The Arab League is calling on Israel to go back to the Quartet-led talks. Oh,and they’re also telling Israel not to make any unilateral decisions. This is going to have a great effect on Israel’s policy, as the Arab League is known for its influence on decisions taken by Israel.
Oh, wait. That must be Bizarro-Universe Israel. My bad.
Voter turnout for this election is the lowest in Israeli history. I think that’s because it’s a choice between bad, bad, and bad policy. It isn’t even the lesser of the three evils. All of their policies stink. But then, the situation stinks. Ariel Sharon is in a coma and isn’t coming out of it. There is no palestinian peace partner, if there ever was one (which I doubt). So how can you have negotiations without someone to negotiate with? So you make unilateral decisions, but they make you look weak in your non-peace-partner’s eyes, so the attacks continue. All the while, no matter what you do, the world hates you. I’m thinking I understand perfectly the lack of voters out there. Hold your nose and pull the lever, or don’t bother and just gripe about what happens? Israelis like to gripe a lot. They must. They’re Jewish, aren’t they?
Meantime, the world’s approach towards Hamas continues, in spite of words like this:
In Gaza, Hamas officials said the election results would have no effect on their hostility toward Israel.
“We are not differentiating between this party and that,” said Mahmoud Zahar, the incoming Palestinian foreign minister. “All of them committed crimes against the Palestinian people.”
And this:
Hamas leader and former Imam of Al Quds Mosque Shaikh Mohammad Mehmood Al Siyam has said Hamas will not abandon the path of jihad despite its sweeping victory in the Palestinian general elections. “Hamas cannot think of abandoning jihad against the Jewish occupation forces,†he said.
“We will never let the Jews rule Palestinian territories,†the Hamas leader said while speaking at the concluding session of the Jamaat-i-Islami’s grand assembly at the Wapda Colony near here on Saturday night.
This is why Israel is building the fence, and declaring borders. Because there is no peace partner, and no matter what Israel does, the palestinians will not be satisfied. It’s a lose-lose situation. The question is, can the new borders stop the rockets from falling on Ashkelon? (Hebrew link)
The engineering and military industries sections of Fatah’s Al-Aqsa Brigades announced Sunday the start of a new military offensive against the Israeli city of Ashkelon, to be called “Volcano Fire.”
The announcement claimed that the group had improved the range of its rockets from 12 to 18 km, which would reach all of Ashkelon.
The Al-Aqsa Brigades announced a plan to fire 100 of the new rockets and 80 mortars at Ashkelon.
If you ask me, the biggest challenge facing the new Prime Minister will be how to stop palestinian attacks. Which is, well, the same problem that has faced every leader of Israel since 1948.
Perhaps the next step should be an announcement that the next attack from Palestinian territory will be treated as a declaration of war, and that Palestinians will be moved back from the border of Isreal a distance exceeding the range of the attacker’s longest range weapon.
The world will scream. On the other hand, the world screams at whatever Israel does, so there really is no downside there. Israel needs to worry about the reaction of the USA and nobody else.
One thing that might help is that when the Palis go too far Israel moves into Gaza and simply pushes all the Palis there out. Go to Egypt, go to Jordan, go whereever your “Arab Brothers” will take you in, but go. They can cite the precedent of the Sudenten Germans, who got their wish to “go home to the Reich” in 1945 in a fashion they had not expected. When you come down to it that is the best the Israelis can expect from the Palis if the latter ever get the upper hand; expulsion (once again for many of Israel’s Jews). More likely of course, if the Palis or the other Arabs ever get the upper hand, is genocide.
Once done Israel should say to the Palis in Judea and Samaria “Shape up or you are next.”
There is nothing Israel can do to bring peace. Every concession has been treated by the Arabs as a position for renewed war. If the rest of the world was actually interested in peace between Israel and the Palis (and other Arabs) there would be tremendous pressure from all interested states on the Arabs to stop trying to destroy Israel and kill the Jews. Since there is no such pressure (except from the US sometimes) I conclude that most countries of the world are copacetic with the genocide the Palis, other Arabs, and Iranians plan.
Meryl: we don’t pull levers in Israel – we still use little slips of paper in sealed envelopes, stuck into a cardboard box.
There is a lack of faith in the leadership. No one believes in any of them, or if they do, it is with the tiniest slice of hope.
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