So, who is the Arab League? Myths and Facts  Eli E. Hertz,

It is illuminating to examine the record of the League of Arab States since the founding of the League in 1945, which is hardly a model for peaceful settlement of disputes in the spirit of the United Nations.

Prior to the establishment of the Jewish state, the League took the following steps:

•  
• In December 1945, the Arab League launched a boycott of ‘Zionist goods’ that continues to this day.
• In June 1946, it established the Higher Arab Committee to “coordinate efforts with regard to Palestine,” a radical body that led and coordinated attempts to wipe Israel off the map.
• In December 1946, it rejected the first proposed Palestine partition plans, reaffirming “that Palestine is a part of the Arab motherland.”
• In October 1947, prior to the vote on Resolution 181 – the “Partition Plan” – it reasserted the necessity for military preparations along Arab borders to “defending Palestine.”
• In February 1948, it approved “a plan for political, military, and economic measures to be taken in response to the Palestine crisis.”
• In October 1948, it rejected the UN “Partition Plan” for Palestine adopted by the General Assembly in Resolution 181.

On May 15 1948, as the regular forces of Egypt, Trans-Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, and contingents from Saudi Arabia and Yemen invaded Israel to ‘restore law and order,’ the Arab League issued a lengthy document entitled “Declaration on the Invasion of Palestine.” In it, the Arab states drew attention to:

“The injustice implied in this solution [affecting] the right of the people of Palestine to immediate independence … declared the Arabs’ rejection of [Resolution 181]” which the League said “would not be possible to carry it out by peaceful means, and that its forcible imposition would constitute a threat to peace and security in this area” and claimed that the “security and order in Palestine have become disrupted” due to the “aggressive intentions, and the imperialistic designs of the Zionists” and “the Governments of the Arab States, as members of the Arab League, a regional organization … view the events taking place in Palestine as a threat to peace and security in the area as a whole. … Therefore, as security in Palestine is a sacred trust in the hands of the Arab States, and in order to put an end to this state of affairs … the Governments of the Arab States have found themselves compelled to intervene in Palestine.”

The Secretary-General of the Arab League, Azzam Pasha, was less diplomatic and far more candid. With no patience for polite or veiled language, on the same day Israel declared its independence on May 14 1948, at a Cairo press conference reported the next day in The New York Times, Pasha repeated the Arabs’ “intervention to restore law and order” revealing:

“This will be a war of extermination and a momentous massacre which will be spoken of like the Mongolian massacres and the Crusades.” The League of Arab States continued to oppose peace after Israel’s 1948 War of Independence:

In July 15 1948, the UN Security Council adopted Resolution 54 calling on Arab aggression to stop:

“Taking into consideration that the Provisional Government of Israel has indicated its acceptance in principle of a prolongation of the truce in Palestine; that the States members of the Arab League have rejected successive appeals of the United Nations Mediator, and of the Security Council in its resolution 53 (1948) of 7 July 1948, for the prolongation of the truce in Palestine; and that there has consequently developed a renewal of hostilities in Palestine.”

• In October 1949, the Arab League declared that negotiation with Israel by any Arab state would be in violation of Article 18 of the Arab League.
• In April 1950, it called for severance of relations with any Arab state which engaged in relations or contacts with Israel and prohibited Member states from negotiating unilateral peace with Israel.
• In March 1979, it suspended Egypt’s membership in the League (retroactively) from the date of its signing a peace treaty with Israel.

More recently, in the Beirut Declaration of March 27-28, 2002, adopted at the height of Palestinian suicide attacks in Israel, the Arab League declared:

“We, the kings, presidents, and emirs of the Arab states meeting in the Council of the Arab League Summit in Beirut, capital of Lebanon … have conducted a thorough assessment of the developments and challenges … relating to the Arab region and, more specifically, to the occupied Palestinian territory. With great pride, we followed the Palestinian people’s intifada and valiant resistance. … We address a greeting of pride and honour to the Palestinian people’s steadfastness and valiant intifada against the Israeli occupation and its destructive war machine. We greet with honour and pride the valiant martyrs of the intifada.”

THE ARAB LEAGUE, WHICH HAS SYSTEMATICALLY OPPOSED AND BLOCKED PEACE EFFORTS FOR NEARLY 67 YEARS, AND IS IN A DECLARED STATE-OF-WAR WITH ISRAEL, IS NOW DEEMED BY THE U.S. STATES DEPARTMENT AN ORGANIZATION THAT CAN CONTRIBUTE TO PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST.

 SHIMON NETANYAHU OR BINYAMIN PERES?

By MARTIN SHERMAN  3-20-14

Anyone watching portions of the PM’s AIPAC address might have been excused for thinking Bibi had morphed into Peres. But worse, much worse, was still to come.

By virtue of our natural and historic right and on the strength of the resolution of the United Nations General Assembly, [we] hereby declare the establishment of a Jewish state in Eretz Israel, to be known as the State of Israel. 

– Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel, May 14, 1948 

I think it’s a mistake for some people to be raising it again and again as the critical decider of their attitude toward the possibility of a [Palestinian] state, and peace. 

– John Kerry on Binyamin Netanyahu’s insistence on public recognition by the Palestinians of Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people, March 14 

The “Jewish state” question is hard for many non-Israelis to understand… But for Netanyahu and his followers, the question is essential. Arab leaders have never conceded that a non-Arab state can hold a permanent place in the Middle East… Until they do so, there will be no real peace, because Palestinians will keep pressing to weaken and eventually eliminate Israel’s Jewish majority.

– Jackson Diehl, “Obama’s Middle East fallacy” – The Washington Post, March 17.

In last week’s column, I warned that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s continued capitulation to concessionary demands has proven dysfunctional and counter-productive, and has not created any understanding of Israel’s position, but rather a stimulus for additional demands.

As if on cue… 

Readers will recall, I wrote: “Once exposed, his weakness precipitated mounting pressures to give way again and again. And each time he did, rather than receiving commendation for his ‘moderation,’ all Netanyahu got was continuing condemnation for not complying with the next emerging demand.”

And then, as if on cue, just as the column was submitted, the next demand emerged, along with incipient condemnation for his refusal to comply.

This resounding affirmation of the accuracy of my assessment-cum-prognosis was provided courtesy of none other than US Secretary of State John Kerry, with his demand that Israel forgo its eminently reasonable insistence that the Palestinians publicly acknowledge the very raison d’etre of its establishment – to be the nation-state of the Jewish people.

Since compliance with this new demand would in effect largely nullify much of the rationale for Israel’s continued existence, the very fact that it is now being raised should be cause for grave concern for Israel and its supporters in the US.

After all, to mollify the Obama administration, Netanyahu has over the past five years consented to a series of previously inconceivable concessions, despite expressing prior unequivocal opposition to them, frequently excoriating political rivals for contemplating similar concessions in the past.

Long, lamentable list 

As I pointed out last week, this lamentable list is long and depressing: 

• His acceptance of Palestinian statehood in stark violation of electoral pledges; 

• His agreement to impose an unprecedented discriminatory freeze on Jewish construction in Judea-Samaria that was unreciprocated by the Palestinians, and unappreciated by the Americans; 

• His demeaning (and futile) apology to vitriolic, anti-Israeli Turkish premier, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, for IDF commandos having to defend themselves against a frenzied mob of Islamist extremists; 

• His craven consent to negotiate generous compensation for thwarting their murderous initiative; and worst of all, 

• His egregious release of scores of convicted Palestinian terrorists, guilty of the most gruesome atrocities imaginable, for no more than the Palestinians deigning to enter into negotiations, which they should have greater interest in advancing than Israel.

The fact that Netanyahu had vigorously denounced each of the preceding concessions as unacceptable before eventually adopting them, clearly conveys that every Israeli “no,” however resolute it appears, should merely be considered a submissive, post-dated “yes.”

This has served to generate two unavoidable consequences.

The first is to destroy the credibility of any objection — whether his personally, or that of any official Israeli organ – to any additional demands on Israel in the future, no matter how perilous.

The second is to make the advent of such pernicious demands inevitable.

Outrageous and infuriating 

And as we have seen, the inevitable was soon upon us – and with it, a sense of foreboding that further capitulation would soon follow.

This trepidation was aptly conveyed in a talk-back to my column by JPost.com reader Icry, who noted: “As this was written previous to Kerry belittling Netanyahu’s demand that Abbas recognize the Jewish State, the countdown begins to when Netanyahu again capitulates.”

Why this matter is so fateful, and why it is so crucial that Israel not yield on it, was succinctly articulated by theWashington Post’s Jackson Diehl in the introductory excerpt (see above). He is of course entirely correct in asserting that if it does acquiesce, “Palestinians will keep pressing to… eventually eliminate Israel’s Jewish majority.”

It is the paramount importance of this issue – especially for anyone who purports to believe that durable peace with the Palestinians is feasible – that makes Kerry’s new demand so outrageous; and his expectation that Israel should consent to an arrangement based on its adversaries’ denial of its essence, so infuriating.

Feigning disingenuous bemusement 

Feigning disingenuous bemusement at all the fuss, Kerry attempted to dismiss its importance, by alleging: “‘Jewish state’ was resolved in 1947 in Resolution 181 where there are more than 40-30 mentions of ‘Jewish state.’” 

Echoing this line, State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki stated: ”The United States’ position that Israel is the Jewish state... has been consistently made clear by the president and secretary,” adding, “However, we do not see a need that both sides recognize this position as part of the final agreement.”

So, having failed to persuade the Palestinians to acknowledge what Kerry himself claims should be self-evident, he is attempting to railroad Israel into accepting what is, in effect, a negation of its identity. One can only wonder whether America’s top diplomat is aware of how transparently mendacious and self-serving his endeavor is beginning to look.

After all, the Israel-Arab conflict has raged for decades despite “the US position that Israel is the Jewish state.” What really matters is the Arab position, and in particular the Palestinian- Arab position, and it is precisely this which Kerry proposes Israel disregard.

Absent such a condition, any “two-state” agreement will quickly emerge as no more than a “two-stage” subterfuge.

In many ways, the requirement that Abbas acknowledge Israel as the Jewish nation-state is analogous to Ehud Barak’s requirement that Arafat declare an “end of conflict” with the Jewish state.

It was a deal-breaker then, and it is clearly a deal-breaker now – because Arab opposition to Jewish sovereignty is not due to what the Jews do, but to what they are, Jews.

Strategic positioning 

Regrettably, there are detrimental voices from inside the Israeli establishment that seem oblivious to the significance of Palestinian recognition of Israel’s Jewish character.

Among the most noticeable is that of Finance Minister Yair Lapid. With characteristically flippancy, he derided the demand for Palestinian recognition as “rubbish,” proclaiming: “My father did not come from the ghetto to be recognized by the Palestinians. The entire Zionist idea is that we recognize ourselves and that’s enough.”

His imbecilic bravado should be summarily dismissed for the arrogant tripe it clearly is.

For this Lapidian swagger might be a position of some merit, if one was not seeking accommodation with the Palestinians. However, as I have pointed out previously (“What an idiot,” October 10, 2013) it is totally senseless, if – as Lapid claims – he is devoted to the peace process, even approvingly envisioning the prospect of Palestinian flags over public buildings in east Jerusalem. (Der Spiegel, May 8, 2008) 

It should be made crystal clear that withholding recognition of Israel as the Jewish state is not tactical posturing by the Palestinians, but strategic positioning. By refusing such recognition, the Palestinians preserve for themselves the rationale for continuing to press for the “right-of-return” for millions of Palestinian Arabs into a “non-Jewish” Israel.

This is what makes the required structuring of any agreement qualitatively different from those signed with Egypt and Jordan, where, with all their shortcomings and manifest impermanence, the “right-of-return” into pre- 1967 Israel was never an issue.

By forgoing the demand for this recognition, Lapid is complicit in facilitating future demands for the implementation of a ruinous “right-of-return” – something the Washington Post’s Diehl is keenly aware of but which seems to elude the somewhat limited grasp of Israel’s finance minister.

Shimon Netanyahu/Binyamin Peres? 

But enough of Lapid. Back to Bibi. 

It is against this vicious cycle of outlandish demands, followed by compliance, followed by more outrageous demands and further compliance, that growing signs are emerging of a disturbing metamorphosis in Netanyahu and his policy predilections. It is a metamorphosis that appears to entail Netanyahu increasingly embracing policies that he once disdainfully derided with good reason.

Thus, although his recent AIPAC address was – as usual – a rhetorical masterpiece, tailored to a tee for US audiences, there were certain aspects of his speech, where the seasoned listener might have been excused for thinking Bibi had morphed into Shimon. For portions of what he had to say were substantively indistinguishable from the disproven and discredited delusion of the “New Middle East,” touted by Peres in the mid-’90s, but today, in the wake of the visceral violence of the Arab Spring, seem even more absurd and detached from reality than before.

Echoing the implausible platitudes of the Oslo era, Netanyahu proclaimed “… peace with the Palestinians would turn our relations with… many Arab countries into open and thriving relationships… The combination of Israeli innovation and Gulf entrepreneurship...could catapult the entire region forward…” R-i-g-h-t! That’s just what the world’s most decadent regimes are hankering after – to catapult the entire region forward into an era that would question their nepotistic hold on power.

And even if they did – with all due respect to the unique ingenuity of Israeli expertise – they could still significantly “catapult forward” with what is available today, absent any Israel- Palestinian accord, with the Americans, British, Germans, Swiss, Japanese, Koreans… 

Unless someone seriously believes they are putting their own desire for progress on hold, because of their identification with their Palestinian “brethren” for whom they have shown undisguised disdain.

Crazy Talk: Reinstating ghettos 

But worse is still to come. For there are increasing indications that Netanyahu is seriously considering measures that, in effect, involve abandoning Jewish communities in Judea-Samaria, in detached and isolated enclaves (read, “ghettos”).

There is hardly an alternative interpretation for his words in his March 8 interview with Channel 2, where he stated that (a) Israel would not be able to extend its sovereignty under a permanent accord to encompass all of the settlements, but (b) he was adamant that “there will be no act of evacuation” and (c) that the government will not force West Bank settlers to leave their homes, even under a permanent peace agreement with the Palestinians.

This heinous and hazardous notion was recently raised in a delusional policy-paper, “Jewish Enclaves in a Palestinian State” (April 8, 2013), authored by Gideon Biger and Gilead Sher, and published by the Institute for National Security Studies (see my analysis, “Infuriating, insidious, immoral, December 19, 2013).

Alarmingly, this possibility seems to be taken seriously by Netanyahu, who reportedly tasked cabinet secretary Avichai Mandelblit with researching whether the complicated array of Dutch and Belgian enclaves, which originated in a mixture of medieval treaties, might constitute a viable legal precedent for similar arrangements under which Jewish settlers could stay put within a Palestinian state.

Belgium and Holland? Really? Can anyone genuinely believe that this is a case study of any relevance for the Israel-Palestinian conflict? 

Choreographing capitulation? 

Those who would dismiss this as idle talk, or as unavoidable spin to forestall international pressures, should recall my caveat last week: In the discourse on the Arab-Israel conflict, words once uttered have a dynamic of their own, and their impact frequently extends well beyond the control – and intentions – of those who uttered them.

So whatever Netanyahu’s true intentions, there should be grave concerns that, at least on the Palestinian issue, he has surrendered psychologically, and is strenuously seeking some way to choreograph his capitulation.

Martin Sherman is founder and executive director of the Israel Institute for Strategic Studies 

The State Department’s Campaign Against the ‘Jewish State’ Idea—in 1954

Rafael Medoff 3-20-14

 Secretary of State John Kerry’s remark last week that it is a “mistake” to insist that the Palestinian Authority recognize Israel as a Jewish state brings to mind a little-known episode in the early 1950s, when the Eisenhower administration briefly embraced the notion that Israel should stop identifying itself as a Jewish state.

The key figure in this unusual chapter in U.S.-Israel relations was a young U.S. Army officer named Henry A. Byroade, who in 1952 was picked by President Harry Truman to be Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, although he had no Middle East-related experience or education.

According to a previously unpublished interview with Byroade in the files of the Truman Presidential Library, in Missouri, the president summoned Byroade for a discussion in late 1952, shortly before he left office. “I was very critical of both the policies of Israel and our policy towards Israel,” Byroade recalled. “And he outlined his view[s] for me, which really were very surprisingly similar my own. I left there extremely encouraged that we would get White House backing for what I called an even-handed, balanced policy position between both Arabs and Israel.”

Bryoade reasoned that if Truman, who had received considerable Jewish support, was ready to back away from Israel, then his successor Dwight Eisenhower, who had much weaker ties to American Jewry, would be even less supportive of Israel. And he was right.

In April 1953, Israeli Foreign Minister Moshe Sharett visited Washington and got a first-hand taste of how Byroade was reshaping U.S. policy. Byroade demanded that Israel make territorial concessions to the Arabs, and threatened Sharett that the Eisenhower administration would present “our own peace plan,” which Israel might not like.

On the same day Byroade met with Sharett, two leaders of the anti-Zionist American Council for Judaism (ACJ) met with President Dwight Eisenhower. The Council had provoked tremendous controversy with its lobbying in the 1940s against creation of a Jewish state. What is not widely realized is that even after Israel was established, the Council continued its activities and, in fact, had even more impact on U.S. policy than previously.

ACJ officials Lessing Rosenwald and George Levison urged the president to consider American Jews a purely religious group with no obligations to Israel. They also denounced the idea of American Jewish immigration to Israel and said the Israelis should become “Middle Eastern” like their neighbors. Levison came away from the meeting convinced that Eisenhower was “in general agreement with our views.”

Afterwards, they visited the State Department and delivered a memorandum making the same points. Assistant Secretary Byroade took the memo with him when he accompanied Secretary of State John Foster Dulles to Israel in May. Parts of the ACJ memo found their way into a landmark Mideast policy speech, ghostwritten by Byroade, that Dulles delivered in June.

Dulles vowed to improve relations with the Arabs, said the U.S. would not become “a backer of expansionist Zionism,” and proposed that Jerusalem be ruled by “the world religious community,” and not be Israel’s capital. Challenging Israel’s identity, Dulles declared that Israel “should become a part of the Near East community and cease to look upon itself… as alien to this community.”

Jewish leaders hoped the speech did not represent a shift in U.S. policy, but those hopes were soon dashed. When the Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Abba Eban met with Dulles in October, the secretary ticked off a lift of demands that Byroade had prepared for him: Israel must “re-examine its policy of encouraging large-scale immigration,” refrain from counter-terror raids, and “bear her share of the Arab refugee burden.”

By the spring of 1954, Byroade was ready to go public. Sixty years ago next month (on April 19, 1954), in an address to the World Affairs Council, in Dayton, he called on Israelis to “look upon yourselves as a Middle Eastern state, rather than as a headquarters… of a world-wide grouping of people of a particular religious faith.” He also demanded that Israel “drop the attitude of the conqueror” and halt what he called “retaliatory killings.”

Then, with the approval of Secretary Dulles, Byroade delivered the keynote address at the ACJ’s annual convention, in Philadelphia on May 1. His public association with the anti-Zionist group appalled Jewish leaders.  And what he said at the conference was even worse.

Byroade repeated his demand that Israel become “a Middle Eastern state.” He targeted Jewish immigration to Israel as a central obstacle to peace, asserting that Israel’s calls for “greatly expanded immigration” convinced the Arabs that it was planning “a future attempt at territorial expansion.”

The Israeli government filed an official protest against the “unjustified interference in matters which are purely Israel’s own concern.” American Zionist leader Emanuel Neumann blasted “Byroadeism” for “negating the hopes and dreams and the religious emotions of countless generations.” In a dramatic demonstration of Israel’s commitment to aliyah, keynote speakers at 19 different government-sponsored Israel Independence Day events throughout Israel the following week focused their remarks on the need for increased immigration.

The Eisenhower administration stood by Byroade and his comments. But the controversial policy he was shaping soon withered in the face of Arab intransigence. As Byroade discovered during his subsequent stint as U.S. ambassador in Cairo, Arab leaders such as Egypt’s Gamal Abdel Nasser could not be appeased by Israeli concessions on immigration, territory, or refugees. Their unflinching refusal to accept Israel’s existence made it impossible for the Byroade line to be maintained as America’s Mideast policy in the years to follow.

A  Plan for Peace in the Middle East---

The Israeli Solution 

Caroline Glick interviewed by Mark Levin

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=epImuqWBGGg

Lies, Damn Lies, and J Street 

 Janet Tassel  3-16-14

A film is coming your way called The J Street Challenge. If you don't see it coming your way, say something to your pastor, rabbi, or librarian to insist that it be shown.

A production of Americans for Peace and Tolerance, with APT's Charles Jacobs as  special consultant; produced, directed and written by Avi Goldwasser and Ilya Feoktistov, The J Street Challenge lines up a phalanx of illustrious academics and activists to expose the deception, the lies, and the anti-Israel animus behind J Street. But the film is not a snooze-parade of talking heads; ideas -- important ideas -- are supplemented with illustrations, maps, videos, and images both heartwarming and heartbreaking.

The film opens with shots of terrorism against Israel, and then, a veritable deus ex machina, breaking through the tumult, from on-high comes the voice of Jeremy Ben-Ami, president of J Street, crying, "We want this conflict to end!"

Well, that certainly gets your attention. Who doesn't want the conflict to end? But Ben-Ami knows the way.  Ben-Ami and others, including George Soros, founded J Street in 2008, to (according to their website) "provide a home for pro-Israel, pro-peace Americans who believe that a 'two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is essential to Israel's survival as the national home of the Jewish people and as a vibrant democracy.'"

"The majority of the people on all sides," he says in the film, "share a desire for a peaceful world for their kids and their grandchildren. They want to figure out how to compromise in order to live together in peace."

He's slick, no doubt about it; but can he really be preaching to the Jewish people about peace? Harvard professor Ruth Wisse retorts, "One of the most seductive messages to the Jewish people, for the last two centuries at least, has been the message of peace." And she puts "the conflict" in perspective:

There is no such thing as an Arab-Israeli conflict. There is an Arab war against Israel. There is an Arab war against the Jewish people's right to a state. It is the conflict of over twenty countries, with an enormity of land, more land than they know what to do with, that refuse to allow one people its sliver of land.

Ben-Ami, however, wants a slice of that sliver. A piece for a peace. "Israel's long-term security depends on fulfilling the aspirations of the Palestinian people for a two-state solution," he says. And further:

We believe that the Palestinians too must have a national home of their own, living side by side with Israel.  This is in Israel's interest, in America's interest, and it is right and just.

In other words, says Daniel Gordis, vice-president of Shalem College, "J Street advocates a complete exit from the West Bank without alerting anyone to what the real dangers are." Or as Wall Street Journal columnist Bret Stephens says,

The  moment Israel withdrew from the [Gaza] Strip entirely, the rocket fire didn't abate; it expanded. The Palestinians didn't take the greenhouses so generously left by the Israeli settlers.  They trashed them.  The Gaza Strip did not become a showcase for Palestinian moderates to prove what they might do with a state -- turn Gaza into a little Hong Kong or Singapore, or Dubai even. They turned it into a giant terrorist entrepot.

And, he adds, "I'm not against a two-state solution, if the other state is Canada. Do we think Israel should be party to the birth of the 23rd Arab state, another Iran hard on its borders?"

The map created by J Street's two-state solution is displayed,  ironically showing just how vulnerable Israel would be, reducing the country's narrowest width to nine miles, its population centers open to rockets, missiles, and worse. And even more scarily, it shows how insane it would be to surrender control of the Jordan Valley, creating essentially a land bridge from Baghdad to Tel Aviv.  As Charles Jacobs comments, "This is a map that will enable the Arab world to see Israel's total vulnerability. No sane country would ever do this."

Just then, as if in confirmation, a video of a prominent Fatah member is interposed, in which he says, "What will be with Israel? Israel will come to an end."

When it comes to carving land out of Israel, Ben-Ami out-Obamas Obama. "It is up to us to get Israel back to the 1967 lines, and we must push our leaders to do what is right. We do support the president's vision for two states, but we do think he could be pushing harder.  That's part of our call to action."

As Ruth Wisse says, "So we can't convince the Israeli electorate, but we can circumvent them to pressure the Israeli government from the United States?" Noah Pollak, executive director of the Emergency Committee for Israel, calls J Street's position "imperialistic": "They know they can't sell their ideas in Israel, so they sell them in Washington, pushing the government to pressure Israel." It is not as if they don't realize, according to Richard Landes, professor of history at Boston University, that "this pressure on Israel amounts to, literally, a genocidal threat."

It was after the Arabs lost the Six-Day War in 1967 that they began to shift their focus to an ideological war, cloaked in Marxist language about colonial rule.  They also began to talk about a Palestinian identity. The conflict has now narrowed down to vilification of Israel's "occupation," adopted by the universities, the media -- in short, the Left.  It is a mainstay of J Street's raison d'être. Again, Ruth Wisse:

Since that so-called "occupation" was the consequence of the war against Israel, it cannot retroactively have become its cause. So anyone who claims the "occupation" of those territories is the reason for Arab aggression against Israel is simply inverting historical reality.

Ben-Ami's repertoire is stocked with rusty clichés:

We raise our children to not treat other people the way we want not to be treated ourselves, but we make a real mistake if we tell those children to check their Jewish values at the door of Zionism.

To which Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz replies:

The greatest Jewish value of all is pikuach nefesh, the saving of lives, and that includes the protection of the 6 million Jews who now make their home in the Jewish state. Anything that undercuts Israel's ability to defend itself against nuclear or terrorist attack is inconsistent with Jewish values.

But J Street knows only the one-sided blame game. Indeed, when J Street took its message to college campuses to establish J Street U, it found itself faced with students who were embarrassed about being Jewish, so instead of "Pro-Israel, Pro-Peace" they made it easier by simply dropping the part about Israel. What college student is not ardent about peace?  As Ben-Ami speaks from aloft, "We believe that it is our role to repair the world. We must rouse our neighbors from indifference." Note that Israel is not even mentioned.

As Noah Pollak comments, "It is about a sort of tikkun olam, a confusion of religion and politics. The idea to keep in mind is that for them Judaism is liberalism and liberalism is Judaism."  Richard Landes calls it "moral narcissism," an "overwhelming concern for being a nice person and really not caring about the consequences. In this way, you can completely identify with the people who hate you and consider you their mortal enemy."

Perhaps the most impressive response comes from young Samantha Mandeles, a campus coordinator for CAMERA. Responding to another stale canard from Peter Beinart, she says,

That's the good Jew, the Jew that helps everyone else, who puts others before themselves, who cares more about strangers than they do about family.  If a Jewish student feels that repairing the world and being a universalist and progressive is equivalent to being Jewish, then they can forget being proudly Jewish and Zionist. They don't want to believe that other people have other world views….because their world views are all about pluralism, this utopia where everybody is the same, where there isn't anything to have a conflict about.

"J Street and J Street U," she continues, "insist on being considered part of the big tent of Jewish organizations that care about Israel. But they insist that these events are invalid if they don't criticize Israel, advocate BDS [boycott, divest, and sanction] and Israeli apartheid."

There is a hair-raising section in the film devoted to some of J Street U's scurrilous activities on various American campuses, including calls for subverting Birthright Israel, calling for Birthright to place more importance on the Palestinian narrative, and promoting trips for Jewish students to the grave of Yassir Arafat in Ramallah.

As the film shows, J Street has no qualms about its followers, who, says Ben-Ami proudly, include 600 rabbis. Some of his flacks, like Medea Benjamin and Naomi Chazan and other nasties, are shown in full cry here. J Street continues to back politicians, like Rep. John Dingell, who have shown themselves to be consistently anti-Israel. [See the J Street website for the entire list] In 2013, J Street enthusiastically supported the nomination of Chuck Hagel to be Secretary of Defense.

Ben-Ami's donors include, in addition to George Soros (a fact that Ben-Ami hid for years) a number of pro-Palestine figures; Genevieve Lynch, who is an official of the National Iranian-American Council, sits on the J Street finance board. According to Lenny Ben-David, a former deputy chief of the Israeli embassy in Washington, fifty per cent of J Street's budget comes from outside the United States, a fact Ben-Ami also lied about.

There is much, much more in this well-made, provocative film -- provocative enough that Jeremy Ben-Ami, ordinarily an unseemly publicity hound, declined to be interviewed. Don't miss it.

Page Printed from: http://www.americanthinker.com/2014/03/lies_damn_lies_and_j_street.html at March 16, 2014 -

THE DEBATE IS ABOUT OUR RIGHT TO EXIST

Dror Eydar 3-16-14

This is what you found? A murmured response to the question by PLO leader Yasser Arafat in 1988, and an additional hum directed toward Haaretz journalists? And after this, they'll be angry that people talk about U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry in terms of messianic obsession.

Why should it be necessary to search high and low for Palestinian recognition of a Jewish state? Because there is none. One can read the declarations of the Palestinian Authority and its leaders over the past 20 years. Indeed, opposing recognition of Israel as the national home of the Jewish people is more important to the Palestinians than land, since this is the true heart of the conflict, rather than the other territorial nonsense that the Left has been selling for years. It's not about territory and not about settlements and not about refugee rights, not at all.

The hundred-year-old argument is about the Jewish people's right to an independent home in the Land of Israel. Not only the Palestinians -- no Arab state recognizes our right as Jews to any part of the region. They obscure the issue and talk about "recognizing Israel," since the desire is to perpetuate the conflict even after a diplomatic treaty is signed, when the false claim will be that the Arab minority in Israel is suffering under "apartheid" and should have autonomy, since they belong to the Palestinian people who have been here since the dawn of creation. The international battle against Israel will continue to dismantle its Jewish identity on the way to making it a state for all its nationalities. There will be no end to the conflict without recognition of a Jewish state. This should be at the top of the Left's priorities.

Kerry should read the Palestinian National Charter, the founding document of the "moderate" Fatah. It was ratified by the Sixth General Assembly of the Fatah Movement in Bethlehem in August 2009, when Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was again elected head of the organization. This conference approved a plan that included the principle of "absolute irrevocable opposition to recognition of Israel as a 'Jewish state' to protect the rights of refugees and the rights of our people [Israeli Arabs] beyond the Green Line."

Here, Mr. Kerry, is the rationale for the Palestinian refusal to recognize a Jewish state: They will continue to demand that refugees return even after a deal is signed and turn the parts of Israel around the Green Line into a binational state. Abbas and Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat both voted in favor of the plan.

And here is a quote from the Palestinian platform that thus far, despite repeated promises, has not been changed: "Claims of historical or religious ties of Jews with Palestine are incompatible with the facts of history and the true conception of what constitutes statehood. Judaism, being a religion, is not an independent nationality. Nor do Jews constitute a single nation with an identity of its own; they are citizens of the states to which they belong." The Jews are not a people but a religion, and therefore have no national rights. Clear and simple. Just read it.

The insistence upon recognition of a Jewish state isn't meant for us. We don't need recognition from Ramallah. The call to recognize Israel as a Jewish state is intended to block the PLO's progressive tactic in which each territory it receives serves as the base for the next demand. And not recognition in empty words, but a requirement that this recognition make its way into the Palestinian school studies and media. As of now, the state of Israel doesn't exist in the PA. So the Israeli insistence on recognition is non-negotiable. Without this, it is better to maintain the status quo. The so-called threat that without a diplomatic deal Israel's situation will worsen has been made for a hundred years already. Don't try to scare us. We've managed all right so far.

Ahead of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's arrival, the American administration sought to pressure Israel by releasing an aggressive interview President Barack Obama gave to Jeffrey Goldberg. And now, as Abbas is on his way, John Kerry is putting out statements to press Israel -- imagine that -- into relieving the Palestinians of their responsibility. It's not only a matter of justice and fair mediation, it's much more serious. John Kerry's recent remarks have helped the PLO's step-by-step approach.

The Questions No One Asks

By Bassam Tawil  3-14-14

http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/4209/the-questions-no-one-asks The Palestinians aspire to control all the holy sites in the Old City of Jerusalem, not only those holy to Islam, but those holy to Christianity and Judaism as well. They understand that [in a peace agreement] they would have to declare the end of the conflict. That is not a situation the Palestinians are ripe for yet. The next Palestinian leader will simply say that any agreement was Abbas's, not his, and does not commit them or the Palestinian people. Both Palestinian society and public policy are based on the rejection of peace with Israel, and the Palestinian street is bombarded daily with propaganda from the Palestinian establishment advocating war, the return of refugees and the destruction of Israel. American Secretary of State John Kerry recently asked Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas about the possibly of locating the capital of Palestine in Beit Hanina, the eastern neighborhood of west Jerusalem. That would allow the Palestinians, for the first time in annals of the emerging Palestinian people, to have a capital in Jerusalem, in the eastern section known as Al-Quds. The proposal was ostensibly an achievement for the Palestinians, but actually it was a bad omen. It would end the Palestinian dream of controlling the holy sites of Islam and Christianity in Jerusalem, and the Palestinians would no longer be able to demand the Old City of Jerusalem as the capital of their country. The Palestinians aspire to control all the holy sites in the Old City, not only those holy to Islam but those holy to Christianity and Judaism as well. Needless to say, that is to be accomplished at the expense of both Israel and Jordan, which manages the Islamic holy sites as part of its peace agreement with Israel. Secretary Kerry's question was the reason Jordan reacted badly to suggestions in the Israeli parliament from the Israeli right to give sovereignty over the Temple Mount - managed by the Jordanian Waqf - to Israel. Kerry told Abbas that, as part of the agreement being formulated, the Palestinians would have to recognize Israel as a Jewish state. Mahmoud Abbas and his close associates understand that this request would force them to accept that they will no longer be able to claim the "right of return" of the Palestinians refugees to the State of Israel or destroy it by changing its demography. They understand that the refugees would have to settle in the future state of Palestine and that the Palestinians would have to declare the end of the conflict. That is not a situation the Palestinians are ripe for yet. Kerry also told Abbas that the Palestinians would have to waive security control of the Jordan Valley corridor along the border with the Kingdom of Jordan. The Americans have therefore foiled the Palestinian plan of "stages," Yasser Arafat's original plot, never abandoned by the Palestinians, of dismantling Israel one slice at a time like a roasted lamb. The initial plan of "stages" was for Islamists to cross the Jordan river, join the Palestinian Authority's armed security forces (or those of Hamas, if it managed to take over the West Bank), and attack Israel's cities with missiles, cross its borders and slaughter its citizens. If Israel were to waive security control, first the Palestinians would reap the political and territorial fruits of the agreement, then soon they would violate it by flooding the West Bank with mujahidin from all over the world. In rejecting the American proposal, the Palestinians now accuse Kerry of being a foil for the Israelis, and have told him that Abbas is the one rational man with whom Israel can make peace. Some Palestinian leaders threaten that if no agreement is reached, a third intifada may break out. For Israel, that clearly means the entire peace process depends on one man alone, not on the will of the Palestinian people. The result of such a deal will be that the conflict will not have been resolved even after Abbas's eventual departure from the political scene: the next Palestinian leader will simply say that any agreement was Abbas's, not his. Thus, according to Palestinian reasoning, Israel's one chance for peace depends on one rational man, and will evaporate when he quits, is ousted or dies. The enterprise is not only fragile, it is doomed to failure from the outset. The Israeli demand for the end of incitement and threats against Israel is directly related to its demand to construct a foundation for the Palestinian people which includes a real peace that will continue even after Mahmoud Abbas is no longer the Palestinian leader. It is therefore obvious why Israel hesitates to sign a peace agreement in which all its political and territorial concessions are liable to fall into the lap of Hamas or the other subversives waiting to oust Abbas. This highly collapsible situation is also the reason Israel insists on dealing with the fate of the agreement should Abbas's successors suddenly change their minds and claim that whatever Abbas signs does not commit them or the Palestinian people. Israel has good reason to be suspicious, especially in view of the amateur and irresponsible policies of the current Obama administration, which now has a pattern of abandoning friends in need. Kerry's proposal reflects an understanding of historical truth: the need for both a Palestinian state and Israel's security needs -- but what will happen if Arab or European pressure forces the Americans to alter their policies, as they have done so often before? The Arabs regard Israel as a well-oiled, state-of-the-art war machine, but in reality it is vulnerable, fragile and easily blackmailed, unable fully to implement its forces to counteract the Islamic terrorism deliberately hidden within the Palestinian population in the territories. In the meantime, Hamas continues to use human shields and the Palestinian Authority continues its anti-Israeli incitement, especially via Qatar's Al-Jazeera TV channel in Arabic. Qatar funds Hamas and supports Islamic terrorist organizations all over the Arab world. * In addition, the permanent support the Arabs and the Europeans give the Palestinians -- such as the Europeans' demand for "proportional" force and the expectation that Israel will compromise its own security by sacrificing its territorial assets -- only serves to encourage terrorism, makes the Palestinians less flexible and leads them to believe that between pressure from the Arabs and the sanctions and boycotts they expect to be imposed by the Europeans, they will eventually be able to defeat Israel. The Arabs seem to have forgotten that Israel already overcame Arab and Palestinians boycotts. During the last two intifadas, when there was a Palestinian boycott of Israeli-made products and Palestinians were forbidden to work in Israel, Israel began using automated industrial building techniques, thereby leaving the tens of thousands of Palestinians who had previously worked in construction permanently without jobs. Now the EU is trying to impose a boycott on goods manufactured in the Israeli settlements, but ignoring that most of the workers there are Palestinians. The result will be that Palestinian workers will again be let go and again find themselves unemployed. Palestinians were also always the ones who were harmed. The Palestinian leadership might do well to understand that the consequences of a third intifada will be even more destructive, with no chance of success. It can be assumed that Abbas understands the situation, but unfortunately the Palestinian people still think they will be able to destroy Israel and install a Palestinian state on the ruins. When it comes to changing their situation, the Palestinians still refuse to ask the right questions. Is there a single Palestinian, for example, who really thinks Israel will sign an agreement that would settle millions of Palestinians into its territory? Would Israel agree to have its future depend on a leader like Mahmoud Abbas, who does not enjoy either a consensus or a legal Palestinian constitutional status? Can Israel ignore that both Palestinian society and public policy are based on the rejection of peace with Israel, and that the Palestinian street is bombarded daily with propaganda from the Palestinian establishment advocating war, the return of refugees and the destruction of Israel? And is there really a single Palestinian who thinks Israel will rush to sign an agreement while the Palestinian Authority works unceasingly in international forums to delegitimize it, boycott it and maneuver to achieve unilateral international recognition without a gesture towards Israel? There are other questions the Palestinians refuse to ask themselves: for instance, is there a single Palestinian who really believes that Israel places faith in the upper echelons of the Palestinian Authority who are now planning to have Israel's leaders tried as war criminals in the International Criminal Court in The Hague and threatening of a third intifada? Can Israel make concessions to the Palestinians in the Jordan Valley and ignore what happened after the Israeli army withdrew from south Lebanon, which it saw it turn into a vipers' nest of Hezbollah-instigated terrorism? Will Israel ignore the lessons of the past, especially after Hamas's border with Egypt turned into a highway for smuggling arms and the Gaza Strip itself became a regional and global stronghold of Islamism? The Palestinians fool only themselves as they waste their time theorizing, inventing excuses and plotting, while the Jews engage in practical matters, and do not plan their future based on the unattainable. Do the Palestinians not understand that once the murderers terrorizing the civilian population of Syria in the name of jihad have finished there, they will turn their attention to the Palestinian Authority and do the same to the Palestinian population there? The Palestinians, who expect the jihad fighters in Syria to liberate "Palestine" for them, do not understand that the men who went to fight the Assad regime in Syria have nothing to lose. Their own families are far from the confrontation and when they enter the Palestinian Authority, Palestinian women will be their first victims. The peace process is not simple, it requires time and the building of trust. Israel has territories the Palestinians want and holds the key to the international recognition of "Palestine." The Palestinians have the resources of trust necessary to win over the hearts of the Israelis. The more that time passes, the more the Palestinians waste that precious resource. The Israelis dig in their heels and the Western world is gradually coming around to their way of thinking. If the Palestinians really want to establish a Palestinian state, they might start by asking themselves the right questions. Bassem Tawil is based in the Middle East.