Captivity and Forgiveness

When the news media were full of the kidnapping details in 2005 in Iraq of four men representing a Christian peace group, it seemed a lunatic enterprise on the part of those held hostage to enter the country for the purpose of attempting to turn Iraqis toward peace and away from violence. The Iraqis themselves were fully invested in their tribal and sectarian hatred toward one another. Their focus was on the capture, torture and murder of Shia or Sunni by Sunni or Shia.

But the Christian Peacemaker Team sent a delegation of four committed members to preach sweetness and light, courtesy fundamentalist Christians who believe in forgiveness and redemption to fundamentalist Muslims who practise violent jihad and martyrdom. One of the abductees who had been held for 118 days as hostages before a joint commando raid freed them, has written a memoir of the experience.

Long before James Loney wrote his memoir he had issued a public expression of forgiveness toward his captors. Recalling his statements at that time he seemed like a delusional and fearfully stupid man, determined to support his faith by declarations of unflagging hope in the decency and goodness of humankind. Failing to make a distinction between social environments and hereditary antipathies.

"I know I'm speaking out of school here, but I'm going to say it anyway. You have no idea how many people were involved, how many people risked their lives to get you out. I want you to tell your people that. Just tell them to think about that before they decide to send someone else here. I'm not saying anything else. Just tell them. Tell them to think about all the people that risked their lives to get you out."

This was spoken to James Loney in an icily chiding lecture by one of the soldiers who had been tasked to rescue him and the three other abductees. It was a joint British-U.S. task force, whose formation had the purpose of hunting for al-Qaeda operatives and rescuing foreign hostages. Everything comes at a price. The men who rescued Loney and the two others risked their lives.

The fourth man was beyond rescue. An American, Tom Fox, had earlier been removed from the squalid site where he had been kept along with James Loney, Norman Kember and Harmeet Singh. He was murdered, his body found on a street in Baghdad. And the following is what illuminates the peculiar mind-set of a man like James Loney.

Determined to forgive, he will not permit himself to feel any kind of rancour or blame against his abductors. He lived for all the time he was in captivity in the fear of their discovering that he is gay knowing that they would make an attempt to cure his homosexuality; the cure for which in many Muslim societies is death.

Like the jihadis that captured him and his three colleagues determined to turn the face of peace toward their captors, he believes in self-discipline and self-sacrifice; where they believe in the sacrifice of martyrdom with its great reward of attentive virgins in Paradise, he believes in the martyrdom of self to a greater ideal of Godly virtue.

Neither he nor the two others who were rescued from their miserable captivity and possible even future torture and death, would agree to testify against their captors in the prosecution of the death of the American Tom Fox, by trial in Iraq by its Central Criminal Court. "They took Tom away from us, but they did not take away our ability to forgive.

"We did not lose ourselves. We were not infected with the poison of hate. They may have changed our lives, but they did not change us." This is how James Loney celebrates his victory over the events that occurred to him as a tormented prisoner of the Swords of Righteousness Brigade who held them for ransom.

In pledging forgiveness and refusing to testify against their captors they effectively denied justice to the man whom their captors murdered. This kind of moralistic hubris does not reflect a humble mind but a sadly delusional one. Obtusely, deliberately delusional.

Suing for Statehood, Suing for Peace

The Palestinian Authority has pronounced itself ready for statehood. The United Nations has congratulated the Palestinian Authority for its work in resulting in producing nascent government departments, the administrative instruments of government required for the functioning of an independent state. Infrastructure development has been produced that will assist a new Palestinian State to govern well.

And there are 100 UN member-states prepared to support the PA's unilateral push for sovereign statehood.

Of these 100 state governments allied with the United Nations in the General Assembly and the United Nations administration itself, where are the questions looking for answers related to the PA's intentions toward its neighbour? Not much in the way of good will when the Palestinian Authority abrogates the necessary first step to living adjacent an established neighbour before seeking statehood.

That first step being a commitment to living in peace with Israel, the neighbour that the Palestinians have been attempting to dislodge from the geography since 1948.

Israel remains adamant that first things must be settled first, a not-unreasonable assumption that this would be in the best interests of both solitudes and by extension the entire Middle East. Agree on a peace settlement and in the process clean up the outstanding issues that have been a prickly matter of contention between both Israel and the Palestinians.

But to do so would be to clearly acknowledge that the Jewish State has a right to exist as a Jewish State. And that by extension the Palestinians agree to accept their portion of the geography, inside borders agreeable and practically useful to each.

The international community sees a Palestinian Authority claiming it has matured politically and socially and is prepared to take its place as a nation within a community of nations.

This is also the administration that continues to honour suicide bombers as 'martyrs'. In the process recruiting others to emulate the passionate and violent rejection of Israel's survival as a state. As a good neighbour the PA has chosen to use Passover as a jumping board to honour the PA terrorist responsible for the 2002 "Passover Massacre" in which 30 Israelis died.

The family of Abbas Al-Sayed who masterminded the deadly attack was officially awarded a "festive plaque, in celebration of the anniversary of the massacre". The bomber, Abdel-Basset Odeh detonated a bomb contained in a suitcase, killing outright 30 elderly civilians celebrating Passover, and maiming dozens more at the Park Hotel in Netanya.

Of more recent vintage was the attack on the Fogel family of five, one an infant, by two young men arrested later by Israeli Security. Amjad Awad, 19, and Hakim Awad, 18, both residents of the Arab village of Awarta, next to the Jewish community of Itamar, where the slaughter took place, were raised in families that had dedicated themselves to martyrdom.

They were proud of what they had accomplished, telling their interlocutors that had they known that two other children of the Fogel family were asleep in their rooms they would have killed them as well. They will be tried of the crimes of which they are accused in an Israeli court of law.

But not if Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas has anything to say about it. For the Palestinian Authority and its Chairman now call upon Israel to release Palestinian prisoners as yet another condition of sitting down to discuss peace options. That these Palestinian prisoners languishing in Israeli jails are terrorists and murderers is not lost on the PA who consider them honourable martyrs.

This then, is the partner for peace that Israel is matched against. And to whom the international community and the United Nations is prepared to grant statehood on the basis of their having achieved the basic determinants for responsible governance. Absent the intention to live in peace with their neighbour.

Absent the determination to instruct their people otherwise than to continue to conduct violent raids against their neighbour. Reflecting, in fact, the issue seen but not recognized when Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad stated, speaking at the United Nations, that Israel should be wiped from the map of the Middle East.

This is the responsible governing entity prepared to enter statehood, one that insists upon the release of all Palestinians in Israeli jails, encouraging its public to hold protests across the West Bank for the release of prisoners in Israeli jails. They speak not of Israel, but of the "1948 territories".

The PA's "Minister of Prisoner Affairs, Issa Qarage who has praised terrorists in his official capacity, was out encouraging people to mount their protests, stating "Struggle is the story of the Palestinian people". "Struggle" being code for conducting violent attacks against the "oppressor"; Israel.

In the PA's school system an hour was dedicated to the indoctrination of students that all Palestinian Authority prisoners, regardless of their crimes, irrespective of the lawful judgements brought against them, must be released. In the West Bank mosques and churches added their encouragement calling for the release of prisoners in speeches, and clanging bells in solidarity.

This is Israel's partner for peace; not eschewing violence and entreating its citizens to do likewise, but celebrating violence; encouraging and honouring it. And this is the Palestinian Authority that will present itself as the new administration of a new country to be respected for its ability to govern itself well and be a credit to the United Nations in its human rights record.

That Palestinian State

The United Nations representatives in the Palestinian Territories are jubilantly self-congratulating. Their mission to assist the Palestinian Authority to finally establish civil authority and infrastructure as a precursor to establishing a sovereign Palestinian State has succeeded. The newly-issued United Nations report, Palestinian State-building: A Decisive Period, claims with pride that a functioning government is finally possible.

The Palestinian Authority can now boast, thanks to the invaluable assistance of the United Nations and funding by the international community, that it is governmentally functional in the areas of rule of law and human rights; livelihoods; education and culture; health; social protection; and infrastructure and water. Which is a considerable advance from the inchoate state it represented under Yasser Arafat.

Who preferred to launch the first destructive Intifada rather than continue on the imperfect road to establishing a decent civil infrastructure for his nascent country. He was unable to see past his violent militant wing's intention to entirely dislodge Israel from the map of the Middle East, and retake all of what Palestinians claim to be their rightful inheritance.

A declaration through the United Nations General Assembly, supported by over 100 countries prepared to recognize a unilateral declaration of statement for the Palestinians on pre-1967-war land, would most certainly present as a problem for neighbouring Israel. Without the establishment of a firm peace agreement that would settle the problems of Jerusalem and West Bank settlements such a declaration would be fraught with tension and danger and the prospect of another war.

Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad is prepared to proceed with a unilateral declaration of statehood approved by the United Nations. He has issued a call for the international community to fund the transition to statehood over a period of years to the tune of a total of $5-billion in investment support. Which will assist the process immeasurably. And the initiative will proceed.

This, despite that the Palestinian Authority agreed a few years back that final status would best be achieved through negotiations with Israel beforehand. Now Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, having two years ago cut off peace talks, has turned instead to gaining of international support for a PA state. Leaving Israel with the massive headache of considering the half-million Jews now living in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

While The UN's Middle East envoy, Robert Serry, states that ideally it is vital yet that Israelis and Palestinians resume serious peace talks with an aim to settle all disputes, and while Israel's Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu is prepared to pledge Israel to those talks, the PA's Mahmoud Abbas remains talk-shy, preferring to opt for unilateralism.

Leaving Israel in a truly untenable position.

Sincerely Neighbourly

Fogel Family Slaughter Deliberately Incited by PA
by Chana Ya'ar

The Palestinian Authority government deliberately incited its population to terrorism long before the Sabbath slaughter of the Fogel family in the Samaria Jewish community of Itamar this past Friday night.

“Incitement against Israel, which frequently turns into genuine anti-Semitic incitement, is an inseparable part of the fabric of life in the Palestinian Authority, “ noted Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu in a statement issued by his media adviser following the murder. “These anti-Israeli and anti-Semitic messages are regularly heard in both the private and official media and in mosque sermons, and are studied in school textbooks. Terrorists are given honored status and become models for emulation in Palestinian society, both in the media and via ceremonies held by institutions affiliated with the PA."

“Institutionalized and systematic incitement against Israel has never ceased in the PA, even during the height of the diplomatic process in the 1990s,” the PMO noted.

Recent Examples of PA Incitement

Praising numerous attacks by terrorists, the PA government has made special efforts to encourage the murder of Israelis – and has not shied away from praising those who kill children, despite protestations to the contrary.

On the day before the brutal slaying of the Fogel family, Sabri Saidam, adviser to Abbas and under-secretary of the Fatah Revolutionary Council, told PA Arabs in a speech that “the weapons must be turned towards the main enemy [Israel] and that internal differences of opinion must be set aside.” Saidam denounced the low monthly stipends to families of terrorists who murder Israelis. He also called for the naming of another public square in honor of Dalal Mughrabi, the bloodthirsty terrorist who led the 1978 Coastal Road massacre that left dozens of Israelis dead, including 13 children.

On March 6, the Al Hayat Al Jadida newspaper advertised the naming of a “youth” tournament for 19 year olds honoring the memory of "shahida" (Martyr) Wafa Idris – the first female PA Arab suicide bomber. As a Red Crescent ambulance volunteer, she was able to bypass Israeli security and enter Jerusalem, where she murdered one person and wounded more than 150 others in January 2002.

One week prior to the brutal attack on the Fogel family, the Fatah faction led by Abbas held a ceremony at the Deheisheh neighborhood of Bethlehem, honoring those of its homegrown terrorists who were killed during the PA's terrorist campaign against Israel in the years 2002-2005. Those “honored” included suicide bomber Muhammad Daraghmeh, who murdered nine Israelis in Jerusalem, as well as Saed Saud Abu Amar, Jad Mahmoud Atallah, Issa Zakri Faraj and Ayyat Al-Akhras – who at age 17 was the youngest female suicide bomber, having murdered two Israelis in her suicide bombing of March 2002.

On February 9, the official PA TV station broadcast a clip from a campaign entitled “Women as Role Models” during which Dalal Mughrabi was extolled as a prime example. Last summer several children's camps were named in her memory.

Two months prior to the Fogel murder, PA Chairman and Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas awarded $2,000 to the family of a terrorist who attacked and attempted to murder IDF soldiers. Khaldoun Najib Samoudy raced towards IDF soldiers at the Hamra checkpoint in December 2010, carrying two pipe bombs and screaming “Allahu Akbar!” (G-d is Great). His act was lauded in the January 25 edition of the Fatah-backed PA newspaper, Al Hayat Al Jadida, which covered an award ceremony in which Abbas bestowed a “presidential grant” of $2,000 on the relatives of the “Shahid” (martyr) in the village of Al-Yamoun. The article, in Arabic, was translated by media watchdog the Palestinian Media Watch (PMW).

On January 2, the Al Hayat Al Jadida newspaper reported a speech by Azzam Al-Ahmed, a member of the Fatah Central Committee, which expressed the PA government's support for terrorism as a means of “resistance." During a gathering on the 46th anniversary of the faction's founding, Al-Ahmed was quoted as saying, “We emphasize today the aims for which the Fatah movement was established,” adding Fatah is a mass movement which believes in popular revolution and has wrested its right to use all means of resistance in order to achieve its aim.

On October 26, 2010, PA TV broadcast a documentary about the work of PA medical teams that included an entirely fictitious scene in which an Israeli soldier shoots a PA Arab in the head.

On June 21, 2010, a children's program was broadcast on the official PA TV channel which taught that “The Jews are our enemies,” and that “Israeli soldiers are wild animals.”

On December 27, 2009, official PA TV reported that Tayib Abd A-Rahim, a representative of Abbas, presented condolences on behalf of the PA chairman to the families of three terrorists killed by IDF soldiers after murdering Rabbi Meir Avshalom Chai. A-Rahim said on Abbas's behalf, that “without doubt, the Occupation authorities perpetrated a wild and barbaric assassination, maliciously and in cold blood.”

In PA schools, the “History of the Arabs and the World in the 20th Century” is a 12th grade textbook used the Palestinian Authority to teach about World War II. The textbook includes material on Nazi ideology – but does not mention the Holocaust at all.

Israel-Egypt Peace Accord - in Jeopardy?

Wonderful that there are moderates in Egypt who see the practicality, as did the regime of now-deposed President Hosni Mubarak - inheriting it from his predecessor Anwar Sadat - of maintaining a peace accord (however cold it is) with the State of Israel. Anwar Sadat paid dearly for his bold admission of peace trumping conflict. Because of his initiative Egypt was able to focus on slowly drawing itself into the modern world rather than being financially mired in prosecuting an ideological/religious war after war.

The chief of the Egyptian armed forces, and the ruling forces council, now in control of the administration of the country post-administration-collapse (as though this is particularly new; simply the figurehead is now missing) until such time as the new constitution is prepared (a type of lightning-speed immaculate conception) and elections take place, has assured Israel and the international community that the peace treaty will remain intact.

And that is a profound relief. There is more than sufficient unrest and instability, to put it mildly, in the geography at the present time without the prospect of yet another war potential heating up to once again confront the Arab/Muslim-encircled State of Israel. If, however, that assurance has more than face value. Given that the Muslim Brotherhood is now on the cusp of influence. And its fierce hatred of Israel remains undiminished.

But it isn't just the Muslim Brotherhood, after all, with its possible one-third of Egyptian supporters. It is also the moderate Egyptian politicians who have much to say of the 30-year peace treaty. "The Camp David accord is over", pronounced Dr. Ayman Nur, leader of the Tomorrow party, planning his own candidacy in the forthcoming presidential elections.

He is most certainly playing to popular opinion. Because it is fact, despite the long-standing peace agreement enforced on the population by the National Democratic Party led as president by Hosni Mubarak and his colleagues, that the agreement is an extremely unpopular one with the populace. Egyptians mostly detest Jews. If they think of Jews at all it is to revile them as enemies of Islam.

The most accursed people on the face of the Earth are the Jews that crawl upon the face of the Earth, as far as most Egyptians are concerned. They cannot see a need for a peace agreement with Israel, when it would seem far more in keeping with their sentiments to wage war against the Jewish presence unfathomably permitted to continue soiling an Islam-dedicated geography.

The late Anwar Sadat's courageous admission that it is better to live in peace with one's neighbour than constant war has no resonance with the Egyptian street. Whose hatred for Jews runs so deep that they will attack light-skinned Egyptians on the premise that they are really Jews in their midst. Who will attack a blond female American reporter to viciously sexually assault her in a mob attack, shouting all the while, "Jew, Jew!!!"

	Anwar Sadat, left, Jimmy Carter, center, and Menachem Begin on the White House lawn, after signing the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty in 1979.
	Photo by: Archive

This man, Dr. Ayman Nur, is a secular liberal, expressing the common enough opinion of the man on the street, appealing to their inherited prejudices against the Jew whose irritation-quotient is invaluable as the perennial scapegoat for all that has gone awry in the geography. Anything that occurs that is seen to be detrimental to any Arab country is the result of an accursed Zionist conspiracy.

Egypt, Tomorrow

The Egyptian armed forces now securely back in control have given their pledge that theirs is a temporary authority, awaiting the re-writing of the country's constitution and the free and fair election of a new civilian governing body. And then they will obligingly melt into the background. Always on the alert, however, to do their duty to their country. Above all, to save it from itself.

And the Western media, being onside, is a really nice bonus.

Of course, having President Obama finally making up his mind is not a bad thing, either. His tenuously insipid pronouncements, announcements and grandiose glimmerings of control at a time when the U.S. had clearly no influence, spelled confusion in the minds of onlookers only; Barack Obama was in firm control, knew all along what he was conveying; the mangled message was an illusion.

The reality is, according to the jubilant Western media, that the democratic way of life and governance is proving irresistible. It's that 'didn't we tell ya so!?" syndrome. But sometimes a rose is a rose is a rose doesn't work, and this is one of those times when the democracy that is known and loved in the West will be transformed beyond recognition.

It already has been, and will continue to be further disfigured beyond recall.

Bearing in mind that the ruling military council does not want to be seen as controlling the country and has admonished those tasked (including a Muslim Brotherhood representative) to remake the constitution for which they've been given ten days to come up with a miracle of acceptance. After which a leisurely six months will pass to offer competing political parties ample time to organize themselves and mount an election campaign.

A formality that will, in effect, leave two entities standing; the current National Democratic Party, now seen to have been disgraced by their years of corrupt autocratic rule, though in fact they performed for Egypt quite a fine job of administering the affairs of the country with some notable human rights exceptions. And, of course, the waiting-on-tenterhooks-and-finally-opportunity-has-materialized, Muslim Brotherhood.

Take your pick, energized and triumphant Egyptians. Whatever the choice, it will have brought democracy to modern Egypt born from the ashes of ancient Egypt. With the change in the constitution and a change in leadership in style and substance, all will be well. Violent criminals will be plucked off the streets and returned to the jails; police stations will be re-built, as will government buildings that were torched in the peaceful protests.

The historical, irreplaceable and priceless heritage objects of antiquity that were handily heisted will be missed, but that loss too was part of the peaceful protest. In due time foreign investment will return, foreign- and Egyptian-owned manufacturing will get up to speed once again, the stock market will recapture all it lost, and tourism will once again boom.

The price of food will continue to grow, and imported wheat, more costly than ever, will be used for subsidized bread for the poor.

Under a new government something will have to be done about the 40% of Egyptians living well under the poverty line. And while that is being bruited about, jobs for all those unemployed young men must also be achieved. Just incidentally, those who have employment insist it is past time for raises in their livelihood to lift them out of the mire of the employed poor, still better off than the utterly destitute.

And then there's the matter of a monumental deficit and that miserable debt that keeps ballooning. Imagine, if Egypt were on a war footing with its neighbour, Israel, how much of its stretched treasury would be wasted on prosecuting war after war - just like old times. Wait; isn't that just what the Muslim Brotherhood is demanding, that Egypt abrogate its legendarily-despised peace treaty with Israel?

With Shariah law imposed on the country how will that impact on tourism, on relations between foreigners visiting the country, given to understand that casual Western-style clothing is no longer permissible at those overheated vacation spots? And relations between Egyptian Copts and the majority Muslim population under the Muslim Brotherhood's rule, possibly a formula for a new round of persecution?

The possibilities that democracy brings to Egypt seem boundless, fascinating, quite unrecognizable. Just as well that Hosni Mubarak will likely not be around to witness the tumult, the downward-spiralling changes that would surely break his heart.

Firmly In Control

The world waited with bated breath. The U.S. administration let it be known discreetly that President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt was prepared to announce he was stepping down from the presidency, meeting the demands of the anti-government protesters in Tahrir Square. Great relief, that finally the protesters, who have repeatedly refused the armed forces' request to move on, vacate the square and permit life to return to normal, would have no reason to continue their vigil.

President Mubarak had other ideas. He resolutely refused to leave his post, at a time when he was needed to oversee an orderly transition in government. He and his newly-appointed cabinet have already made considerable concessions to the demands of the anti-regime crowd. They have met with opposition party representatives. Have taken strides toward changes that will ameliorate hardship for many.

But the country is in desperate need of calm, of a return to order. So that people can return to opened and operating shops and manufacturing enterprises, so that foreign investors will have their doubts erased that their investments will be imperilled by anarchic chaos, and so that tourism can resume, at the high point in the season.

The stock exchange will re-open, banks will be prepared for business, people will be paid, food deliveries can re-commence as transportation is once again enabled, and bakeries will receive their deliveries of wheat so they can bake the bread that the poor are entitled to. President Mubarak spoke to his people calmly and with dignified purpose.

The Western media interpreted his speech as "paternalistic", as "arrogant", described him as "defiant". He was, in fact, comporting himself as would a confident, determined president of a great country whose valuable experience and level-headed direction his country needs at this time in its history. The old order has come to a screeching halt. The new stands on the cusp of delivery.

It is the anarchic energy of the tens of thousands of protesters who demand the immediate ouster of their president that has, in fact, been "defiant", not the dignified response of their president. He and his colleagues are perfectly correct that it is not the nervous tension of foreign governments that will impel their actions toward the democracy the protesters claim is their right.

Whether democracy does in fact result from the upheaval of the past few weeks and the following weeks and months, history will tell. In the meanwhile, President Mubarak has demonstrated his mettle in firmly informing his international colleagues that it is he and his government who will see their country into the future, not they.

Be Fruitful And Multiply

Thank you, Prime Minister Stephen Harper, for articulating an official response on behalf of Canada that does not slavishly emulate that of our great good neighbour, the United States of America. Although Canada did not have a close alliance with Egypt as the U.S. has had, guiding that country to reflect American values as much as possible in a geography where dictators, oil sheiks, monarchies reign and repress their populations, we do have many Egyptian-Canadians.

Many of whom doubtless feel as do the protesters in Tahrir Square, that the country would be better off without the autocratic oversight of President Hosni Mubarak. But Canada, through Prime Minister Harper, is not calling for the immediate stepping down of President Hosni Mubarak. Prime Minister Harper called for patience and respect and the proffering of dignity to a man who has served his country long.

Who has overseen a country of 90 million people, administering the tenth largest standing army in the world, maintaining a peace treaty with a neighbour reviled by most other nations in the neighbourhood, and brought the economy of his country to an enviable place, despite a lack of huge natural resources other than moderate amounts of oil and gas reserves.

Under his rule, while the country still has many poor, they are better off than they were, and government subsidized bread helps keep body and soul intact. One huge natural resource Egypt has unparalleled by all the others but Iran and Iraq, is antiquities and tourism, historical relics and pride in a fabled heritage.

Most Egyptians, unlike their president and his colleagues, see no value in maintaining a peace agreement with their neighbour, the State of Israel. Mr. Mubarak recognized great value to his country's dignity and its treasury by avoiding future wars with the State of Israel. It is possible that with his removal from office, that peace agreement will be abrogated.

When his colleague and former fellow General, President Anwar al-Sadat had the courage to defy the other Arab states by signing a peace treaty with Israel, on his assassination as reward for that courage, vice-president Mubarak stepped up to the presidency. Knowing he was right, even as his country was thrown out of the Arab League, he remained faithful to his peace principles.

Both Canada and the United States remain staunch allies of Israel, defenders of her right to peaceful existence among her neighbours. The U.S. has for decades given both Israel and Egypt billions in assistance, three-quarters of which is returned to the U.S. as payment for modern arms, greatly assisting employment in the United States. Egypt's unemployment remained dismal.

But then, this is a country whose majority religion deems it a gift of God and to God to be fruitful and multiply. It is a country, like the others in the region, with an over-abundance of young. Including young men who are restive and unhappily unemployed and as such unable to plan for their futures. As such, susceptible to the blandishments of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Now, in Egypt's hour of pending political collapse, the United States and its European allies urge President Mubarak, their long-time ally in the fight against fundamentalist Islamist terrorists, to step away, absent himself, surrender to the viral demands of democratic-inclined protesters. Who do not seem to understand that when power steps away, a vacuum occurs inviting not necessarily democracy but chaos and anarchy.

In response, the Prime Minister whom the embattled President Mubarak has newly appointed explains on behalf of his colleague: "The majority of Egyptians want honourable treatment and respect for a president who has spent a long time in power, in a civilized manner that is in keeping with the nature of the Egyptian people."

And Canada's Prime Minister Harper explains his view, that the new leadership implement reforms that "lead towards a future that is not simply more democratic, but a future where that democracy is guided by such values as non-violence, as the rule of law, as respect and respect for human rights, including the rights of minorities, including the rights of religious minorities."

History is being made. We will see whether we are the better for it.

Exchanging Geography

"You'll never get an offer that is more fair or more just. don't hesitate. this is hard for me too, but we don't have an option of not resolving [the conflict]." Ehud Olmert

Negotiations between reasonable individuals will bear fruit when there are no assumptions, but there are earnest attempts to bridge the gap of expectations. Some give, some take. At the top of the agenda must be the determination to be as thoughtful and as open to recommendations from each side as possible, to balance the needs of each and arrive at workable solutions.

Good will is an overused term, but it cannot be overstressed. Coming into a negotiating session with the pretense of co-operation but the intention of balking at potential solutions spells failure. Just as much as arrogance and entitlement.

When, after prolonged periods of negotiation between the State of Israel and the Palestinian Authority and the helpful interventions of the United States and other stake-holders in the Middle East, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas met with then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert for what was to be a final negotiating meeting between the two principals, there were high hopes for success.

Despite which, there was no agreement to be finalized into a workable peace plan. And in the final analysis, that was the case for the very same reason that Yasser Arafat, a far more malicious and corrupt figure than his successor, cited when he finally turned down the offer that President Bill Clinton brokered between Ehud Barak and Arafat; that were he to accept that agreement as preferential as it was to the Palestinians, he would be signing his own death warrant.

As with the Middle East Peace Summit at Camp David in 2000 to negotiate and conclude successfully a "final status settlement" to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, so likewise with the
U.S.- and Egypt-brokered plan on the verge of a peace deal eight years later. Long gone from office, former prime minister Ehud Olmert had hinted years ago how puzzled he had been by failure, when he felt success was close enough to touch.

"I began by presenting the principles of the arrangement that I was proposing", Mr. Olmert later wrote in his soon-to-be-published memoirs, excerpted in the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth. "After I finished, Abu Mazen [Mr. Abbas] sighed deeply, and asked to see the map that I had prepared. I spread it out. He looked at it, and I looked at him. He was silent."

What the map made clear to Mr. Abbas was a possible way out of the dilemma posed to each side by the presence of the problematical and long-standing West Bank settlements housing tens of thousands of Israelis. Major settlement blocs in East Jerusalem and the West Bank, according to the proposal, would be left in Israel's hands. In exchange the Palestinians would receive land upon which majority Palestinians lived.

It represented an equal exchange of land, but with each side logically receiving land that their own lived upon. For the Palestinians it was land incorporated into the West Bank and Gaza Strip, with a narrow corridor of approach from one to the other. Jerusalem would be partitioned between its Jewish and its Arab neighbourhoods, and this would allow for each nation to install their capitals within their portions of the city.

The contested holy site location - where the holiest site in Judaism exists, with the third-holiest site in Islam sitting directly over it, would be administered by an international, special-purpose committee comprised of representatives from both parties, including as well the United States, Jordan and Saudi Arabia; a fully-inclusive governing body.

"Never before had any Israeli prime minister presented such a crystallized and detailed position about resolving the conflict as was presented to him on that day", wrote Mr. Olmert. "For the first time since the negotiations began, I was very tense. For the first time since I had become prime minister, I truly felt the weight of Jewish history on my shoulders, and despite the fact that I was confident that I was doing the right thing, the negotiations were very heavy."

So "heavy", in fact, that they collapsed. In intense negotiations that had preceded this meeting that been ongoing for eight months, none of the offers proved acceptable to Israel by the Palestinians who had themselves offered major concessions. The Palestinians had offered to surrender claims to large parts of East Jerusalem, gave up demands for refugee return, agreed they would share Jerusalem and its holy sites.

And it was the Israelis who adamantly pressed for more concessions. At this meeting Mr. Olmert had the indelible impression that the sides had finally moved together, that each was meaningfully responding to the other, affirmatively. "Take the pen and sign now", he urged Mr. Abbas. "Give me a few days", Mr. Abbas responded. "I don't know my way around maps. I propose that tomorrow we meet with two map experts, one from your side and one from our side. If they tell me that everything is all right, we can sign."

The following day Palestinian negotiators called to say Mr. Abbas had forgotten he had a previous appointment in Jordan. The Palestinian Authority/Israeli meeting would have to be postponed. And that was the day, as it happened, that Mr. Olmert was replaced as leader of his governing party.

"I haven't met with Abu Mazen since then", wrote Mr. Olmert.

"Distortions and Fraud"

Offensively intolerable to the Palestinians, sensible enough, were it to have been true, to the Israelis. Carve out those areas within Israel's borders where majority Arab Palestinians live under Israeli rule and citizenship, and incorporate them into the nascent Palestinian state. Balance that by ceding those areas within the West Bank where sufficient Israelis live to merit the action, and incorporate them into the Israeli borders.

Solve the aching problem of East Jerusalem by submitting its administration, protection and neutrality to a trusted, special-purpose third party to ensure that the holiest site in Judaism remains accessible to Jews, and that the third-holiest site in Islam is equally accessible to Muslims, but with nothing like the preferential treatment given to Muslims as currently exists.

As for the Right of Return, no such thing; there is no 'right' for descendants of the original Palestinians who chose or were forced to flee the fledgling State of Israel. Saeb Erakat may have declared that the accessed/purloined papers were false and taken out of context, but there have been expressions of the utility toward the peace process of ensuring that returnees remain under Palestinian rule.

Problems solved. More or less. A state is negotiating with a population without an established state. There is no force on Earth, moral or legal, that propounds the theory and the necessity that the established state forego many of its most vital needs to satisfy the demands of the state-to-be which has flourished with co-operation from the state, yet resents and abhors its existence.

The positions accredited by the archival material given to Al Jazeera purporting to reveal the double-crossing motions of the Palestinian Authority for the purpose of achieving a peace settlement opening the door to nationhood for the Palestinians are obviously those of Israel, cross-referenced to the PA. The purpose; pure mischief, to make certain the unravelling of the peace negotiations remains permanent.

Who, in the Middle East, stands to profit from the interference and the inferences? Why, all those entities, formal and informal, national and religious, who choose to spike the goblet of potential accord with a poison draught of ongoing hatred, revenge and ongoing plans to destroy Israel. Stand up and take a bow, Syria, Iran and Lebanon, for starters. Qatar? Turkey?

There are some obvious truths that were revealed previously, but denied in self-defence. That in fact Israel did inform the PA leadership well in advance of its defensive invasion of Gaza, and without too much of a doubt, the PA agreed to the necessity, urging the swift defeat of Hamas which had violently uprooted Fatah from Gaza.

But when this information became public, the PA was quick to denounce it as a blatant lie, and to announce that it planned to react to the genocidal-intending Israeli move on Hamas in Gaza by unilaterally withdrawing from the then-ongoing peace talks.

When Mahmoud Abbas claimed that Al Jazeera deliberately confused the Palestinian and Israeli positions, he correctly diagnosed the situation, as well he might, and to little avail. "We don't have anything to hide, and I reiterate that Al Jazeera's information is full of distortions and fraud", fumed Saeb Erakat.

Quite so. And now?

Insurgent Threats

Canada is doing truly commendable work in Afghanistan. Through CIDA and the funding of other humanitarian agencies, along with volunteer work on the part of Canadians from various walks of public life, and the dispatching of Canadian Armed Forces personnel to the country, the commitment to aid and assist a backward nation is ongoing.

Above all, the future lies in the country's children. And the need to have those children well educated is fundamental to the future of the country. Which is precisely why the Taliban - the "scholars" - have no wish to have Afghan children educated, other than within the precincts and the confines of the very same madrassas and divine scriptures in a language foreign to Afghanistan, where they themselves received their education.

Ensuring that the message of surrender to the will of Allah through the will of the Taliban is paramount. Boys may attend school, girls may not, for the place of women and girls in a Sharia-led society has always been and will continue to be confined to the home. Penalties can be harsh by any standards; death, dismemberment, acid attacks.

Traditionally in fundamentalist Muslim societies such as Afghanistan - particularly in the provinces - the presence of women was confined to the home. In public that presence was muted and shrouded, and even then there was the requirement of being escorted by a male family member. The modesty of Muslim women was ensured by completely cloaking their femininity, ensuring that no stray male eyes could assault her status as a possession of a father or a husband.

The Canadian military, tasked with the construction of schools for Afghan children to attend in their mountain villages, are bemused, puzzled and angered that such schools remain unused. In villages where the residents fear the backlash of permitting their children to become educated. Where lurking in the dark of night are neighbours who support the Taliban and who may themselves be Taliban and who bear threats.

These same villages where the elders during an arranged shura will assure their interlocutors that there are no IEDs in the area, and if there were any, their presence and purpose would be a complete mystery to them. And sometimes the information that as long as the Taliban are present, there cannot possibly be any collaboration with foreign troops because the penalty is so dire; life itself.

Canadian and Afghan patrols arrive in remote villages to ask the impossible of the villagers. Allow us to employ you in building useful public structures. Allow us to assure you that your children will be safe if you permit them to attend school. There is great remorse among some villagers as they bemoan the fact that they cannot and may not, for the Canadian and the Afghan military and police will depart.

And the Taliban will then arrive under cover of night, to threaten and to exact their method of justice in the battle for the 'hearts and minds' of Afghans.

Shuttle Diplomacy

It requires an energetic and hopeful agenda to hustle back and forth between adversaries as an interlocutor and diplomatic liaison, hoping to achieve something remotely akin to a break-through where each weary and glass-eyed faction may eventually tire enough to agree to some remote, and unworkable arrangement. But even for that potential there must be at least a modicum of goodwill present.

A little bit of honesty and faith in a common future, to permit two resolute adversaries to agree to live in peace alongside common borders.

The proximity talks which had previously been undertaken by the Bush and then the Obama administrations achieved precisely nothing. Two sides resistant to the very idea of accommodating one another. Particularly in view of all the truly bad blood, the spilled blood, the potential for more always lurking in the background. The complete lack of trust evident from each side.

Based on previous attempts that failed, and based on a history of bloodshed.

Israel, of course, is to blame. For occupying areas of the West Bank which the Palestinian Authority has earmarked conclusively as their future territorial state. That this was a geography available to them sixty years ago and which they emphatically rejected in favour of the entire geography is another matter. But is it, given the fact that there are two streams of consciousness at work here?

One that is clearly championing a two-state solution and peace between itself and Israel, and which is fervently, famously espoused to the international community, while pleading for assistance in forcing Israel to withdraw from the West Bank as it did unilaterally from Gaza. Did that Gaza withdrawal assist in achieving peace? As a goodwill gesture what did it achieve?

The other stream of consciousness is the one spoken in Arabic, not English, and addressed to a home audience, sheltered from the international community's scrutiny. And that is the constant advocating of 'resistance' against the 'occupier'.

A resistance that is part of the PA school curriculum, and which plays a huge part in teaching Palestinian children how the past was horribly marred and what the future represents, and who their mortal enemy is and how they are being groomed, as ardent young Palestinian warriors of the future, to combat that enemy.

It manifests itself in commemoration of the martyrs who died in the cause of Palestinian statehood by nobly acting as suicide bombers. It names holidays and streets and buildings after the esteemed martyrs that the enemy considers terrorists for taking the lives of innocent men, women and children.

Those same civilian women and children who are considered also to represent the enemy because they were Israeli, they were Jews.

If it is difficult to persuade Israel that it must take a gigantic leap of faith and dismantle its many and populous settlements in the West Bank, and surrender half of its heritage city of Jerusalem to the demands of the Palestinian Authority, and prepare to grotesquely welcome back Palestinians who fled the country in 1948, effectively diluting the Jewish presence of Israel to a minority, it is equally difficult to persuade the PA to relinquish its hatred of Jews and Israel.

To persuade the Palestinian Authority to surrender its aspiration of assuming the entire territory inclusive of where Israel sits, to once again hold complete autonomic sway over "Palestine". To those solemnly dedicated and determined diplomats dispatched time and again from the United States to the Middle East to achieve the seemingly impossible, good luck and prepare to settle in for another long run.

After which do not be amazed if nothing is achieved. Intransigence is the hallmark of that geography. Bitter grievance is the inheritance of a people who have become quite comfortable in their ongoing status as willing refugees, since the United Nations is itself comfortable in supporting them as helplessly dependent refugees.

Is it little wonder that official Israel expects so little of its Palestinian counterparts? On the basis of previous encounters, ongoing events of violence so readily unleashed in rejection of the deep communion of a desire to establish an aura of peace and reconciliation, why place trust in those who choose not to deserve it?

Two-State "Temporary Solution"

Majority of PA Arabs See Two States as 'Temporary Solution’
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu

A majority of Arabs in Judea, Samaria and Gaza favor two states only as a step towards an Arab state of Palestine, by the use of violence, if necessary, according to a new poll by the non- profit The Israel Project.

The results of the survey were released on Friday, hours before Palestinian Authority negotiator Saeb Erekat said that if Israel agrees to recognizing the Palestinian Authority as a new Arab country based on Israel’s size being shrunk to the indefensible 1949 Armistice Line borders, the PA then would relinquish all claims to “historic Palestine,” which he said includes all of Israel from the Dead Sea to the Mediterranean Seas.

The Israel Project poll of PA Arabs shows that 60 percent favor direct negotiations with Israel for “two states” of the Palestinian Authority and Israel, but it also reveals that two-thirds agree that “over time, Palestinian must work to get back all the land for a Palestinian state.”

Only 23 percent of the respondent agreed that “Israel has a permanent right to exist as a homeland for the Jewish people.”

The option of armed violence still is a high priority for a majority of PA Arabs, 58 percent preferring “armed struggle” over “engagement with Israel.” A majority of Arabs in both Gaza and Judea and Samaria favor violence, with a higher percentage in Gaza.

On the other hand, Arab opinion was somewhat more conciliatory when respondents were given the option that an agreement with Israel would be based on 1949-1967 Armistice lines, once referred to former Israel Ambassador to the United Nations Abba Eban as “Auschwitz borders.”

Most of the PA Arab would like to see an end to the naming of public places after terrorists, but only a tiny minority of 12 percent agree that official maps, documents and school textbooks should show the name ”Israel.”

As in previous polls, the popularity of Hamas has declined, even in Gaza, where the rival Fatah party would easily win if elections were held today.

In contrast to another recent poll that showed PA Arabs as having a favorable view of Iran, most of the respondents in the Israel Project poll had negative opinions on Iran and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Published online at Arutz Sheva, 21 November 2010

Seriously, Now...Peace!

Now that is absolutely wonderful.  Another peace conference.  One cannot conceivably entertain too many conferences devoted to the resonating subject of peace.  And where else than in Ottawa, the nation's capital?  Where concerned and considerate and not-too-well-informed, let alone -intentioned individuals have formed a quartet of dedicated concern to defuse misunderstandings between East and West.  More specifically, perhaps, the world of Islam and that of the West.  Since they seem, of late, to be at loggerheads, to put it mildly.

In that specific groups and individuals claiming to represent Islam have been violently attacking Western symbols, personages, institutions and populations in a not-in-vain effort to persuade those of the West that they are despised and hated.  While the West, for their part, are taken aback, startled out of their complacency, and attempt to protect themselves, by routing the presence of the violent Islamists in Muslim countries as well as those who have infiltrated into Western countries.  Thus the disaffection is mutual, but the methodology is quite opposite.

The stringency of the polarization of the two world views, ideologies, values and imperatives could not be more emphatically at odds.  Yet it is the world of Islam that blames the West for the situation, insisting that "Islamophobia" is at the heart of the matter.  While the West, given to reasonable discourse when all else fails, points out that it is not they who initiated and continue to initiate the bloody conflict, but those who represent Islam, and who quote zingers from the Koran and the Hadiths in support of violent jihad.

Now, here in Ottawa, there are four individuals, all of whom have been involved with one of Canada's (lesser-known and ballot-box-recognized political parties, the Greens) official opposition parties to the governing Conservatives, who have out of the goodness and breadth of their worldly perspective, mounted a conference on "just and sustainable peace", taking place at the Government Conference Centre.  Three featured guests represent academia from Tehran University.  With the keynote speaker being dean of the faculty of global studies at the university.

Panelist Davood Ameri is director general of the Islamic World Peace Forum, based in Tehran, a NGO with a website that reflects the worldview of the current Iranian administration.  Who better to speak of peace and conciliation between peoples than Iranians?  Particularly those who support Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the reigning Ayatollahs?  It is a tragedy of immense proportions that the world misunderstands the intentions of the Islamic Republic of Iran which desperately desires peace and unification between diverse people, rejecting the misunderstandings that result from inadequately parsing the statements of Mr. Ahmadinejad.

No nuclear weapons, period.  For peaceful, civil use, nothing more.  The intention is to live in peace and harmony with its Middle East neighbours and the world at large.  How could they be judged otherwise?  The world has a frail sense of humour; standing in the United Nations addressing the General Assembly and introducing a few light words that sound like the intention of destroying 'the Zionist entity', just proves how gullible people are, how ready to accuse others of dangerously malicious intent.  When nothing could be further from the truth.

The conference is a legitimate affair, an attempt for cool, rational and intelligent heads to reach a consensus on peace initiatives.  Is not the highly respected Imam Zijad Delic, president of the Canadian Islamic Congress one of the moderators?  Is not RCMP Constable Wayne Russett, aboriginal and ethnic liaison outreach officer scheduled to attend this momentous event?  Despite the outrageous slur voiced by Public Safety Minister Vic Toews characterizing the Canadian Islamic Congress as an extremist group?

The entirely fallacious assumption that Iran is up to no good is untenable, has no relation to reality: for Tehran has no intention of expelling IAEA inspectors from its nuclear sites; has no intention of placing its ballistic missiles on a state of alert, along with that of the Syrian army.  Nor is there any intention of developing nuclear weapons, and nor is Hezbollah standing by for further orders to initiate a large-scale military exercise. Perish the very thought of such dangerously provocative events ever occurring; not on their watch.


Just incidentally, it appears that Nigeria has intercepted an Iranian shipment of 13 containers, which held rocket launchers, grenades and other explosives which were camouflaged as building materials.  The Nigerian National Security Adviser advised that his government intended to destroy the weapons.
It is speculated that this seized shipment was meant for transfer to Hamas in the Gaza Strip; a new attempt at a new smuggling route via Africa.  Previous such arms smuggled through Sudan to Gaza have been detected through international supervision auditing the cargo of Iranian ships.

	an illegal arms shipment seized by authorities in Lagos, Nigeria.
	Photo by: AP

In early 2009 there was a news report that the Israel Air Force had attacked a weapons convey being smuggled through Sudan into Gaza.  Later that same year the Israeli Navy boarded a vessel carrying tons of weapons from Iran to Syria, or Hezbollah in Lebanon.  This September an arms shipment from Iran to Syria was intercepted in the Italian port of Calabria.  Shortly after that an arms shipment headed to Syria from North Korea was captured in Greece.

Trifles, incidentals, meaning little.  The "Ottawa Group of Four", as they have named themselves, current and previous candidates for the Green Party, Paul Maillet ,Qais Ghanem, Akbar Manoussi and Sylvie Lemieux, deserve to be recognized for the good peace-seeking souls that they are.  Honouring Canadian soil and values by inviting Iranian scholars to speak on the subject so dear to the hearts of all of us.  Peace in our time.

Clear Solutions

Duplicitous Israel, at it again. The ten months of holding in abeyance construction projects on Jewish settlements in the West Bank have come to an end. No amount of pleading on the part of the Obama administration has moved Prime Minister Netanyahu to declare an extension of the building freeze. And since Mahmoud Abbas warned time and again that the talks would not proceed should the freeze not be extended, there go the peace talks.

Of course the peace talks could proceed with no pre-conditions. With each side finding grounds to negotiate and to surrender in some part the demands of the other in something approximating an equal and just determination to find common ground. To collaborate in good faith on a search for meaningful compromises that would promise each side security and a sound basis for a social, economic and political future.

A departure from the past, when the Palestinian Authority, in its previous incarnation as Fatah under Chairman Yasser Arafat authorized the first Intifada to demonstrate precisely what he and his militants thought of Oslo and peace negotiations, resulting in countless deaths. Not quite a entire departure from the present where Mahmoud Abbas is still quietly encouraging 'resistance', while speaking peace-potential.

The PA negotiators are leaning on the Obama administration, expecting it to lift a heavy hand of condemnation against Israeli obduracy again. "We need a practical position from the United States against settlements. I am surprised that America is unable to stop them." Time to meet with the Arab League again.

Well, there do exist practical and obvious solutions to that problem of 300,000 Israeli settlers in the West Bank. An equal number of Israeli-Palestinians within Israel. Negotiations to carve out borders that would include/exclude the offending Jews/Arabs, leaving them where they belong, each with their respective countries within common-sense, newly-drawn borders sounds like a potential.

Israel's foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, has long advocated just such a solution, and it's not a far-fetched one. Former U.S. president Clinton may consider the million Russian Jews now Israeli citizens a hindrance to a peaceful solution, but their leader is not shy of expressing common hard-headed sense. Jewish settlers would be delighted to be incorporated into greater Israel.

Israeli-Arabs, with the prospect of losing Israeli citizenship and becoming citizens of a new Palestinian state, perhaps not quite so delighted, but they could become accustomed to the idea. And the Palestinian Members of the Knesset who find such dreadful fault with the State which has given them freedom and equality and opportunities could then criticize Israel from the other side of the border.

And given the reality that Palestinians continue to violently attack Jews whenever and wherever opportunities arise, separation is never a bad thing. At least until both sides learn to become more civil and discontinue the use of violence. Toward which end Mr. Lieberman's recommendation of a "two-staged" solution to take a "few decades" to complete, makes eminent good sense.

Within those few decades the Palestinian Authority could change its school curricula to portray Jews as neighbours, not rapacious enemies to be engaged in bloody battle. And it could undertake to do its duty as a civilized society by encouraging all of its citizens to respect the human rights of others to live in peace and security without constant threats and bombardments.

France, Germany, the European Union in fact, the United States and the United Nations could become accustomed to the realization that Israel has a right to exist and their obligation to support its existence a trifle less critically than has been done, and an equal obligation to anticipate and demand from the Palestinians behaviour more becoming a civil, nascent-nation.

And all of them, the United States in particular, would do well to view a trifle more clearly that the urgency to deflect Iran from its nuclear pursuits has little-to-nothing to do with settling the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and far, far more to do with overweening religious fanaticism and political-ideological ambitions to control the Middle East and eventually the world of the West.

Another Israeli Provocation!

PA Objects to Conferences in Jerusalem
by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu

The Palestinian Authority charged that holding international meetings anywhere in Jerusalem is a “provocation” because most of the world does not recognize it as Israel’s capital.

The PA’s office in Ramallah made the comment to the Independent Media Review Analysis (IMRA), which had asked it to clarify its objection to Jerusalem as a venue for last week’s World Jewish Congress convention.

The PA did not stipulate if it also would refuse to meet Israeli and American officials if and when the direct talks between the PA and Israel move to the capital. The next session is scheduled for Sharm-el Sheikh, Egypt next week.The official Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) WAFA news agency reported Sunday its “deep concern because Israel opened the door to the World Jewish Congress to hold its 14th meeting in occupied Jerusalem [with] the participation of more than 200 representatives of Jewish groups in the world.”

The actual location of the convention was the David Citadel Hotel, which is within the limits of Jerusalem that were recognized by the United Nations after the 1949 armistice that officially ended the War of Independence.

However, WAFA said that holding the convention there was “a blatant defiance of the resolutions of international legitimacy, which considers all Israeli actions in Jerusalem 'invalid and illegal', which emphasizes that Jerusalem is part and parcel of the occupied territory."

It said that the World Jewish Congress convention at the hotel was “a provocation to the feelings of Arab and Islamic nation, and that such a move would confirm that Israel continues to take all necessary measures for control of Jerusalem 'capital' eternal, and an affirmation of the Israeli refusal to reach a just peace that guarantees the Palestinian rights in Jerusalem as the capital of an independent Palestinian state.”

Published in Arutz Sheva, 7 September 2010

The Two-State Solution

Once feasible, presenting as a solution to the admitted problem of sharing a geography between two solitudes, people vastly different from one another in ethnic background, social tradition, heritage, essential values and religion. One group which has returned to its ancestral homeland, to join others of its ethnicity and religion whose continuing domicile there kept the embers of original settlement alive. The other, which assembled gradually over time to the geography from contiguous border-countries eyeing the territory as a potential extension of their own.

The original Palestinians of the Middle East were, in fact, Jews whose long-time credentials as residents of the geography were widely recognized, but which over time and the passage of recent memory have become the interlopers, while the nomenclature of Palestinian has been claimed by Arabs who migrated primarily from Jordan and Egypt, into the territory. Under the British Mandate it was eventually recognized that the land could be divided to embrace singly, the Jews and the Arabs.

That volatile institutional pairing in a land of tribal tempers and violent challenges went awry from its inception. And since that time the irreconcilable positions of the new State of Israel and the Palestinian Arabs who fled the area in the belief they would soon enough return triumphant as true owners of the real estate, has little changed. Other than to become more unstable, restive and resentfully violent with the passing years.

The last of many combined Arab assaults on the Jewish State left Israel in legal occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Judea and Samaria, for the Jewish interpretation based on biblical precedents and historical reality. But now contested as a potential new national state for Arab Palestinians. On the surface, that is, while covertly the entire area encompassing also that of the State of Israel is coveted to recapture the idea of a final resolution in a majority-Arab Palestine.

On the basis of that reality, rarely recognized by the international community but openly stated by the Palestinian Authority, even while it remains locked in conflict with Gazan Hamas, the stated ideal of sharing the geography with side-by-side sovereign states is a mirage. One that needn't be so, but is by the very nature of the PA's maneuvering, and intentions. In reflection of the original resistence to and denial of Partition.

What real call for ownership does the PA have on Jerusalem as its capital? Other than Jordan's brief flirtation with administering the Old City, denying Jews the opportunity to encroach upon Arab rule, even to approach the most sacred sites of Judaism? The insistence that the Palestinian Arabs who fled, along with their descendants be absorbed into greater Israel, another demand. And borders to return to the 1967 placement.

Not addressed is the unilateral pull-out of Israeli troops from Gaza and the forced evacuation of eight thousand Israeli settlers who flourished there, making a home for themselves and their children, harnessing opportunity to turn the desert into gardens and fertile fields. When they left, struggling to resist evacuation orders, it took 55,000 IDF personnel strenuously engaged in the trauma of removal to succeed.

Behind they left a good-will thrust of Jewish philanthropy, operating greenhouses capable of producing all the fruits and vegetables needed for a thriving Arab community, with the potential of providing for a highly successful agri-business venture for export. And all of it, funded by Jews, as a gift to the Gazans, was systematically destroyed, looted, and left useless.

In the West Bank, school curricula urgently teaches children from elementary to high school that they must mourn the Nakba, the tragedy that befell Palestinian Arabs with the birth of the State of Israel, that the land belongs to the Palestinians, and that it will be returned by force, and that the Jews remain enemies to be feared, hated and ultimately destroyed.

Is this human material for contiguous borders with two sovereign states living side by side in peace? With rocket attacks continuing to be lobbed by Gazan terrorists into Israel? And the international community exclaiming its dismay when Israel responds in its own defence? Is Israel to hold its collective breath with expectation that the attacks against it will cease once a new Palestinian state is declared?

What, exactly, will change in the mind-set of the Palestinians? Either the violence-fomenting moderate Fatah or the imminent-destruction-promising Hamas. Both armed by Western sources in the belief that an independent Palestinian State will result in a pacified, resigned and civilized intent to accept the reality of the legal presence of the State of Israel.

But which arms added to the arsenal smuggled in continually to augment reserves already in use and preparing for future use, gives Israel much pause to ponder its existential future. Fatah and Hamas on one border, Hezbollah/Syria/Iran on the other. And the balance of the Middle East States looking on impassively.

Frankly Speaking

Wavering and weaving just as the cool breezes of opportunity and and the over-heated winds of criticism from within his own party present, U.S. President Barack Obama has now declared in a push-and-shove message to PA President Mahmoud Abbas that direct peace talks, as urged by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu must be embarked upon. Again. Indirect talks could yield nothing but diplomatic wrangling at a remove. Direct talks have the potential to lead to substantial improvements in relations ultimately promising success.

On the other hand, direct talks between the Palestinian Authority and the Kadima party head and then-Prime Minister Ehud Olmert produced nothing but hedging of bets. At a time when Ehud Olmert was prepared to offer almost anything the PA demanded, and awaited a response to what could only be termed a generous-verging-on-delusional compromise, the Palestinian Authority remained mute. Not surprising, and given the history of the Middle East and its bargaining processes, there is a tendency to push and to shove.

To internally gloat at the strides made in demands, yet it seems inevitable, on the record, that the Arab bargaining agents succumb time and again to the illusion that if so much has been promised them, then why not hold out for more? And each time another barrier is broken through in incremental steps, an internal celebration takes place, pushing aside any potential for reasonable accommodation, as further concessions are demanded without which no agreement can be possible.

So proximity talks are out, and direct talks in again. Although there were rumours during the previous direct talks with the previous Israeli administration that Fatah was jubilant that the IDF entered Gaza to confront Hamas under Operation Cast Lead, that event was used as a pretext to indignantly cease negotiations, placing direct talks into the limbo they're currently in. The truth is, Mahmoud Abbas hardly knows where to turn, what to do. He is under pressure by other Arab governments, particularly Saudi Arabia, not to surrender cheaply.

And then, just like his predecessor, Yasser Arafat, he is exceedingly aware of the radical wing of Fatah refusing any kind of 'accommodation' or 'recognition' of Israel, utterly devoted to their dream of militarily - and with international public opinion on their side - defeating Israel, to recapture land still claimed as 'Palestinian'. Mr. Abbas made the somber trek to the Arab League hoping they might offer him a solution. Their decision was to leave the solution in his hands - but yet to insist that the Saudi plan for peace be implemented.

As Arab League chief Amr Mussa explains, "written guarantees" remain a requirement before direct talks should proceed. Even while President Obama strenuously urges Mr. Abbas to drop all pre-conditions and get down to direct talks with his counterpart (or risk losing financial support). Still, the statement by the Arab League is sufficiently ambiguous to leave Mr. Abbas some wriggle-room, even while he and the League deplore the pressure the U.S. is placing on the PA.

They liked it far better when the Obama administration was leaning on Israel.

And here's a sweet little quote from PA chief negotiator Saeb Erekat, claiming that the Palestinian Authority has offered a proposal to U.S. Middle East envoy George Mitchell, represented as 'more generous' than was presented to Ehud Olmert. Former Prime Minister Olmert finds that extremely puzzling, since he claims never to have had a counter-offer from the PA through their-then-direct negotiations.

Mr. Olmert speaks painfully of the concessions he was prepared to make for Israel to attain peace with the PA. Of his concern and disappointment that it came to naught. From what has transpired in the past when the adversaries seeking to become peaceful neighbours have spoken of peace and sat down to deliberate compromises on both sides that would ultimately result in a state of peaceful relations and the creation of a Palestinian state such anticipation is fraught with disappointment.

Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, on the other hand, has raised the ire of both Fatah and Hamas for his eminently practical recommendations. While critical of Israel's West Bank settlements and the influence the settlers have over the Israeli government, he is also a practical man who has made great inroads on paving the way for civic infrastructure for the new Palestinian state. He feels that it is the new Palestinian state that should absorb Palestinian returnees, not Israel. Under his auspices an agreement to carve out majority Arab settlements in Israel and trade them to the PA for majority Jewish settlements in the West Bank could be feasible.

On the other hand, this man faces danger of assassination at the hands of both stridently militant Fatah groups and those of Hamas terror groups. While Mahmoud Abbas hardly knows where to turn, weighed down by the passions that surround him, by the expectations of those prepared to do serious harm to Mr. Fayyad. Business as usual in the Arab world, in other words.

On Balance....

Hamas is willing to exchange one prisoner it holds, Gilad Shalit, a young IDF soldier who was abducted from the Kerem Shalom crossing in Israel, in 2006, and held since in the Gaza Strip. It will agree to exchange Gilad Shalit for one thousand Palestinians held in Israeli jails, most of whom are there for terrorist activities against Israel.

Israel would agree to the exchange, and is prepared to free one thousand Palestinians and has already as a good-will gesture, freed some female Palestinians, but Hamas continues to hold out for the release of those whom it considers high-value. These are generally speaking prisoners held by Israel for truly vicious crimes against humanity, the planners and murderers of Israeli citizens, innocent bystanders, victims of attacks and bombings.

Some of whom who have been released in the past in similar 'good-will' gestures have returned to their life-work of attempting to destroy the State of Israel, through mass shedding of blood, resistant to the very notion that Jews and Arabs could life side by side in two separate states without war. And these dedicated Jew-murderers are hailed as heroes in the pantheon of Palestinian courageous 'resisters' to the 'occupation'.

The UN and the US have prevailed upon Israel to assist them in training and arming Palestinian Authority police and military. Through the auspices of the US military, Palestinians have been trained in the art of modern warfare, taught to use sophisticated weaponry, and the US military is proud of the excellent job they have done in this respect.

It was not all that long ago, while Israel was working closely with the newly-established PA, post Oslo Accord under Yasser Arafat to help guide the PLO-Fatah in achieving civil infrastructure and state structure toward potential statehood that the first Intifada resulted in Palestinian police, taught by Israeli police, turning against their 'colleagues'.

Currently, U.S. Senators John McCain, Lindsey Graham and Joe Lieberman, friends of Israel all, toured the West Bank and met with PA officials, visiting the armed forces' bases in
Ramallah, greatly impressed. They are of the conviction that these armed forces of the PA would never comprise a future threat to Israel.

Senator McCain even gave his opinion of the potential for PA forces in the possibly-near future to police security checkpoints in the West Bank. Belying the reality that there are instances where Palestinian soldiers are still involved in anti-Israel acts.

Israel is continually being threatened by the righteous countries of the West that trade and economic embargoes might result from its intransigent attitude toward granting Palestinians full autonomy of their territories and refusing to withdraw all the settlements of the West Bank, as they did unilaterally in Gaza. A painful, costly withdrawal that resulted in Gazan Palestinians running amok, coming under the control of Gaza, and increasing violent attacks then resulting against Israel.

Can any world power guarantee that this will not be repeated should Israel withdraw all its settlements from the West Bank?

In Western academia and in their unions, the threats of academic boycotts are continuous. And within Israel those threats have their counterpart occasions, where hundreds of Israeli academics are prepared to join the boycott - of Israel and their own academic credentials and freedoms. While political Israel is aghast at the very thought of their own academic community joining ranks with harsh critics of the country's insistence on its right to self-defence, the situation of sabotage from within its own social-activist and peace groups
enjoys no counterpart activity from within the broader Arab and Muslim community.

During the most current visit to Washington and New York by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, support for Israel is evidenced by Members of the U.S. Congress and Senate, along with demonstrations by American campus advocacy organizations, the American Zionist Movement, the National Council of Young Israel, Women's Leagues for Conservative Judaism, and Hadassah chapters among others.

Speeches declaring dedication toward stable and secure requirements for Israel's existence were given and applauded.

And on the other hand, great contingents of anti-Israel, pro-Hamas groups formed themselves in opposition; the anti-Zionist Chareidi organization, Neturei Karta, allies of Iran, American Jews for a Just Peace, Jews Say No!, holding Palestinian flags and chanting "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free" made noble, common cause with The Muslim Students Federation and others declaring their revulsion for Israel, holding it responsible for the Turkish flotilla deaths, and the squalor and poverty of blockaded Gazans.

And then there is the human interest factor at a closer scale, where Israeli hospitals and Jewish doctors regularly look after the medical needs of Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza whose own hospitals and physicians are incapable of seeing to their most serious medical cases. Where in one hospital in Tel Aviv alone, up to a hundred Gazan residents seek treatment yearly.

Residents of other Arab countries, some of whom still do not recognize Israel, also seek care at those Jewish hospitals. All are provided with care, their relatives given food and a place to stay. Reciprocation? Hardly. Hospitals throughout Israel are accustomed to treating Palestinian and other Arab patients who are not residents of the country; treating them for their ailments, then sending them on their way, back to their places of origin, to continue living in good health.

Hamas itself is involved in sending Palestinian Gazan patients to Israeli hospitals. This is the same Hamas that turns a deaf ear to the pleading of the parents of Gilad Shalit, whom even representatives of the International Red Cross are unable to visit to ensure his state of well being. He remains, inhumanely, a human bargaining chip. But the world does not hold Hamas and Palestinians to account for much of anything.

And the search for peace? Meaningful, trusting and truthful dialogue between the Palestinian Authority and the State of Israel? In a state of suspended dis-animation. Direct talks broken off with the launching of Operation Cast Lead; which like the defensive IDF operation never did result in anything hopeful for the future.

Palestinian elementary and high school curricula still show a map of the region absent Israel, still teach Arab children that Jews are their feared and detested enemy, to be hated and violently 'resisted'. The achievement of martyrdom for their peoples' cause, the devotion to Palestine, must be embraced as the highest order of the peoples' dedication to itself.

And the moderate Palestinian Arab leader of the long-suffering Palestinian people, Mahmoud Abbas, whose struggles on behalf of the population have as yet availed nothing whatever? Little surprise, given his careful agenda; his Janus-faced vocalizations to the West and his tribal reassurances to his home audience: "If you want war, and if all of you will fight Israel, we are in favor. But the Palestinians will not fight alone because they don't have the ability to do it", he declared recently.

Chairman Mahmoud Abbas spoke to Arab leaders in the kind of language that they all seem to understand; that the PA is prepared to engage in war with Israel as long as the rest of the Arab world commits to another such combined war front. The PA daily Al-Hayat al-Jadida reported these statements by Mr. Abbas, and they were translated by Palestinian Media Watch.

Is anyone listening out there? These were statements issued at the Arab League Summit held in Libya in March.

The PA and Chairman Abbas are engaging in distanced diplomacy. Their negotiations, such as they are constitute demands that Israel cannot possibly accede to without dire consequence to the longevity of the Jewish State itself.

But of course this is the purpose of those demands. While Hamas is openly 'resistant' to Israel's existence and seeks to expunge it by terrorism, refusing to negotiate with the very idea of Israel's existence, the PA dialogues because it is, at the present time, unequipped to challenge Israel militarily.

How nicely all of this is carefully balanced on the scale of world credulousness and willful belief in the incandescently absurd.

Ultimatums

If Israel wishes to restore normalcy of relations with Turkey it must eat crow. To assuage Turkey's fury over a situation that developed out of its own misguided mission to cause its former political-social-military ally to lose face and bring down condemnations from the international community, Israel must apologize.

Israel must apologize for acting legally in supporting its blockade of a territory whose government clearly calls for its demise.

Ankara with knowledge beforehand of precisely who would be boarding the main ship in the flotilla, encouraged its departure and its purpose. This is a malignant act conducted by a purported ally against an erstwhile ally. Much can change in the space of a few years, years that have seen formerly secular Turkey become Islamist Turkey.

Where the government has arrested key high-placed members of its military, accusing it of conspiring to unseat the current government. Where a slow but steady erosion of secular governance has gradually been overtaken by an Islamist-agenda government. Which has latterly discovered itself to be a Muslim state with far more in common with Iran and Syria than with Israel.

Turkey itself is at a cross-roads and does not quite appear to know which road it should take. The old familiar, Euro-centric, Israel-friendly track, or the suddenly-appealing Iran-Syria-Turkey-axis track. One which has made the Middle East and the world of Islam sit up and take notice. Suddenly, Turkey is seen as a hero of Islam for vilifying Israel, the enemy of Islam.

Or is that Islam, the enemy of Israel?

The world of Islam, after all, is well over a billion-strong, with countless countries, those of the Middle East, Africa, Central Asia, geared up to confront a country where another religion entirely exists, the parent religion which Islam views as a mere precursor to the 'real' religion worshipping the only true god, Allah.

Israel, a Jewish state comprised of fewer than 6 million Jews; 13.3 world-wide.

Quite the balance there.

Former close ties between Turkey and Israel are in jeopardy. Israel being Israel, little wonder. For it remains stubbornly dedicated to prolonging its existence as a Jewish State. And it remains unreasonably resistant to allowing surrounding quasi-states to gain the impression that violent belligerence will gain them the territory upon which Israel sits.

Moreover, Israel and its armed forces insist on protecting the lives of its citizens.

All internationally approved national aspirations and completely legal, but then Israel is a special case. Its very specialness is underlined and maligned on every available occasion within the United Nations, dedicated to world peace and the support of national identity and sovereignty for all nations on Earth; save perhaps one.

So, because IDF naval commandos boarded a ship headed illegally toward Gaza to break what humanitarians consider to be a travesty of justice forced upon Gazan Palestinians and in the process became entrapped in a pre-arranged conflict organized by a Turkish group specializing in such thuggish actions and while attempting to protect themselves shot to death 9 of the Turkish terrorists, it must apologize.

Those who come to express their humanitarian support for the Palestinians living in Gaza might never consider that there would be no blockade if the Palestinians agreed to recognize the legitimacy of the existence of the State of Israel and forswear violence against it. This is a simple solution, but one that appears to evade the consciousness of both the Palestinians and their ardent supporters.

The entire Middle East is upset by the confrontational nuclear threat posed by the Islamic Republic of Iran, in its agenda to achieve superior might over the geography and in the process hasten the projected demise of Israel. But Turkey now recognizes Iran's intentions as being peaceful in nature, threats notwithstanding, and international and United Nations sanctions be damned.

Turkey has gone so far as to relinquish its demand for an international enquiry into the the May 31 bloodshed on the Turkish ship. It will, it has announced, accept the enquiry that Israel itself has initiated with its two international observers, as long as the conclusion is reached that Israel is guilty of what she is accused of; murdering nine innocent humanitarians.

And with that anticipated meal culpa must come a heartfelt apology. Accompanying that apology must come cash reparations. Without this happening to assuage the rage within the Muslim world - well actually the international community as well, all of which have arraigned themselves in mass condemnation of Israel - future amicable relations between Turkey and Israel will remain a thing of the past.

Well, in fact, that relationship appears to be mortally wounded. And that wound was inflicted in fact, well before the sailing of that flotilla. Poor Turkey just cannot make up its mind whether it should remain a "European" country, or an Islamist country. It is tilting dangerously in a direction that Kamal Ataturk vowed his country would never again descend toward.

Is a state of controlled 'peace' once again possible between the now-adversaries? If so, it will be one frozen in an attitude of one-sided censure, blame, hatred. Which seems to serve Turkey quite well. Cold Turkey, hot Islam. Most unappetizing.