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ISRANET DAILY BRIEFING ARCHIVE Volume IV, No. 821 • Friday, February 27, 2004 ANTI-SEMITISM IN 3D This week I took part in a conference on anti-Semitism in Europe. Hosted by the president of the European Commission Romano Prodi, the conference brought together leaders from around the world determined to fight the new wave of anti-Semitism that has engulfed Europe over the last few years. The question is how the sincere intentions of the participants to combat this evil can be translated into effective action. My experience has convinced me that moral clarity is critical in taking a stand against evil. Evil cannot be defeated if it cannot be recognized, and the only way to recognize evil is to draw clear moral lines. Evil thrives when those lines are blurred, when right and wrong is a matter of opinion rather than objective truth. That is what makes the battle against the so-called new anti-Semitism so difficult. To the free world's modern eyes, classical anti-Semitism is easily discernible. If we watch films that show Jews draining the blood of Gentile children or plotting to take over the world, most of us would immediately recognize it as anti-Semitism… But the new anti-Semitism is far more subtle. Whereas classical anti-Semitism was seen as being aimed at the Jewish religion or the Jewish people, the new anti-Semitism is ostensibly directed against the Jewish state. Since this anti-Semitism can hide behind the veneer of legitimate criticism of Israel, it is much more difficult to expose. In fact, over the past year, whenever we have criticized particularly virulent anti-Israel statements as being rooted in anti-Semitism, the response has invariably been that we are trying to stifle legitimate criticism of Israel by deliberately labeling it anti-Semitism. What emerged from this conference was an admission by European leaders themselves that not all criticism of Israel is legitimate. This recognition was evident in the remarks of President Romano Prodi, German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer and other officials. If not all criticism is valid, how then do we define the boundary line? I propose the following test for differentiating legitimate criticism of Israel from anti-Semitism. The 3D test, as I call it, is not a new one. It merely applies to the new anti-Semitism the same criteria that for centuries identified the different dimensions of classical anti-Semitism. The first D is the test of demonization. Whether it came in the theological form of a collective accusation of deicide or in the literary depiction of Shakespeare's Shylock, Jews were demonized for centuries as the embodiment of evil. Therefore, today we must be wary of whether the Jewish state is being demonized by having its actions blown out of all sensible proportion. For example, the comparisons of Israelis to Nazis and of the Palestinian refugee camps to Auschwitz…can only be considered anti-Semitic. Those who draw such analogies either do not know anything about Nazi Germany or, more plausibly, are deliberately trying to paint modern-day Israel as the embodiment of evil. The second D is the test of double standards. For thousands of years a clear sign of anti-Semitism was treating Jews differently than other peoples, from the discriminatory laws many nations enacted against them to the tendency to judge their behavior by a different yardstick. Similarly, today we must ask whether criticism of Israel is being applied selectively. In other words, do similar policies by other governments engender the same criticism, or is there a double standard at work? It is anti-Semitism…when Israel is singled out by the United Nations for human rights abuses while tried and true abusers like China…and Syria are ignored. Likewise, it is anti-Semitism when Israel's Magen David Adom, alone among the world's ambulance services, is denied admission to the International Red Cross. The third D is the test of deligitimation. In the past, anti-Semites tried to deny the legitimacy of the Jewish religion, the Jewish people, or both. Today, they are trying to deny the legitimacy of the Jewish state, presenting it, among other things, as the last vestige of colonialism… If other peoples have a right to live securely in their homelands, then the Jewish people have a right to live securely in their homeland. To remember the 3D test I suggest we recall those 3D movies we enjoyed as children. Without those special glasses the movie was flat and blurred. But when we put on our glasses the screen came alive, and we saw everything with perfect clarity. In the same way, if we do not wear the right glasses, the line between legitimate criticism of Israel and anti-Semitism will be blurred and we will not be able to recognize this ancient evil, much less fight it. But if we wear the special glasses provided by the 3D test--if we check whether Israel is being demonized or deligitimized, or whether a double standard is being applied to it--we will always be able to see anti-Semitism clearly. And with moral clarity, I have no doubt that our efforts to combat this evil will prove far more effective. (Natan Sharansky, Israel's Minister of Diaspora Affairs and Jerusalem, will be opening the International Conference on Global Antisemitism in Montreal, March 14-16.) ______________________________________________________ DIALOGUE
AS REVENGE February 21 was the second anniversary of the murder of my son, Daniel Pearl. This murder has come to symbolize the post-9/11 species of anti-Semitism as well as the blatant rejection by militant Islam of any form of dialogue with the West. For the past two years I have found myself totally immersed in projects aimed at building trust between Muslim and Western communities. I see this process as a form of revenge and, compelled by the spirit of Danny, I try to channel all the positive energy and goodwill that the tragedy has evoked toward one aim: fighting the hatred that took Danny's life. To this end, the Daniel Pearl Foundation brings Pakistani journalists on fellowships to work at US newspapers, organizes worldwide concerts that promote intercultural respect, and sponsors public dialogues between Jews and Muslims to explore common ground and air grievances. I constantly ask myself how effective these projects are and whether they contribute in a meaningful way to the goal of hate reduction. The answer hinges critically on the nature of the struggle that currently goes on within the Muslim world itself. According to one theory, the struggle in Islam rages between the vast majority of peaceful, good Muslims who simply wish to live their lives alongside those who think and pray differently, and a tiny minority of Muslims, such as the Taliban and other extremists, whose fanaticism is in fact a rejection of true Islam. A more pessimistic theory claims that the vast majority of Muslims sympathize deeply with bin Laden's ideology, both religiously and politically (though not engaging in actual violence), while moderate forces are but a thin intellectual veneer, lacking power, credibility, and leadership, and trying to lull the West into believing in the optimistic theory above. My current assessment, based on readings and speaking with moderate Muslims after the murder of my son, is that the true state of affairs lies somewhere between these two theories. Moreover, even though the pessimistic theory bears the weight of much evidence, we should adapt the optimistic theory as a working hypothesis, constantly guarding against the dangers lurking from its pessimistic alternative. The evidence against the optimistic theory is substantial. The anti-Semitism radiating from the authorities, the clergy, and the media in Muslim countries and their persistent dehumanization of Israel and the West certainly do not add credence to the peaceful theory of Islam. But the continuing silence of Muslim clergy in the face of so-called "non-Islamic" acts committed in the name of Islam is even more telling. The fatwa issued against Salman Rushdie in 1989 (and recently renewed) shows that Islam has powerful instruments to deal with those who are perceived to be anti-Islam. Yet, to the best of my knowledge, no fatwa has ever been issued against suicide bombers and their mentors or against bin Laden and his followers or against the murderers of my son. Since Danny's murderers are still at large, a well-publicized fatwa could well lead to their apprehension. The explanation I am usually given for this silence is that the role of Muslim clergy differs from that of religious leaders in the West. Clerics in Muslim countries are usually political appointees who are expected to echo, not lead, their followers in matters of world affairs. Accordingly, due to the anti-West sentiments evoked by the war on terrorism and the lingering Israeli-Palestinian conflict, clerics cannot risk trumpeting the compassionate voice of Islam to condemn those who act against its true teachings. If we accept this explanation, we are left with the conclusion that it is only from the mosques in the West that we can expect an emergence of reconciliation with the West and explicit religious rejection of jihadi mentality. Clergy in the West are not under the direct scrutiny of repressive regimes, and the influence of Saudi money on Muslim education is on the decline. Muslims in the West are exposed to the practices of other religions and hence expect clerics to take on a more active leadership role in their communities. Likewise, these Muslims are exposed to modern standards of pluralism and human rights and are increasingly adamant about incorporating such standards in their religious teachings and practices. Most importantly, Western Muslims are the most direct victims of post-9/11 Islamophobia and the distorted image of Islam that their leaders' silence is projecting; they would benefit substantially from seeing that silence broken. I envision, therefore, a natural partnership developing between Muslims and Jews in the West and slowly making its way, through religious channels, toward the Middle East and other regions. Jews are seasoned veterans of religious reformation, as well as world experts in fighting defamation and discrimination. They can therefore offer invaluable assistance to Western Muslims who feel besieged and are struggling for dignity and social acceptance. Western Muslims, on the other hand, can help the Jewish community by speaking out, in religious vocabulary, against sins of anti-Semitism, terrorism, incitement, and the teachings of Islamic fanaticism. Indeed, my public dialogue programs with Professor Akbar Ahmed (author of Islam under Siege) have spawned new alliances between Jewish and Muslim organizations which, in turn, have paved a path of legitimacy for such a partnership to evolve. Finally, helping our Muslim cousins achieve modernity is only part of the battle against jihadi hatred. The other part calls for strengthening our ranks with pride and self-respect to withstand the ideological attacks periodically launched against us. To this end, my wife and I have edited a new book entitled I am Jewish: Personal Reflections Inspired by the Last Words of Daniel Pearl, which was published this month by Jewish Lights Publishing. The book contains about 150 essays by leading Jewish personalities, from Thomas Friedman and Shimon Peres to Richard Dreyfus, Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau, and Larry King, each answering a simple question: "When you say 'I am Jewish,' what does it mean to you?" The result is an honest mirror of how modern Jews define themselves, as well as diverse and insightful new answers to the…question of Jewish identity. To us, this book represents another victory of Danny over his killers and their ideological sympathizers. Whereas those murderers tried to sow fear, humiliation, and confusion among Jews, Danny's words and the book inspired by them will lead to empowerment, pride, and a greater understanding of Jewish identity; hence, eventually, to a stronger, more united Jewish people. (Judea Peal, a computer scientist, is president of the Daniel Pearl Foundation) Shabbat Shalom to our readers! Volume IV, No. 820 • Thursday, February 26, 2004 FIGHTING ISLAM'S
GENDER APARTHEID: [The following are excerpts from an interview with Phyllis Chesler, author of The New Anti-Semitism.] …FP: Why don’t we start by talking a bit about the need for an alliance between sane feminists and conservatives. Isn’t this an important step in our war against militant Islam? Chesler: Yes. Conservatives and people of faith must realize that women’s rights are human rights. They must strategically adopt the feminist critique of gender apartheid under Islam and must use it in the…war that Islamists have declared against America and western civilization. Feminists need to understand that freedom of religion is as important as freedom from religion and must connect to peoples of faith, beginning with Jews and Christians, who are being persecuted by Islamists in the Middle East. …If feminists are serious about anti-colonialism then surely they must oppose Arab jihadic colonialism… If they are serious about anti-racism, they must oppose Jew-hatred by any other name. Someone recently asked me: “As a feminist, how can you justify your being pro-American and pro-Israel?” I answered: “Because I oppose totalitarianism and gender and religious apartheid…” As a feminist I opposed the Taliban and I supported President Bush's invasion of Afghanistan. Few other feminists did… We are battling men with 10th century mentalities who have access to 21st century weaponry… We are also battling their view of women as chattel property whose savage subordination is, increasingly, their culture's definition of “honor.” What do you think is the best way we can expose and defeat gender apartheid under Islam? …First, we must recognize that Islam is the largest and most systematic [practitioner] of both gender and religious Apartheid on earth… Life under the Taliban…is a nightmare version of misogyny which exists in various ways all over the Islamic world. Indeed, it has been imported to Europe/Eurabia and to North America too… Nawal el-Sadawii, the Egyptian Marxist-feminist has described French Muslim women marching for their right to be veiled as a case of “false consciousness,” one that is fraught with contradictions since the marchers are also wearing tight jeans and heavy makeup. However, el-Sadawii also goes on to blame international capitalism and American imperialism for the Arab and Islamic mistreatment of women… In fact, the 2000 Arab Human Development Report describes corruption, poverty, and illiteracy in 22 Arab countries rather bravely but then goes on to blame it all on Israel! Second, we must learn the history of both women and non-Muslims under Islam and monitor and document the plight of these groups now. Third, we must educate others, both as wartime-propaganda but also as part of our own concept that human rights are and should be universal, available to everyone, everywhere… Gender apartheid includes the Arab “honor” killings of women who have been raped, had sex outside of marriage, wear lipstick, want an education and are thus “dishonouring” medieval notions of what is proper and Islamic for women. Gender apartheid also includes forced veiling, genital mutilation, arranged child marriages, marital rape, polygamy, constant pregnancies without proper nutrition, shelter, or medical care; sequestration at home, stonings to death for alleged adultery, domestic slavery, sexual slavery. Assuming that America and Britain can bring about democratic elections in Iraq, what kind of vote will misinformed, and terrorized people cast? Women may vote against their best interests… Tell us how the Left—and radical feminists in particular—have been trying to silence you. Let me first say that The New Anti-Semitism has been very well received in conservative, Christian, Republican, and right-wing venues—which is quite refreshing for me…[M]any feminists have been very supportive of The New Antisemitism and have shared with me similar experiences of being silenced for their pro-Israel, pro-democracy, and pro-Judaism views in their academic and social circles… But, I was also attacked non-stop on various left feminist listserv groups about my Zionism—as if it were a Thought Crime… Some Arab and Palestinian feminists…sent a barrage of non-stop anti-Zionist screeds and also threatened to resign from the listserv groups if I continued to oppose such propaganda or to say “unmentionable” truths. For example, when I wrote in these very pages about the possibility that Palestinian female suicide bombers might be a new category of Arab honor killings, …few feminists said: “How awful if true.” They did not say: “If this is true, what can we do about it?” The piece was greeted with silence—or with attacks because I’d published it in Frontpage (!) or because I was somehow “fighting dirty” by critiquing Islamic misogyny when Islam/Palestine was under such “genocidal” attack… Lilith magazine, a Jewish feminist magazine founded by Aviva Cantor Zuckoff, has been around since 1976. Aviva interviewed me for their second issue as a major cover story…in 1976/77. Over the years, I have written for Lilith and they have reviewed many of my books. Aviva left the magazine years ago. Now, …the review of The New Antisemitism was buried on a back page and not listed in their table of contents. The review was mainly favorable but Lilith insisted on running it two months before books reached the stores. I am not sure what conclusion I may draw but I must note that a good deal of their financial support comes from “politically correct” Jews. In these circles it is not currently politically correct to be pro-Israel or pro-American. The Women's Review of Books has, so far, done me a great favor by not reviewing it. In the past…they maintained an anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist, anti-Zionist stance. I understand they have a new editor-in-chief. Perhaps this might change things. I am also grateful that the pro-PLO feminist newspaper, Off Our Backs, has not reviewed the book either. Feminist anti-racists should be discussing The New Antisemitism because I expose both left and feminist Jew-hatred which is a form of racism… I also describe an incident in which an Israeli feminist was disinvited to an international feminist conference merely because she was a Jew from Israel. She happened to be a pro-PLO…feminist but feminists decided to punish her for what they viewed as Sharon’s crimes. They did not disinvite any Palestinian or Arab women for the far more considerable crimes of Arafat, and other Mid-East dictators… Media that used to be liberal is now increasingly left or at least “politically correct.” On the subject of Jews and Israel that means an unexamined and irrational preference for the Palestinians…and an abiding hatred for anything Israeli as “worse than the Nazis.” Thus, the venerable NY Times has not reviewed this book either which is surprising since two of my books received front page NYT Book Reviews, my photo once appeared on the cover of the Sunday magazine, I’ve published about 9 pieces in their pages in just the last decade, and I’ve been interviewed at least one hundred times since 1969. Of course, they do not have to review every single book I’ve written… Still, in the seven months since my book has been published, the NYTBR has reviewed at least six male-authored books on…Israel and antisemitism… Could sexism account for why my book was not reviewed? Anything is possible but I doubt it… The Globe and Mail commissioned a review of my book and then found it too scurrilous to run. The reviewer self-published on the internet. Perhaps this happened at the Times. At least two NY Times journalists (not friends, not colleagues) requested to review the book and to interview me. Both were turned down more than once… I happen to disagree with the Times’ coverage of the Middle East but since the NY Times is such a gatekeeper of culture, their failure to review my book has certain consequences. Leftist voices such as NPR and the Nation are pushing various Jews forward to speak about the Middle East—and obviously in condemnation of Israel. Why would any Jewish person do such a thing? … …At one level, those Jews who are the first to condemn Israel (but not Saudi Arabia or Afghanistan) and religious Judaism (but not totalitarian Islam) are, in their view, practicing Jewish ethics… Some Jews pride themselves on being a “light unto the nations,” and on understanding the other fellow’s point of view and feeling his pain… But, many such Jews are also refusing to extend any compassion to the Jewish and Israeli victims of suicide terrorism—or for that matter, to American civilians too. Many are, instead, demonizing Israel and religious Judaism as if their lives depended upon it. Many such progressives end up romanticizing fascism and scorning democracy. Tony Judt, in a recent article for The New York Review of Books, said that he was a Jew but that he did not “need” the Jewish state. Let me suggest that he apply for citizenship in Saudi Arabia, Iran, Jordan, or Egypt and he will discover not only that life is harsher there than in Israel…but that, as Jew, he cannot even become a citizen. All 22 Arab Muslim states in the Middle East are judenrein… This does not bother Judt at all nor does the surreal level of Jew-hatred in the Islamic world or [its] glorification in the West among intellectuals. I do not know Judt nor do I know the Nation’s reviewer, Brian Klug, whose name may be Jewish. Their cover story was about the “myth” of the new anti-Semitism and they copied my book jacket as their cover… In my view, they and others like them are not self-hating Jews… Their psychology is one of sheer, heartbreaking, opportunism—similar perhaps to that of Nazi-era German Jews who felt more German than Jewish and who did not think that pariah status should or would apply to them. Also, some people deal with terror by denying it exists, or by blaming themselves or a designated scapegoat (Israel, America, Jews), for it… Thinking psychologically again about leftism: Perhaps some leftists, both Jewish and non-Jewish, prefer to cling to a communist/socialist dream rather than admit that in [its] name, hundreds of millions of innocent people were tortured and killed. To acknowledge this would be tantamount to accepting some responsibility for what happened and this they cannot bear to do. Some Jews simply want their safe and illusion-filled lives to continue and do not want…them interrupted even by a Just War. Paradoxically, many such Jews glamorize or sympathize with Islamist jihadists but reject both religious Jews and Israelis as reactionary parent figures who are endangering the ability of their politically correct “children” to assimilate and to appease Jew-haters. (I do not mean to…reduce sophisticated political differences to a parent-child argument but this dimension must also be considered). Perhaps such psychological insights might explain, in part, why Israeli left wing Jews brought the case of the Security Fence before the International Court of Justice in the Hague; and why European academic Jews published a letter in which they renounced their right of Return to Israel. (I am not aware of any Palestinian counterpart letter in existence which renounces their right of return)… ___________________________ THE
COURAGE OF MUSLIM MODERATES It is a sad irony that the world’s freest Muslims—those who live in liberty in the West—are so unwilling to publicly condemn the world’s worst Muslims—the militant Islamist fascists who believe in violent jihad, intolerant theocracy, subjugated women, and hatred of Jews and Americans. If anyone should be raising their voices against the totalitarians and terrorists who promote such evil in the name of Islam, it is the millions of moderate Muslims in America, Canada, and Europe… But the vast majority are reluctant to do so. Some say nothing out of a misplaced sense of loyalty; others are afraid of being ostracized if they rock the communal boat. All the more reason, then, to applaud those outspoken moderate Muslims who do lift their voices against the hatred and violence of the extremists. I have devoted several columns to the importance of supporting and listening to these moderates. They are key allies in the war against terrorism… In a column that ran nearly two years ago, I quoted Irshad Manji, a Canadian TV personality who had recently published an essay titled “A Muslim plea for introspection.” That essay has now grown into a best-selling book, The Trouble With Islam: A Muslim's Call for Reform in Her Faith, and Manji, who calls herself a “Muslim refusenik,” has received a good deal of well-deserved publicity. She has also received hate mail, vitriolic insults, and death threats serious enough to require her to have a bodyguard. Muslims who insist on talking bluntly about contemporary Islam and its failings don’t have it easy. That is another reason there are so few of them. “We’ve got to end Islam’s totalitarianism, particularly the gross human-rights violations against women and religious minorities,” Manji writes. She is appalled by “the continuing scourge of slavery in countries ruled by Islamic regimes” and by “the Jew-bashing that so many Muslims persistently engage in.” Islam desperately needs to undergo a reformation, much as Christianity did, she argues, and it is Muslims in the West who should be spearheading it. Why? “Because it is here that we already enjoy the precious freedom to think, express, challenge, and be challenged, all without fear of state reprisal.” Another courageous Muslim moderate is Ahmed al-Rahim, who co-founded the American Islamic Congress following the atrocities of Sept. 11, 2001. It is an explicit purpose of AIC to stop being silent “in the face of Muslim extremism” and to “actively censure hate speech made in the name of Islam.” In a recent address, he noted that anti-American “hate speech and incitement” has too often been “promoted by many American Muslim organizations… This hate speech against America, against Christians, against Hindus, against Jews…has somehow been accommodated, not denounced,” Al-Rahim said. “I believe it is a priority for the American Muslim community to hold its leadership accountable for what they say…” It isn’t always easy to distinguish between militant Islamism and genuine Islamic moderation. Some Muslim leaders and institutions claim to oppose intolerance, yet attack those who expose extremism as bigots and “Islamophobes.” Daniel Pipes of the Middle East Forum says that often the only way to tell the real moderates from the fakes is by asking questions—not vague queries (“Do you condemn terrorism?”), but specific ones… Do you condone or condemn the Palestinians, Chechens, and Kashmiris who give up their lives to kill enemy civilians? Will you condemn by name such terrorist groups as Abu Sayyaf, Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, and Al Qaeda? Should Muslim women have equal rights with men? … Ultimately, only Muslims can decide whether Islam’s future lies with the militants or with the moderates. But those of us who are not Muslim can help the cause of reform and moderation by promoting and encouraging the moderates, and by repudiating the extremists they are brave enough to challenge.
Volume IV, No. 819 • Wednesday, February 25, 2004 WEDNESDAY’S “NEWS IN REVIEW” ROUND-UP WEEKLY QUOTES “What is happening at the Hague is an attempt to deny Israel the right to defend itself. We will not give in. Israel will build the security fence and complete it. The government of Abu Ala [Ahmed Queri’a] is a government of murder and lies. With such a government it is impossible to reach any agreement.”—Prime Minister Ariel Sharon denouncing the proceedings at The Hague as “a campaign of hypocrisy”. (Ha’aretz, Feb. 24) “With the exception of the Palestinian themselves, we believe it is us who are the ones most affected by Israel’s decision to place the wall where it has, and where it intends to do so in the future. My country already hosts a number of refugees and displaced persons and my country is now faced with the new threat of refugees.”—Jordanian Prince Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein, announcing to the International Court of Justice that Jordan does not wish to take in any more Palestinians, which it sees as an unavoidable consequence of Israel’s security fence in the West Bank. (Jerusalem Post, Feb. 24) “The wall is not about security. It is about entrenching the occupation and the de facto annexation of large areas of Palestinian land.”—Palestinian Ambassador to the UN Nasser al-Kidwa in his opening statement to the International Court of Justice. (Globe and Mail, Feb. 24) “As we went to Durban to witness the orgy of antisemitism disguised as a conference against racism, so, too, we will stand as representatives of the world Jewish community to bear witness to this cynical attempt to strip the Jewish people of their right to self-defense and self-determination."—B’nai B’rith International president Joel S. Kaplan, announcing his plans to be present at The Hague.(Jer. Post, Feb. 20) “It is simply horrifying to see it up close, to see the pieces of human flesh on the ground. Any other nation on earth under attack as Israel is would have already began bombing the Palestinian Authority… It is sheer hypocrisy on the part of those who say that Israel must not build the security barrier.”—U.S. Congressman Gerald Nadler, overwhelmed by what he saw after a suicide bombing on a crowded Jerusalem bus killed eight passengers and wounded 60 others, most of them high school students. (Maariv International, Feb. 22; New York Post, Feb. 23) “Without a peace partner, Israel is forced to protect its people unilaterally. In the past three and a half years Israel has intercepted 313 attempted homocide bombers. Nonetheless, more than 130 others were able to main and kill innocent civilians. It is unfortunate that Israel has to contemplate this barrier, however, a similar security perimeter has stopped all suicide attacks from the Gaza Strip. The Canadian government correctly objected to the politicization of the barrier in the International Court of Justice…”—Canadian Liberal MP Anita Neville, responding to Liberal MP Pat O’Brien who accused Israel of violating international law by building the security fence. (House of Commons, Feb. 19) “The Israeli withdrawal [from the Gaza Strip] is a victory for us and we must celebrate it… [It] is one of the most important achievements of the intifada. The withdrawal should take place without an agreement and with no political gains [for Israel]. Sharon has decided to unilaterally withdraw, and this is cause for celebration.”—Mohammed Dahlan, the PA’s former minister of security, in an interview with the Palestinian daily Al-Quds. When asked for his views on the PA’s opposition to Sharon’s plan for disengagement he said, “We have fought the Israelis for two years to have the checkpoints removed. Now Israel wants to evacuate the settlers and the army. How can some argue that this is a plot?… I have learned a lot of lessons in my short life, and, in short, I don’t want to work with the Palestinian Authority.” (Jer. Post, Feb. 21) “Jewish communities in Europe live in fear. How is it that the reverberations of the 20th century still spread into the 21st century? Haven’t we learned anything? People come to me and whisper in my ear. They don’t ask me if they should leave Europe, but when.”—Nobel laureate and Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel, speaking at the conference on antisemitism organized jointly by the European Commission and the European Jewish Congress. (Ha’aretz, Feb.19 & 20) “We are heroes in error. As far as we are concerned we’ve been entirely successful. Our objective has been achieved. That tyrant Saddam is gone and the Americans are in Baghdad. What was said before is not important. The Bush administration is looking for a scapegoat. We’re ready to fall on swords if he [President Bush] wants.”—Ahmed Chalabi, member of the Iraqi Governing Council and ardent anti-Saddam lobbyist, shrugging off charges that he deliberately misled U.S. intelligence with faulty information about Saddam Hussein’s weapons. (National Post, Feb. 19) “Islam is to be the main source for laws in the country. Islam is the religion of Iraq and the source of legislation. That must be respected… We’re not bound by others’ points of view.”—Iraqi Governing Council president and Secretary-General of the Iraqi Islamic Party, Mohsen Abdel-Hamid, on the future of Iraq’s legal system. Paul Bremer, head of the coalition provisional authority in Iraq, declared “Our position is clear. It can’t be law until I sign it,” indicating that he would veto any attempts to adopt an Islamic legal system. In the even of an election several secular parties may form an alliance to campaign Islamic power.— (Nat’l Post, Feb. 19; N.Y.T., Feb.22) “What we don’t see in Mel’s movie is historical context or historical scholarship. The movie is anti-Jewish in its interpretation of the death of Jesus, but so are the Gospels. The movie is even more so than the Gospels because of what it omits: the teaching and events that led up to the crucifixion of Jesus.”—Rev. Phillip Kennedy, director of lay and continuing education at the United Theological College in Montreal. (Gazette, Feb. 25) “I am very careful when using the term antisemitic. I will say that in the wrong hands, the movie [The Passion of Christ] could be used to justify antisemitism. But I have too much faith in the Christian leadership to believe that I need to be fearful of the impact of the movie in North America.”—Rabbi Reuben Poupko of Montreal’s Beth Israel Beth Aaron Congregation. (Gazette, Feb. 25) “It’s all—maybe not all fiction—but most of it is. Do you know what it takes to get rid of a dead body? To cremate it? It takes a litre of petrol and 20 minutes. Now, six million of them? They (the Germans) did not have the gas to do it. That’s why they lost the war. ”—Mel Gibson’s father, Hutton Gibson, in a telephone interview with a New York Radio talk show. (Agence-France Presse, Feb. 19) SHORT TAKES NO TERRORISM WHERE SECUIRTY FENCE BUILT—(Jerusalem) According to Avi Dichter, Director of the Shin Bet Security Services, terrorist activities “ceased completely” in the areas where the West Bank anti-terrorism fence has been erected. Recent infiltrations into Israeli territory occurred in areas where the security fence has not yet been completed. Dichter added that cities subjected to a large number of terrorist attacks in the past have experienced quiet since the erection of the security fence. Israelis who lost loved ones in terrorist attacks demonstrated in the streets after the Palestinian delegation at The Hague derided the construction of the anti-terrorism fence. (Ha’aretz, Globe and Mail, Feb. 24) ISRAEL AND JORDAN TO COOPERATE IN DESERT PROJECT—(Jerusalem) Israel and Jordan agreed to build an environmental studies center on their shared desert border. The countries will donate a total of 150 acres of parched land along the border. Bridging the Rift, a private group, will develop the center in conjunction with two American universities, Cornell and Stanford. Supporters see this project as both a serious scientific effort to focus on biology in the desert environment as well as a bridge-building initiative envisioned when Israel and Jordan signed a peace treaty in 1994. (N.Y.T., Feb. 25) ARAFAT MEETS THE PRESS—(Jerusalem) On Sunday, over 200 Palestinian journalists marched into the empty chamber of the Palestinian Legislative Council in Gaza City, demanding an investigation into what they describe as an “organized campaign of intimidation and terror” waged against them by “hostile and suspicious elements.” The journalists threatened to resume their protest if the PA failed to fulfill its promise. (Jer. Post, Feb. 19) ARAB-LEAGUE REJECTS HUMAN RIGHTS EDUCATION—(Cairo) Guidelines for Teaching Human Rights in the Arab Countries, put forth by the Arab Organization for Science, Culture, and Education, deemed the curriculum used in Arab schools a hindrance to human rights education, citing verses taught from Koran that discourage tolerance and interfaith dialogue. “This does not make young people believe in the rights of others to follow their own religion,” the report stated. Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa dismissed the report as “insufficient, unbalanced, and dubious.” (Jer. Post, Feb. 23) PRO-FENCE ADS AIR ON U.S. TV—(Jerusalem) In an effort to garner public support for Israel’s anti-terrorism fence, The Israel Project sponsored TV ads featuring mothers whose children were killed in suicide bombing attacks. The ads, broadcast on CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC, aired in the Washington area. Questioned by The Israel Project, 74% of 800 likely voters believe that Israel has the right to erect a security fence. The recent poll also revealed that 69% of those surveyed agreed that Israel “should not be told by an international court how to protect its own citizens;” 25% disagreed. (Jer. Post, Feb. 23) TOP BIN LADEN AIDE THREATENS NEW ATTACKS AGAINST THE U.S.—(Cairo) The C.I.A. believes that it was Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri, a senior leader of Al Qaeda, who threatened further attacks against the U.S. and denounced France for banning Islamic head scarves. Testifying before the Senate Intelligence Community, Director of Central Intelligence George J. Tenet said that Al Qaeda retained the ability to carry out attacks. (N.Y.T., Feb. 25) IRAN MADE FUEL FOR ATOMIC WEAPONS: INSPECTORS—(Washington) International Atomic Energy Agency experts in Iran found evidence of indigenous production of a concentrated fuel that, can be used to make nuclear weapons. Iran maintains that any traces of concentrated fuel must have come from equipment contaminated before it was imported, presumably from Pakistan. But inspectors found the fuel on Iranian-made parts, and "only negligible traces" on imported parts. (N.Y.T., Feb. 25) BUSH APPEARS ON “THE FREE ONE”—(Washington) Speaking on “The Free One,” a new U.S.-sponsored Middle East TV channel, U.S. President George W. Bush declared that he would continue to push for a Palestinian state and for democracy in Arab countries. The Middle East Television Network aims to counter the influence of Al-Jazeera and other regional networks that promulgate anti-American and anti-Israel views. The station, launched last weekend, drew mixed reviews, ranging from praise for slick packaging to criticism for attempting to improve the image of “Satan.” (N.Y.T., Feb. 19, Feb. 20) U.S. DELAYS EASING LIBYA SANCTIONS—(Washington) The White House delayed plans to lift travel restrictions to Libya after Libyan P.M. Shokri Ghanem denied his country's guilt in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing. U.S. President George W. Bush intended to ease the decades-old travel ban to reward Libya for scrapping its WMD programs but put plans on hold after Ghanem said that Tripoli only agreed to pay compensation to the Lockerbie victims in order to “buy peace.” The U.S. will likely lift the ban if Libya issues a statement denouncing Ghanem’s comments. (Reuters, Feb. 25) ANTISEMITIC ATTACKS UP IN U.K.—(London) Last year, antisemitic incidents in Britain rose to their second-highest levels since 1984. 375 malicious acts were aimed at Jews or Jewish sites, including the desecration of at least 400 gravestones at an East London cemetery in May, 2003, described as the biggest incident of its kind recorded in Britain. (International Herald Tribune, Feb. 21-22) AL QAEDA SUSPECTS TO FACE MILITARY TRIBUNALS—(Washington) Charged with “conspiracy to commit war crimes” because of their involvement in al Qaeda, Sulayman al-Bahlul of Yemen and Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud al-Qosi of Sudan will stand trial in the first U.S. military tribunals since World War II. Pentagon spokesman Major John Smith said that prosecutors do not plan to seek the death penalty against the men. (Washington Times, Feb. 25) BRITAIN HONORS NAZI-HUNTER WIESENTHAL—(London) Britain awarded an honorary knighthood to Nazi-hunter Simon Wiesenthal for a “lifetime of service to humanity.” Wiesenthal, 95, spent five decades tracking down more than 1,000 Nazi war criminals, including Adolf Eichmann, who oversaw the implementation of Hitler’s Final Solution. (N.Y.P., Feb. 20) COMEDIAN ACCUSED OF ANTISEMITISM TO TAKE TO STREETS—(Paris) French comedian Dieudonne, who faces trial on charges of making a racial slur, vowed to perform on the street in the front of Paris’ Olympia theater after theater officials cancelled his show. Last December, Dieudonne appeared on TV dressed as an orthodox Jew and gave a Nazi salute. He described the sketch as a criticism of Israel’s policies toward the Palestinians, insisting that such a commentary does not constitute antisemitism. Theater officials feared they could not guarantee the audience’s safety. (I.H.T., Feb. 21-22) Volume IV, No. 818 • Tuesday, February 24, 2004 LIFE AMONG THE
BOMBS The bombing of the No. 14 bus here on Sunday began like many others: first the boom, then the sirens and finally the phone calls. This time the calls were particularly harrowing because our children and many of their friends regularly ride that line. We soon heard that two of their classmates were killed by the blast and eight others wounded. After the surge of rage, helplessness and sorrow…[w]e returned to our routines. Israelis are proud of their ability to carry on in the face of terrorism. The determination with which buses keep running and cafes serve brunch only minutes after an attack has been widely lauded… Over the past three years, since the Palestinian bombings began, Israelis have had hundreds of opportunities to perfect that skill. Whereas once the explosion of a bus or a restaurant would send the country into paroxysms of sadness and rage…today even the bloodiest atrocities recede from memory in a matter of days… Israel's resilience seems to suggest that terror…has its limits. If suicide bombers stop terrorizing their targets, then, by definition, suicide bombings no longer constitute terrorism… By steeling itself to pain and horror, a society can deprive its enemies of their most potent weapon--fear--and help ensure its…survival. Yet what if Israelis have not grown inured to terrorism but have rather become numbed by it? What if, instead of showing resolve, they have merely lapsed into a state of shock so deep that assaults on their national existence cannot stir them? The lesson, then, would be much different: subjected to prolonged and relentless terrorism, even the most robust society is in danger of crumbling. Israel's goal must be to maintain a balance between steadfastness and indifference. True, we have not allowed terror to dominate our lives… We have been striking back…erecting barriers to hinder terrorists even as we work to eliminate the conditions that create them. At the same time, however, we must never lose sight of the suffering that terrorism causes, the reality of dismembered bodies, the anguish of families bereaved. Israelis provide the world with a model for maintaining normal life even under the pall of terror. In spite of Sunday's bombing, we must go back to our jobs and our schools, demonstrating that terrorism will not defeat us. Still, not for a moment can we forget the emotional costs of our endurance. For Israelis and Americans, this is the challenge of our time: reconciling fortitude with sensitivity. (Michael B. Oren, a senior fellow at the Shalem Center in Jerusalem) _____________________________________________________ THE
INTIFADA IS STUPID When a suicide bomber blew himself up on a Jerusalem bus on Sunday, Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia was visibly angry. The bombing came the day before the International Court of Justice in The Hague began hearing arguments about the legality of the security barrier that Israel is building... Israel argues that it needs the barrier to keep terrorists out, and the bombing, which killed eight people, only served to underline its case. "This is a gift to The Hague," muttered Mr. Qureia. "Stupid, stupid." The same thing might be said about the whole of the war the Palestinians are waging against Israel. Leaving aside the moral bankruptcy of massacring innocent passengers on a commuter bus to make a political point…the intifada that began in September, 2000, has been an unrelieved disaster for the Palestinian cause. Palestinian extremists have succeeded in causing their enemy much misery, killing 463 Israelis in 110 suicide bombings—the most…ruthless terrorist campaign any nation in history has endured. But…the campaign has gained nothing for the Palestinian people except more poverty and misery. The security barrier…is a direct result of the violence. Israel would not even have contemplated such an extreme measure unless it was under repeated attack. In fact, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was against the idea until the public began pressuring him to do something about terrorism. Whether or not you believe the barrier is the right response to the terrorist onslaught…it is a response… Suicide bombings are not a "pretext" for building the barrier, as Mr. Qureia seems to think. They are the main reason for it. The fence is just one of many blows that have fallen on the Palestinians as a result of the intifada. More than 135,000 Palestinians who once worked in Israel have lost their jobs. The infrastructure of Palestinian nationhood—government offices, public services, the police force—has been devastated. Palestinians complain they can achieve nothing as long as they face the hard-line Mr. Sharon. Yet he was elected in 2001 and re-elected in 2003 as a direct result of the violence. Israelis fed up with the bloodshed turned to an arch-hawk to protect them. At the same time, they turned away from the thought of making concessions to Palestinian nationalism, and the dream of an independent Palestinian state receded yet again. Stupid. Stupid. That sums it up nicely. _____________________________________________________ MANIPULATING
THE COURT FOR POLITICAL ENDS Canada has a big stake in what happens in The Hague. As a middle power dedicated to multilateralism, Canada agreed to join and be part of international organizations to protect our interests and values when they are focused beyond our borders. The integrity of these organizations is therefore paramount. Yesterday, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague began its hearings on Israel’s security fence. Canadians should be very concerned that the reputation of the court might be seriously compromised if it allows itself to be drawn into what is fundamentally a political dispute. The ICJ is an important and prestigious institution. Inside the court, the tone was measured and judicious, as is appropriate in a court of law. But there is nothing appropriate about the court answering the question put to it by the United Nations General Assembly. The question asked for an advisory opinion on the “legal consequences arising from the construction of the wall being built by Israel, the Occupying Power, in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.” The question is biased and one-sided, and contributes nothing positive to the cause of peace. For these reasons, Canada and more than 30 countries as diverse as Russia, France and Japan have presented written briefs arguing that the court should not hear the case. That is also why most democratic countries have declines to participate in these proceedings. The case raises serious problems. There are significant jurisdictional issues between the Security Council and the General Assembly, and the court lacks an institutionalized fact-finding process. But the real problem is that this case could lead to the manipulation of an important judicial institution for purely political purposes. That the issue is fundamentally political is underscored by the events that unfolded on the streets of The Hague as the court began its proceedings. Outside the atmosphere was almost carnival-like. The Palestinians and their supporters were demonstrating. They were joined by anti-globalization advocates and those accusing the United States of causing international terrorism. Signs and banners called for the dismantling of the “apartheid wall,” the end to “concentration camps” in the West bank, and the boycotting of Israeli products. Everyone was playing to the television cameras. The court proceedings seemed incidental. Again, this was pure politics—just another occasion to take to the streets and capture some media attention. What are we as Canadians to make of all of this? Canadians should be concerned about the hijacking of international institutions by anti-democratic forces. The question put to the court was drafted and supported by a coalition of anti-democratic states that can regularly be counted upon to support any and all resolutions attacking Israel, regardless of how one-sided they may be. To its credit, Canada has taken the lead in rallying democratic countries to retake the initiative in international institutions. Democratic states must regain sufficient influence to ensure that institutions they have established are able to make a constructive contribution to peace and security in the world. One such contribution would be to focus attention on the growing pandemic of suicide bombings. These nihilistic actions have become the tactics of choice for terrorists around the world. It is a bitter irony that only one day before the ICJ began its proceedings, a suicide bomber struck again in Jerusalem. Suicide bombing needs to be condemned as a violation of international law, basic human rights, and a crime against humanity. Canada is playing an important role in encouraging other states to join in this imperative as a growing number of countries recognize their vulnerability to this threat. Finally, for those of us who support the rights of Israelis and Palestinians to live in peace and security, the proceedings in The Hague are very troubling. Not only do they fail to advance the cause of peace. They deflect attention from what must be done in order to resolve the tragic Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In this respect, the voice of the international community is clear. The international roadmap demands an end to terror as the essential condition for the resumption of direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. Until that happens, Israel has no choice but to defend its citizens by building a security fence. The attempt to substitute the proceedings of the International Court of Justice for the obligation to halt terror does a disservice both to the court and to the cause pf peace. (Marc Gold chairs the Canada-Israel Committee and teaches law at McGill University) ______________________________________________________ ISRAEL'S
FENCE IS SADLY NECESSARY Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia went through the motions, Sunday, of condemning the latest murder of civilians on a Jerusalem bus. This time, however, was a little different: He meant what he said. Unfortunately, pathetically, contemptibly, Qureia did not say—or mean—"this tactic is wrong" or even "it will not work for us." Instead, he said the timing for this particular suicide-murder—eight dead, many injured—was wrong. The timing was bad because these latest shattered bodies, these new pools of blood, these newly-bandaged wounded, these suddenly-grieving kinfolk, all interfere with the latest Palestinian propaganda effort. In the Netherlands, where buses do not blow up, the International Court of Justice has agreed, foolishly, to hear Palestinian arguments against the security fence Israel is building in the West Bank. The court has no jurisdiction, but Palestinians are counting on an opinion critical of the 620-kilometre long fence, now one-quarter built. The latest slaughter in Jerusalem, because it lets the fair-minded see what horrors the fence is intended to exclude from Israel, will impair this propaganda. That's all that bothered Qureia. The need for the fence—a wall in some places—is a thoroughly bad thing. It divides families, kills commerce, and can be seen as a land grab. It looms…as a monument to the failure of negotiation. But the fence is also the least of the three evils available to the Israelis. (The other two would be to yield in some way to terror tactics, or to accept stoically the frequent explosions, fear, and murder spread by Palestinian "martyrs.") The fence won't stop the terror murders, but it will likely reduce the number of such outrages. The basic Mideast question never changes: what will it take to move from today's situation to meaningful talks aimed at an enduring peace? The answer starts with "a Palestinian will for peace" and "an end to terrorism." Blowing up buses full of civilians is not a tactic that invites compromise. Ask yourself: At the first sign from the Israelis that these murders lead to concessions, will the bombings cease? Or multiply? Qureia's master, Yasser Arafat, ceaselessly duplicitous, has been deep in the business of terrorism for many years. The hard men who equip and dispatch deluded individuals to death and murder obviously do not want peace. Until there's a Palestinian leadership willing to abandon terrorism—and to really try to stop it—there will be no peace. Nor will the terror necessarily be confined to the streets of Jerusalem. Qureia's concern with political tactics and timing are more revealing than he realized. The day the twisted minds of Arafat and those behind him see any profit in it, buses in Montreal, New York or even the Hague will start exploding. In standing fast against such nihilism, the Israelis are a bulwark for us all. In the meantime, we have a serious proposal for the judges of the International Court of Justice: Go to Jerusalem. Get on a bus. Conduct your earnest deliberations as other passengers get on and off. See then how you feel about the need for the fence.
Volume IV, No. 817 • Monday, February 23, 2004 YOU ARE JUDGING
AND I AM BURYING MY HUSBAND [Fanny Haim’s husband Yehuda was killed in yesterday’s terrorist attack in Jerusalem.] Today, in The Hague, you will sit in judgment. Today, I will bury my husband, my heart—which has been cut in two. I am not a politician. I am appealing to you as someone who has lost her husband, a woman whose heart has been silenced—and a woman whose tragedy the separation fence could have prevented. I was married to Yehuda for 21 years. He was the love of my youth, since I was 15. Yehuda’s sister is Israel’s Economic Attaché in The Hague and works in the Embassy there. For months, she, her husband and the Embassy staff have been trying to open the world’s eyes. For months, they have been fighting for the rights of the State of Israel. As for me, what could I have asked for? Only for my small right, my husband’s right, the right to see our children grow and prosper, go to school and serve in the army. I will no longer receive this right. But today, you can see to it that other Israeli families will merit this basic thing—to raise a happy family, to get up in the morning without bereavement, without gravestones, and without cemeteries. Today, as you begin your deliberations with open eyes, think, just for a moment, about the ordinary people behind this bloody conflict. Think for a moment about the golden heart of my husband Yehuda, and about our young son, Avner. Maybe you can explain to him—he’s only 10-years-old—why in God’s Name he doesn’t have a father any more. People will enter your hall today, who will speak, who will accuse. Mourners will enter my home and I will be unable to understand and I will certainly not be consoled. This evening, you will go home, kiss your spouses, hug your children—and I will be alone. True, the politics are far from me, but now as the pain is far too close to me, I think that I have acquired, with integrity and with tears, the right to appeal to you and say: If there had been a fence all along the length of the state, then maybe I, just like you, could kiss my husband this evening. Do not judge my country; do not restrain it from preventing additional people from becoming victims. Today, I am burying my husband; don’t you bury justice. ______________________________________________________ SUICIDE
BOMBERS ARE REAL BARRIER TO PEACE A few weeks back, I wrote a piece that mentioned the security fence between Israel and the West Bank. My article was an attempt to articulate how (mostly) left-wing Israelis, perplexed by the collapse of negotiations with the Palestinians and desperate to escape the daily suicide attacks, were promoting the fence as a sort of unilateral disengagement from the Palestinian territories. Very reluctantly, Ariel Sharon was being forced to adopt the policy, despite vigorous resistance from the Israeli right wing. Alas, there is a sad tendency among those who disagree with the fence to attack anyone trying to explain it as personally complicit in its alleged failings. Thus, the Scottish Palestinian Solidarity Campaign (SPSC) website devoted space to a lengthy diatribe against my article, penned from Tulkarm on the West Bank. In the spirit of democratic debate, the SPSC called me a "hack" and "the Barclay brothers’ liar in chief". "What condensed callousness drips from Kerevan’s keyboard," exclaims the writer. According to this polemic, the fence "is a prison for Palestinians" and "Kerevan must lack the simplest ability to consult a map…" Today the International Court of Justice begins formal hearings into the legality of the barrier. No-one can doubt the fact that, whatever the original motives behind building it, the fence has become yet another irritant in the long-running dispute between Israelis and Arabs in the Holy Land. From the Palestinian perspective, the fence is seen as a land grab because it takes in areas that were inside the West Bank before Israel occupied these territories during the Six Day War in 1967. Having lived through the Troubles in Northern Ireland, where my mother was caught in several bombings, I am only too well aware of the ease with which two sides can misconstrue each other’s motives. I am also well aware that there are always people who want to make mischief. For instance, the author of the Tulkarm venom is actually a prominent Scottish left-winger. For him, Palestine is just another cause to hijack in his ceaseless war against capitalism. Nevertheless, let me have one more try at shedding a little light on the issue of the security fence. Try grasping this one essential fact: far from being an Israeli plot, the damn thing is a giant piece of improvisation. Two and a half years ago, practically no-one in Israel wanted it. For one thing, it is horrendously expensive to build and the Israeli economy is in tatters, thanks to the dotcom meltdown and the intifada. Besides, Israel’s extreme right has never been comfortable with giving up West Bank and the thought of marooning Jewish settlements behind a barrier is anathema to them. The impetus to build the fence came in March 2002 after 37 attempted Palestinian suicide bombings were launched in 31 days. I found wandering around Belfast in the 1970s was nerve-wracking enough, but at least you knew the Provos would try to give a warning before a bomb went off. In Israel, as we saw again on Saturday, the aim of Palestinian extremists is deliberately to murder civilians. In particular, they have a penchant for blowing up school buses—I’m sorry, but I find no cause in the world justifies such "condensed callousness". The Israelis found themselves in a bind. Something had to be done to stop the suicide bombings. Yasser Arafat’s Palestinian Authority showed no capacity or inclination to curb the extremists on its own side… Rather than use his standing in the Arab world to lead from the front, he has maintained his position by playing off the various Palestinian factions against each other. Thus, on Saturday, his Palestinian Authority was condemning—in words—the suicide bomb in Jerusalem. But responsibility for the attack was claimed by a section of his very own Fatah movement, the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades. With no other option other than massive repression on the West Bank, the Israelis have opted to keep out the suicide bombers by starting to build the security fence. Just for the record, I know that, in places, it is a cement wall rather than a wire fence: this tends to be in areas where there has been sniping from the Arab side. There is a similar wall in Belfast, built to stop the communal violence. To date, no-one has referred the Belfast wall to the International Court of Justice. Is the Israeli fence "illegal"? This is a daft question because the answer—whatever it be—is beside the point. Israeli bashing is not going to restart negotiations and the Israelis are certainly not going to take the fence down until the suicide bombings cease. The Palestinians may secure a propaganda victory, but where does it get them in practical terms? That said, it seems to me the Israelis have a right to protect themselves. Some, such as the Liberal Democrats’ foreign affairs spokesman, Sir Menzies Campbell, pay lip service to this, but then say the fence should not be "on land earmarked for a Palestinian state". Sir Menzies even wants the European Union to withdraw preferential trading terms with Israel until it complies. This is disingenuous. Just how do we get into negotiations to determine the borders of Palestine until the suicide bombing is stemmed? And how do we stop the suicide bombing without the fence? The case for the fence’s illegality rests on the notion that Israel is illegally "occupying" the West Bank. For the sea lawyers among you, remember the West Bank was originally a part of Jordan and not Palestinian. In 1967, it was Jordan that attacked Israel first—the Israelis were at war with Egypt and Syria at the time and wanted no unnecessary fight with the Jordanians in their back yard. Israel then overran the West Bank in self defence. There is nothing illegal I can see in a state, in such circumstances, taking appropriate security measures on captured territory until such time as there is a general settlement. Does the fence inconvenience Arabs disproportionately? Yes, and the Israelis need to rethink its line in places. But even more inconvenience has been caused to the 135,000 Palestinians who used to work freely in Israel but have lost their jobs because the suicide bombers have blown up the economy and created a security nightmare. The fence just might ease their predicament. The key issue is whether Israel is prepared to move the fence when a border is recognised with an independent Palestine. We can all call Ariel Sharon names, but let’s look instead at the facts. Israel has a proven history of taking down security fences—it did so in South Lebanon and the Sinai. Israel has said it does not consider the fence the final border with Palestine and is willing to negotiate a land swap. Clearly, the Palestinians want the 1948 border (the so-called Green Line). Equally clearly, the Israelis want to give up land in the Negev in return for ironing out twists in the Green Line. That’s all for negotiation. But does anyone doubt that if, instead of suicide bombers, Yasser Arafat had led non-violent, sit-down strikes on the Green Line, such negotiations would not be further forward today? ______________________________________________________ UNWANTED
BUT NECESSARY Like every other obstacle to the free movement of innocent people, the barrier that Israel is constructing beside or in parts of the West Bank is an abomination. And as with every other such obstacle…reasonable people can only regret that it is necessary and hope that it will eventually be relocated or even removed. [T]his barrier—95 per cent of it is fence; 5 per cent of it, in populated areas, is wall—need not be looked at as permanent. Such barriers have already been relocated or removed in the context of Israel's peace agreements with Egypt and Jordan. But the way to make that happen in this case is to eliminate what makes it necessary. And what makes it necessary is not Israel's appetite for territory, but Palestinian terrorism. More specifically, the barrier is not a way for Ariel Sharon, Israel's Prime Minister, to grab land. For a long time, Mr. Sharon led the Israeli resistance to such a barrier… And when he finally caved in under the pressure of public opinion, he approved a route that will encompass only about 16 per cent of the West Bank… Even the most charitable of Mr. Sharon's critics accuse him of harbouring much more expansive territorial ambitions… To make a really coherent argument that the barrier is meant to entrench a land grab, Mr. Sharon's critics need to explain…why the ambition this barrier purportedly embodies falls so far short of the ambition they universally attribute to him. The barrier is a way to keep Palestinian terrorists out of Israel. True, the overwhelming majority of Palestinians trying to get into Israel are not terrorists. What most of them are looking for is a job or, at worst, a chance for criminal profit. But some have an altogether different agenda: to blow themselves up in a restaurant or on a crowded bus, as one did yesterday in Jerusalem, and kill as many Israelis as they possibly can on their way to everlasting life in the company of 72 virgins. And those few have already done more than enough to convince Israelis that scattered checkpoints and roadblocks will not prevent the suicide bombers from getting through and that only a continuous physical obstacle will protect lives. Where such a barrier already exists, as around the Gaza Strip, it has proven its effectiveness. Only two suicide bombers have penetrated from the Gaza Strip, both of them British Muslims using their foreign passports to masquerade as tourists. And from the northern part of the West Bank, where the fence has been erected, the number of successful infiltrations has dropped drastically in recent months. The barrier does impose serious hardship on Palestinians interested only in their personal welfare. Part of this stems simply from Israeli insensitivity, for which the Israeli government should be called to account. But much of it stems from an unavoidable tradeoff between Israeli life and Palestinian quality-of-life which, for most Israelis, is no choice at all. The only way to avoid such a tradeoff is for the Palestinians to abandon a political culture that glorifies martyrdom and incites people to murder. There is no intrinsic reason why Palestinian determination to do that should depend on a political agreement with Israel. Prior British acceptance of Indian independence was not a condition of Mahatma Gandhi's determination not to use violence in the pursuit of independence; prior American endorsement of civil rights was not a condition of Martin Luther King's determination not to use violence in the pursuit of civil rights; prior Israeli acceptance of the principle, much less the terms, of Palestinian independence was not even a condition of the commitment Yasser Arafat gave to pursue a political settlement only through non-violent means. But if the Palestinians are nevertheless unable or unwilling to stop terrorism without an agreement on terms acceptable to them, then the demand that the International Court of Justice condemn the anti-terrorist barrier only addresses a symptom of the problem, not the problem itself. The Palestinian request for an advisory opinion on the barrier…is one more in a seemingly endless string of appeals to international tribunals. This time it is cloaked in legal verbiage and supported by other such paragons of international legality as Syria (still defying a 22-year-old UN Security Council resolution calling for the withdrawal of all foreign forces from Lebanon), and Morocco (still ignoring at least five Security Council resolutions demanding a referendum in the Western Sahara, which Morocco continues to occupy). A favourable opinion by the International Court would provide more ammunition for yet another condemnation of Israel in the UN General Assembly, that is, for yet one more small victory in the endless propaganda war that accomplishes nothing except to perpetuate the conflict. All of this is perfectly consistent with the long-standing Palestinian strategy of trying to mobilize outside pressure on Israel in order to avoid engaging Israel directly, except through the medium of terrorism. This amounts to a strategy of bombing and whining. It hasn't worked for the past 100 years. And while the indulgence of those who presume to speak in the name of the international community may encourage its persistence for another 100 years, it won't work in the future, either. (Mark Heller, Research Associate at Tel Aviv University’s Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies, co-authored (with Sari Nusseibeh) 'No Trumpets, No Drums: A Two-State Settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict')
Volume IV, No. 816 • Friday, February 20, 2004 CAN ISRAEL GET
A FAIR TRIAL? As the International Court of Justice's consideration of Israel's separation fence draws closer, the political and propaganda aspects of this battle are gaining strength. For the Palestinians and their supporters, this is a mega-opportunity to put Israel on trial and a milestone in the demonization process. They can hope to build on the achievements of Durban, where thousands of powerful NGOs turned the September 2001 UN Conference on Racism into a rally against Israel. From Durban, they moved to Jenin, condemning the Israeli anti-terror operation that followed the Passover bombings as a war crime, and repeating the false Palestinian claims of a massacre. And now, instead of accepting the Israeli separation fence as a legitimate response to terror, the demonization coalition is attacking the "apartheid wall." The fact that this case is being heard at all is a farce that further erodes any remaining moral authority of the UN and the…court. In a very partisan vote, the UN General Assembly gave the court a highly loaded mandate, essentially telling the judges to find Israel guilty without considering the history of terrorism and hatred. In agreeing to hear such a pre-cooked case, the ICJ…will be weakening its standing even further. But for the anti-Israel…campaign, the main event will take place outside the court. The media campaigns will be led by Arafat's representatives, including…the anachronistic European-funded Negotiation Support Unit, as well as the Arab League, and the Conference of Islamic States. [T]his highly partisan version of reality, amplified through the doctrine of Palestinian victimization, will be supported by powerful NGOs, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch…This group led the way by spreading the use of the term "apartheid wall" and other incendiary language. As a result, these organizations, despite their claim to further the principles of human rights, have become active participants in the conflict… Given this framework of warfare by other means, the challenge for diplomats, journalists, and for the international court itself is to be able to separate the massive hype from the substance. In particular, the question is whether the Israeli case will even be given a hearing. The proceedings should be widely recognized as a kangaroo court, with no claim to moral or legal legitimacy. From the perspective of the Israeli consensus--and, it should be recalled, Israel is a vibrant democracy--this separation barrier is not only legitimate but a vital necessity. The reports that refer to unilateral disengagement…as Ariel Sharon's plan to avoid making peace with the Palestinians, miss the point entirely. Sharon resisted this approach for a long time, but the logic has become inescapable. If he had not announced this move, another leader would have… The logic and morality of unilateral separation begins with the understanding that the status quo--based on a Swiss-cheese map of intertwined Palestinian cities and Israeli settlements left over from the failed Oslo process--is intolerable for all. Israeli military responses to three years of terror have been quite effective, but sporadic attacks continue. The multiple checkpoints, frequent closures and other sources of daily friction between individual Palestinians and Israeli soldiers contribute to the tension. And the political status quo poses a demographic threat to the survival of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state. At the same time, efforts to negotiate an end to the conflict have failed completely. Until there is a credible Palestinian leadership to disarm the terror factions and implement a lasting accord, negotiations, however well intended, are not going to end the conflict. The evolution of a pragmatic Palestinian leadership will take many years or decades. Until then, unilateral disengagement is the least bad option, as many Israelis, including Sharon, now recognize. Israel needs to define pragmatic de facto borders, and build its defensive shield along these lines. The section that has already been built has proven effective in protecting northern coastal cities such as Netanya and Hadera from terror attacks. In some cases, while the logic of these arguments is accepted, the campaign to demonize the separation plan focuses on the route. Indeed, on this issue, there is an active debate within Israel, and the route has been changed a few times to reduce the impact on Palestinian villages located along the seam. At the same time, the political accusations that Israel is stealing territory are not supported by the facts on the ground. Demands that Israel ignore security and other factors, and build the fence along the 1949 ceasefire line--the Green Line--are without foundation, and the massive efforts to rewrite history and turn these lines into sacred international borders are entirely fraudulent. And if the Palestinians were to receive all of their demands as a result of terror, the lesson would be that murder pays. By registering its formal opposition to the procedures at The Hague, Canada may be signalling its unwillingness to any longer tolerate Palestinian efforts to abuse the international institutions that are central to the Canadian ethos. In attempting to get these arguments into the public debate, the main arena will not be in the International Court of Justice, but rather the television screens, Internet sites, and newspaper headlines. Previous experience in the cases of Durban, Jenin and in much of the press coverage and NGO reporting on the Israeli separation policy to date has shown that the urge to join in demonizing Israel for protecting its citizens from terrorism is hard to resist. Perhaps this time, some lessons will have been learned. (Gerald M. Steinberg is the director of the Program on Conflict Management and Negotiation at Bar Ilan University, and editor of www.ngo-monitor.org). ______________________________________________________ ILL-ADVISED
ADVISORY The sullen debates of the U.N. General Assembly rarely crack the headlines. Working groups, subcommittees and regional caucuses meet in basement rooms…produce "resolutions"--non-binding ones, of course. But the General Assembly has now decided to broadcast its rancor over the state of Middle East politics by throwing a spitball to the International Court of Justice (ICJ). It has asked the judges in The Hague to cast aside the rest of their docket…to "urgently render an advisory opinion" on the Israeli security fence. Hearings will begin on Feb. 23, and so far, all the filings are secret. Obviously, Palestinian civilians need freedom of movement to tend their farms and visit family members across the fence. Equally obviously, Israeli Jews and Israeli Arabs have a human right not to be blown to pieces by suicide bombers who slip quietly into Israeli towns and cities… The fence presents hard questions of proportionality and balancing, and a quest for workable alternatives. Judging the reasons for its particular route requires ground-level facts on routes of attack and topography. The need for a fence would diminish if Syria and Iran cut off funding for Hezbollah and Hamas, or if the Palestinian Authority stopped celebrating the cult of martyrdom in its media and school curricula. The ICJ has no trial chamber for…fact-finding. It has no ability to extract promises from Syria and Iran. The General Assembly, [in] its resolution seeking an Advisory Opinion on the Israeli fence, invokes "the unanimous opposition by the international community to the construction of the wall." It simply wants to know "the legal consequences" of Israel's original sin. It is well to be clear on some fundamentals. Every state has the right to build a fence on its international borders… [O]bjections to the Israeli fence are thus coherent only to the extent that the barrier goes beyond established borders. Israel argues that final borders have never been drawn, that the Green Line is simply the armistice line where the armies stopped after the 1948 war. And even an occupying power has the right to take measures…to maintain security, under the Fourth Geneva Convention… The demand for an Advisory Opinion amounts to an open vote of "no confidence," setting aside the Road Map, the role of the Quartet, and the private diplomacy of the Geneva Accord. Yet peace will not be aided by hurling legal brickbats or seeking to use the U.N. as a club to reduce Israel to pariah status.
The ICJ's British judge, Rosalyn Higgins, has noted that the "relationship between Advisory Opinions and existing disputes has been one of the most problematic areas for the Court over the years." Advisory opinions may not legitimately be used to side-step the ICJ's consent-based jurisdiction. Former ICJ president Stephen Schwebel, an American, has pointed to the equal danger of self-serving requests for legal advice: The "appearance of telling the Court what the answer is to the question put to the Court is not consonant with the judicial character and independence of the Court." The danger is not just to the court. The U.S. has no veto in the General Assembly, and we need to be concerned about the evasion of consent-based rules for international adjudication. The next request for an Advisory Opinion could ask the court, without U.S. consent, to pronounce on the legality of the war in Iraq or American attempts to stop the proliferation of nuclear material. Such opinions--even though non-binding…are dangerous, because they are seen by the "victors" as conferring legitimacy on their position. The court has discretion to refuse requests for Advisory Opinions in compelling circumstances…it should do so here. At a minimum, the court is obliged to broaden the question at hand, to explore the correlative "legal consequences" of suicide bombings… [I]t’s worth noting that Article 12(1) of the U.N. Charter prohibits Assembly "recommendations" where the Security Council is already considering a situation. The Assembly's request could be rebuffed as ultra vires. So, too, its voting rules could be scrutinized. Decisions on "important questions" require a two-thirds majority of states "present and voting." The Israeli fence resolution had 90 states in support, eight against, and 74 abstaining. The General Assembly chooses not to count abstentions. But the "legal consequences" of this convenience could also generate an interesting opinion. (Ruth Wedgwood is a professor of international law and diplomacy at Johns Hopkins.) ______________________________________________________ THE
ISRAELI BARRIER DOESN'T BELONG IN COURT The International Court of Justice…will begin hearing arguments Monday on the legality of Israel's new security barrier. Whatever the rights or wrongs of the controversial barrier, the court is not the proper forum to examine the issue--and not merely because the odds are stacked against Israel from the outset. Thirty countries, including Canada, the United States, Russia and the members of the European Union, all rightly agree with Israel's position that this is a political issue that needs to be addressed through political means. They are staying clear of the proceedings, even though most of those same governments have voiced serious concerns over the route of what Israel calls its "terrorism-prevention fence." The fear is that the barrier could prove yet another major roadblock to an eventual negotiated peace settlement. It is well recognized in international law that countries have a right to protect their borders, including building high walls, if they so desire. And it is understandable that Israel would want to create as large an impediment as possible to the suicide bombers who have often roamed freely into Israel from occupied territory. But the new barrier, which will be about 700 kilometres long when finished, does not faithfully adhere to the Green Line, the frontier that divided Israel from the West Bank until the 1967 war. Instead, it juts deeply into the West Bank to include many Jewish settlements, isolating Palestinian towns and in some cases cutting off people's access to hospitals, schools, workplaces and sources of water. At certain points, the fence actually separates Palestinian farmers from their land. This has drawn the ire of the…International Red Cross, which…called the barrier's placement a violation of humanitarian law. Palestinian officials say Israel is engaged in a naked land grab under the guise of safety, while the Israelis insist they have no such intentions. The fence, they add, does not constitute Israel's version of a new permanent border, and Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has said he will take into account the hardship to Palestinians in determining the location of future segments of the barrier. He has been under considerable pressure from the United States and other governments to reroute the wall away from Palestinian land... "Israel, like most Western and democratic countries, believes that this is a political issue which should not be dealt with by a judicial body like the international court," an Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman said. "It not only could undermine the peace process, but also constitute a problematic precedent in the future for political issues being brought to the international court." Indeed it could. But that has not stopped the Palestinians and their usual allies from seeking the imprimatur of a court ruling to buttress their case. The court's task is to provide a non-binding advisory opinion to the…General Assembly, which asked the judges to take up the matter urgently. The assembly, which has never failed to embrace an anti-Israel resolution, has already made up its mind that the fence is indefensible, although 74 countries abstained in the vote that sent the matter to the court. Most of the 13 nations that intend to make oral arguments next week happen to agree that Israel is wholly in the wrong. It is also obvious where three other interveners, the Palestinian Authority, the Arab League and the Organization of the Islamic Conference, stand. Israel has the right to protect its citizens from terrorist attacks, but ultimately its best hope of doing that lies in a negotiated peace. No matter what the court decides--and it may yet choose not to offer any opinion--it will not help to get that process back on track. Shabbat Shalom!
Volume IV, No. 815 • Thursday, February 19, 2004 AN ANCIENT JEWISH
MEASURE [The following is an excerpt is from a dialogue between Rabbi Steinsaltz and Andrew Cohen at the rabbi's home in Jerusalem, 1995] “There is a dividing line. We have always had a demand that is written even in the books of law: a person may be a great scholar, extremely intelligent and all that but if he doesn't measure up to what he says, he is of no value and he shouldn't be honored. He shouldn't be respected; he's only talking. There is a book, one of the most famous books we have on morality. For us, as an old people, it's a recent book, only four hundred years old. This book became very influential. It's called The Beginning of Wisdom because there is a verse in Proverbs that says, 'The beginning of wisdom is fear of God.' It's a book on morality, which means behavior, and includes everything from theology to sex, with very high demands on every level... After he wrote this book, the author was living here in this country, in Zefat, and some scholars were sent to examine him. Now they didn't examine what he wrote in his book because they knew that he was scholarly enough to write everything correctly. They wanted to see whether he was the kind of a person who behaves according to his book…. In this case they found out that he was consistent. Then the book came to have a great amount of influence, but not so much because of the content. It was not just a matter of sincerity; it was a matter of having here a person who is saying what is true, true in the sense that he is living it, he is being with it, he is a part of it. So because of that we believe that the book has what we call the Seal. The seal of God is Truth. That is the seal. Where there is no truth, it means that the seal is absent. It's a forgery.” (Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz has published over 58 books on the Talmud including multiple volumes of the Steinsaltz Talmud, a new edition of the traditional Jewish scriptural commentary.) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- A
CHRISTIAN SCHOLAR'S DEFENSE OF JEWISH RIGHTS In 1505, Johannes Pfefferkorn (a recently converted Jew) offered his services to the Dominican order in Cologne. Though only one of the numerous apostates who maligned their discarded faith…Pfefferkorn was destined to play a crucial role in the history of antisemitism. Pfefferkorn became a willing tool in the hands of the Dominicans, who were anxious to "spread the flames of the Inquisition that in 1492 had lapped up the last remnants of Jewish life and culture in Spain." He wrote venomous treatises which alleged that all Jewish writings apart from the Bible contained "blasphemous attacks" on Christianity. He demanded the suppression of rabbinic works… Emperor Maximilian was nevertheless persuaded to order the confiscation of Jewish books, and nearly 2,000 volumes were seized in the Rhineland (1509-10). Since an earlier apostate, Nicolas Donin, had instigated the burning of countless rabbinic manuscripts in Paris (1242), the Frankfurt Jews vehemently protested and Archbishop Uriel of Mainz lent them his support. In July 1510, the Emperor asked various churchmen and scholars to determine whether Christian interests would be served by the destruction of Jewish books… Another scholar, Johannes Reuchlin (1455-1522), a humanist and law professor, despised "the meshummad" and his Recommendation set a historic precedent. As the leading Christian Hebraist in Germany, Reuchlin was at first more concerned to preserve Jewish books than to defend Jewish rights. In his view, Hebrew and the Kabbala were primary sources of Christian truth, the basis for his own works on Hebrew grammar and Jewish mysticism. After agreeing to write an assessment of the Talmud, however, Reuchlin adopted a more positive attitude toward Jews. This emerged at the very outset of the "Battle of the Books" (1511-21), when Reuchlin's Augenspiegel ("Eyeglass") exposed the antisemitic claptrap in Pfefferkorn's Handspiegel ("Hand Mirror")… For the first time, a Christian scholar combined his defense of Jewish rights with an objective survey of rabbinic literature, tearing away "the veil of strangeness and the pall of superstition surrounding these books in the popular consciousness." After summarizing the arguments for and against the Talmud's destruction, Reuchlin explains why--on legal, logical and religious grounds--it should not be suppressed or burned. "If someone wished to write against mathematicians, and had not mastered simple arithmetic, he would be made a laughingstock." Accordingly, since no Christian in Germany has mastered the Talmud, "it is unreasonable for the ignorant to cast aspersion on it." Reuchlin also observes that the Talmud contains "many useful medical prescriptions... as well as many admirable legal decisions compiled by knowledgeable Jews."… Turning to the place of Jews in Christian society, Reuchlin maintains that "just as we are not bound by the Laws of Moses, so they are not subject to the laws of Jesus." Jews had the right to practice their religion within the framework of the Roman Empire long before the advent of Christianity; and legally speaking (he implies) they are subject, like Christians, to the Empire's laws and not to the jurisdiction of the Church. "Having to endure, year after year, the public calumny we heap upon them in our churches on Good Friday, calling them 'perfidious Jews,' they might rightfully reply among themselves: 'They [the Christians] slander us. We have never disavowed our faith' " Reuchlin even affirms that "the Jew is as worthy in the eyes of our Lord God as I am... How can we pass judgment on the soul of another?" Reuchlin paid heavily for his courageous stand: opponents denounced him as a heretic and Pope Leo X condemned his books in 1520. By then, Martin Luther (one of Reuchlin's supporters) had embarked on the Reformation, and it is grimly ironic that Luther's failure to convert the Jews turned him into a rabid antisemite. Even so, but for Reuchlin, all those confiscated Jewish volumes would have been destroyed and Jewish intellectual life might have been shattered. To quote Josel of Rosheim, German Jewry's chief spokesman at the time: "Our enemies, and the oppressors from among our own people [i.e., Pfefferkorn], arose to abolish the written Torah. Then God performed a double miracle, for the Torah was restored to its former glory [the books were returned] by a sage among the nations [Johannes Reuchlin]." One might add that, in 1520, Daniel Bomberg (a Christian printer) began printing the first full edition of the Babylonian Talmud… ______________________________________________________
A much-debated question among scholars today is whether or not our Christian Gospels are anti-Jewish. There's no clear solution on the horizon. What is not debated is the anti-Jewish content of some Gospel texts as they are proclaimed and heard today. Unless these texts are checked, clarified, and at times even censured, they will continue to perpetuate a teaching of contempt toward the Jewish people, a teaching which, we should remember, has been rejected by all mainline Christian churches in recent years. We are facing this same issue in relation to The Passion of the Christ. In this case, faithfulness to a literal reading of the Gospel Passion narratives is a liability, not an asset. It has the unfortunate effect of perpetuating the view of the Jews as Christ-killers... This can no longer be accepted… Christian texts or movies such as this one that may be perceived to be anti-Jewish must therefore be denounced. With its incessant depiction of the Jewish court's responsibility for the condemnation and death of Jesus, this movie is certainly anti-Jewish. This aspect of the film, however, is overshadowed by another issue that I had not expected to find: the gory depiction of the scourging of Jesus. The theology that underlies this depiction makes me shudder. What takes up no more than a few sentences in Luke (22: 63-65 and 23: 22) and half a sentence in John 19: 1--Matthew and Mark do not speak of flogging, only of mocking--unfolds during more than 30 minutes of horrific and disgusting scenes of torture. By comparison, the Crucifixion comes almost as an anti-climax… No human being could endure the kind of beating that Mel Gibson's Jesus endures. But Jesus is no human; for Mel, he is obviously Divine and only Divine. Only God (or a superman) could suffer that much "for our sins, and still manage to stand. Jesus not only stands all by himself but goes on to carry the whole cross (with some help after falling a few times) to the place where he is to be crucified. In Mel's view, God's extraordinary love for humanity is measured by this unimaginable suffering "for our sins." This is the message that is marketed in this movie. This is the "gospel" according to Mel. It is as if the more blood there is, the easier one will be convinced of the love of God. It is this emphasis on the blood and suffering of Jesus that I find so disturbing. The fact that God would require Jesus to pay such a price "for our sins" may say a lot about how Mel perceives our humanity, but what picture of God are we left with--a loving Creator or a sadistic destroyer? It is not the quantity of blood and suffering that has redeemed us, but Jesus's death--crowning a life of "service" as Mark says in 10: 45. It was Jesus's dream of God's reign that led him to the cross--not the other way round. It trivializes Jesus's sacrifice to offer such a spectacle of Jesus's Passion and death totally disconnected from his message and life mission. Much is made in the promotion of the movie…of the historical reliability of what viewers are shown… It is presented as a faithful description of what happened to Jesus during the last 12 hours of his life. But the differences among the Gospel narratives themselves constitute a strong argument against the popular belief that they are biographies of Jesus. Even the passages concerning only the Passion, though more consistent, cannot escape such a conclusion. Mr. Gibson did not bother with these academic questions or adhere to such radical conclusions. Whatever he borrowed from the Passion narratives ended up as a mishmash or conflation of all four narratives. Anyone owning a Bible can read these narratives and see where Mr. Gibson's imagination took off and his piety caught up with him. Let me provide some examples. The film's depiction of Jews speaking Aramaic (the language spoken by Jesus and some other Jews in first-century Palestine) and the Procurator Pilate and the Roman soldiers conversing in Latin is meant to convey a sense of historical authenticity. But the words themselves do not. Only parts of the dialogue come from a direct translation of what the Gospel writers have written (in Greek, I might add). Most of the conversation must be credited to Mr. Gibson's imagination. Why, also, is so much attention given to the mother of Jesus? The Gospels are rather discreet on the role of Mary, more so in the Passion narratives. Only John has a little scene showing the mother of Jesus and the Beloved Disciple at the foot of the cross. In the first three Gospels, written closer to the time of Christ, the women who are mentioned at the Crucifixion site do not include the mother of Jesus. In contrast with this discreet appearance in the Gospels, the movie shows the mother of Jesus everywhere. Furthermore, she is always accompanied by Mary of Magdala (identified with the "adulterous woman" of John 7: 51 - 8:11), and the Beloved Disciple (whom many will identify with John, the disciple of Jesus). She is not only found at the foot of the cross, but is also present throughout the entire Passion. She witnesses Jesus's scourging and is shown together with Mary of Magdala to clean up the blood after the orgy is over. She runs to a fallen Jesus, remembering a time (or is the flashback directed to viewers?) when she had comforted her child after a bad fall. Where on earth did Mel get so much information about Jesus's mother? And then there is Satan. While only Luke and John mention Satan in the Passion narratives, both report the betrayal of Jesus by Judas was the work of Satan (Luke 22: 3 and John 13: 27). But the film makes Satan omnipresent. Just as the demonization process in the Gospel narratives has proven to be dangerous, the work of Satan throughout this movie also calls for caution. The Roman soldiers are demonized, but this is of little consequence today since they have disappeared from the world scene. The same thing cannot be said of the Jewish people--who form, to this day, a dynamic community. I do not understand why the Jewish children are demonized, first as the instruments that drive Judas to suicide, and secondly as this puzzling fetus-like child that derides the nearly unconscious Jesus… The account found in the Book of Acts 1 speaks of Judas's death as an accident. Only Matthew reports on Judas's suicide but, contrary to the movie, in Matthew's account (27: 3) Judas commits suicide only after repenting. As to an explanation for the fetus-like child in Satan's arm, I have only suspicions. The Passion of the Christ is not a movie like other movies. It is a fiction, but like no other fiction. It purports to be a respectful, reliable, and faithful rendering of the last 12 hours of Jesus's life--based, one is to assume, on the Passion narratives of the four Gospels. That is not so and it should not be taken as such. But more than that, this movie is not only historically dubious, but also anti-Jewish and theologically flawed. It was Mel Gibson's prerogative to make such a movie and I have no interest in questioning his honesty and faith. But as a Christian, too, and a priest, and a professor of biblical studies, I feel obliged to address some of the issues that this movie raises for me… (Father Gerald Caron is a professor of biblical studies at the Atlantic School of Theology, Halifax).
Volume IV, No. 814 Wednesday, February 18, 2004 WEDNESDAY’S “NEWS IN REVIEW” ROUND-UP WEEKLY QUOTES “By participating in the hearings, we would be giving legitimacy and validity to the court dealing with this issue. Their intervention is likely to undermine the peace process and the road map. Also, the court has only been asked half the question, which is Israel’s security fence. It has not been asked the second half of the question, which is about Palestinian terrorism.”—Jonathan Peled, Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman, arguing that Israel will rely instead on the affidavit it submitted to the court, rejecting the ICJ’s authority to adjudicate a political issue that is best resolved between states. (National Post, Feb. 13) “If you truly believe in the principles of human rights and democracy then you must support Israel because it stands as a tiny island in an exceedingly dangerous sea of totalitarianism, with all the challenges of waging war as a democracy.”—Israel’s Minister for Jerusalem and Diaspora Affairs Natan Sharansky, responding to the question posed by Dallas Brodie, the host of an FM radio talk show, on why the West should care if Israel survives as a country. (Vancouver Sun, Feb. 12) “You know the answer before I give it… The world knows the answer. We take the world like you find it; and Israel is a small state with a small population. It’s a democracy and it exists in a neighborhood that…over a period of time has opined…that they’d prefer [Israel] not be there and they’d like it to be put in the sea. And Israel has opined that it would prefer not to get put to the sea, and as a result, over a period of decades, it has arranged itself so it hasn’t been put in the sea.”—Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld, replying to a voiced concern over Israel’s nuclear weapons capabilities at the Munich Conference on Security Policy. (U.S. Department of Defense, Feb. 7) “There is a consensus among nations that proliferation cannot be tolerated. Yet this consensus means little unless it is translated into action. Every civilized nation has a stake in preventing the spread of weapons of mass destruction. We will find the middlemen, the supplier and the buyers. We will find you and we’re not going to rest until you are stopped.”—U.S. President George W. Bush, speaking at the National Defense University on his proposed seven-point plan, intended to put a stop to the sale of nuclear equipment on the black market. (New York Times, Feb. 12) “We have a saying here that the ‘evil’ of Israel is better than the ‘heaven’ of the West Bank. Here [in Israel] you can say whatever you like and do whatever you want–so long as you don’t touch the security of Israel. Over there [under PA rule] if you talk about the [PA Chairman Yasser] Arafat, they can arrest you and beat you up.”—Shoaa Saad, a resident of Umm-Al-Fahm, one of the sprawling Arab cities that may be ceded by Israel to the Palestinian Authority in exchange for Jewish settlements in the West Bank. (Washington Times, Feb. 17) “…Israel was established on the basis of theft. [T]he State of Israel is…a Satanic offspring. Israel was founded on theft from the first moment. It was founded on the basis of robbery, terror, killing, torture, assassination, death, stealing land and killing people. On this basis, Israel was founded and will continue this way, never able to exist because its [Israel's] birth was unnatural, a Satanic offspring, and cannot exist among human beings…”—Ahmed Nasser, Secretary of the Palestinian Legislative Council, insisting Israel has no right to exist, in an interview broadcast on Palestinian Authority TV. (Palestinian Media Watch, Feb. 12) “The Hamas will not gain control over the Gaza Strip in the future. Though Hamas leaders declare that their movement will ‘take over’ the Gaza Strip in case of an Israeli withdrawal, the Palestinian people will not allow. Our people want a secular regime. They want a democratic government, not a fundamentalist government.”—Jibril Rajoub, Yasser Arafat’s national security advisor, speaking on behalf of Chairman Arafat with Israeli military correspondents. (Jerusalem Post, Feb. 17) “[Ayatollah Sistani] is insistent on holding the elections, and we are with him on this 100%. These elections should be prepared well, and should take place in the best possible conditions, so that it would bring the results which [the Ayatollah] and the people of Iraq and the UN want.”— UN envoy Lakhdar Barahimi after his meeting with Iraq’s most powerful Shiite leader, Ayatollah Sistani, in an attempt to break the political deadlock on how best to transfer sovereignty to Iraqis by June 30. (Nat’l Post, Feb. 13) “These terrorists want to inflame the area to get the UN to give up on the idea of elections. A few weeks ago, things were quiet, but as soon as the delegation arrived, the violence exploded.”—Wael Abdul Latif, a Basra-area judge and member of the Iraqi Governing Council, commenting on the situation in Iraq following the back-to-back bombings last week just as the UN delegation arrived to examine the possibility of early elections. The Bush administration announced yesterday that elections would be impossible to organize by June 30, the date still on the books for ending the U.S. occupation of Iraq. (N.Y.T., Feb. 12; Gazette, Feb. 18) “The wall denies basic human rights to the Palestinian people and further reduces the West Bank and Gaza Strip to the status of concentration camps. The deplorable impact of Palestinian people is unconscionable. It is neither anti-Israel nor antisemitic to criticize the inflammatory actions of the Sharon government. Like most Canadians my hope is that Israel and its Arab neighbours will agree to coexist peacefully and build bridges of justice, not walls of desperation”—Canadian Liberal MP Pat O’Brien, telling the House of Commons that the Israeli government of Ariel Sharon is violating international law by building the barrier. Rochelle Wilner, President of B’nai Brith Canada, called on the Canadian government to “repudiate” the Ontario MP’s remarks, saying “Mr. O’Brien’s comments have crossed the line and are totally unacceptable. Not only is Mr. O’Brien abysmally ignorant of the facts regarding the fence, but he has attacked it in a similar manner that is extremely painful to Canadian Jews, particularly those who survived the evil of Nazi Germany.” (Nat’l Post, Feb. 18) “For Jews, there's the rub. A thousand years of discrimination and persecution--culminating in the attempt, in the European heartland of Christendom, to annihilate the entire Jewish race--have left a legacy of mistrust that cannot be allayed by even the best efforts of the Second Vatican Council and the greatest Pope of modern times... It was understandable, even inevitable, that Jewish voices would be raised against an attempt to dramatize the very passages of the Gospels that, however distorted, inspired the deicidal imagery of the Jews as the murderers of Christ…Are the Gospels anti-Semitic? This charge was levelled recently by the Jewish historian Daniel Goldhagen, who demanded that the Church should either excise the offending passages or at least append corrective footnotes to every Bible.”—Columnist, Daniel Johnson. (Daily Telegraph, Feb. 16) SHORT TAKES SHARON OVERCOMES SETTLEMENTS VOTE—(Jerusalem) PM Ariel Sharon survived a no-confidence vote concerning his Disengagement Plan. The Knesset voted against three no-confidence motions, 53-45 with 22 abstentions or absences. The National Union Party and National Religious Party, two of Sharon’s three coalition partners, used their vote to make clear that they will quit the coalition if Sharon evacuates Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza. The Labor Party promised to back Sharon if he carries out his plan. (A.P., Feb. 16) ARAFAT AN OBSTACLE TO PA REFORM—(Jerusalem) PM Ahmed Qureia’s cabinet approved legislation to deposit PA security forces’ salaries directly into their bank accounts after international donors complained that the current system facilitates corruption. PA Chairman Yasser Arafat refused to implement the new legislation, thereby blocking efforts at economic reform, a precondition for much-needed European and American financial aid. Lack of transparency in spending donor money led to a 50% drop in international aid to the PA since 2001. The cash-strapped PA recently sold its shares in the local cellular phone company to help pay the salaries of government employees. However, Qureia has denied reports that he threatened to resign after a heated debate with Arafat.(Gazette, Feb. 16; Reuters, AP, Nat’l Post, Feb. 17) IRAN EMERGES AS TOP SOURCE OF FATAH FUNDING—(Springfield, VA) Over the last year, Iran and its Hizbullah ally supplied the PA’s ruling Fatah movement with close to 90% of the funds needed to sustain the Palestinian war against the State of Israel. Prior to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, deposed dictator Saddam Hussein gave Fatah and other West Bank and Gaza terrorist groups about $2 million a month, making Iraq the foremost financier of Palestinian terrorism. (World Tribune.com, Jan. 29) IRAN’S NUCLEAR PLANS UNCOVERED—(Washington) UN weapons inspectors in Iran found blueprints for a highly sophisticated machine used to enrich uranium, a discovery they say undermines Iran’s promise fully to disclose its nuclear activities. The plans included instructions for the construction of a gas centrifuge known as the P2, used in the production of enriched uranium, the fuel used in nuclear power plants and a key component of atomic bombs. Iran previously admitted possessing hundreds of the less efficient P1 machines. (Washington Post, Feb. 13) ROMANIAN PRESIDENT TO MAKE UNOFFICIAL VISIT TO ISRAEL—(Jerusalem) Romanian President Ion Iliescu will accompany the Romanian National Yiddish Theater to Israel. This unofficial visit constitutes the most recent of a series of steps taken by the Romanian government to improve its relations with the Jewish State. Romania also established a commission to investigate the Romanian Holocaust and designated a Holocaust memorial day. Meanwhile, Corneliu Vadim Tudor, the ultra-nationalist leader of the Greater Romanian Party who denied the occurrence of the Romanian Holocaust, told the chairman of an Israeli advertising firm that he wants to lead members of his party on a mission to Auschwitz. Tudor, who plans to run for president next year, wants the firm to manage his campaign, and promised that, if elected, he would introduce the study of the Holocaust in Romanian schools. (Ha’aretz, Feb. 13; Jer. Post, Feb. 14) HAMAS KASSAM ROCKET CELL CAPTURED—(Jerusalem) Israeli authorities arrested six Hamas operatives who manufactured Kassam rockets in Ramallah. Their laboratory, searched after the arrests in early January, contained canisters of gas, a refrigerator rigged with explosives, fertilizer and rocket engines, and one Kassam rocket in the final stages of production. With a range of about 8 kilometers, the rockets could strike Jerusalem if fired from the Ramallah area. (Jer. Post, Feb. 12) AL QAEDA PLANS NEW ATTACKS—(Washington) A top American intelligence official warned that al Qaeda deployed an army of terrorists to launch airplane-hijack attacks, derail trains carrying hazardous materials, and bomb financial centers in the U.S. Robert Hutchings, chairman of the National Intelligence Council, confirmed that the U.S. and its allies had successfully foiled several major terrorists plots. Officials also recently arrested an Army National Guardsman stationed in Washington State whom they believe to be a spy for al Qaeda. (N.Y.P., Feb. 13, 17, 18) U.S.-BACKED TV STATION HOPES TO WIN ARAB HEARTS—(Ottawa) Last weekend, satellite viewers in the Arab world got their first glimpse at a new U.S.-backed, Arabic TV channel designed to counter the influence of Al-Jazeera and other regional networks that promulgate anti-American and anti-Israel views. Alhurra, “The Free One,” pledged to provide accurate and balanced news to Middle East viewers, “enabling them to make informed decisions.” (Nat’l Post, Feb. 16) CHINA LINKED TO LIBYAN WMD—(Washington) Documents turned over to weapons inspectors in Libya yielded “dramatic evidence” that China transferred nuclear technology and designs to Pakistan in the 1980s, which Pakistani scientists later resold to Libya. The packet of documents included detailed instructions for assembling an implosion-type nuclear bomb. Despite promises to control arms proliferation, American officials believe that China still provides Saudi Arabia assistance with missiles and aides Pakistan with nuclear technology and missiles. (Gazette, Feb. 16, Nat’l Post, Feb. 15) MICROSOFT REMOVES “UNACCEPTABLE SYMBOLS”—(London) Microsoft released a critical update to remove the swastika from its Bookshelf Symbol 7 font. However, Microsoft also eliminated the Magen David, suggesting that it, too, constitutes an “unacceptable symbol.” (The Register.com, Feb. 11) CANADA A TERRORIST-FRIENDLY NATION: U.S. REPORT—(Ottawa) A report released by the U.S. Library of Congress concludes that Canada’s immigration laws and social programs have helped make the country “a favored destination for terrorists and international organized crime groups.” The report cites the ease with which refugee claimants gain status and the likelihood of the government granting asylum to illegal aliens as factors drawing terrorists and criminals to Canada. Canadian immigration and crime experts denounced the report as biased, misguided and shoddy. (Gazette, Feb. 16)
Volume IV, No. 813 • Tuesday, February 17, 2004 FASCISM AT BERKELEY
If reaction to Daniel Pipes' lecture on Tuesday [February 10] was any indication, fascism is alive and well at UC Berkeley. Pipes was invited by the Israel Action Committee and Berkeley Hillel to speak at the college campus known for its leftist politics. But ironically, the home of ''free speech'' and ''tolerance'' has shown itself to be distinctly intolerant to those who express political views other than their own. And Daniel Pipes happens to fit that description. Pipes is director of the Middle East Forum, a member of the U.S. Institute of Peace, and a columnist for the New York Sun and the Jerusalem Post. But most importantly, he is pro-America, pro-Israel, and one of the foremost strategists of our time when it comes to the threat of militant Islam. [T]he Muslim Student Association (MSA) was out in full force on Tuesday, acting like the thugs and bullies they routinely accuse Pipes of supporting. There were about 50-70 of them, amidst a crowd of 700, and after failing to prevent Pipes from speaking, they did their best to try and disrupt the lecture and intimidate the audience. Pipes had anticipated problems beforehand and had warned supporters that the Muslim Student Association was planning to make an appearance. They had posted an announcement about the lecture at the leftist website SFIndyMedia.org, raving that a ''Zionist'' was coming to town, and exhorting members to show up. In fact, the lecture was moved to another site on campus to accommodate a larger audience, but the MSA students still managed to sniff it out. Outside the lecture a crowd of them were gathered, along with sympathetic leftists, many carrying the types of signs and slogans that have become all too familiar in recent years. Signs equating Zionism with Nazism, for instance… Then there was the guy who shows up at all Bay Area leftist events in an Uncle Sam outfit with a sign saying ''Israel Wants You to Die for Her.'' Another nut-job hovered near the entrance shouting…about how Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. ''were against Zionism.'' The Berkeley Police Department was out in full force, as were a private security team. People going inside were frisked three times and had their bags searched thoroughly as well. And a sign on the door warned that no banners, signs, shouting, or violence would be allowed. Yet all of this seemed rather futile because any and all were welcomed into the lecture… The event was meant to be free and open to the public, but there's a point at which this type of inclusiveness becomes counter-productive. It was clear from the get-go that the protesters intended to…disrupt the event… It began as soon as Pipes stepped up to the podium. In fact, before he'd spoken one word, someone had to be escorted outside... Then jeering, giggling, hissing, booing, and finally, the orchestrated chanting of ''racist'' and ''Zionist,''…starting drowning out the lecture. However, the rest of the audience gave as good as it got and the event turned into a shouting and clapping match between Muslims and Jews. The tension in the air was thick, tempers were rising, and yet amidst it all, Pipes kept his cool. He managed to deliver his lecture, which covered the War on Terrorism, the Arab-Israeli conflict, and Iraq, but he was forced to stop many times. Pipes spoke directly to the protesters on several occasions, pointing out the irony of their undemocratic behavior… He even brought up the fact that members of the MSA are currently under investigation for possible ties to terrorism. Their reaction to his speech was telling. When Pipes brought up the need to support moderate Muslims over those who subscribe to militant Islam, they booed. When he brought up the need to improve the status of women in Islamic countries, they booed. When he warned that peace in the Middle East would never be achieved as long as the Palestinians continued to subscribe to a ''cult of death,'' they booed. When he mentioned Middle East Studies professors who have been arrested under terrorism charges, they booed. When he discussed the need to combat Islamic terrorism, they booed. When he referred to the perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks as subscribers to militant Islam, they booed and shouted ''Zionism''--no doubt a reference to the myth that Jews were behind the attacks. When Pipes brought up CampusWatch.org, the website he founded to provide a voice for students feeling oppressed by their leftist professors, they shouted out ''McCarthyism'' and, of course, ''racist'' yet again. And when he mentioned Iraqis' ''liberation'' from Saddam Hussein's tyranny, they booed even louder. ''I'm sure the Iraqis were much better off under Saddam Hussein,'' Pipes responded sarcastically. When it came time for the question and answer period, the group of MSA students all got up together and left, chanting ''racist'' and ''Zionist''… [A] few stragglers were left in the audience, and they eventually had to be escorted outside by the police because of their unruly behavior. One of these was the man who had been babbling about Gandhi. By this time he got down to basics, calling Pipes ''a racist Jew.''… After the lecture, many Jews in the audience were visibly shaken. For those who hadn't yet encountered Muslim hostility up close and personal, it was an eye-opening experience. Perhaps not all of UC Berkeley's Muslim students subscribe to the anti-Semitic views of the MSA, but if that's the case, they certainly didn't make their voices heard that evening. The fact is, radical Muslim students and their leftist counterparts are the most domineering, destructive, and dangerous forces in higher education today. If we're to win the War on Terrorism, we may have to start with our own college campuses.
THE CAMPUS LEFT:
OPPOSING FREE SPEECH BY FORCE The university exists for the free exchange of ideas, right? Then why is it that representatives of one half the argument--the conservative half--need bodyguards and metal detectors when they speak on North American campuses, and their leftist counterparts almost never do? Consider three suggestive parallels of how the Right needs security and the Left is welcomed. Government officials. In September 2002, Benjamin Netanyahu, a former Likud…prime minister of Israel was to speak at Concordia University in Montreal, but he never made it. Nearly a thousand anti-Israel protestors rioted prior to the event, smashing windows and hurling furniture at police, kicking and spitting on people… “By lunchtime,” notes the Globe & Mail daily, “…Concordia’s main downtown building was littered with paper, upturned chairs, broken furniture and the choking aftereffects of pepper spray.” In contrast, Hanan Ashrawi, a well-known Palestinian politician and activist, never faces such opposition. As she makes the rounds of American universities…she speaks without interference, and what protests take place are completely non-violent. At Colorado College, students held small signs and a rebuttal was offered after the speech. At the University of Pennsylvania, protesting students were so respectful, Tarek Jallad, president of the Penn Arab Student Society which sponsored her visit, commented: “I was very happy with the way the crowd showed her a lot of respect.” 1960s activists. David Horowitz, a founder of the New Left movement in the 1960s and now a high-profile conservative, speaks…at campuses and often faces problems. Protestors at the University of Chicago…disrupted his talk before he uttered a word. At the University of Michigan, “the university administration assigned 12 armed guards and a German Shepherd to protect the safety” of those who came to hear him speak. By comparison, Angela Davis, a former Black Panther and still today a far-leftist, enjoys the highest of esteem when visiting campuses. As she tours American colleges, she meets no protests, requires no excessive security, and is dutifully acclaimed by campus newspapers for her “wise presence.” Middle East specialists. Daniel Pipes, director of the Middle East Forum, a Harvard University Ph.D.,…and a recent Bush appointee to U.S. Institute for Peace, needs security at…his campus appearances. At York University in Toronto…security provisions included “a 24-hour lockdown on the building beforehand, metal detectors for the audience, identification checks.” [B]odyguards escorted Pipes through a back entrance and kept him in a holding room until…his talk. More than a hundred police…stood by… In contrast, John Esposito, head of Georgetown University’s Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding, a Temple University Ph.D.,…and key advisor to the Clinton State Department, enjoys honor and praise at the campuses. He recently served as keynote speaker for the inauguration of Stanford University’s new Islamic Studies program, for example, with no hint of special security. A clear pattern emerges. Speakers on the left are welcomed, conservatives require strict security… This contravenes a post-9/11 statement by the American Association of University Professors that “specific attention should be given to the freedom to invite and hear controversial speakers.” Some “controversial” positions--vilifying the United States and its president--are just fine on the campus, whereas those who support the president, the war on terror, Israel…must summon (and sometimes pay for) a small army. The incipient threat of violence on the university [sic] makes it unique in North American life… Far from being the institution where ideas are freely exchanged, intolerance that would never be permitted elsewhere has become the norm on campuses. The message is clear; if visiting conservatives require police protection to speak for an hour or two, local conservatives and others who support causes unpopular on the campus must tread even more carefully… One visiting conservative reports hearing from a Harvard student “that her open identification could cost her, damaging her grades and her academic future. That her professors, who control her final grades, were likely to view such activism unkindly, and that the risk was too great.” This environment--so one-sided that students censor themselves for fear of harassment or retribution--is exactly what parents, donors, and taxpayers do not expect to receive for their education dollars. They need to do something about the crisis that afflicts North American universities. ______________________________________________________ THE
BRITISH LEFT GOES ANTI-SEMITIC Socialism and anti-Semitism are closely related worldviews. Anti-Semitism, someone once said, is the socialism of fools: but he might just as well have said that socialism is anti-Semitism with the Jews left out, for both doctrines appeal to the same resentments, hatreds, and style of thought. It was no accident…that Marx himself, though Jewish, was a ferocious anti-Semite who accepted the ancient stereotype of the Jew as a bloodsucking usurer. Socialist and anti-Semite alike seek an all-encompassing explanation of the imperfection of the world, and for the persistence of poverty and injustice: and each thinks he has found an answer. There are other connections between left-wing thought and anti-Semitism… The liberal intellectual who laments the predominance of dead white males in the college syllabus or the lack of minority representation in the judiciary uses…the same argument as the anti-Semite who objects to the prominence of Jews in the arts, sciences…and in commerce. They both assume that something must be amiss--a conspiracy--if any human group is over- or under-represented in any human activity, achievement, or institution. The cartoonists in the left-leaning British press rarely pillory plutocratic capitalists without giving to them a distinctly Der Sturmer-type Jewish visage or physique: fat and hook-nosed… Looking at the cartoons, one wonders how long it will be before accusations of ritual murder are made. Not long ago, The Observer…published a flagrantly anti-Semitic poem by the Oxford English don, Tom Paulin, who later opined that American Jewish settlers on the West Bank should be shot. The Middle East conflict has given respectability to old prejudices, especially in British academic circles. Two hundred British academics…have selected Israel…as the object of a total boycott, as if Israel were a uniquely evil state. While one can disagree strongly with the Israeli government's policies without being anti-Semitic, the selection of Israel alone for a boycott in a world in which atrocity and suppression of freedom are routine must arouse suspicions of pre-existing animus--…of old-fashioned anti-Semitism. When Professor Mona Baker of the University of Manchester…dismissed two Israeli academics from the editorial board of two academic journals, The Translator and Translation Studies Abstracts, on the sole grounds that they were Israeli, not a peep of protest was heard from British academics... Professor Baker…said she thought she was only doing what many British academics would have done… True, a belated reaction has now set in, and Professor Baker's own university is investigating her for her high-handed reaction. She might even face dismissal. But what is clear is that anti-Semitism is no longer…the preserve of the neo-Nazis. Because of the structural similarities between leftist thought and anti-Semitism, it remains a permanent temptation on the Left as well as on the Right.
Volume IV, No. 812 • Monday, February 16, 2004 A JEWISH SOUL
His voice is rarely heard… Aharon Appelfeld doesn't so much talk as whisper. And when he approaches the painful points of his life, his words are literally swallowed up within him. Such as when he describes the pastoral life of Czernowitz (Bukovina) before the war, or when he tells about his mother's loving beauty. And again when he tries to evoke the lost tranquillity of Central Europe in the Hapsburg era--the educated public, the opera, the coffee houses…--and how it all vanished in an instant. How all that was transformed within hours into a near loss of humanity, into a furtive, animal-like existence… He will not admit it in so many words, but in his own eyes, Appelfeld is a literary relative of Marcel Proust. In the 30 books he has written since the late 1950s, he, too, is trying, in his way, to trace times past. To restore the lost world of yesterday… To those Jewish riches, that Jewish pain, that Jewish totality. And grandmother-grandfather, of course. Father, mother. All that was erased. [T]he 71-year-old writer (father of three) looks for moments like 8-year-old Irwin, who survived that hell alone. Who made the great journey of the Jews of the 20th century alone. [E]ven after gaining broad international recognition, Appelfeld is still perceived here [in Israel] as being different. Not subversive, but not actually a Zionist, either. Not belonging, but not someone who doesn't belong, either. A Jew. Aharon Appelfeld, you
do your writing in cafes, not in this basement den. Why? May one ask about your
ghosts and demons? You went through the rest
of the war alone? And it's all still with
you? Day in and day out? It's said that you deal
too much with the Holocaust in your writing, that you constantly cling
to the Jewish world of Central Europe that was destroyed in the Holocaust.
You write very little about present-day Israel, which is so vibrant
and lively. Do you see any general
rule in this, any cultural proposal? …Israeliness…cut
itself off from Jewish history, and from the irony and the compassion
and the aesthetics and the broad knowledge of modern European Judaism. Let's move for a moment
to the first war, the war of the body. What are your feelings about
the conflict? What is your take on the story of the Jewish-Arab struggle? Is that really your picture
of the conflict? You believe that the Arabs…want to remove us
from here? Do you really see this
place disintegrating? When you look around,
do you sometimes see a ghetto? Is that your also your
personal feeling? Are you saying that we
are really afflicted with self-hatred? That it's real, a fact of life? If so, the modern Jewish
story is actually the story of the escape from being Jewish? But today, when we are
occupiers…do you still feel…that our story is one of victims? When you see this process,
does it frighten you? Does it evoke associations? Do you envisage a catastrophe
of that kind occurring…the possibility of an Israeli Holocaust? Do you see the process
unfolding to the same ending? Did anything in these
years of terrorism bring back something of the old Jewish fear? Doesn't that make you
despair? Doesn't it arouse deep fear for the future of the Jewish people? So…what bothers
you in Israeli literature and in the Israeli spirit is that there is
not enough empathy for the Jews and their story. But isn't it the task
of intellectuals to be critical, to stand apart, to set a high bar? Volume IV, No. 811 • Friday, February 13, 2004 WEAPONS OF MASS
HYSTERIA The United States has lost less than 350 American dead in actual combat in Iraq, deposed the worst tyrant on the planet, and offered the first real hope of a humane government in the recent history of the Middle East--and is being roundly condemned rather than praised for one of the most remarkable occurrences of our age. Yet a careful postbellum anatomy of the recent WMD controversy makes the original case for the war stronger rather weaker. A Weapon of Mass Destruction.
Therefore as long as Saddam Hussein was in power it mattered little what the professed status of his chemical and biological arsenal was at any particular time, since our only certain knowledge was that he had a proven desire and ability to purchase, recreate, and use them on any given day--and that day would be mostly unknown to everyone outside of Iraq. He may have had thousands of tons of weapons in 1980, hundreds of tons in 1990, and tens of tons in 1995, almost zero in 2003--and yet once again perhaps hundreds in 2005 and thousands again in 2010. Thus the cliché that Saddam Hussein himself was the weapon of mass destruction was in fact entirely accurate. Throughout this war there has been consistently fuzzy nomenclature that reflects mistaken logic: WMDs are supposedly the problem, rather than the tyrannical regimes that stockpile them--as if Tony Blair's nuclear arsenal threatens world peace; we are warring against the method of "terror" rather than states that promote or allow it--as if the Cold War was a struggle against SAM-6's or KGB-like tactics; September 11 had nothing to do with the Iraqi war, as if after 3,000 Americans were butchered through unconventional and terrorist tactics the margin of tolerance against Middle East tyrannical regimes that seek the weapons of such a trade does not diminish radically. Casus Belli The threat of WMDs may have been the centerpiece of the administration's arguments to go to war, but for most of us, there were plenty of other--and far more important reasons--for prompt action now. Let us for the nth time recite them: Saddam had broken the 1991 armistice agreements and after September 11 it was no longer tolerable to allow Middle East dictators to continue as rogue states and virtual belligerents. Two-thirds of Iraqi airspace were de facto controlled by the United States--ultimately an unsustainable commitment requiring over a decade of daily vigilance, billions of dollars, and hundreds of thousands of sorties to prevent further genocide. He had defied U.N. resolutions; and he had expelled inspectors, demanding either enforcement or appeasement and subsequent humiliation of the international community. It really was an intolerable situation that in perpetuity thousands of Kurds and Shiites were doomed on any given week that American and British planes might have been grounded. Saddam had a history of war against Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Iran, and the United States, destroyed the ecology of the Mesopotamian wetlands, gassed his own people, and relented in his massacres only to the degree that the United States monitored him constantly. Should we continue with the shameful litany? Well, in addition, in northern Iraq al Qaedists were battling the Kurds. Old-line terrorists like Abu Abbas and Abu Nidal were at home in Baghdad. Husseinite bounties subsidized suicide-murdering in Israel. A number of accounts had cited relationships between al Qaeda and Baathist intelligence. Iraq, in fact, was already at a critical mass. Faced with a brutal unending U.N. embargo and the loss of its airspace, it was descending into a badland like Afghanistan. The amorality is not that we took him out, but that after 1991 we waited about 100,000 corpses too long. “Intelligence”
is rarely intelligent We were fooled by Japan in 1941 and had no idea that its enormous fleet was a few hundred miles off Hawaii. The Soviet absorption of Eastern Europe caught utopians off guard in 1945-6. Everyone underestimated Mao's resilience ("Who lost China?"). MacArthur's "infiltrators" across the Yalu River turned out to be several Chinese armies. We know only now that the Soviets cheated on several major arms agreements--and had WMD arsenals far beyond what was disclosed. Its nuclear accidents and WMD catastrophes are still clouded in mysteries. Remember the Missile Gap of the 1960 election that helped to elect John Kennedy? Yet Cuba, we now learn, had more ready nukes than even Curtis LeMay imagined. The British surely had no warning about the Falklands invasion. An American ambassador gave the wrong message to Saddam Hussein in summer 1990, precisely because the CIA had no clue that Saddam Hussein was gearing up to invade Kuwait. Libya and Iran were further along with their nuclear programs than the CIA dared to imagine. Ditto North Korea. Who knew that Pakistan has been running a nuclear clearinghouse? The point is not to excuse faulty intelligence, but rather to understand that knowing exactly what the enemy is up to is difficult and yet almost never acknowledged to be so. The wages of bluffing
I am sorry that the United States has established a hair-trigger reputation in matters of deadly agents of mass destruction--but apparently other rogue nations now believe that the burden of proof is no longer on us to establish that they have them, but rather on them to ensure the world that they do not. And that is not necessarily a bad thing if we ponder that the lives of thousands may hang in the balance. WMD deterrence. Whether we like it or not, the precedent that the United Sates might act decisively against regimes that were both suspected of pursuing WMD acquisition and doing nothing to allay those fears, has had a powerful prophylactic effect in the neighborhood. Only in this Orwellian election year, would candidates for the presidency decry that the war had nothing to do with the dilemma of WMDs--even as Libya, Iran, and Pakistan by their very actions apparently disagreed. Cost-benefit analysis.
Again, I am sorry that David Kay's preliminary findings suggest an intelligence lapse; but that sorrow is mitigated by the recognition that there are tens of thousands of rotting skulls in the deserts of Iraq--the work of a psychopath and his sons, who, thanks to the belated efforts of the United States, have now been put permanently out of the business of mass death. WMD paranoia Unconventional weapons, in other words, by their very nature of stealth, horrific death, and the failure of conventional military deterrence scare people--especially in the present context of asymmetrical warfare where rogue states and terrorist cells seek them precisely to nullify Western military advantage. This is not to excuse WMD paranoia, but only to suggest, for example, that Colin Powell's excursus to the U.N. might in retrospect been inaccurate in all its details, but nevertheless a well-meaning effort to ensure the United States did not experience something like the cloud in Kurdistan--or unconventional and unpredictable acts analogous to September 11. History's verdict This is not an argument to ignore concerns over dissimulation, but rather to appreciate that when confronted with an ogre the moral issue sometimes is ending his reign and leaving millions safe and free in his wake, rather than quibbling over the legal basis to do so. In contrast, we talk still about an exaggerated Gulf of Tonkin resolution precisely because the ensuing war became morally questionable, was often waged nonsensically, and was ultimately lost--resulting in millions of dead in vain, refugees, and internees. Had we acted wisely in Vietnam, created a South Korea-like state within three years, and today be witnessing a Saigon similar to Seoul, the Gulf of Tonkin legislation would be seen instead as an irrelevant if improper effort to prompt needed action to save millions from Communism rather than the disingenuous catalyst that led to quagmire. Again, this is not to suggest the ends justify the means, but rather to acknowledge that there are always deeper reasons to go to war than what lawyers, diplomats, and politicians profess. Those underlying factors are ultimately judged as moral or immoral by history's unforgiving logic of how, and for what reason, the war was waged--and what were its ultimate results. We live in a sick, sick West if we investigate Mr. Bush's and Mr. Blair's courageous efforts to end Iraqi fascism, while ignoring the thousands of Europeans and multinational corporations who profited from his reign of terror. Postmortem The real outrage is instead that at a time of one of most important developments of the last half-century, when this country is waging a war to the death against radical Islamic fascism and attempting to bring democracy to an autocratic wasteland, we hear instead daily about some mythical rogue CIA agent who supposedly faked evidence, Martha Stewart's courtroom shoes, Michael Jackson's purported perversion, and Scott Peterson's most recent alibi. Amazing. Shabbat shalom to our readers!
Volume IV, No. 810 • Thursday, February 12, 2004 ABOUT THOSE SETTLEMENTS… Ariel Sharon, the prime minister of Israel, has broken with decades of his own history and declared an intent to withdraw all Israeli habitations from Gaza, plus some from the West Bank. Doing so raises a basic question: Just how important are these “settlements” in the grand scheme of Palestinian-Israeli relations? (I use quotation marks around settlements because the dictionary defines this word as “a small community” or an establishment of people “in a new region.” This inaccurately describes the Jewish habitations in question, many of which boast tens of thousands of residents in place over several decades.) Some analysts consider Jews living in the West Bank and Gaza to be one of the leading obstacles to resolving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. For example: · Thomas Friedman, The New York Times: “Israel must get out of the West Bank and Gaza Strip as soon as possible and evacuate most of the settlements. I have long advocated this, but it is now an urgent necessity. Otherwise, the Jewish state is in peril. Ideally, this withdrawal should be negotiated along the Clinton plan. But if necessary, it should be done unilaterally. This can't happen too soon, and the U.S. should be forcing it.” · Jean AbiNader, Arab American Institute: “the settlements are the major political obstacle” to a resolution. · Dennis Kucinich, Democratic presidential candidate: “Israeli settlements are a significant obstacle to a viable peace between Israel and the Palestinians.” I disagree with this argument, and for two main reasons. First, it assumes that Palestinians seek only to gain control over the West Bank and Gaza, whereas overwhelming evidence points to their also aspiring to go further and control Israel proper. Therefore, pulling Israelis from the territories does no good. In fact, it probably does harm. Imagine that Israelis were uprooted and the Israel Defense Forces pulled back to the 1967 boundaries--what then? Friedman, AbiNader, and Kucinich assume the Palestinians would be grateful and reward Israel by tending to their own gardens, permitting Israel quietly to go its separate way. But I expect a quite different reaction: Palestinians will see a pullback signaling that Israel is weak, appeasing, and vulnerable. Far from showing gratitude, they will make greater demands. With Jenin and Ramallah in the maw, Jerusalem will be next on the agenda, followed by Tel Aviv and Haifa.This implies Israel is fated to stick with its towns and communities in the West Bank and Gaza. They might be a tactical and political liability, but they must retained and defended… Second, Sharon’s intent to uproot Israeli habitations assumes that they pose a large, perhaps insuperable, barrier to a Palestinian-Israeli resolution. In contrast, I see them as a minor obstacle. Once the Palestinians do fully, irrevocably, in deed as well as in word, accept the existence of a Jewish state, all sorts of possibilities for ending the conflict open up. · Adjusted borders: As Sharon himself suggested last week, the “triangle” area in northern Israel, with its large Arab population, might be up for trading. · Non-contiguous sovereignty: Jews living separate from Israel proper could live under Israeli rule. · Palestinian sovereignty: Once Palestinians truly accept the Zionist presence, then Jews in the territories could live under Palestinian rule. Such schemas, admittedly, sound like cloud-cuckoo land at present. But when Palestinians finally…accept Israel’s existence and renounce the use of force against it, all sorts of positive developments can take place to sweep aside today’s seemingly intractable issues… “How will we know when that change of heart takes place?” my reply is: When Jews living in…on the West Bank have no more need for security than Arabs living…in Israel. Until that happy day arrives, the issue of Jews living in the territories is perhaps the least significant one facing strategists and would-be diplomats. Instead…they should devise ways to induce the Palestinians to accept the existence of a sovereign Jewish state called Israel. Until that happens, no other initiatives will do any good. ______________________________________________________ THE
REGION: RETREAT OR REDEPLOYMENT? Whether he is thinking of a "withdrawal" or "redeployment" will determine whether Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's current policy is a catastrophe or a success. Withdrawal means retreating from an area. Redeployment means moving forces into a more rational military position, pulling out of some places while staying or even advancing into others. In this sense Israel could dismantle settlements within Gaza and not withdraw. If, however, Sharon's intention is merely to pull out completely from the Gaza Strip it is hard to see how this will bring any real improvement. The experience of the Oslo process and the withdrawal from Lebanon are tough lessons in this regard. Palestinian leaders and gunmen would claim victory and be able to do whatever they wanted in Gaza. Their policy would not be to reduce violence to benefit their people, build a model polity, and attract foreign investment. Instead, they would organize their troops, build and smuggle in more arms, and launch as many assaults as possible against Israel. Nor would there be any political benefit for Israel. The world would criticize withdrawal as a trick while stepping up demands for Israel to withdraw completely to the 1967 borders whether or not it got anything in return. The U.S. would be more sympathetic, but calling this move no substitute for a negotiated agreement with the Palestinians would not give Israel anything either. Instead of land for peace, such a withdrawal would be land for nothing. But is this what Sharon has in mind? First, even if he dismantles settlements in the Gaza Strip, that is not the same thing as a military withdrawal. The army could still hold areas it deemed necessary to preserve Israel's security. This would certainly be true on the Gaza-Egypt border to prevent the massive smuggling of arms, military equipment, and terrorists across it. Second, Israel would also retain the right to go into any area necessary to protect the country's citizens, using both air power and ground forces… Third, it seems more likely that Sharon's idea is to pull out of the most exposed settlements and roads in the midst of Gaza, dangerous positions that make no security contribution. Israel would retain settlements and bases closer to the border as buffer zones to stop attacks on Israeli territory. Fourth, any shift of forces in Gaza should be combined with strengthening Israel's position in the West Bank and completing the security fence as soon as possible. These factors would reduce the likelihood of terrorists being inspired to further violence by the belief that their methods were successful in weakening Israel. …Of course, it is quite true that most Israelis don't want to hold onto any of the Gaza Strip or most of the West Bank. They are ready to accept a Palestinian state if they believe it will really keep the peace. But they want to get something in return. If Yasser Arafat had accepted the Camp David or Clinton plan offers, there would probably be a Palestinian state right now… …Israel is in the territories at all not because it wants to keep them but because it cannot give them up knowing they will be used as a staging area for a war to destroy Israel completely. What does make sense--and perhaps this is what Sharon intends--is a sensible redeployment. It is difficult to hold onto exposed settlements in the Gaza Strip that sit amid major Palestinian population concentrations yet have no security, political, or economic value. The settler movement's view that every settlement is sacred and that it will ignore the country's elected government should not be the basis of the country's national security strategy. It is simply not a brilliant strategy to have the army strung out along so many roads and forced to defend so many isolated settlements, regardless of terrain or Palestinian population centers. What is needed is a rational approach which establishes priorities and sets up the best way to defend Israel's national territory and the most populous settlements, or those that sit on strategically important land. If forces are moved to a better position…this will not convince the Palestinian leadership and Islamist terrorists that victory is at hand and Israel is surrendering. On the contrary, it will show that Israel is digging in for the long haul and that the Palestinians themselves are the ones in danger of collapse… Combined with the security fence such an approach would best preserve the lives of Israelis, including settlers. It would build a real national consensus of everyone not on the extreme left or right, a basis for the needed steadfastness in this era when there is no real Palestinian partner for peace. It is also far more likely to bring peace by showing Palestinians that only moderation will ever bring them material gains. (Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center) ______________________________________________________ ISRAEL'S
BEST OPTION [F]rom an Israeli perspective, the logic of unilateral disengagement is inescapable. As one of the founders of Israel’s post-1967 settlement policy, Sharon resisted this approach for a long time… If he is forced to resign, his successor is likely to follow a similar course. Public opinion polls and other indicators demonstrate that the majority of Israelis view the territorial status quo…as unacceptable. Israeli military responses to three years of terror have been quite effective, but sporadic attacks continue, and the costs of protecting small and isolated settlements are unreasonable. In addition, the multiple checkpoints, frequent closures and other sources of daily friction between individual Palestinians and Israeli soldiers contribute to the tension. And the political status quo poses a demographic threat to the survival of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state. At the same time, the efforts to end this situation through negotiation of a stable agreement—from Oslo to the Quartet’s roadmap—have had catastrophic results. Until there is a credible Palestinian leadership to disarm the various factions and implement a lasting accord based on the two-state model, negotiations are not going to end the conflict, and may add to the violence. The evolution of a pragmatic Palestinian leadership anchored in basic societal changes will take many years or decades… Under these conditions, unilateral disengagement has become the least bad option… In the absence of what academics and policy makers refer to as “ripeness”—in terms of broad societal readiness to make realistic compromises—Israel needs to define pragmatic de facto borders. This logic led to the intense public demand for construction of a separation barrier/fence/wall, which has proven effective in protecting the northern coastal cities such as Netanya and Hadera from terror attacks. The construction of a separation barrier, and a clear—if temporary—boundary, only makes sense with the reduction in the points of friction and greater contiguity for the vast majority of both Palestinians and Israelis. This means the removal of isolated settlements near Palestinian cities, and strengthening of Israeli control in strategic areas, including Jerusalem and the Jordan Valley, to ensure border control. (This is not a peace plan, and political and diplomatic issues related to the 1949 ceasefire line—the “Green Line”—are irrelevant.) However, despite the logic and support from the Israeli consensus, the implementation of this process will be difficult and costly. Sharon’s long-term core constituency anchored in Judea, Samaria and Gaza denounced limited unilateral withdrawal as “appeasement”, and violent resistance is expected. If the issue is brought to a referendum, it is likely to gain approval, but this could delay implementation, and force some changes. Opponents also argue that withdrawal from Gaza will be seen by Palestinians as a victory, and, like the IDF’s sudden pullout from Lebanon in May 2000, will encourage more terror. However, others counter that in the long term, Israeli security and deterrence were strengthened by this move. Attacks are far less frequent and Hizbollah’s power base in Lebanon was weakened… Furthermore, many Palestinians, including Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen), have declared that the decision to copy Hizbollah’s tactics of terrorism was a disaster. Israel’s unilateral withdrawal will give the Palestinians far less than would have resulted from an agreement with Ehud Barak four years ago, and efforts to use terms such as “apartheid” to demonize Israel via the UN and the International Court will not change the situation. In addition, for Israel’s Arab citizens, separation means an end to the unfettered access to the West Bank that they have enjoyed since 1967. However, in contrast to the period between 1948 and 1967, when this territory was under Jordanian occupation and the armistice lines were impassable, the current policy of unilateral disengagement includes mechanisms for regulated movement at numerous crossing points… [T]he implementation of unilateral disengagement, whether under Sharon’s leadership or a successor, will face many challenges. But unless a better option appears that provides security, reduces friction and ensures the survival of Israel as a Jewish democratic state, the course is unlikely to change. (Gerald M. Steinberg is
the director of the Program on Conflict
Volume IV, No. 809 • Wednesday, February 11, 2004
WEDNESDAY’S “NEWS IN REVIEW” ROUND-UP WEEKLY QUOTES “I believe it was an historic mistake that we didn’t exile Arafat during the past three years because he is a terrorist leader and he is leading the terror activities and the incitement against the state of Israel.”—Shaul Mofaz, speaking on the eve of his first official visit to Britain as Israel’s Defence Minister. (Daily Telegraph, Feb. 11) “Yes, we are in a state of anarchy. [W]hen a Palestinian policeman cannot walk around freely wearing his uniform, this creates a vacuum in which everyone does whatever one pleases. The situation is becoming grave. We have people selling land that is not theirs, and our courts are unable to enforce the law. Everyone who has money can purchase as many arms as he wants and can do with them whatever he wants…”--Zayyad Abu-Zayyad, Palestinian Legislative Council member and a former Palestinian Authority Cabinet minister, describing life in the areas ruled by the PA. ( J.T.A., Feb. 2) “I don’t think America can stand by and hope for the best from a madman. He had the capacity to have a weapon… The international community thought he had weapons. [H]e had the capacity to make a weapon, and then let it fall into the hands of a shadowy terrorist network. In my judgment we had no choice, when we look at the intelligence I looked at that says the man was a threat… Saddam and his henchmen could have destroyed [the weapons] as we entered Iraq. They could be hidden. They could have been transported to another country… The evidence I had was the best possible evidence that [Saddam] had a weapon. Every potential harm to America had to be judged in the context of the war on terror… And the worst nightmare scenario for any president is to realize that these kinds of terrorist networks have the capacity to arm up with some of these deadly weapons… I’m a war President…The American people need to know they’ve got a President who sees the world the way it is, and I see dangers that exist…"—President George W. Bush in an interview on NBC’s Meet the Press, defending the war in Iraq despite the fact that no WMD have yet been found in Iraq. (National Post, Feb. 9) “All I have to do is see what happened to the Kurds the other day--this proud mountain people who have built a nice little democracy and free market in northern Iraq, only to have it suicide-bombed by Islamists--to be reminded that this is a just war. It is a war of the forces of tolerance, pluralism and decency against the forces of intolerance, bigotry and religious fascism…”—Thomas Friedman, columnist. (New York Times, Feb.8) “[T]he world is a very scary place. The trouble is, the world might be much scarier if Saddam were still around. My guess is he'd be…ordering up some centrifuge technology from Abdul Qadeer Khan. Mr. Khan and the Musharraf regime would still be peddling their nuclear wares…because who was going to stop them?… Pakistan's nuclear deceptions were blown wide open [only because] Colin Powell put the boots to President Pervez Musharraf, and Mr. Musharraf knew there would be consequences. Would that have happened without the war in Iraq? Would you want to bet on it?… [S]ometimes force is the only way to persuade other people not to mess with you. The salutary effect of this message is evident in Libya, Syria, Iran... You can despise George Bush and everything about him. You can believe he duped us about the war…and still believe that the world is a lot safer than it was a year ago.”—Columnist Margaret Wente. (Globe and Mail, Feb. 7). “I take full responsibility for my actions and seek your pardon. I offer my deepest regrets and unqualified apologies to a traumatised nation. I also wish to clarify that there was never any kind of authorization for these activities by the government.”—Pakistani physicist and nuclear weapons development chief Abdul Qadeer Khan, declaring on Pakistan State t.v. that he was solely to blame for the selling of nuclear secrets to Libya, Iran and North Korea. Contradicting earlier reports, Abdul Qadeer Khan now states he did so without the knowledge of the government. Khan was pardoned by General Musharraf, who then abruptly ended the two-month investigation into the scandal. (Guardian, Feb. 5, Feb. 11) “I was quite intrigued by Prime Minister Sharon’s decision to pull out of Gaza. I think it’s a positive development…If it does take place, [it] can really give us a very important moment, a new dynamic that can propel the peace process forward… I think the issue really is land for peace and eventually Israel will have to give up land to make that peace possible.”—UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, speaking to reporters following P.M. Ariel Sharon’s decision to remove 17 settlements in Gaza. (Jerusalem Post, Feb. 5, Agence-France Presse, Feb. 7) “Our report is a balanced assessment of the humanitarian situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. It shows that Israel's security policy is having a marked impact on everyday life. Key measures, such as the construction of a security barrier higher than the Berlin Wall, may bring the mirage of immediate security to Israelis, but the level of despair felt by ordinary Palestinians at being denied an ordinary life can only increase the supply of suicide bombers…”— British Conservative MP Tony Baldry, a member of the Select Committee on International Development, whose recently published report called on the British Government to consider “economic pressure on Israel to ease the movement restrictions which are crippling the Palestinian economy and causing soaring poverty.” The report concludes, “…there is a deliberate Israeli approach of putting the lives of ordinary Palestinians under stress as part of a strategy to bring the population to heel. Certain security measures…are completely undermining the viability of a future Palestinian State.” (Ha’aretz, Feb. 6) “The moral defense of Muslim terrorists, while denying any appreciation for the burdensome duty of Israeli soldiers defending the only democracy in the Middle East, is an exercise of a double standard that reduces the Jewish state to the role of scapegoat. Some of the most shameless perpetrators of this double standard are Jewish intellectuals, eager as always to make common cause with enemies of the Americans and their allies in the West. If the Israeli-Palestinian conflict were to disappear overnight, can anyone believe that anti-Semitism--or hatred of America and the West--would disappear with it? Resurgent anti-Semitism is merely camouflaged by conflict in the Middle East.”—Columnist Suzanne Fields. (Washington Post, Feb. 2) “We have no argument regarding the question of the legitimacy of these [suicide-bomb] operations, because they are considered a powerful weapon used by the Palestinians against an enemy with no morality or religion…Even if during [an operation] civilians or children are killed—the blame does not fall upon the Palestinians, but those who forced them to turn to this modus operandi…”—Editorial in the Egyptian government daily Al-Masaa, justifying the murder of innocent civilians and children at the hands of suicide bombers. (MEMRI, Feb. 6) “[Frederic] Warburg was born into an English-Jewish family. In 1936 he tried to explain this predicament to his second, non-Jewish, wife: ‘It makes me what I am. A Jew is glad to be an Englishman, but proud to be a Jew... Nearly all non-Jews live in boxes--called England, France, Germany, Russia. These boxes protect them from damage. The Jew has no box, or if he has it's a flimsy one, liable to collapse round him in a crisis. The Jew is in the open; it makes him proud, sensitive and wary. It ensures that he takes nothing for granted. He knows that disaster is only just out of sight round the corner.’”--Michael Handelzalts in an article about English publisher Frederic Warburg (1899-1981) (Ha’aretz, Feb. 6) SHORT TAKES FRANCE PROBES SUHA ARAFAT’S BANK ACCOUNTS—(Paris) French prosecutors opened an inquiry into transfers totalling $11.5 million into bank accounts held by Palestinian Authority leader Yasser Arafat’s wife, Suha Arafat. An IMF report on PA accounts between 1997-2003 revealed that $900 million had been diverted by PA officials into accounts overseas. (Reuters, Feb.10) PALESTINIAN PM’S FAMILY BUSINESS UNDER SCRUTINY—(Jerusalem) A Palestinian parliamentary committee launched an investigation to determine whether a cement company owned by PA PM Ahmed Qureia’s family sold cement to Jewish settlements in the West Bank. According to Israel’s Channel 10 TV, the Al-Quds Cement Company also supplied materials to build the Israel’s anti-terrorism fence in the West Bank. Palestinian officials, however, denied these allegations. (Gazette, Feb. 11) FATAH CRISIS SENDS LEADERSHIP REELING—(Ramallah) Protesting the lack of political reform and abundance of corruption in the Palestinian Authority, hundreds of members of PA Chairman Yasser Arafat’s Fatah movement resigned. The resignations attest to a deepening crisis within the organization that dominates Palestinian politics. (Jer. Post, Feb.8) GAZA ISRAELIS MAY SETTLE IN WEST BANK—(Jerusalem) To implement his Disengagement Plan, PM Ariel Sharon explained that Israel would have to relocate the 7,500 Jewish settlers in the Gaza Strip. An administration official later disclosed that Israel might relocate them to the West Bank. Palestinian PM Ahmed Qureia rejected the proposal to move Gaza settlers to the West Bank, insisting on the removal of all settlements. (N.Y. P., Feb. 7) ISRAELI CONSULATE IN MUMBAI REOPENS—(Jerusalem) FM Silvan Shalom announced that Israel plans to reopen its Consulate in Mumbai. This decision underlines the strategic importance that Israel places on relations with India. (Foreign Minister's Office, Feb. 9) FREED TERRORIST VOWS TO FULFILL SUICIDE MISSION—(London) A terrorist released in the prisoner exchange between Israel and Hezbollah vowed to carry out a suicide bombing attack even though he signed a statement renouncing violence prior to his release. The Shin Bet arrested the German-born and British-educated Steven Smyrek in 1997 on the charges that he flew to Tel Aviv to carry out a suicide bombing. (The Sunday Times, Feb. 8) JEWISH SITES IN OTTAWA TARGETED—(Ottawa) According to U.S. intelligence reports, Arab terrorists planed to planned to attack Jewish targets in Ottawa and several other cities in Canada, Paraguay, and Argentina in an attempt to undermine peace efforts in the Middle East. In 1999, Argentinian intelligence officials reportedly thwarted a plot by a South-American-based terrorist organization linked to al Qaeda A recent report by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) warned that terrorists continue to target Canada. In a related story, last year, Canada denied entry to 203 immigrants and asylum seekers whom the CSIS flagged because of suspected links to terrorism. (Nat’l Post, Feb. 9) 39 DIE IN RUSSIAN SUBWAY BLAST—(Moscow) Russian authorities blamed Chechen rebels for last Friday’s terrorist bombing on a Moscow subway that killed 39 people and injured over 120. In the wake of the attack Russian President Vladimir Putin called on world leaders to unite against terrorism, which he deemed “the plague of the 21st century.” “Russia does not hold dialogue with terrorists,” he declared, “it eliminates them.” (Jer. Post, Feb. 6; Nat’l Post, Feb. 7) FRENCH ASSEMBLY BANS RELIGIOUS SYMBOLS IN SCHOOLS—(Paris) The French National Assembly voted 494 to 36, with 31 abstentions, to ban Muslim head scarves and other religious symbols from public schools. The draft law bans "ostensibly" religious signs—Islamic head scarves, large Christian crosses and yarmulkes. Sikh turbans are also likely to be banned. The Minister of National Education, Luc Ferry, said that the law would require all students to attend physical education classes and accept what is taught on the Holocaust and human reproduction. In recent years, teachers have complained that some Muslim students rejected the veracity of the Holocaust, disrupting classes. (N. Y. T., Feb. 11) CANADIAN AMBASSADOR CANCELS CONDOLENCE TRIP—(Jerusalem) Donald Sinclair, Canada’s ambassador to Israel, cancelled a condolence visit to the West Bank home of Canadian-born Yechezkel Goldberg, killed in last week’s suicide bombing in Jerusalem. Dr. Ron Goldberg, Yechezkel’s brother, told the Jerusalem Post that the Canadian Embassy informed the family that the ambassador had no jurisdiction to pass the Green Line. Invited to meet the ambassador in Jerusalem, Goldberg declined, believing that to do so “would be an insult to my brother’s memory.” (Jer. Post, Feb. 5) SAUDIS DEFENDS YEMEN BORDER “SCREEN” PLAN—(Riyadh) Saudi Arabia announced plans to build a security “screen” on its border with Yemen, in the hopes of curbing the influx of militants and weapons into its territory. The neighboring countries, who only recently resolved a long-running border dispute, stepped up security cooperation after suicide bombings in Riyadh killed more than 50 Saudis last year. However, the Yemeni government complained that the barrier would stand in a 20km zone that an agreement signed in 2000 designated as an open area. Saudi officials refused to acknowledge similarities between the Saudi “screen” and Israel’s anti-terrorism fence. (Reuters, Feb. 9) SECOND 9/11 ATTACK FOILED—(Riyadh) Saudi officials arrested a fighter pilot suspected of plotting a 9/11-style terrorist attack against the State of Israel. Authorities believe that al Qaeda recruited the pilot to crash a jet into an undisclosed Israeli target. They have also rounded up others potentially involved in the terrorist plot. (N.Y. P., Feb. 10) AL QAEDA RAPPERS SING OF HOLY WAR AGAINST “DIRTY INFIDELS”—(Dubai) In an effort to recruit young Muslims, Al Qaeda launched an English music video on the Internet. Performed by Soul Salah Crew, a London-based band considered sympathetic to Osama bin Laden’s terrorist organization, Dirty Kuffar, or Dirty Infidels, urges young Muslims to wage holy war. “Dirty Kuffar wherever you are; From Kandahar to Ramallah; OBL [Osama bin Laden] Crew be like a shining star; like the way we destroy them two tower ha ha,” belts out the group’s lead singer, who stands before images of the September 11 terrorist attacks against the World Trade Center. The video also shows Israeli PM Ariel Sharon morphing into a pig and US President George W. Bush into a chimpanzee. (Nat’l Post, Feb. 10) 80 IRAQIS KILLED IN BLASTS—(Baghdad) Two explosions within 24 hours killed 80 people and injured 76 in Iraq. A car bomb exploded on Wednesday morning in front of Iraqi Army recruiting station, located next to the office of a prominent Shiite political party. Tuesday’s bombing, in the town of Iskandariya, 30 miles south of Baghdad ripped through a police station where many Iraqis had lined up to apply for jobs. (N.Y.T., Feb. 11) CANADIANS WANT MISSILE DEFENSE—(Ottawa) According to the results of a Liberal Party survey, 64% of Canadians want PM Paul Martin to pursue closer military ties with the U.S. and 60% want Canada to harmonize it security policies with the U.S. PM Martin approved missile defense talks with Washington when he took office in December. He also promised closer security cooperation when he met with U.S. President George W. Bush last month. (Nat’l Post, Feb. 11) Volume IV, No. 808 • Tuesday, February 10, 2004
HUMAN RIGHTS AND
THE NEW ANTI-JEWISHNESS [This paper was originally published by the Jewish People Policy Planning Institute in November 2002.] What we are witnessing today…is a new, virulent, globalizing and even lethal anti-Jewishness reminiscent of the atmospherics of the 1930s, and without parallel or precedent since the end of the Second World War… Anchored in the "Zionism is Racism" resolution, but going beyond it, the new anti-Jewishness…can best be defined as the discrimination against, denial of, or assault upon, national particularity and peoplehood anywhere, whenever that national particularity and peoplehood happens to be Jewish. In its more benign form (if it can be called benign), it finds particular expression in the singling out of Israel and the Jewish people for differential and discriminatory treatment in the international arena—where United Nations human rights bodies are used as the mask or protective cover for this anti-Jewishness (e.g. The 2001 World Conference Against Racism in Durban). In its most lethal form, it refers to the singling out of Israel and the Jewish people for existential or genocidal assault, as evidenced by the suicide-bombers—or what I prefer to call genocide-bombers…—the convergence of both politicide and genocide. In a word, classical or traditional anti-Semitism is the discrimination against, or denial of, the right of Jews to live as equal members of a free society; the new anti-Semitism—incompletely, or incorrectly, [referred to] as "anti-Zionism"…—involves the discrimination against, denial of, or assault upon the right of the Jewish people to live as an equal member of the family of nations. What is intrinsic to each form of anti-Semitism—and common to both—is discrimination. All that has happened is that it has moved from discrimination against Jews as individuals—a classical anti-Semitism for which there are indices of measurement (e.g., discrimination against Jews in education, housing, or employment)—to discrimination against Jews as people—a new anti-Semitism—for which one has yet to develop indices of measurement. …I would like to propose…a set of indices by which we can identify…and monitor the nature and meaning of the new anti-Jewishness. These indices are organized around a juridical framework and draw upon principles of discrimination and equality as they find expression in both domestic and international law. There are thirteen indices that may serve to illustrate this new anti-Jewishness… Genocidal anti-Semitism
In a word, Israel is the only state in the world today, and the Jews the only people in the world today, that are the object of a standing set of threats from governmental, religious, and terrorist bodies seeking their destruction. And what is most disturbing is the silence, the indifference, and sometimes even the indulgence, in the face of such genocidal antisemitism. Political anti-Semitism
…[I]f classical anti-Semitism was anchored in discrimination against the Jewish religion, the new anti-Jewishness is anchored in discrimination against the Jews as a people—and the embodiment of that expression in Israel. In each instance the essence of anti-Semitism is the same—an assault upon whatever is the core of Jewish self-definition at any moment in time… There is yet another, and third, variant of political anti-Semitism. I am referring here to the "demonizing" of Israel… This is the contemporary analogue to the medieval indictment of the Jew as the "poisoner of the wells." In other words, in a world in which human rights has emerged as the new secular religion of our time, the portrayal of Israel as the metaphor for a human rights violator is an indictment of Israel as the "new anti-Christ"—as the "poisoner of the international wells"… Ideological anti-Semitism finds expression not only in the "Zionism is Racism" indictment…but the further criminal indictment of Israel as "an apartheid state," and the calling for the dismantling of this "apartheid state"—a euphemism for Israel's destruction. If the proclamation of "Zionism as Racism" gave anti-Semitism the appearance of international sanction, the calling for the dismantling of the apartheid state of Israel is even more toxic and virulent, once again giving anti-Semitism the appearance of international sanction. Indeed, the increased characterization or libeling of Israel as a "Nazi state" is tantamount to transforming ideological anti-Semitism into a duty—the obligation to remove this Nazi state, Israel. Theological anti-Semitism
As for cultural anti-Semitism, I am referring here to the melange of attitudes, sentiments, innuendo and the like—in academe, in parliaments, among the literati, public intellectuals, and the human rights movement—…as found expression in the remarks of the French Ambassador to the U.K. to the effect of, why should the world risk another world war because of "that shitty little country Israel"; or as British journalist Petronella Wyatt put it, "Anti-Semitism, and its open expression, has become respectable at London dinner tables" once more—not just in Germany or Catholic Central Europe. [W]e are witnessing an explosion of European anti-Semitism without parallel or precedent since World War II… Some examples, to which I can personally attest to, following my visits to European capitals these past two years, include assaults upon and desecration of synagogues, cemeteries and Jewish institutions; attacks upon identifiable Jews; convergence of the extreme left and the extreme right in public demonstrations calling for "death to the Jews"; atrocity propaganda against Israel and Jews (e.g., Israel injects the AIDS virus into Palestinians); the ugly canard of double loyalty; the demonization of Israel through the escalating ascription of Nazi metaphors; indifference or silence in the face of horrific acts of terror against Israel and the threatening of sanctions against Israel for exercising its right of self-defense against these acts of terror. In the words of Joel Kotek of the University of Brussels: "One's position on the Arab-Israeli conflict has become a test of loyalty. Should he become a supporter of Israel, he becomes a supporter of a Nazi state." Denying Israel equality
before the law The denial of international due process to Israel and the Jewish people in the international arena refers to the disenfranchisement of Israel in the international arena, where, for example, Israel emerges as the only country denied "standing" in any regional grouping in the United Nations, which resulted in Israel (and Jewish NGOs) being excluded from the Regional Conference in Iran, where the regional Asian position for the World Conference Against Racism was prepared. "Legalized" anti-Semitism refers to the international "legal" character of this anti-Semitism, in which, in a kind of Orwellian inversion of law and language, United Nations human rights bodies become the mask under which this "teaching of contempt" is carried out… Economic anti-Semitism
The cutting edge of this new anti-Semitism is…Holocaust denial, which moves inexorably from denying the Holocaust, to accusing Jews of fabricating the "hoax"…to indicting Jews for extorting false reparations from the innocent German people, to the building of their "illegal" State of Israel on the backs of the real indigenous owners, the Palestinians. Let there be no doubt about it, those who would seek to deny the Jewish people their past are the same people who, if given the chance, would deny the Jewish people their future. Racist terrorism against Jews refers to the state-orchestrated incitement to violence and terrorism against Jews… This racist terrorism has been ratcheted up into an alarming case of "mega" or "catastrophic terrorism" as exemplified by the recent attempts to literally incinerate thousands of Israelis by blowing up fuel and gas storage facilities in the Herzliya area and blowing up the Azrieli office towers in Tel Aviv; the attempted use of cyanide poison in a Jerusalem restaurant; the attempted blowing up of residential apartment areas in Haifa; and the recent disclosure of Hezbollah and Al-Qaeda connected plans to target Israeli institutions and Jewish nationals in the Western hemisphere. State-sanctioned anti-Semitism
None of this is intended to suggest…that Israel is somehow above the law, or that Israel is not to be held accountable for any violations of law. On the contrary—Israel is accountable for any violations of international law or human rights like any other state; and the Jewish people are not entitled to any privileged protection or preference because of the particularity of Jewish suffering. But the problem is not that Israel as the "Jew among Nations" seeks to be above the law, but that it has been systematically denied equality before the law; not that Israel must respect human rights—which it should—but that the human rights of Israel have not been respected; not that human rights standards should be applied to Israel—which they must—but that these standards have not been applied equally to anyone else. Israel and the Jewish people have been singled out for differential and discriminatory treatment in the international arena—and worst of all—singled out for destruction. The time has come to sound the alarm—not only for Israel and the Jewish people whose safety and security is under existential threat and attack—but for the world community and the human condition as a whole. For as history has taught us only too well, while the persecution and discrimination may begin with Jews, it doesn't end with Jews. (The Honorable Irwin Cotler, an MP when he wrote this article, is now Canada’s Minister of Justice) Volume IV, No. 807 • Monday, February 9, 2004 GOOD FENCES =
GOOD NEIGHBOURS Israel's anti-terrorist security fence, now under construction, is the focus of an unusual international legal exercise. The International Court of Justice in The Hague has been asked by the UN General Assembly to do something the court should not and arguably cannot do--render an opinion that would embroil it in a longstanding political, rather than a legal, dispute. The court was asked to opine on "the legal consequences arising from the construction of the wall being built by Israel, the occupying power, in the Occupied Palestinian Territory." The assumptions underlying this highly politicized language in the "legal" issue underscore just how inappropriate the UN's request really is. It also highlights the complexity of the political conflict and why the route of the fence has been the focus of so much attention. To its credit, Canada has joined other democratic states that take the position the court lacks the jurisdiction to adjudicate the matter. The language of the General Assembly's resolution prejudges the matter. It baldly asserts the planned route for the fence will put "Occupied Palestinian Territory" on the Israeli side of the fence. This reflects the view of the Palestinians and their supporters all territory east of the 1949 armistice lines is Palestinian and should be included in their prospective state. This is a myth. In fact, that territory is an unallocated part of the old British Mandate, territory to which both Israel and the Palestinians can lay claim. No sovereignty has been established. These competing claims are political, not legal, in nature, and, therefore, cannot be adjudicated in a court. Furthermore, Resolution 242, the most important Security Council resolution on Arab-Israeli peacemaking, calls on Israel to withdraw to "secure and recognized boundaries" in exchange for peace. It was clear in 1967, when that resolution was adopted, the 1949 armistice lines were not regarded as secure. Implicit was the expectation Israel would be better able to defend itself with a more favourable line on the map and, therefore, was justified in insisting on that. Why has Israel undertaken the fence project in the first place? The answer is simple: It is a defence against continuing terrorism that follows exhaustive efforts to negotiate a political resolution, and is a response to the Palestinian Authority's failure to meet its obligations to dismantle terrorist groups. It is not intended as a final border but rather as an attempt to separate Israelis and Palestinians until the latter abandon the practice of terrorizing the former. While the route of the fence is the issue of the day, final political boundaries can be set only through negotiations and that requires an end to the terrorism, to which the Palestinian national movement has been wedded for nearly 40 years. In the meantime, Israel has determined the route that best meets its pressing need to protect the lives of its citizens. When there is peace with an agreed boundary, the fence can be dismantled or relocated. The poet Robert Frost, who apparently had no love for fences, acknowledged in his poem Mending Wall that under certain circumstances good fences make good neighbors. Israelis can be excused if they are not entirely focused on neighbourly pursuits following last month's murder of 10 civilians in a suicide attack on a Jerusalem bus. In that context, though, it is instructive to consider how Israel's proposed fence might well pave the way for peace. Until now, Israel has been active in ferreting out or intercepting potential bombers before they can execute their deadly deeds, and has also used pre-emptive as well as retaliatory military action in its war on terror. In contrast, the fence represents an attempt at a passive defence. If successful, it is likely to decrease the need for these military measures. Thus, it should benefit both Israelis and Palestinians: The former will be less likely to be blown up by bombers and the latter will be less likely to become casualties of Israel's military responses. Why does the Palestinian Authority appear to want to stop the fence rather than stop the bombings? One explanation is its chairman, Yasser Arafat, believes terrorist bombings are an effective and acceptable weapon to achieve political objectives. Indeed, such bombings have become a key tool to further the Palestinian cause. If the fence were to be completed or if the PA itself reined in terrorism, the pressure on Israel would be reduced… While the kind of neighbourliness referred to by Robert Frost is something to strive for, the issue from an Israeli perspective is not whether a good fence can make good neighbours of the Palestinians. Rather, it is whether a fence will allow Israelis to live to see the day when the Palestinian people will accept them as neighbours at all. (Harold Waller is professor of political science at McGill University. Howard Gerson practises law in Toronto.) ______________________________________________________ WHY
DID ARAFAT TURN TO THE INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE? Ever since he arrived in the Gaza Strip in 1994, Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat has been seeking to internationalize the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by getting as many countries as possible involved. His ultimate objective is to push the international community into putting as much pressure as possible on Israel to force it to make far-reaching concessions. Moreover, Arafat has been hoping that the involvement of the international community, including the US, Russia, and the European Union, would guarantee the continued flow of billions of dollars to the Palestinian Authority budget. Money plays a key role in ensuring Arafat his continued control over the PA and, more important, the dozen or so Palestinian security forces. The intifada, which erupted in September 2000, provided yet another excuse for Arafat and the Palestinian leadership to step up their efforts to internationalize the conflict. A few days after the violence broke out, Arafat called for dispatching an international force to the West Bank and Gaza Strip “to defend the Palestinians against Israeli atrocities.” Almost on every occasion over the past three years, Arafat and his senior officials have repeated the call for deploying an international force with the hope that such a move would put the Palestinian issue on the top of the world’s agenda. Now that the International Court of Justice in The Hague has agreed to look into the case against the security fence Israel is building in the West Bank, Arafat appears to be on the brink of fulfilling his dream. For him, the mere fact that he managed to raise the issue of the “apartheid wall” before a respected international forum is in itself a significant achievement. The Palestinian strategy is to obtain a court ruling declaring the fence as “an illegitimate action taken by an occupying state.” Arafat knows that the ruling will not deter Israel from proceeding in its plans to complete the construction of the fence. Senior officials in Ramallah say that the main goal at this stage is to embarrass Israel on the international arena by exposing its practices against the Palestinians, including the construction of the controversial fence. “A court ruling against the fence would de-legitimize Israel’s claim that the fence is being built for security reasons,” explains one official involved in working out the Palestinian strategy against the fence. “What we want to show the world is that [Prime Minister Ariel] Sharon is trying to unilaterally draw the borders and that Israel is confiscating Palestinian land. If he continues with his plan, Sharon will make it impossible for us to establish an independent state on all the territories occupied in 1967.” In an interview with Access|Middle East, Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei said this week that the security fence “kills the Palestinian dream for statehood.” As such, Qurei believes that the Palestinians would be left with no alternative but to demand a one-state solution where Palestinians and Israelis would live together as equal citizens. “This wall is the biggest disaster that has hit the Palestinians since the nakba [catastrophe--the term Palestinians use to refer to the defeat of Arab armies following the creation of Israel in 1948],” he said… In any case, Arafat is hoping that the trial would set a precedent for other cases he wishes to bring to similar international forums. According to sources close to the Palestinian leadership, Arafat’s next move would be to try to bring as many Israeli leaders as possible before a war crimes tribunal. “Israel is a state of terror and apartheid and this is what we are planning to prove to the entire world,” a Palestinian legal expert explained this week. “The fence is only part of the problem. We want to dig deeper and expose the true face of this racist Zionist enemy. We want to see people like Sharon and [Defense Minister Shaul] Mofaz stand trial like [former Yugoslav President Slobodan] Milosevic.” While many of the arguments made by Palestinian farmers and villagers against the loss of lands may appear to be justified, Arafat is seeking to turn the case into a political and historical trial of Israel. He is less worried about The farmer who is unable to reach his land because of the new barrier as he is about regaining international recognition--much of which he lost because of his failure to stop Hamas and Fatah suicide bombers. As far as Arafat is concerned, the high profile case at The Hague provides an excellent opportunity for him to try to break the boycott imposed on him by Washington and many of its European allies in the past two years. The fact that he shares responsibility for the construction of the fence is as irrelevant as he is in the eyes of many world leaders. ______________________________________________________ WHEN
PALESTINIANS BECOME OPPRESSORS The mistreatment of Palestinians by Palestinians has seldom been given more than cursory examination by journalists outside the Middle East… Palestinians have somehow become the favourite oppressed people of intellectuals and journalists in Europe and elsewhere… Last week, in an article mostly ignored abroad, Bassam Eid, a brave man who runs the Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group, described the violence that now rages uncontrolled among his people. His article, "The Reign Of the Thugs," in an Israeli daily, Haaretz, said the Palestinian Authority can't begin to curb the violence. Palestinians murder other Palestinians in cold blood and no one gets charged…. But, Eid asks, "What Palestinian interior minister would be daring enough to punish those responsible? Would the Palestinian interior minister be killed if he imposed a penalty upon them?" Eid reported that in the town of Tul Karm, local security is now managed by the Al-Aqsa Brigades when they are not running terrorist operations against Israel… This makes it less surprising that it was a Palestinian "policeman" who killed 11 (including a psychologist originally from Toronto) in a Jerusalem bus... [Eid] says that the town of Nablus is currently ruled by two armed, illiterate thugs… [H]is human rights campaigns put him in even more severe conflict with the Palestinian leaders, whom he considers incompetent as well as corrupt. A vehement opponent of suicide bombing, he thinks it scandalous that Yasser Arafat encourages Palestinians, including children, to kill themselves and others… In 1995 he brought out a report on the PA's human rights violations, including torture, quoting the testimony of 72 victims. In 1999, in a study of academic freedom at Palestinian universities, he found a network of undercover agents collecting the names of those who criticize the PA. He said students and faculty did not feel free to speak in class. "There are a number of cases, particularly in Gaza, of violations of academic freedom. The consensus is that these professors are used as examples for others." Students know that classmates are paid to monitor them. Many students have been arrested and then later repeatedly visited by PA security forces. Despite [Eid’s] resentment of the Israelis, he has no illusions about the virtues of the Palestinians. He wondered aloud who was more to blame for Arafat's crimes: Arafat, or the populace that tolerates and even reveres him? He said Palestinians fall into three categories. Those who support the Arafat gang out of self-interest, those who are apathetic, and the rest, who are afraid to speak. Once he hoped that Palestinians could build a bridge of democracy to the Arab world. "But when the Palestinian Authority arrived, everybody just forgot about democracy." He believes all Palestinians have two faces, one they show each other, one they show the outside world. He tries to reveal the face that's usually hidden. Over dinner someone asked him, "Isn't there anything good you can say about your people?" His reply was chilling. "At the moment, no."… Volume IV, No. 806 • Friday, February 6, 2004 SHLOMO AVINERI
ON DISMANTLING GAZA SETTLEMENTS Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has taken the middle road between the use of force and the Camp David 2000 approach, which have both failed, Prof. Shlomo Avineri told Access/Middle East in an exclusive interview on Tuesday night… Avineri, an internationally renowned Professor of Political Science at the Hebrew University, also served as Director-General of the Israeli Foreign Ministry in Yitzhak Rabin’s Government. Q: Do you believe this Gaza initiative is a genuine endeavor by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to carry out unilateral disengagement from Palestinian areas? A: “It certainly looks like this. Nobody knows motivations and I am unable to read the tea leaves. But there's no doubt that in the last year or so Sharon has moved gingerly, but surely in this direction. It started with his talks about having to make ‘painful concessions’; he referred to the Israeli rule on the West Bank and Gaza as an occupation that has to end—not the usual language used by Likud people… [U]ntil now we have had some words, some planning…but the ultimate test will be implementation. But I think the way is very clear. Q: In your assessment, is the unilateral disengagement plan going to be able to pass through the Knesset and the Government—does Sharon have a good chance of that? A: “I guess yes… One of the things that has characterized Israeli public debate in the last years, if you wish—decades—are two varieties of how to bring Palestinians to negotiations. The doves—and I'm oversimplifying—the doves say that 'if you make the Palestinians a decent offer, this is the end of the conflict, they will accept it'. And the hawks thought, ‘if you hit them hard enough on the head, they'll cave in.’ “Both have proven to be wrong: at Camp David in the year 2000, Israel made a offer which is certainly the most generous offer it has ever made, and in return it got the claim for the 'Right of Return' and the Intifada. And whatever brutal measures we have taken haven't really put an end to Palestinian resistance and really haven't brought them to a meaningful negotiating posture vis a vis Israel. “So people who would criticize the unilateral disengagement—and it can be easily criticized—have to say, 'what would you do instead.' For 37-40 years Israel has done nothing and has basically 'waited for Godot.' This suggests another option and the burden is on those who oppose it to say what would be their more practical, doable and reasonable option. Q: What—if any—are the alternative in the present circumstances? A: “…all the alternatives up until now have failed: force has failed, Camp David 2000 has also failed. So it's not exactly an accident that Sharon—who comes from the more hawkish side of Israeli politics—finding himself now in the situation where he has to make decisions, has realized—and that's my way of reading the situation—that something has to be done… Q: What happens to the Roadmap Plan? A: “The issue here is if there is any other reasonable option at the moment. There may be people who may think one may do something with the Roadmap, but for the Roadmap you need a partner. It's pretty obvious that we don't have a partner. There may be other people who think that [the] Geneva [Accord] may be an option. Without going into the details—they're so totally impractical—…any reasonable person will realize that this is totally utopian… I have personally supported unilateral disengagement for years, being convinced that there is no partner at the moment. “Unilateral disengagement has really a twofold agenda: On one hand it is trying to put, as much as possible, an end to the Israeli occupation of the Palestinians… On the other hand, it is the only reasonable way Israel can put a stop to suicide bombing… For that you need a unilateral disengagement, for that you need to make it difficult, if not impossible for them to get into Israel. “To have a meaningful barrier, you need to take down some settlements, and the settlements in the Gaza Strip are an obvious case—and as Sharon has said—they are not going to remain under Israeli rule.” Q: Will this be considered a surrender to terror—as perceived here and among Palestinians vis a vis the Lebanon withdrawal in May 2000? A: “I think there's a basic difference, because Lebanon was an adventure. Here you’re dealing with an Israeli attempt to find partners, and Israel has gone out of its way, both in Oslo and later in Camp David, to offer what—to reasonable people I think—looks like a fair offer. And it was rejected, mainly because on the Palestinian side there is no willingness to accept Israel as a Jewish State. “Now, the present situation really means that we have given the Palestinians a veto on how we're going to live, how we're going to behave and what the nature of a Jewish and democratic state is going to be. We have to make some decisions and they are going to be some hard decisions…Any reasonable person can see that in the end, Israel cannot rule 3.5 million Palestinians. The fact that the Palestinians are violently against unilateral disengagement suggests who is going to be the winner. Israel is going to be the winner, not the Palestinians, that's why I am so positive.” Q: Speaking of violence, if Israel can at the present time barely stop the smuggling of arms into Gaza by tunnels and by sea, how are they going to do it when they are almost completely out of the Gaza Strip? A: “The question is not what's happening in Gaza—Israel cannot stop smuggling in Gaza…[or] the West Bank. The question is whether it will be possible for people to move from Gaza into Israel. The fact is that when you look at the whole series of suicide bombings and suicide bombing attempts in the last three years, all of them—with the exception of perhaps one—came from the West Bank, where there is no border. None of them came from Gaza. Whatever arms are smuggled into Gaza cannot be used by suicide bombers trying to get into Israel, because there is a barrier. Some of those weapons may be used against the Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip—that's a different story. “The major issue in terms of the ability of Israel to live more or less a normal life has to do with stopping suicide bombers… And the only way of stopping them is at a border. We have a border with Egypt, …with Syria, …with Lebanon; the only area where we do not have a border is the one from which the murderers are coming. And just like after 9/11 the United States and all the Western countries changed their border policies, we have to do the same.” Q: If there is a Gaza withdrawal, will there likely be an increase or decrease of attacks against Israelis which emanate from the West Bank? A: “It depends if there’s going to be a [security] barrier on the West Bank… Out of 3.5 million people, you will always find hundreds, if not thousands, who are ready to kill themselves and murder Israelis. The question of whether they’ll succeed or…not has nothing to do with their motivation. It has to do with their ability to carry it out, and this is almost exclusively dependent on their ability to get into Israel. The suicide-bomber last week in Jerusalem was able to get [into Israel] from Bethlehem because there is no border. From Gaza, it’s very difficult to get to Ashkelon, Ashdod, or Beer-Sheva. Q: What impact do you foresee a move in Gaza having on relations with the Palestinians? A: “I don’t think it makes any difference… The Palestinians had, at Camp David, an historic opportunity, just as they had in 1947-1948, when the UN suggested the partition of British Palestine into two states. They rejected it then, and they had another opportunity in the year 2000, and they blew it. I think the Palestinians are, unfortunately, their own worst enemies. They’re bringing misery to themselves, and also obviously to ourselves. They have shown that in the total absolutism of trying not to accept the end of armed conflict, not to accept Israel, they’re hurting themselves. What will happen to the Palestinians in the future is an outcome of their unwillingness to…negotiate meaningfully on terms acceptable even to even more moderate Israelis.” Q: Is the Road Map dead? A: “I think the Road Map is dead. The Road Map was dead on arrival. Not because it wasn’t well-intentioned. It was very well-intentioned. But I think it overlooked two very basic issues. “If you look very carefully at the Road Map, it’s not a Road Map, it’s a wish-list. It suggested what the United States, and many people in the West and Israel would have liked to see… “And if you look at why the Road Map was dead on arrival, you could see that it wasn’t even able to start its first step. It got bogged down on details where the United States wasn’t able to get all its power into the act. The President of the United States can’t deal on a daily basis personally with the Middle East for three years… “And it was totally unrealistic for another reason. If you look at similar conflicts that have characterized the last decade—Cyprus, Kosovo, Bosnia—in none of them is there an attempt to have a Road Map to a final-status solution. What you have in those cases are stop-gap measures… The only place where people think you can find a final solution in two months or two years is the Middle East. This is totally unrealistic, totally utopian. One has to lower one’s sight from conflict resolution to conflict management. And this is what the international community has done with relative success in Bosnia, Kosovo… “Therefore, unilateral disengagement is in this department, and therefore I think it certainly has a better chance than anything else that has been tried until now. Everything else has already failed… Q: What is Europe’s role? A: “I don’t expect the international community will be enthusiastic about unilateral disengagement, for obvious reasons. However, if it will work, the international community will accept it… If the violence de-escalates, as I think it would de-escalate if there’s unilateral disengagement, the pressure by the international community will lessen." Q: What about the Palestinians’ attempts to internationalize the conflict? A: “Well the Palestinians have tried to internationalize it, but I think it’s totally irrelevant. “…The Europeans were not able to put their own house together, to write a constitution, to work out a common foreign and security policy… So the Europeans don’t have the wherewithal to offer a realistic solution. They can write papers. They can preach sermons to both sides, probably more to the Israelis than to the Palestinians. But they can’t offer a workable alternative, and if one doesn’t offer a workable alternative, ultimately you shut up. And the Europeans, eventually, will shut up." Regarding ramifications on Israeli politics A: “Nobody knows what the next few weeks and months will mean for the internal Israeli political scene. It will, of course, depend on how seriously Sharon goes ahead. “But I think there’s a possibility that there will be a government reshuffle. I can imagine a situation in which, if Sharon goes ahead with what he has suggested, some of his right-wing coalition partners will leave… “We may see a situation in which Labor will give Sharon the necessary parliamentary support from outside the government, but I don’t want to rule out the possibility that, in the end, we may end up with a coalition in which Labor or part of Labor will be part of the government. I’m not sure it’s necessary or advisable, but I don’t want to rule it out." Shabbat shalom to our readers Volume IV, No. 805 • Thursday, February 5, 2004 WITHDRAWING FROM
GAZA WILL BACKFIRE I must confess that if I were an Israeli soldier serving in the Gaza Strip—or the parent of such a soldier—I would have been thrilled at Monday's announcement by Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon that he intends to evacuate the 17 Israeli settlements in the Gaza Strip. Yes, an Israeli withdrawal is a sensible move from a security perspective in terms of saving human life in the strip, but alas, in broader strategic terms, it is a mistake for Israel. The relocation of the 7,500 settlers will make it easier for Israel to draw a line in the sand and re-enforce its security fence that runs the entire length of the Gaza Strip and which, to a large degree, has prevented attacks on Israelis being mounted from there. So successful has this fence been that attacks on Israelis by Palestinian groups based in the Gaza Strip have been confined to attacks on Israeli settlers or soldiers within the Gaza area. In strategic terms, however, one is reminded of Israel's last unilateral withdrawal that took place from Lebanon. At the time, several Israeli generals criticized the rapid withdrawal because it gave the impression that if Israel's enemies can make its life intolerable in disputed lands, the political leadership (under public pressure) will order a unilateral withdrawal. The Palestinian leadership was quick to pick up on this point. Though few are brave enough to say it, the price for the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon was the Palestinian Intifada, with Yasser Arafat and his cohorts believing Israel can be driven out of the West Bank and Gaza Strip by force. Mr. Sharon is acutely aware of this linkage and has attempted to mask this weakness by stating that the withdrawal will take up to two years to complete. Nobody believes this nonsense. Not even his deputy, Ehud Olmert, who let the cat out of the bag by stating on Israeli television the withdrawal was part of Israeli's disengagement plan and will be complete by the end of this summer. Arafat will no doubt portray any Israeli withdrawal as the first great victory for Palestinian forces over the Zionists. In short, Sharon's moves will inflame the Palestinian violence—not reduce it as hoped. After Gaza we can almost imagine Arafat chanting in Howard Dean fashion, "Next we'll take Hebron, then we'll win in Jerusalem." So why is Sharon, who is not known as a gambler when it comes to national security, rolling the dice?
Here there are two major reasons: the continuing violence and his own political position. A report by the Israeli internal security agency, Sinn Beth (Shabak) published last week predicted if Arafat stays in charge, Palestinian violence will continue through 2006 and into 2007. It also concluded there could be an escalation of the violence with an increased threat that Palestinian terrorist groups will use a dirty bomb (chemical) against Israeli targets. This would no doubt lead to massive Israeli retaliation and a heightened risk of a regional war. Sharon wants the effective border in place in Gaza, as well as the West Bank, to help prevent attacks. The Sinn Beth report outlined how important the West Bank fence has been in preventing attacks. The fence, they argue, has led to Palestinian groups having to involve more people in the organization of suicide attacks. This has allowed Israel—which is now busy recruiting Palestinian informants—to break up many groups before the bomber enters an Israeli city or town. Sharon's argument is that he clearly does not want Israelis to live outside the fence, be it in the West Bank or in Gaza. A sound argument, but not when the evacuation of the settlers beyond the fences will present Arafat with a public victory of sorts. Politically, Sharon wants the Labour party in the government serving as a safety net for both his peace-making polices and his own personafate. On Monday night, he survived a vote of confidence on the Gaza withdrawal by one vote in the Knesset, but the days of this coalition are numbered. Having Labour in the coalition could also help take the political heat away from the corruption scandal that surrounds the Sharon family at present. On a superficial level, an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza appears a logical move, and will no doubt be welcomed by both diplomats and commentators alike, but it should not take the form of a unilateral withdrawal. Yes, leave Gaza but not before a political agreement is reached with the Palestinians. Egyptian President Abdul Gamal Nasser was famed for making political capital out of Israeli political mistakes—despite heavy Egyptian military defeats. Arafat is no Nasser, but it will not take much effort on the part of the Palestinian propaganda machine to portray an Israeli withdrawal as a great Palestinian victory. (Neill Lochery is director of the Centre for Israeli Studies at University College, London.) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ISRAEL'S
GIFT TO A TERRORIZED WORLD The BBC recently invited me to a panel discussion on the subject "Is Israel Losing Its Soul?" Cynics can be forgiven for noting a certain improvement in the network's attitude toward Israel, by assuming that Israel still has a soul to lose. Unfortunately, I couldn't make the debate, but…here's what I would have said: "Before dissecting the flawed soul of Israel, I'd suggest we discuss the collective soul of Palestine and, by extension, of the Arab world. Israel, after all, was ready to become the first country in history to voluntarily withdraw from its historic heartland and share sovereignty over its capital city. By contrast, Palestinian society has become prisoner of a death cult that celebrates mass murderers as religious martyrs and educational role models. And, unlike the Israeli soul, which is torn over the price we must pay for self-preservation, the Palestinian soul shows few signs of remorse for its culture of national suicide." No country's soul has been more severely tested than Israel's. Only Israel has faced terrorism from its creation; only Israel confronts an enemy that considers its existence an offense. The vitality of our soul is tested daily in the intensity of our dilemmas. How do we reduce humiliation at the roadblocks while controlling an enemy that uses ambulances to smuggle explosives belts? Which is the more moral decision—to kill Hamas leaders along with innocent Palestinians or allow mass murderers to escape and risk the lives of innocent Israelis? How do we maintain basic human sympathy for Palestinian suffering without encouraging Palestinian self-pity and avoidance of blame for creating this disaster? Not all our answers to those and other challenges have been wise. Sometimes we yield to immoral power, sometimes to immoral weakness. Still, it is our struggle for balance between security and morality that is a sign of the vitality of the Israeli soul. In the global war against terror, Israel is humanity's laboratory for testing the limits of a democracy under permanent siege. The value of that experiment is ignored by Israel's foreign critics. But not only by them. Our own ideologues of left and right demand a simplistic resolution of the tension between security and morality. Dogmatic leftists—like the Israeli human rights activists who petitioned the international court against the security fence—perceive the Palestinians as a benign minority merely seeking freedom, rather than as part of a regional majority that wants to uproot us and denies the legitimacy of our being. For their part, dogmatic rightists despise the democratic norms we've imposed on ourselves and want nothing more than to be freed of those constraints. In measuring the state of our soul in the war against terrorism, I would suggest two criteria. The first is our ability to withstand terrorist blackmail. That is not only a tactical but a moral necessity. If Israel surrenders—for example, if we negotiate substantive political issues under terrorist fire—then terrorists everywhere will be encouraged to persist. If Israeli society can be broken, terrorists will realize, then any society can be broken. The fact that we haven't surrendered to a terrorist assault intended to atomize Israeli society by frightening us away from our public spaces is Israel's gift to a terrorized world. Arguably no other Western nation could have withstood the sustained atrocity assault we've endured over the last three years and still remain basically intact. In a recent article decrying what he called a "failed Israeli society," former Knesset speaker Avraham Burg wrote, "Israel, having ceased to care about the children of the Palestinians, should not be surprised when they come washed in hatred and blow themselves up in the centers of Israeli escapism." In fact, our ability to maintain those "centers of Israeli escapism" and refuse to be intimidated is proof of our moral health. Burg ends his eulogy for Israel by appealing to Israel's friends abroad to help us once again become a light to the nations. But that's precisely what we've been during these last three years, even if much of the West and some on the Israeli left don't realize it. When we weigh our tactics in the war against terrorism, the psychological impact on terrorists should be a central consideration of our decision-making. By that measure, the prisoner exchange agreement between Israel and Hizbollah, which frees hundreds of terrorists and rewards kidnapping, is immoral. Not surprisingly, Hizbollah leader Nassrallah boasted, just after the exchange was announced, that he would now initiate additional kidnappings of Israelis. President Moshe Katzav's declaration that he was ready to pay "any price" for the return of Ron Arad was likewise an immoral psychological empowerment of terror. The question of unilateral withdrawal is not just a political but a moral dilemma. Ehud Barak's Lebanon withdrawal, on the eve of final status negotiations with the Palestinians at Camp David in 2000, only encouraged the Palestinians to "learn to speak Lebanese" as some Palestinians put it at the time. The current terrorist war is, to some extent, a result of Barak's flight from Lebanon. These days, a single terrorist attack can produce as many casualties as Israel suffered in a year of combat in Lebanon. That is the price of surrender. If the Sharon government wants to ensure that unilateral withdrawal from Gaza and parts of Judea and Samaria won't empower terrorism, it needs to balance withdrawal with a tough message to the Arab world. Annexing those parts of the territories still in our possession after withdrawal, for example, would make the point that terrorism exacts a price not only on the society that is targeted but also on the society that encourages it. The second criterion for judging the state of Israel's soul is the vitality of our democratic institutions and culture. We note with justifiable pride that Israel is the Middle East's only democracy. But that's not just a debating point against Arab propagandists: it also imposes responsibility. As the sole Middle East democracy at a time of radical transition for the region, the responsibility to be an example of democracy under stress is even more acute. Yes, it is maddening to see Mustafa Dirani, who sold Ron Arad to the Iranians, appear in an Israeli court to sue for six million shekels in compensation for abuse he claimed he endured under interrogation. But decisively resolving the unbearable tension inherent in our war against terror, in favor of either an absolutist human rights agenda or an absolutist security agenda, would destroy the essence of Israel's soul, which is the ability to sustain paradox. (Yossi Klein Halevi is a contributing editor and Israel correspondent for The New Republic and an associate fellow of the Shalem Center in Jerusalem.) Volume IV, No. 804 • Wednesday, February 4, 2004 WEDNESDAY’S “NEWS IN REVIEW” ROUND-UP WEEKLY QUOTES “I will give the [international] court a written opinion to the effect that we consider that it’s not time for the court to take this as a legal question. It’s better that it remains for the discussions between the parties, as mandated by the [UN] Security Council.”—Bill Graham, Canada’s Foreign Affairs Minister, speaking to reporters regarding the Martin government’s position that the International Court of Justice should not hear arguments on Israel’s anti-terrorist fence. The UN General Assembly voted 90-8, with 74 abstentions, in favour of the motion that the ICJ should hear case. The U.S., Israel, Australia, Ethiopia and four Pacific island states oppose the resolution. Other countries now supporting Israel’s position include the Netherlands, Senegal, Cameroon, Russia, Germany and South Africa. (Nat’l Post, Jan. 31) “The World Jewish Congress is now launching an international campaign involving every Jewish Community…to persuade governments to press for the carrying of a resolution on [antisemitism] at the UN. We intend resurrecting [sic] the resolution condemning antisemitism that was initially promoted by the Irish Government at the General Assembly, and subsequently withdrawn under pressure from the Arab bloc… Our primary objective will obviously be to promote the passage of the resolution condemning antisemitism at the United Nations. But should that fail, we would at least identify those purportedly respectable governments who refuse to condemn bigotry directed against the Jewish people and expose the UN as a body unfit to provide moral leadership. We regard this campaign as the first major Jewish global counterattack designed to stem and ultimately reverse the tide.”—Isi Leibler, senior vice president of the World Jewish Congress. (Jerusalem Post, Jan. 27) “I am working on the assumption that in the future there will be no Jews in Gaza. It is my intention to carry out an evacuation—sorry, a relocation—of settlements that cause us problems and of places that we will not hold onto anyway in a final settlement, like the Gaza settlements.”—P.M. Ariel Sharon in a supposedly off-the-record interview with Ha’aretz correspondent Yoel Marcus, detailing the plan to evacuate 17 Gaza settlements and move the 7,500 residents living there into the State of Israel. (New York Times, Jer. Post, Feb. 3; Ha’aretz, Feb 4) “This terrorist attack is the best argument we can use to defend the sacred right of Israel to exercise legitimate self-defence. No institution or country can give us lessons in morality in regard to the fence after the scenes of horror in Jerusalem.”—Israeli spokesman Raanan Gissin, following the horrific bus bombing that killed 10 passengers and wounded 50. (National Post, Jan. 30) “…I reflected on the horrendous attack that took place in Jerusalem this morning, and…condemn it thoroughly. Once again, terrorists have killed innocent people, and…they have struck a blow once more against the aspirations of the Palestinian people to have a homeland of their own. This kind of action has got to stop, and I once again implore the Palestinian leaders, and especially Prime Minister Abu Ala, to do everything in his power…to ostracize these terrorists, to go after them… It’s time to end the terror, and the Palestinian leadership has to realize this and face it…”—Secretary of State, Colin Powell. (Press Release, U.S. Department of State, Jan. 29) “The [Palestinian] factions will not spare any effort to kidnap Israeli soldiers. And they tried many times, but the Israeli soldier today is as cautious as a bird is about its chick.”—Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, speaking to reporters outside a mosque after Friday’s Muslim prayers in the wake of Israel’s prisoner swap with Hizbullah. Responding to Yassin’s threat, Israel’s Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz declared, “The statements of Yassin just emphasize the need to strike the heads of Hamas and the Islamic Jihad. (BBC, Jan. 30; A.P., Feb. 2) “In exchange for one rogue Israeli civilian captured while possibly engaging in dubious transactions, plus the remains of three soldiers, Israel released 429 terrorists and criminals…a major decision of state was taken for the sake of bringing small solace to three families. But what are the strategic consequences for Israel…? [M]any of those 429 will again engage in terrorism against Israel… The lopsided deal signals Israel's enemies that they can extract huge benefits by taking even just one civilian Israeli hostage... Hostage-taking looks like a more effective tactic than it did a week earlier. These many negative consequences raise questions about the morality of this Israeli government action. When will the descent stop? By then, how much damage will have been done?”—Daniel Pipes, Director of the Middle East Forum. (New York Sun, Feb. 3) “We in Iraq have seen Saddam Hussein develop, manufacture and use these weapons against us with impunity. The system of hiding, of concealment was very sophisticated in Iraq. So I really believe some of those weapons could be found.”—Iraqi F.M. Hoshyar Zebari’s comments came after the top U.S. weapons expert, David Kay, confirmed that he found no trace of chemical or biological stockpiles in Iraq. Meanwhile, U.S. troops in Baghdad found a seven-pound block of the deadly cyanide salt in what they believe to be Iraqi poison specialist Abu Musab Zarqawi’s safe house. Coalition forces have not yet found Zarqawi, whom officials believe has strong ties not only to the former Iraqi regime but also to terrorist groups such as Al Qaeda and Ansar al-Islam. (A.P., Jan. 30; Fox News, Feb. 3) “We are talking
about a regime [Syria] that is one of the last political dinosaurs of
the 20th century…a rigid dictatorship that is unable to change
from within… Terror is a basic element in Syria's policy toward
Israel. It is the most substantial component in the Syrian regime's
modus operandi. A dictatorship that oppresses its own people does not
know how to behave differently with its external enemies. We should
have no hesitation in setting, as a precondition, that Syria immediately
dismantle the terror infrastructures on its territory, cooperate in
dismantling Hizbullah, and immediately stop supporting anti-Israeli,
Palestinian and other terror organizations. Meanwhile the Syrians must
enter upon a pattern of normative, humane behavior. They should immediately
return to Israel the body of hero Eli Cohen and solve the problem of
the MIAs… “...When a story is challenged, news organizations must investigate seriously. The BBC could have spared itself humiliation and resignations if it had asked Mr. Gilligan some tough questions, examined his notes intelligently and responded as required. Instead, it bobbed and weaved and puffed out its chest... The atmosphere around the Iraq war was as highly charged as any I've seen. It is hard to believe that the judgments of an anti-war BBC were not infected by general anger at the British government. You can be right in principle and wrong on the facts... But reporting is an exercise in facts. And Mr. Gilligan's facts didn't stand up to scrutiny. An untruth told in the service of a (supposed) truth is not journalism; it is sophistry...”—Edward Greenspoon, Editor-in-chief of the Globe and Mail, a Toronto daily. (Globe and Mail, Jan. 31) SHORT TAKES ISRAELI RIGHTS GROUPS JOIN ANTI-FENCE CASE—(Jerusalem) Ten Israeli human rights organizations and peace activist groups operating in the West Bank issued a detailed statement opposing the security fence. The declaration, which the Palestinians will use when the International Court of Justice reviews the legality of the fence, challenges the Israeli government’s defense of the fence. Signatories include Gush Shalom, Bat Shalom, the Israel Committee Against House Demolitions and Yesh Gvul. Other groups, such as Peace Now, B’Tselem, Ta’ayush and the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, refused to sign the open letter. (Ha’aretz, Jan. 28) BRIBERY IN THE WEST BANK—(Jerusalem) Authorities arrested five Israeli soldiers who confessed to taking bribes from Palestinians at a checkpoint near the West Bank city of Ramallah. The Qalandia checkpoint is the main crossing from the northern West Bank into Jerusalem. The soldiers accepted money, food and drugs and, in exchange, allowed Palestinians in and out of the city. (New York Post, Feb. 3) PALESTINIAN GENEVA ACCORD GROUP INVITED TO KNESSET—(Jerusalem) A group of Palestinian signatories of the Geneva Accord received an invitation to the Knesset to participate in a conference entitled “There’s Someone to Talk To.” Labor MK Ophir Pines-Paz and former MK Yossi Beilin will host the event. Knesset Speaker Reuven Rivlin approved the conference on the condition that no Palestinian convicted of security violations or wanted by the Shin Bet participates. He did not, however, support the event, explaining “this is not an official Knesset event, but it is an event a member of Knesset is allowed to hold.” (Ha’aretz, Jan. 28) PA USES MICROSOFT MUSIC IN NEW HATE VIDEO—(Jerusalem) The Palestinian Authority incorporated the music from Halo, a popular Microsoft video game, into its newest hate video. This video shows still photos of Palestinian children and superimposes targets on them to create the impression that they are being shot. Microsoft insisted that it never gave the PA permission to use the Halo soundtrack but gave no indication that it would take action to have its music removed from the video. (Palestinian Media Watch Bulletin, Feb. 2) SYRIAN REJECTS “ZIONIST” AWARD—(Damascus) Syrian cartoonist Raed Khalil rejected a UN Correspondents Association award because it pays tribute to a renowned Israeli cartoonist, Ranan Lurie. “As a matter of principle, I refuse to accept an award linked to a Zionist Israeli no matter under whose patronage it was,” he declared. “There is no honor in it for me. Most of my cartoons are against Israel and Israeli policies.” (N.Y.T., Jan. 27) PAKISTANI SCIENTIST POINTS FINGER AT RULING ELITE—(Islamabad) Abdul Qadeer Khan, the founder of Pakistan’s nuclear program, confessed to supplying rogue states with nuclear technology. He told investigators that the country’s ruling military elite, and Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, knew that he funneled nuclear secrets to Iran, Libya and North Korea. However, army spokesman Major-General Shaukat Sultan dismissed allegations that Musharraf had any such knowledge. (Globe and Mail, Feb. 4) SADDAM TO GO SPECIAL COURT—(Baghdad) Ousted Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein will appear before a special court being set up by the U.S.-appointed Governing Council in Iraq. Asked whether Saddam cooperated with investigators, U.S. administrator Paul Bremer replied, “he is not cooperating, but he is not a troublemaker either.” Documents found on Saddam and information obtained during his interrogation are helping troops track some of the fourteen cells of Saddam loyalists operating in Baghdad. Meanwhile, Iraqi leaders launched an investigation to determine if Saddam bribed politicians and institutions in forty-six countries, including senior officials in France, India and Bulgaria, and even the Russian Orthodox Church. (N.Y.P., Jan. 29; Agence-France Presse, Jan. 31; AOL News, Feb.1) IRAN’S TOP REFORM PARTY TO BOYCOTT ELECTIONS—(Tehran) Iran’s leading reform party plans to boycott the upcoming parliamentary election. The Islamic Iran Participation Front, headed by Iranian President Mohammad Khatami’s brother Mohammed Reza Khatami, reached this decision after more than a third of the Parliament resigned in protest over a ban on hundreds of reformist candidates. With the Islamic Iran Participation Front out of the running, religious conservatives stand a good chance of regaining control of the Parliament. (N.Y.T., Feb. 3) ANNAN STATEMENT SILENT ON SUICIDE BOMBING—(United Nations) Israel criticized UN Secretary General Kofi Annan for issuing a statement that failed to mention the January 29th suicide bombing in Jerusalem. Dan Gillerman, Israel’s ambassador to the UN, warned that UN “indifference” to Palestinian terrorism undermines efforts to achieve peace. Annan’s statement, released after the attack that killed ten Israelis and wounded more than 50, condemned those who resort to “violence and terror” and pleaded with Israelis and Palestinians to resume peace talks, but made no mention of this most recent bombing. (A.P., Jan. 31) SURGE IN FRENCH ANTISEMITISM DRIVES JEWS TO SETTLE IN ISRAEL—(Paris) Rising antisemitism in France prompted a surge in the number of French Jews immigrating to Israel. Last year, 2,380 French Jews made aliyah and 2,556 the year before whereas, in the 1990s, only about 800 French Jews settled in Israel each year. French PM Jean-Pierre Raffarin intends to curtail antisemitic television broadcasts coming from the Middle East by fining satellite operators who distribute anti-Jewish programs. Meanwhile, last week, the directors of Paris’ Sorbonne University received antisemitic death threats in which the author vowed to kill staff members if the university welcomed Israeli President Moshe Katsav, who is scheduled to receive an honorary doctorate on February 17. (London Daily Telegraph, Jan. 29; J.T.A., Jan. 31; Reuters, Feb. 2) Volume IV, No. 803 • Tuesday, February 3, 2004 A FENCE BUILT
FOR PEACE Later this month, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague will offer an advisory opinion on Israel's security fence, following a request from the UN general assembly. That request puts under threat the fundamental values and founding principles of the UN itself, and puts at risk the independent non-political nature of the ICJ… The court must reject this attempt to exploit its mandate for political objectives and instead protect the legitimacy…of the institution and the goals of the Palestinian-Israeli peace process… …[T]he request for a "legal opinion" is blatantly prejudicial. It makes no reference to Palestinian terrorism and incitement, nor to the total failure of the Palestinian leadership to fulfil its internationally recognised commitment to dismantle the infrastructure of terrorism. After over 19,000 terrorist attacks, over 900 dead and thousands more wounded, Israel started to build a defensive anti-terrorist fence… The general assembly request recalls the famous observation of Abba Eban that "if Algeria introduced a resolution declaring that the earth was flat and that Israel had flattened it, it would pass by a vote of 164 to 13 with 26 abstentions". …Israel is not averse to discussion or debate regarding the impact of the fence on the Palestinian population. We have no desire to cause hardship. Indeed…passageways and agricultural gates to allow for easier movement…have been adapted, based on consultation within Israel and with the local population… Every Palestinian who is affected by the fence has a right of direct appeal to Israel's supreme court. There has been a longstanding effort to hijack the agendas of the UN political and humanitarian organs. The 2003 general assembly saw 19 anti-Israel resolutions… This stands in stark contrast to the failure of the very same assembly to muster a majority for resolutions to protect the Israeli child against terrorism… The Palestinians have enlisted multiple forums to rule on the issues that must be negotiated. This time it is the ICJ whose mandate they seek to exploit. The international community must say no… The international community must protect the integrity of international institutions…founded to safeguard the rights of the citizens of the community of nations. The Palestinians are shirking the commitments they have repeatedly undertaken since the peace process began in 1993. We cannot allow their destructive behaviour to damage the ICJ. This was expressed by President Truman at the creation of the [UN]: "…if we seek to use it selfishly—for the advantage of one nation or any small group of nations—we shall be equally guilty of…betrayal." (Silvan Shalom is Israel's foreign minister and deputy prime minister) ______________________________________________________ THE
UN AND THE JEWS It was not an event that any of the big newspapers saw fit to cover, but this past December, a draft United Nations resolution condemning anti-Semitism was quietly withdrawn by Ireland… In a complicated exchange, Irish Foreign Minister Brian Cowen had promised the measure to his Israeli counterpart Silvan Shalom, but in the end Cowen refused to carry out his side of the bargain, pointing to a lack of consensus on the issue. (Several Arab and Muslim states had objections.) Thus went by the boards what would have been the first-ever General Assembly resolution dealing directly with the problem of anti-Semitism. And thus, too, has gone much else at the UN in the name of human rights… Even when judged against the hypocrisy with which the UN has frequently treated its own founding principles—principles of tolerance, human dignity, and national self-determination—the international body’s abiding hostility to the just claims of Israel and the Jewish people remains a special, and especially egregious, case… Not until 1959, when some 2,000 anti-Jewish incidents, ranging from serious property damage to threats of bodily harm, were reported in almost 40 countries…did the UN’s Commission on Human Rights pass a resolution titled “Manifestations of Anti-Semitism and Other Forms of Racial Prejudice and Religious Intolerance of a Similar Nature.” By the time the resolution reached the floor of the General Assembly, however, the term “anti-Semitism” had been dropped…When, in 1964-65, the American delegation (with the assistance of Brazil) tried to include a reference to anti-Semitism in the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, the effort failed, thanks to the Soviet Union, its satellites, and its Arab allies, who among other things insisted that anti-Semitism was a question not of race but of religion. When the UN finally got around to adopting its first declaration on religious intolerance in 1981, anti-Semitism was again excluded. By 2003, the lead sponsor of the perennial resolution on religious tolerance, Ireland, insisted with a straight face that anti-Semitism should be omitted because it was more properly considered under the rubric of race… By the summer of 2001, at the now notorious UN World Conference Against Racism in Durban, South Africa, the notion that Jews were the target of any special animus, now or in the past, was being treated with simple contempt. References to anti-Semitism were removed from almost all parts of the final declaration… The only references to the Holocaust and anti-Semitism appeared as part of a “Middle East package” in which Palestinians were declared to be victims of Israeli racism. And what of today, as we experience the world’s most virulent outbreak of anti-Semitic deeds and speech in over a half-century? Concern over this phenomenon did make an appearance, however fleetingly, in two reports issued in 2003 by the UN special investigator on racism, Doudou Diéne. In one of them, his comment consisted of a short, vague reference to the controversy surrounding the recent broadcast on Egyptian television of a series based on the infamous czarist forgery, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. Unnamed “authorities of the countries concerned,” Diéne wrote, were in the process of sending him further information on this “allegation” of anti-Semitism. In a second report published last year, …Diéne offered a seemingly new approach, promising to turn his attention to the “clear resurgence of anti-Semitism.” But his only action to date has been to take note of the obvious fact that attacks on Jews are “on the rise in Europe, Central Asia, and North America.” … This indifference to anti-Semitism has been mirrored by the UN’s growing refusal over the decades to support the principle of self-determination for the Jewish people… The irony, of course, is that the UN General Assembly was very much present at the creation of the state of Israel, having endorsed the postwar partition plan for British-ruled Palestine… In general, and in the abstract, the UN has remained committed to the ideal of self-governing nation-states… Where the UN has fallen markedly short is in the application of these principles, and in no case more strikingly than that of Israel… In 1975 the UN General Assembly passed its notorious resolution explicitly equating Zionism with racism. Ever since then, and notwithstanding the formal repeal of the resolution in 1991, the repellent imagery of Israelis as racists has been a staple of UN rhetoric. Today, diplomats from Arab and Muslim states—states that effectively rendered themselves Judenrein in the late 1940’s—refer to Israel’s new security fence against terrorism as an “apartheid wall.”… To judge by the UN’s official pronouncements, the Jewish state is the world’s archetypal human rights villain. Over the past 40 years, almost 30 percent of the resolutions passed by the UN Commission on Human Rights to condemn specific states have been directed at Israel… As for the General Assembly, of the ten emergency special sessions it has convened…six have focused on the purported misdeeds of Israel, from the Suez campaign of 1956 to the current dispute over the security fence. The abuse of this process has gone so far that the tenth session, originally convened in 1997, has become a permanent, open-ended forum; it has now been “reconvened” twelve times, most recently this past December… The UN’s response to an Israeli military incursion into the West Bank town of Jenin in April 2002 typifies the organization’s treatment of the Jewish state. At the time, even a report by Yasir Arafat’s Fatah movement recognized Jenin as “the suicider’s capital,” a place where organizations like Hamas and Islamic Jihad had sought shelter, among civilians… But the UN saved its venom for Israel’s armed response to the violence directed against its citizens. Terje Roed-Larsen, the organization’s special coordinator for the Middle East peace process, described the scene after Israel’s strike—a strike expressly designed to limit civilian casualties—as “horrific beyond belief.” Peter Hansen, commissioner general of the UN Relief and Works Agency, called it “a human catastrophe that had few parallels in recent history.” …Only much later, in mid-summer, did the UN Secretary General release a report on Jenin noting that the Palestinian death toll from this “massacre” was 52, approximately 35 of whom were armed combatants… The justifications that are typically given for turning a blind eye to human-rights violations in 95 percent of UN states are predictable enough. In 2003, teaming up to defeat a resolution condemning Russian behavior in Chechnya, Syria and China called it “interference in the internal affairs of that country.” India said that “every state had the right to protect its citizens from terrorism.”… How is it, one might wonder, that such reservations never give the UN a moment’s pause when it comes to the organization’s relentlessly one-sided prosecution of Israel—a democratic state with an independent judiciary that, unlike all these others, can point to a long and distinguished record of respect for human rights? The demonization of Israel would seem to be about something else entirely. What that something is has become too clear to deny: over the past several decades, the UN has fashioned itself into perhaps the foremost global platform for anti-Semitism. The leading agent of this process…has been the Palestine Liberation Organization, Israel’s supposed “partner in peace,” in close cooperation with Arab and Muslim members of the UN. In presentations to the UN Commission on Human Rights, Palestinian delegates have repeatedly devised new variations on the medieval blood libel, accusing the Israelis of such things as needing to kill Arabs for the proper observance of Yom Kippur and of injecting Palestinian children with HIV-positive blood. …Israelis are now routinely condemned with Nazi terminology—current resolutions speak of the “Judaization” of Jerusalem… The nadir of the UN’s record in these matters was the conference on racism and xenophobia held under its auspices in Durban in 2001… At the conference’s NGO forum, the Arab Lawyer’s Union freely distributed books containing cartoons of swastika-festooned Israelis and fanged, hooked-nosed Jews, blood dripping from their hands. Another best-selling title was The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. Hundreds of flyers were distributed with a picture of Hitler and the words, “What if I had won? The good thing—there would be no Israel.” Appeals to the conference’s secretary-general, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson, to demand the removal of this anti-Semitic literature went unheeded. The NGO forum at Durban did sponsor a single event on anti-Semitism, but it was disrupted by an angry mob of protesters, shouting, “You are killers! You are killers!” … Worse still, organs of the UN have taken to glorifying terrorist violence against Israeli targets. In 2002, John Dugard, a special rapporteur for the Commission on Human Rights, could barely contain his admiration for the murderous enemies of the Jewish state: “…while suicide bombers have created terror in the Israeli heartland, militarized groups armed with rifles, mortars, and Kassam-2 rockets confront the IDF [Israeli army] with new determination, daring, and success.” In 2003, as Israel suffered…waves of attack against its civilians, the commission itself put forward a resolution affirming the legitimacy of suicide bombing, declaring that movements against “foreign occupation and for self-determination” were entitled to “all available means, including armed struggle.” …The American and Canadian delegates protested that the resolution was “contrary to the very concept of human rights” and “deeply repugnant to the commission’s core values.” It carried by a wide margin. It is no accident that a UN apparatus which, for decades, has ignored anti-Semitism and distorted beyond recognition the idea of Zionism would seek to isolate Israel from the global community. At the UN, Israelis and Jews are, by definition, oppressors, as are the nations and organizations that rally to their cause… …[Anti-Semitism] is an out-and-out malignancy, and it has compromised the integrity of the entire organism. Perhaps it is time to stop holding seminars and conferences on whether the UN glass is half-full or half-empty. The contents of the glass have been poisoned. (Anne Bayefsky is a professor of Political Science at York University and an adjunct professor at Columbia University Law School) Volume IV, No. 802 • Monday, February 2, 2004 BLAIR-BBC BATTLE
IS OVER Tony Blair's long public nightmare is over. The chairman of the BBC is toast, and Andrew Gilligan's career is dead. The BBC board of governors is huddled in emergency sessions to deal with Lord Hutton's finding that its editorial system is fundamentally flawed. The war on terror grinds on and on. But not even Mr. Blair could have dreamed that his war against the BBC would end in such a total rout. Who lied? Not he. "The allegation that I or anyone else lied to this House or deliberately misled the country by falsifying intelligence on WMD is itself the real lie," he thundered yesterday. The terms of the Hutton inquiry were actually quite narrow. They were to examine the circumstances surrounding the death of…weapons inspector David Kelly, who either was or wasn't the source for one BBC story by Mr. Gilligan, which claimed that the government had deliberately "sexed up" the case for war… From the start, the inquiry was really a proxy for the bitter fight over the war in Iraq. The BBC (and most of the British press) was on one side, and Prime Minister Tony Blair's government was on the other. During the war, I sometimes tuned in to the BBC for news. One night, I saw Mr. Gilligan broadcasting from Baghdad. He was openly contemptuous of the U.S. military, which he insinuated was dishonest and inept, and he was ridiculing its claim (which was accurate) that it was in the process of securing the Baghdad airport. Later, after Saddam's fall, he told viewers that Baghdadis were experiencing their "first days of freedom in more fear than they have ever known before." Not all the BBC's coverage was so ridiculously skewed. But when critics began calling it the Baghdad Broadcasting Corporation, you couldn't blame them. Long before the story about the sexed-up dossier, BBC news director Richard Sambrook had raised concerns about Mr. Gilligan's reporting. But no one did anything about it… Astonishingly, the outfit that really blew the whistle on the BBC was—the BBC. Last week it aired an exposé of itself, a scathing documentary called A Fight to the Death. In it, veteran journalist John Ware said the broadcaster's executives had made "fatal mistakes" in their handling of the case, and had "bet the farm on a shaky foundation." In one panicky meeting, he reported, BBC director-general Greg Dyke said: "Have we effing got this right, because if we haven't we better go back on it now." Even now, Dr. Kelly's role in this affair is not entirely clear… One thing is clear. He was rather sure Saddam had weapons. The documentary included a previously unaired interview with him in October of 2002, a month after the Prime Minister had made the case for war with his allegedly dodgy dossier. When asked whether there was an "immediate threat" from Iraqi weapons, he replied: "Yes there is. Even if they're not actually filled and deployed today, the capability exists to get them filled and deployed within a matter of days and weeks. So yes, there is a threat." He added that he thought Saddam would be reluctant to use them "in the buildup to war." Separately, in an article published posthumously, he wrote, "The long-term threat remains Iraq's development to military maturity of weapons of mass destruction—something that only regime change will avert." Now we know that Dr. Kelly's first statement was almost surely wrong (although his second was almost surely right). It looks as if Saddam had nothing he could launch in 45 minutes, or even 45 weeks. He was a toothless tyrant. But the war over the war in Iraq isn't really about the facts…or what went wrong with the intelligence, or who believed what when. It's a titanic clash of beliefs, between those who think the war was generally a good thing, and those who think it was rash, or dangerous, or opportunistic, or colonialist, or downright evil. It is not, mainly, about Iraq at all. It is a giant referendum on George Bush and the United States, and on those who chose to stand with them. And of one thing you can be sure: That war won't end any time soon. ______________________________________________________ THE
BBC'S HATRED FOR ISRAEL Those who wonder why Israel was chosen as the state most dangerous to world peace in a recent European poll need only look to the European media. A recent BBC film Israel's Secret Weapons, devoted to exposing Israel as a prime international threat worse than Saddam Hussein, is a prime example of how the European media vilifies Israel… This is not the first time, of course, that the BBC has taken on Israel in an effort to delegitimate it and, as in its previous efforts, it uses all possible means, including lies and distortions. From the beginning of the al-Aksa intifada in 2000, the BBC's reports were routinely skewed in favor of Arafat's terrorist regime… In November 2000 the BBC sank to the nadir of its pathological hatred for Israel… It opened a program about Palestinian children killed in the intifada by presenting as fact…the ancient anti-Semitic calumny of "Herod's massacre of the innocents." Cutting straight from the skull-stuffed crypt…to…a funeral…of an Arab boy "shot through the head"…by Israeli troops, the BBC brazenly drew a straight line connecting an alleged attempt to kill the child Christ to Israel's killing of Palestinian children. Throughout the intifada, the BBC repeated—with no corroborating evidence—the worst Arab fabrications… The many Arabs…on the BBC's talk shows can spread any calumny about Israel and…will never be challenged by BBC hosts… For "balance," the BBC carefully chooses pro-Arab Israelis or some fumbling official from our pitiful foreign ministry. Anyone…capable of mounting an effective rebuttal to the BBC's distortions and lies [is] never…invited to speak. Besides its news broadcasts, the BBC has been devoting…special programs to the task of delegitimizing Israel. A memorable hatchet job—also shown at the Cinematheque—was the Panorama program framing Prime Minister Ariel Sharon as the "real" killer in the Christian Lebanese militia massacre of innocent Palestinians at Sabra and Shatilla. The BBC's "case" was woven from a tissue of lies, distortions, significant omissions, allegations lacking…factual basis, and a sickening animus toward Sharon and Israel. The same malevolent spirit animates Israel's Secret Weapon. The film asks "Which state harbors the most dangerous weapons of mass destruction, refusing to let anyone inspect them?" It portrays Israel as a police state that commits atrocities just like Saddam Hussein's Iraq… When the dishonest Frenkiel asks [Shimon] Peres why Israel should not be treated like Iraq, the outraged Peres responds with "How could you compare, when Saddam killed so many innocent people and used gas against the Iranians and the Kurds?" Olenka's response is "Some do compare."… Israel's Secret Weapon was followed by a panel discussion…. It was heartening to hear how even those who generally criticize Israeli policies from the Left were shocked by the BBC animus and bias… Hebrew University's professor Robert Wistrich, an expert on anti-Semitism, said that "the documentary tries to suggest that Israel is the real rogue regime in the Middle East, an axis of evil, a state more dangerous than Saddam's Iraq. It tells us that Dimona, not Baghdad, should be the target… Such a distorted documentary…can only inflame anti-Israel feelings and antipathy to Jews still further"… But the BBC representative stonewalled…and he refused to address any of the distortions and the lies… In the 1947-8 War of Independence, British policemen and soldiers disarmed Hagana members and then left them among Arab crowds to be cut to pieces. The BBC is trying to do the same to Israel. By portraying it as the worst criminal state and by totally whitewashing Arab dictatorships, especially the gangster-ruled Palestinian Authority—which it casts in the role of the righteous underdog, fighting against oppression—the BBC tries to disarm Israel morally and politically. As the panel discussion indicated, it is no use pleading with the BBC for fairness, decency, or justice. It is determined in its mission. It is time for Israel to recognize who its enemies are and to protect itself from them. (Daniel Doron is president of The Israel Center for Social and Economic Progress) ______________________________________________________ AS
EDITED BY… ‘THE HERALD TRIBUNE’ Anyone puzzled by the vast difference between European and American attitudes toward Israel ought to spend some time comparing… The New York Times and the Paris-based International Herald Tribune. That may seem like an odd statement, since the IHT is owned by the Times and most of its articles are Times reprints… But it turns out that IHT editors often "improve" the Times copy a bit. The adjustments are…sufficient to give the reader a completely different understanding of events. …What sparked the discovery was a piece in the IHT's December 27-28 edition, entitled "Israeli tactics assure future bombings, Palestinians assert" and credited to the Times. The article's main thrust was that the Israel Defense Forces believes its…construction of the separation fence and frequent raids aimed at arresting terrorists and destroying bomb-making facilities has significantly reduced the number of successful attacks. But the article also claimed that the December 25 bombing at the Geha Junction ended a three-month period that "seemed to be a sort of unofficial cease-fire. In that time, Palestinian radical groups carried out no suicide bombings." This struck me as outrageous, since a cease-fire implies that no attacks were attempted—whereas, according to IDF statistics, there were no fewer than 22 attempted suicide bombings during that time, all foiled by Israel's security forces. But when I checked the article on the Times Web site in preparation for an angry letter to that paper, I discovered the following: The Times never referred to this period as a cease-fire. The Times explicitly mentioned that "numerous terror attempts" had been made during this period and were thwarted by Israel; that entire paragraph was cut from the IHT piece. The Times did not say that Palestinians "carried out no suicide bombings," giving the false impression that they attempted none… Moreover, the Times article carried a…far more accurate…headline: "Bombing after lull: Israel still believes the worst is over." The result is that the average Times reader came away with the following impression: Israel's military activity produced three months in which no Israelis were killed, despite "numerous terror attempts." This activity is thus saving Israeli lives, and therefore potentially justifiable. But the IHT reader received the opposite impression: Neither the fence nor the raids were justified, since there was an "unofficial cease-fire" and Palestinians were not committing attacks… Moreover, since no attempts took place during this period, Israel's activity did not save a single life. In short, rather than preventing bombings, Israel is, as the IHT headline asserts, "assuring future bombings" by persecuting the Palestinians for no reason. The IHT later published a letter from me on this subject, but again with crucial distortions. One sentence was cut altogether: "The version of the article that appeared in The New York Times did mention that 'numerous' attempted attacks were thwarted during this period and did not refer to it as a 'cease-fire.'" Another sentence—"according to Israeli army statistics, Palestinians attempted to carry out 22 suicide bombings during this time"—was replaced by "according to one count, Palestinians attempted to carry out more than 20 suicide bombings during this time." Thus the IHT cut both of the sources I cited for my assertion that attacks were attempted… That leaves the reader with the impression that I have no source—I cannot even say according to whose count—and my assertion is therefore not credible. …I have discovered that the IHT often subtly alters Times copy to make its readers dislike Israel more. On January 2…the Times ran an article stating that in 1973, the Nixon administration considered invading three Arab countries "if the [oil] embargo, imposed by Arab nations in retaliation for America's support for Israel in the 1973 Middle East war, did not end." The IHT altered this to state that Nixon planned to invade "if tensions between Israel and its Arab neighbors continued to escalate after the October 1973 Middle East War or if the oil embargo did not abate." Moreover, the IHT erased the statement…that the embargo was due to America's wartime support for Israel, substituting the statement that it was imposed "to try to pressure the United States and other Western countries to force Israel to withdraw from Arab land." Thus the Times reader concludes that Nixon was angered by an Arab action, the embargo, which was retaliation for an American action—wartime support for an ally. Israel was clearly involved, but this was primarily an Arab-American dispute. The IHT reader, in contrast, concludes that Nixon's main concern was not the Arab action, but "tensions between Israel and its Arab neighbors;"… Moreover, the embargo was aimed not at American policy, but at a mysterious Israeli seizure of Arab land whose background—the fact that it was captured in a defensive war—is never explained. In short, the entire crisis was Israel's fault. Very few people know more about Israel than what they learn from the media. It is therefore not surprising that readers fed on a diet of such subtle distortions view Israel as the villain. Unfortunately, in Europe the IHT's behavior is the norm rather than the exception.
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