TENSIONS ARE GROWING

 TENSIONS ARE GROWING

Wurmser: Chances of Israeli Attack on Iran Very High Despite New Government 
In a new LIGNET interview, Dr David Wurmser dismisses media speculation that a broad new Israeli parliamentary coalition will force Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the center and reduce the chances of an attack on Iran, which he believes remain very high. Wurmser instead sees major opposition Israeli politicians uniting behind Netanyahu and his Iran policies. 

Echoes of ‘67: Israel unites

By Charles Krauthammer, Published: May 10, 2012

In May 1967, in brazen violation of previous truce agreements, Egypt ordered U.N. peacekeepers out of the Sinai, marched 120,000 troops to the Israeli border, blockaded the Straits of Tiran (Israel’s southern outlet to the world’s oceans), abruptly signed a military pact with Jordan and, together with Syria, pledged war for the final destruction of Israel.

May ’67 was Israel’s most fearful, desperate month. The country was surrounded and alone. Previous great-power guarantees proved worthless. A plan to test the blockade with a Western flotilla failed for lack of participants. Time was running out. Forced into mass mobilization in order to protect against invasion — and with a military consisting overwhelmingly of civilian reservists — life ground to a halt. The country was dying.

On June 5, Israel launched a preemptive strike on the Egyptian air force, then proceeded to lightning victories on three fronts. The Six-Day War is legend, but less remembered is that, four days earlier, the nationalist opposition (Mena­chem Begin’s Likud precursor) was for the first time ever brought into the government, creating an emergency national-unity coalition.

Everyone understood why. You do not undertake a supremely risky preemptive war without the full participation of a broad coalition representing a national consensus.

Forty-five years later, in the middle of the night of May 7-8, 2012, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu shocked his country by bringing the main opposition party, Kadima, into a national unity government. Shocking because just hours earlier, the Knesset was expediting a bill to call early elections in September.

Why did the high-flying Netanyahu call off elections he was sure to win?

Because for Israelis today, it is May ’67. The dread is not quite as acute: The mood is not despair, just foreboding. Time is running out, but not quite as fast. War is not four days away, but it looms. Israelis today face the greatest threat to their existence — nuclear weapons in the hands of apocalyptic mullahs publicly pledged to Israel’s annihilation — since May ’67. The world is again telling Israelis to do nothing as it looks for a way out. But if such a way is not found — as in ’67 — Israelis know that they will once again have to defend themselves, by themselves.

Such a fateful decision demands a national consensus. By creating the largest coalition in nearly three decades, Netanyahu is establishing the political premise for a preemptive strike, should it come to that. The new government commands an astonishing 94 Knesset seats out of 120, described by one Israeli columnist as a “hundred tons of solid concrete.”

So much for the recent media hype about some great domestic resistance to Netanyahu’s hard line on Iran. Two notable retired intelligence figures were widely covered here for coming out against him. Little noted was that one had been passed over by Netanyahu to be the head of Mossad, while the other had been fired by Netanyahu as Mossad chief (hence the job opening). For centrist Kadima (it pulled Israel out of Gaza) to join a Likud-led coalition whose defense minister is a former Labor prime minister (who once offered half of Jerusalem to Yasser Arafat) is the very definition of national unity — and refutes the popular “Israel is divided” meme. “Everyone is saying the same thing,” explained one Knesset member, “though there may be a difference of tone.”

To be sure, Netanyahu and Kadima’s Shaul Mofaz offered more prosaic reasons for their merger: to mandate national service for now exempt ultra- Orthodox youth, to change the election law to reduce the disproportionate influence of minor parties and to seek negotiations with the Palestinians. But Netanyahu, the first Likud prime minister to recognize Palestinian statehood, did not need Kadima for him to enter peace talks. For two years he’s been waiting for Mahmoud Abbas to show up at the table. Abbas hasn’t. And won’t. Nothing will change on that front.

What does change is Israel’s position vis-a-vis Iran. The wall-to-wall coalition demonstrates Israel’s political readiness to attack, if necessary. (Its military readiness is not in doubt.)

Those counseling Israeli submission, resignation or just endless patience can no longer dismiss Israel’s tough stance as the work of irredeemable right-wingers. Not with a government now representing 78 percent of the country.

Netanyahu forfeited September elections that would have given him four more years in power. He chose instead to form a national coalition that guarantees 18 months of stability — 18 months during which, if the world does not act (whether by diplomacy or otherwise) to stop Iran, Israel will.

And it will not be the work of one man, one party or one ideological faction. As in 1967, it will be the work of a nation.

THE ARAB WORLD IS STILL NOT READY FOR RECOGNITION, NEGOTIATION, AND PEACE 

The problem with US mediation 

Yoram Ettinger   5-7-12

Well-meaning U.S. mediation between Israel and its Arab neighbors began in 1949 in an effort to advance peace and enhance U.S. leadership and influence in the Middle East and beyond. This mediation has failed on both accounts, and has dealt a blow to vital U.S. economic and national security interests.

U.S. mediation has yet to produce a single Israel–Arab peace treaty – and moreover, the only two Israel–Arab peace treaties were initiated directly between the parties without U.S. participation.

Prime Minister Menachem Begin initiated the 1979 Israel–Egypt peace treaty that was then embraced by President Anwar Sadat, in defiance of U.S. President Jimmy Carter’s preference for an international conference over direct Israel–Egypt negotiations. Carter at first attempted to derail the initiative – by pressuring Israel on Jerusalem and the Palestinian issues – but then jumped on the peace bandwagon and played a critical role in sealing the peace treaty.

The 1993 Oslo Accord between Israel and the Palestinians was introduced by Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, surprising U.S. President Bill Clinton, who then facilitated the signing of the agreement. Similarly, the 1994 Israel–Jordan peace treaty was the brainchild of Prime Minister Rabin, adopted by King Hussein and codified by President Clinton during the signing ceremony.

In contrast, several U.S. peace initiatives not only failed to produce peace, but inadvertently fueled Arab belligerence. They were based on the morally wrong and strategically flawed “land for peace” concept, which rewards aggressors instead of penalizing them, thereby fueling further aggression and punishing the intended victim.

Failed U.S. peace initiatives include the 1949-50 bullying of Israel to “end the occupation of the Negev,” to internationalize Jerusalem and allow Arab refugees to resettle in Israel; the 1970 Rogers plan; the 1973-75 Kissinger-orchestrated initiatives; the 1982 Reagan plan; the 1989-1992 Bush–Baker “foreswear Greater Israel” initiative, culminating in the 1991 Madrid Conference where Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir rejected “land for peace”; the 1998 Wye River Conference; the 1999 Sharm el-Sheikh Conference; the July 2000 Camp David Summit and the December 2000 “Clinton Parameters”; the January 2001 Taba Summit; the 2002 “Road Map”; the 2007 Annapolis Conference; and the 2009-2012 enshrining of the 1949 cease-fire lines, the re-partitioning of Jerusalem and the freezing of Jewish construction in east Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria.

The attempt to be an honest broker between Israel and the Palestinians has defied reality and U.S. interests. While Israel has been an unconditional ally of the U.S. and a role model for countering terrorism, the Palestinians have actively and ideologically sided with U.S. enemies and rivals: Nazi Germany, the Soviet Bloc, Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden, North Korea, Iran, China and Russia. They celebrated the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks; condemned the execution of Saddam and bin Laden; participated in the murder of 300 U.S. Marines during the 1983 bombing of the U.S. Embassy and Marines headquarters in Beirut; murdered two U.S. ambassadors in Khartoum in 1973; and established an anti-Semitic and anti-U.S. education system – which has manufactured a line of anti-U.S. terrorists and suicide bombers.

U.S. mediation has been based on the false assumption that the Arab–Israeli conflict is a root cause of Middle East turbulence, creating a delusional connection between the 100-year-old Arab–Israeli conflict and the overarching 1,400-year-old intra-Muslim turbulence in the region. It has diverted U.S. resources from primary to secondary causes of instability in the Middle East, thus undermining U.S. deterrence. It has radicalized Arab expectations for sweeping Israeli concessions, thus inflaming Arab belligerence and terrorism and intensifying tension between U.S. and Israeli administrations. It has clouded U.S.–Israel strategic cooperation while threats increase: The anti-U.S. Arab street is raging; the U.S. is reducing its military presence in the Middle East and cutting its defense budget; Russia and China are increasing their influence in the region; and Iran’s nuclearization is advancing. All of these developments are independent of the Palestinian issue, the Arab–Israeli conflict, Israel’s policies and even its existence.

In 1967, Saudi Arabia welcomed Israel’s devastation of pro-Soviet Egypt and Syria, which aimed to topple the House of Saud. In 1990, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia were focused on the imminent threat posed by Saddam Hussein, but the Bush–Baker team was preoccupied with Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria. In 2012, Saudi Arabia and most Arab countries yearn for a U.S., or Israeli, pre-emptive strike against Iran, which they consider a clear and present lethal threat. They are anti-Israel and wish its destruction, but they do not consider the Arab–Israeli conflict, or the Palestinian issue, to be their primary concerns. They understand that when smothered by a sandstorm, one should not be preoccupied with tumbleweeds.

Increased Arab confidence in the U.S. leadership necessitates that the U.S. focus on regional sandstorms such as Iran, Islamic terrorism, the Islamic threat to pro-U.S. regimes and the recent turmoil on the increasingly anti-American Arab street.

The enhancement of U.S. power and influence in the Middle East requires that the U.S. upgrade cooperation with stable, reliable, capable, democratic and unconditional allies, such as Israel. The U.S. should not subordinate such cooperation to the mediation of secondary conflicts in the Middle East.

Peacemaking mythologies from Taba to Olmert   Dore Gold   5-12-12

Former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was interviewed last Friday by CNN's Christiana Ammanpour and sought to give his audience the impression that he had been on the verge of a historical peace agreement with Mahmoud Abbas in 2008, and only because of the interference of individuals from the US that brought in outside money, an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement was not reached.

Whatever his political motives, Olmert was feeding the international myth machine that Israelis and Palestinians were close to a historic breakthrough which needed to be bridged by muscular American diplomacy.

Leaving aside his dramatic accusations about millions of dollars that were transferred from what he called "the extreme right wing" in the US to hamper his peace initiative, Olmert was not even close to a final agreement, as he implied to his CNN audience. In fact, when carefully examined, Olmert's secret talks with Abbas should be seen as the latest proof that the fundamental gaps between the most maximal concession made by an Israeli prime minister did not meet the minimal requirements of Abbas for an agreement. This was not the first time that the myth of an impending Israeli-Palestinian breakthrough, that never happened, was widely promoted.

Israeli and Palestinian negotiators at end of the Taba talks issued a joint statement on January 27, 2001 when their meetings concluded, saying: "The sides declare that they have never been closer to reaching an agreement.." Yet when Foreign Minister Shlomo Ben Ami repeated this to a radio reporter from Kol Yisrael, Muhammad Dahlan responded immediately afterwards by saying Kharta Barta (slang for baloney). 

The EU representative Miguel Moratinos even wrote in his internal report on Taba that "serious gaps remain" between the parties. Looking back over the last decade and a half, there has been a strong tendency to overstate what exactly has been accomplished in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. David Makovsky, who in the 1990's served as a diplomatic correspondent for Haaretz before going to the Washington Institute, wrote in 2003 that he had interviewed Major General Shlomo Yanai, who disclosed to him that the security committee at Taba hardly convened and that the parties not only did not progress on the issue of security, but rather there was "retrogression." In short, the parties were not closer than ever. 

Nevertheless the myth that Israel and the Palestinians had been on the verge of an imminent breakthrough persisted. What do we know about Olmert's talks with Abbas in 2008? First, there was no actual agreement between the two. Olmert made a proposal to Abu Mazen in 2008, that he never made public in its entirety. Instead, Olmert provided certain details of his ideas in various interviews that he subsequently gave. His office told Haaretz in December 2009 that "for reasons of national responsibility, we cannot relate to the content of the map and the details of the proposal." The most detailed version of the Olmert proposal was detailed in a cover story for the New York Times Magazine by Bernard Avishai.

In language reminiscent of the end of the Taba talks, Olmert told Avishai: "We were very close, more than ever in the past, to complete an agreement on principles that would have led to the end of the conflict between us and the Palestinians." But was Olmert's description accurate? Avishai writes that Olmert used "constructive ambiguity" to deal with the toughest issues like the Palestinian refugees. Abbas told the Washington Post in May 2009 that it was his understanding that Olmert accepted the principle of the "right of return." Yet, Olmert told Avishai two years later that he the exact number of refugees that would return was still subject to further negotiation. 

How could this obvious gap lead Olmert to conclude that he was "very close" to completing an agreement with Abbas? In the area of security, the Olmert proposals were even more troubling. Abbas told Avishai in the New York Times that "the file on security is closed." But he then added "we do not claim it was an agreement but the file was finalized." How was security "finalized" without without an agreement between the parties on such an important topic? Abbas explained that the Israeli security concerns had been worked out with General James Jones, Rice's security advisor, but not with Israel. Unfortunately, Olmert did not seem to have a problem with this. Indeed,according to Condoleezza Rice's memoirs, Olmert told her that the IDF had "a list of demands" and that "some of them are probably okay." But there were Israeli security requirements that the Palestinians would not accept. Olmert asked that the US work this out with the Palestinians.

What eventually occurred was that Palestinians worked with General Jones, but they stopped coming to their bilateral meetings with Israeli officers.This arrangement watered down the security arrangements that Israel would obtain in the Olmert period. Historically, Israel sought after 1967 to retain territories that were vital to its defense, like the Jordan Valley. That was the essence of the famous Allon Plan that had been embraced by Prime MInister Yitzhak Rabin. Then the idea arose in the last decade, that the IDF could be deployed in those vital areas, instead of annexing them, even if you end up with extraterritorial Israeli military deployments inside of a Palestinian state. Rice explains in her memoirs that she thought of removing the Israeli army from those locations and putting in international forces, or even NATO. 

This was reflected in the positions taken by her envoy, General Jones. Thus with Olmert's initiative, the idea that Israel should defend itself by itself, which had been enshrined for decades, was seriously undermined. There are different versions about what Olmert intended for Jerusalem, each more problematic than the next. He told Bernard Avishai that he was willing to give up Israeli sovereignty over what he called the Holy Basin--an area including the Old City, with the Temple Mount and the Western Wall, the Mount of Olives and the area of the City of David. Did these concessions bring Olmert as close to a final agreement as he claims? Rice write in her memoirs that Abu Mazen "refused" to accept Olmert's offer, even after President Bush appealed to him to reconsider his position. In 2009, Abbas was interviewed by Jackson Diehl of the Washington Post and explained why he could not take Olmert's offer to the Palestinians: "The gaps were too wide." Why is this question about the Olmert proposals important today? No matter who wins the upcoming US elections, the next administration will seek to shape an Israeli-Palestinian peace initiative and push the parties to accept it. 

After the failure of Camp David and Taba, the US foreign policy establishment was locked on to trying to go back to these proposals that plainly did not work. Alternatives were not even considered.In 2010, former President Clinton wrote in the New York Times, that because of past diplomacy and Olmert's initiative, "everyone knows what a final agreement would look like." Unfortunately, misinformed American presidents who are led to believe that a peace agreement was within our grasp, inevitably launch initiatives based on the terms that they heard were agreed to, only to end up clashing with their Israeli allies and walking away with a diplomatic embarrassment. Despite his tarnished reputation, Olmert's appearances reinforce this misimpression that there was a full Israeli-Palestinian deal that once existed, that now needs to be revived. 

Moreover, Israel is in a very different situation today than it was when these peace proposals were made in the past. Israelis have gone through a second intifada with suicide bomb attacks in the heart of their cities, the failure of Gaza withdrawal that led to a massive escalation of rocket attacks on southern Israel, and an Arab Spring, that has demonstrated the fragility of the regimes with which Israel has signed peace treaties as well as the probability that they could be replaced by Islamist elements. Under these circumstances, Israeli security needs in future negotiations must be stressed harder and not subcontracted to envoys from any country. What is required instead is an alternative diplomatic strategy, and more secure path for achieving Middle East peace, rather than trying to revive the a formula that has only led to diplomatic failure.