributing in the least to the peace process which we want to create for the sake of the future. You cannot do politics with hate and resentment. Anyone who wants to do politics with hate and resentment should get out of politics. Nobody can rule a country through the liver. You have to rule a country with your head and your heart. Other than that, it's best to stay somewhere else other than in politics....

we must not allow what happened in Iraq to happen in Iran. Accordingly, before sanctions of any kind are imposed, we must make every effort to rebuild the peace in the Middle East. That is what is behind my visit to Israel, Palestine and Jordan - and that is what will also take me on a visit to Iran later. After all, the Middle East conflict is not bilateral and does not pertain only to Israel and Palestine. There are other interests in the Middle East, interests which must be represented so that we can find a solution. Iran is part of all this, and therefore someone must talk to them....

Lula suggested an interesting idea--that being a peaceful country is the qualification for being a mediator. Brazil has renounced nuclear arms, and it is hard to remember the last time that country invaded anyone. Perhaps Brazilian intervention is just what the Mideast needs.

Insulting the US, Israel Endangers Itself

Associated Press (not some hostile country, but our very own Associated Press) ran this as their lead paragraph in an article on the Biden visit to Israel:

An open diplomatic row during the visit of Vice President Joe Biden has shined a spotlight on the U.S. failure to rein in Israeli settlement ambitions and deepened Palestinian suspicions that the United States is too weak to broker a deal.

That is exactly what I warned yesterday (Foreign Policy, "So Much For a Friendly Biden Visit to Israel," first comment) would happen if Obama did not react forcefully. A superpower cannot just go around invading everyone (Bush took that policy about as far as it could go) but must rely on reputation. Remember that Iraq and Afghanistan were both very tiny enemies - nothing remotely like Russia or China or India or Turkey...or Iran. When a superpower leader hands the initiative to a client state, it may or may not help the client but it certainly diminishes the power of the "super-" power. If you think America has something to give the world, then you must be saddened to see it voluntarily give away its power, especially to a country now being run by a fundamentally misguided bunch of nuclear-armed 19th century imperialists.

Israelis should not celebrate having defeated the US; rather they should think carefully about the meaning of the Biden visit: at this point, it has not only made a fool of Obama and undermined the reputation of the US as an honest broker and as an effective country, but--by weakening the US it has also endangered the security of its Israeli client. Israel is, as I have often said, the Mideast military hegemon, but so what? It could not even fight Hezbollah in 2006 for a few weeks without the US having to rush emergency supplies of jet fuel for all those bombers. Israel's nukes are hardly usable. Without a powerful and sympathetic US (as Tzipi Livni recently hinted at), Israel would be in real trouble. If Israelis keep stepping on the eagle's wing, Washington may some day do what Gorbachev did to Honecker - and we all do remember that gentleman, I trust.

Palestinian Bantustan and America's Reputation

I argued recently in “Palestine and Global Security” that the establishment of a Palestinian Bantustan, as opposed to a genuinely independent and viable state, would have several negative security impacts. One would, I predicted, be the undermining of America’s reputation.

Biden, in Israel, has been given a clear message by Netanyahu that Israel has no intention of returning to its legally recognized 1967 borders, thus underscoring the likely emergence of a Palestinian Bantustan. Even Biden found this egregious insult a bit much to swallow and immediately issued a bold condemnation.

Now the American reputation is again on the line. The world’s only superpower will look very pitiful if it does nothing substantive to back up its vice president’s condemnation. Washington’s approach to foreign affairs over the last year has relied enormously on words; to the degree that its words are exposed as nothing more than hot air, Washington loses influence with friend and foe, a dangerous situation that invites instability.

Thus the small issue of Palestine/Israel takes on broader security implications.

Keep an eye on this developing issue.

U.S & Israel: Dangerous Rhetoric, Blurred Signals

Biden's initial (presumably planned) remarks during his current trip to Israel seemed open to enormously different interpretations. One could only wonder how the various parties concerned in fact would interpret them. In a moment of euphoria perhaps left over from an idyllic childhood growing up in the mountains, I might read between the lines a message that Israel is protected by the US and therefore has no further excuse to attack its neighbors, much less try to trick the US into destroying Iran on behalf of Israeli rightwing expansionist dreams. In a moment of cynicism learned during years working in Washington, I might read between the lines a message that Washington will guarantee permanent Israeli military hegemony over the Mideast, a guarantee that would be seen not just in Tehran but widely throughout the capitals of every other regional state with aspirations for independence as mandating the acquisition of advanced armaments and the building of an anti-Israeli coalition.

If there is "no space" between the US and Israel in terms of Israel's "security," then Israel does not need superpower-level armaments (rather, just enough for police actions and holding on against whatever militia might try something). And Israel certainly does not need a nuclear monopoly in the region.

Might some Israeli expansionist interpret "security" as a carte blanche for violating Lebanon's airspace or telling any number of its neighbors what arms they are "allowed" to possess or what technology they are "allowed" to develop? One can only hope that Biden added a bit of explanation in private, but Clinton's recent remark (http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/136258) that Washington refuses to prevent Israeli aggression against Lebanon as long as Hezbollah is arming suggests that he did not.

The "layer of mistrust" he referred to I assume refers to Israel vs Palestine, not Israel vs the US (though that would be a topic worth discussing) and is a statement ludicrous beyond description. When a burglar is in your bedroom (literally, with Israel not only occupying the West Bank but kicking Palestinians out of their homes to make way for more illegal colonists), you don't talk about a "layer of mistrust;' you remove the burglar.

Finally, on the issue of taking risks for peace, Biden told Netanyahyu, "You're prepared to do that." The remark is either laughable or along the lines of a general telling a private to volunteer.

I am open to being surprised. Perhaps Netanyahu will once again remake himself and take a risk for peace by stopping his campaign to push the US into war with Iran or by accepting the vision of a non-nuclear Mideast or by returning the Israeli army to its legally recognized 1967 borders or by halting fighter-bomber violations of Lebanon's airspace or by ending collective punishment of the prisoners in the Gaza Ghetto.

Come what may, those were some of the possibilities inherent in Biden's visit as it got started.

Then Israel slapped Biden (and Obama) in the face, announcing with exquisite timing to show who is boss in the U.S.-Israeli relationship, an expansion of illegal colonialist settlement on the West Bank. This time, Biden's words were pretty clear:

I condemn the decision by the government of Israel to advance planning for new housing units in East Jerusalem. The substance and timing of the announcement, particularly with the launching of proximity talks, is precisely the kind of step that undermines the trust we need right now and runs counter to the constructive discussions that I've had here in Israel. We must build an atmosphere to support negotiations, not complicate them.

Just words, but it does change the tone of the visit. The world waits breathlessly to see if Washington will have the guts to follow up these words with action.

For the moment, the U.S. continues to play a very dangerous game by dangling war with Iran just out of the reach of Israeli militarists while practically burying them in arms designed for precisely such a purpose. Drug addicts should not be counseled in a room full of drugs. On the eve of Biden's visit, the Israeli press depicted one of the dangers in no uncertain terms (Barnea in Yediot, as quoted on Coteret):

Netanyahu has upgraded Ahmadinejad to the dimensions of a Hitler.  [links in original] Against Hitler, one fights to the last bunker.  This is what Churchill did, and Netanyahu wants so badly to be like Churchill.  His credibility—a sensitive issue—is on the table.  If he retreats, the voters will turn their back on him.  Where will he go?  In his distress, he may run forward.

Nothing would be easier than for Israeli militarists to read into US behavior clearance to launch a war against Iran, and nothing would be easier than for Tehran to conclude that violence is the only way it can save itself. Once war starts, it will not matter that someone may have "misunderstood" someone else's clumsy signals. Judging from the public record to date, Biden's trip has further undermined Mideast...and American national security.
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For further thoughts on the games that boys with toys play, see Haselkorn's article in the March 9 issue of Haaretz about the signals Iran may be sending by publicly (in the presence of IAEA inspectors) moving most of its refined uranium into unprotected storage. But don't worry - world leaders are all competent professionals.

Tails Wagging Dogs

To state that the US will support an ally if it is threatened is natural. To state that the US will support an ally in case of a conflict without making clear that the US guarantee only applies if the ally is the victim, not the aggressor would be an irresponsible sellout of US national security interests, to put it politely.

In the case of Israel, currently by far the most aggressive state on the planet (unless you count superpowers), to tell their leaders that the US will support them regardless of how they behave would be an invitation to commit aggression. One could argue about the relative significance of comments made publicly vs privately.

Mr. Biden, Ms. Clinton, if the shoe fits...